#text under the cut

[gael-garcia]

Leila Khaled: Hijacker (2006, Lina Makboul)

-Could you be described as a terrorist? -Our enemies say so. Our enemies call any form of popular resistance terrorism. Who decides and defines what terrorism is? As far as l'm concerned, occupation is terrorism. My people and l have a right to fight it. l don't care what others call it. People have a right to fight those who occupy their country by all means possible, including weapons. That's what it says in the UN declaration. But Leila, if you look up ''terrorist'' in a dictionary?

You, the whole of Sweden and Europe and the USA can travel to Haifa. But l can't, I'm not allowed to. Not just me. 5 million Palestinians can't see Palestine. lsrael doesn't care about international law. Why should we accept that?

[bumblingbabooshka]

He's helping!

Offscreen: You spoil that boy of yours, Sunak. Sunak: [holding a laundry basket] You exaggerate. He is a dutiful child. Already, he eagerly assists me with household & temple work. [A toddler-aged Tuvok pops his head out of the laundry basket, causing laundry to go flying everywhere.] Tuvok: I HELP! Sunak: Too eagerly, at times.

[torimpthree]

ancestral

my nervous system is itching

I’m poking at healing scabs

etched so deep in my conscious

I am misremembering their origins

You look like the sunshine,

keep darkening the edges of these wounds

I feel compelled to hide from you -

unsure which one of us I want to protect.

[klywrites]

🤢🤢🤢

Brian and Maud lived uptown in a house they barely occupied except to host parties for their rich friends. Their lifestyle afforded Mira many luxuries and privileges, but they hadn't raised her so much as they paraded her as a token of their generosity and goodwill to show off to the other WASP conservatives in a weird and creepy self-congratulatory flex. At eighteen, Mira decided to look for her birth parents and found some cousins online whom she contacted and, by way of their help, was able to connect with her birth father. She'd asked Brian and Maud if she could visit Altan in Istanbul, and they flat-out refused. She'd have to attend university, they told her, or else lose her allowance and car. Brian wanted her to study politics but quickly realized her values did not align with his when she expressed her disapproval towards his "solution to the homeless problem" (his words), which involved displacing people by implementing new policies and police presence. He'd called it a childish outburst and had even blamed his wife for failing to provide Mira with the lessons she needed to become an acceptable demure trophy wife to one of several bachelors he'd had in mind for her since she was sixteen.

[daisies-on-a-cup]

Fooling The Killers, by Taha Muhammad Ali

Qasim, I wonder now where you are…. I haven’t forgotten you after all these years, long as the graveyard wall is long. I always ask the grass of the field about you, and the dirt paths.

Are you alive, with your poise, your cane, and memories? Did you marry? Do you have a tent of your own, and children? Did you make it to Mecca? Or did they kill you at the foot of the Hill of Tin?

Or maybe you never grew up, Qasim, and managed to hide, behind your mere ten years, and you’re still the same old Qasim, the boy who runs around and laughs and jumps over fences, who likes green almonds and searches for birds’ nests.

But even if they did it, Qasim, if, shamelessly, they killed you, I’m certain you fooled your killers, just as you managed to fool the years. For they never discovered your body at the edge of the road, and didn’t find it where the rivers spill, or on the shelves at the morgue, and not on the way to Mecca, and not beneath the rubble.

As no one saw you concealing your corpse, so no one will ever set eyes on you, and no earthly breeze encounter a bone of your body, a finger of your hand, or even a single shoe that might fit you. Qasim, you fooled them.

.

I always envied you, Qasim, your skill at hiding in the games of hide-and-seek we played— barefoot at dusk—forty years ago— when we were little boys.

28.VIII.1988

[comradekatara]

white tank top korra to go with my white tank top asami. (and some bonus korrasami sketches under the cut)

[quarklynx]

remember the headcanon that Alhaitham was wearing hearing aids? we should bring that back i think Bonus:

✨reblog to help ur local artist✨

Alt text under the cut

A short comic, all drawn with a loose style in a warmly tinted grayscale. The first panel depicts Scaramouche from Genshin Impact, he is dressed in the attire he wears as the playable Wanderer character and is angrily gesticulating towards the viewer and looking down at them scornfully. He says, in all capital letters, "are you deaf??". The second panel is a view from behind the Wanderer, showing the viewer that he was yelling at the Genshin Impact character Alhaitham. Alhaitham is significantly taller than the wanderer, even with his hat, and has a neutral expression and stance. The Wanderer has an anime style anger mark above his head, and Alhaitham has a speech bubble that only contains ellipses.

In the first panel of the second image, the Wanderer and Alhaitham still face one another in the same poses, except for Alhaitham's right hand. His hand is moving in the American Sign Language sign for "yes", which is also plainly written out for the viewer in text. The wanderer's anger symbol is no longer present. The middle panel is a simplified silhouette of both characters facing one another, their profiles visible to the viewer. A large ellipses hovers above their heads. The final panel shows the Wanderer turning away from Alhaitham, tugging down his wide-brimmed hat from the front to cover his face. All that can be seen of his expression is a small smile and a bead of sweat. The Wanderer has a speech bubble, which says in lower case lettering: "ah. my mistake". Alhaitham is standing behind the Wanderer, his expression still mostly neutral as he watches the wanderer turn to leave, but he has lines below his eyes that show irritation. His arms are now crossed, and his left hand is holding a book open under the opposite arm.

The bonus image is a grayscale sketch of Lumine and Kaveh from Genshin Impact. To the left, Lumine looks frustrated, with her shoulders drawn up and her left hand pressed to her face while the other rests on her hip. The hand on her face is dragging the lower eyelid on her left eye down. Kaveh is slightly hunched over towards Lumine, and he is laughing so hard he's crying and spitting through pursed lips. He's holding his sides with opposite hands tightly, and looking towards Lumine.

[angstober]

Welcome to another year of Angstober! We're delighted to unveil the prompts for this year of angsty, spooky fun.

What is Angstober?

Angstober is a yearly October challenge with 31 angst-themed prompts to inspire you to create. The challenge is open to all sorts of creative work - writing, art, edits, whatever you want - in whatever medium you want. Original work or fanworks? Whatever you feel inspired for!

How do I take part?

Tag your works with #angstober2023 and the day of the prompt (e.g., #day 01) to share on tumblr. Feel free to @ us directly in the post as well! To share your work on AO3, add it to the Angstober 2023 collection.

You can post your works whenever - early or late - and use as many or as few prompts as you feel inspired for! We'll do our best to reblog as many works to the @angstober blog as we can.

Is there a banner to post my work with?

Absolutely!

Anything else?

Nope. Happy Angsting!

Angstober 2023 Prompt List:

Honorbound

Anxiety

A Dangerous Gamble

"I want to believe you."

Dried and Cracked

"What's wrong?"

Attacked

Dark Days

The Catch

Can't Go Home

Beyond Recognition

On Your Own

From Childhood

What You Swore To Destroy

Lessons in Failure

Wake Up Call

Weakness

"But I love you."

Look Away

Just Breathe

Can't Save Everyone

Grasp

Crimes of Passion

Taught You Better

Tired of Fighting

The Day I Lost You

System Collapse

Face the Consequences

Almost

Full Circle

Won't Forget

[surelysilly]

i was reading about Klarion the witch boy.... for reasons... and something said he came to Earth specifically to harass humans... so... yeah...

i wanted to give him a very serious and cool mask like some of the ones in Dorohedoro but... this was funnier.

the devil knew exactly what she was doing.

Danny: Ok... Let me get this straight... You're from an alternative reality where devils make masks for magic users and you're just here to be annoying... culturally...? (No joke?)

Klarion: Yes. (Heh.)

Danny: (Wha...) ... Can you show me? (Are you lying?)

Klarion: The sheer awe of my greatness may stun you. (No.)

Danny: (...) I'll be fine. *squints*

Klarion: Very well. (uwu)

Klarion: Behold. (Impressed?)

Danny, stunned, dying laughing internally: (OMG.) O-Oh. (He's serious.)

[shininguponthestars]

dialtown whiteboard shit from 2 diff boards (more under the cut)

[palskippah]

Hi! @hyperfixatingonbowuigisohard had this idea of Mr. L but preggy and I loved it jsdisd

I know nearly nothing of this game, but here's some ideas anyways for it!

-Mr L does his little presentation number, turning around, balancing his weight on one foot, and almost giving Bowser a heart attack when he clearly was barely keeping his balance, fearing that his husband would stumble and fall.

-Bowser immediately recognizes him, and Peach mutters to herself that Mr L reminds her strongly of someone, but she's not sure who. Bowser looks at her in disbelief, not sure if she's messing with him or not.

>Mario doesn't recognize Luigi at all at first, and Bowser genuinely asks him if he's an idiot. That's clearly Luigi! Same hat (a bit different though) and his overalls (although darker...) and that's his mustache! (looking as dashing as ever, by the way), and he's exactly as pregnant as Luigi! (Mario signs that Luigi isn't the only pregnant person in the world, and Bowser gets exasperated).

>Bowser keeps trying to convince Mario to not fight his expectant husband (AKA, Mario's brother!), and even if it wasn't Luigi, the man was clearly very pregnant, how was he going to fight him?!

>Mr L overhears and takes it personally, jumping into battle. He loses, of course. And when he's on the ground, tired and out of breath (from what Bowser's just sure is just the baby tiring him up, because Mario was really tame on his attacks), the koopa hands him a Shroom Shake so he feels better, and Mr L angrily accepts it and then sends Bowser straight to hell. When he tries to stand up and fails miserably, he lets the koopa help him to his feet, and then sends him to hell again and leaves, to work on his Brobot. (I can't remember what else happens during that fight asdkaj)

>I can't remember how Mr L leaves after the first battle, but imagine he's waddling very slowly away and Bowser's like 'Babe?? Luigi?? Please come back :C' and Luigi is literally within arm reach (especially for Bowser), but he's also very angry and telling the koopa weirdo (AKA, King Corny, King Incompetent, Mr wrappedaroundyourhusbandsfinger, King Bootlicker) to back off or he'll kill him. And well, Luigi is very capable of doing anything, and this is a brainwashed, evil Luigi, so the koopa isn't taking any chances. And the 'Green Thunder' is even more cranky because Mario didn't even break a sweat and Mr L was all huffing and puffing when the battle ended. The whole waddle away, when he wasn't insulting Bowser, Mr L muttered to himself about the stupid huge baby that didn't let him do anything and the horrors of motherhood and pregnancy.

-Mr L doesn't care for the baby, because he just came to existence and found himself heavily pregnant. He doesn't know this baby; he doesn't feel anything for them! But still there's the muscle memory or maybe it's the feelings that Luigi has for the little thing or something, because sometimes Mr L would find that he had been stroking his own belly or resting his hand on it. He'd move his hand away as if burned, and quickly look around hoping none of Count Bleck's other minions saw him showing such weakness, feeling embarrassed.

-Normally Bowser is all over Luigi to be of assistance for anything he may need, to, y'know, make his life easier now that he's pregnant. And Luigi is always glad that he has his husband right there to take care of him, but that is not the case with Mr L. He's angry that the idiot koopa thinks that he needs to be monitored like a baby, when he can take perfectly good care of himself! But also, he claims so and all, but is clearly struggling.

>Like at some moment he presents his brobot control remote (or something? How does he even summon that robot?) and then accidentally drops it. All of them, Mario, Peach, Bowser and Mr L stare at it for a few seconds. When Bowser makes a movement of going forward to pick it for him, the green one swats him away, he can pick it up himself, thanks fucking very much. Cue Mr L doing the pitiful preggy crouch while Mario and Peach pointedly don't look (after he yells that they can stop staring!) and Bowser tries to get closer to just pick the damn thing himself so Luigi can stop straining himself (getting yelled at in return).

-On Super Dimentio form, know that brainwashed Luigi (Mr. L) and Dimentio don't give a single shit about the baby, the first obviously having the set goal of being of assistance to Dimentio or whatevs, and the late one wanting to fulfill the prophecy. But well, Luigi sure does, so he subconsciously makes sure to protect his bebi Magma. The new form is huge, but the baby is still normal sized, it's just that Luigi made sure to give them some extra padding because it looked like they'd need it to be safe.

>By the way, the idea of one side of his face being a crying Luigi and the other being Dimentio is directly from @galaxygermdraws' design of Super Dimentio which is so cool :'''v

>Super Dimentio form may have only some physical characteristics of Luigi and only Dimentio's mind controlling it, but Luigi has been pregnant for many months now, and he can't help muscle memory, so the Super Dimentio form waddles like he does, and maybe Mario, Peach and Bowser would find it funny, if they weren't so horrified by the whole ordeal and the huge hands trying to squish them like bugs.

-As soon as Luigi is out of the Super Dimentio form, he's lying on the ground and wiping the streak of tears from the only cheek that has them, while wondering aloud why is he crying and on his side on the floor, and the next second after that, he's wrapped in Bowser's arms and Mario's holding his hand and Peach is touching his face, all of them fretting over him, while Luigi doesn't know what has them with such worried expressions, or why Bowser's weeping so much.

-If before Bowser was all over him, since the whole Chaos Heart ordeal he doesn't take his eyes away from Luigi, neither does Mario, who's glued to him for long weeks until he can feel that his brother is going to be alright.

>Anyways, baby's born, they're all happy yey :D Also pls look at that paper Magma I drew, that's my best drawing up to date.

ALSO alternate thing where the Chaos Heart remained with the baby in some weird way, but they don't notice because she's literally just a baby but she has the potential to destroy the universe, but Magma never does because she's a chill girl her whole life who doesn't have reasons to unleash the doom of the universe JSJDK silly idea in the same way that Luigi -the bestest guy around- is supposed to help destroy everything (??? or something like that I read somewhere? Maybe it was a headcanon aksdladk)

Thanks if you read till here!

[gael-garcia]

The Palestinian (1977), dir. Roy Battersby

watch

The documentary Vanessa Redgrave participated in and funded- and as a result the Zionist Jewish Defense League put a bounty on her head and she was blacklisted by Hollywood Zionists after her Oscar speech. Later, the theater where the film was due to screen in LA was bombed by a member of the JDL (June 15, 1978).

VR: Why do the fascists, why do the zionists, why do the imperialists want to defeat the Palestinian revolution?

When Palestine was occupied, the people were not strong, but later they carried arms. Their revolution began. It influenced the world. The Zionists told American imperialism that defeat means imperialism loses its place in Palestine. Other people have joined the revolution. Imperialism, the Zionists, and the Rightists here try to crush the Palestinian revolution and its allies But the Lebanese National Movement is united with it In that struggle together, a man is human, not an animal. It spreads everywhere, people support it In Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Oman The bourgeoisie are afraid. It paves the way. They want to destroy the Palestinian revolution

[bumblingbabooshka]

The first memory of the first memory.

[Text: It was raining and there was a dark blue carpet which seemed to go on forever, the soft thread it was woven out of pushing back against his hand. Though it was entirely blue there were different shades and hues throughout. Strelkulkaulk could see them; the light shimmer near the outer edges and the plush depths of its middle - he could see them and to look at them brought him a steady joy which he didn’t allow to show on his face. That was his first memory of the first memory - the tea room’s carpet and the anomalous rain.] This is an excerpt from a novella(?) of four short stories I'm releasing on my patreon about the incredibly slow-burn romance between a Vulcan and the four hosts of a trill.

[peanutty]

life lately in the ballantine household:

it's officially wintertime!

new routines!

sneaking in some cross-stitching while the baby is sleeping

andy has totally been hogging the baby, he LOVES being a girl dad 🥹

the house is constantly filthy and the parents are STRESSED

bunny is learning and growing so much each day :')

willa is almost done w/ her aspiration (country caretaker)

they both are struggling to keep up with the daily farm duties but they're trying their best!

their money has been stagnant for some time now (the farm doesn't make much money honestly & willa's garden has been very sad lately) so andy's been making a lot of tables and wall decor to sell

andy's taken up boxing

[symptomofgout]

the narrative of kaveh being an idiot is so baffling to me because he is, quite literally, canonically considered a genius…? why is the popular consensus “6000 IQ alhaitham and his lovably stupid roommate kaveh” when every npc commenting on kaveh refers to his intellect & talent, the literal god of wisdom says kaveh has an “almost-perfect grasp of what it truly means for sumeru to be a nation of wisdom” (whereas she questions alhaitham’s wisdom in her line about him), and alhaitham’s own story profile calls kaveh a genius multiple times??? like the whole point is that he’s alhaitham’s intellectual equal despite having entirely separate worldviews and demeanors, which frustrates alhaitham to no end — ‘how can someone so smart do all of these things that, to me, are so evidently stupid?’ the takeaway from their dynamic should NOT be kaveh is dumb, but rather that empathy and emotion aren’t actually the opposites of logic and intelligence, but sadly both alhaitham and the realm of academia as a whole are too blinded by their own definitions of logic to fully realize that.

tl;dr kaveh is not dumb by any standards and i will prove it

(under the cut: quotes/screenshots/etc proving this + more. please spread the gospel and dispel ignorance. amen)

some npc voicelines (there are more but i’m lazy):

these are pretty self-explanatory — kaveh is a widely-renowned scholar, architect, and engineer throughout sumeru. he graduated from the akademiya with flying colors, students were desperate to take his classes, etc.

nahida’s voicelines:

both are intelligent but only one is wise: kaveh. alhaitham is too restricted by his narrow definition of wisdom (read: what he deems ‘logical’) to look beyond himself and grasp that there’s more to intellect and knowledge than pure cold rationality. he can’t comprehend that empathy and intellect aren’t fundamentally incompatible — in fact, they’re best when put hand in hand. kaveh is one of the few scholars capable of valuing emotions, empathy, and artistic endeavors, while the rest of the akademiya closes themselves off to that entire realm of knowledge from the get-go. this is what makes kaveh uniquely wise, and what alhaitham lacks. until you understand that emotions and logic can and should coexist, you won’t be successful in the true pursuit of knowledge.

last but not least:

alhaitham’s profile (worth noting that profile stories are pretty much the most reliable source of information on characters’ true beliefs and opinions — their voicelines are still them putting on acts in front of the traveler, but these stories are told from the perspective of an omniscient narrator and are likely closer to the truth):

“two geniuses.” and even after their falling out, “neither of them will deny the other party’s exceptional brilliance” — meaning alhaitham considers kaveh to be exceptionally brilliant. point blank. in the text bro

hilarious line — it’s basically alhaitham saying he doesn’t understand how someone with kaveh’s talent and intellect could have a personality/worldview so different from haitham’s. ‘how can someone that smart be so annoying!!!!!’ and ofc by values we know it’s referring to kaveh’s idealism, empathy, and affinity for the arts

alhaitham considers kaveh to be “another genius,” someone who is so much his intellectual equal that he’s “an excellent mirror” for alhaitham. it’s like an experiment for him — the initial question is “how can someone as smart as me care about all of these things i’ve always believed to be worthless,” the subjects are kaveh and alhaitham, the controlled variable is their intellect. because their intellect is the same, alhaitham is able to study their differences (can’t attribute said differences to varying intellect). alhaitham would never say it out loud — and luckily he doesn’t need to bc his character story tells us — but he’s deeply fascinated by kaveh bc kaveh’s very existence is a threat to haitham’s worldview, & he’s letting kaveh stay with him bc through kaveh, alhaitham learns about not just himself but the outside world and humanity as a whole, and as a scholar, there’s nothing more valuable. (also because he feels comfortable with kaveh [“he’s a familiar face”] and they’re both lonely [“similarly lacks familial attachments”] lol these two are never beating the We Know You Don’t Actually Hate Each Other allegations but that’s a different point so i digress)

IN CONCLUSION:

this is all just the TEXTUAL evidence — people saying “kaveh is smart” — and doesn’t even include all of the obvious implicit signs of kaveh’s intellect (no one who graduates from the akademiya w honors and teaches classes there could be anything other than incredibly intelligent, al “i don’t do anything that i don’t want to do” “i’m not going to bother explaining it to you because you won’t understand” haitham not only puts up with but actively seeks out debates with kaveh which he absolutely would not do if he didn’t respect him or consider him to be of roughly equal intellect, look at the debates he has w alhaitham on sumeru messageboards and TELL ME those messages sound like they were written by an idiot or itto or something [you cant], etc etc etc).

and also this is all from 3.3 (+ 3.4 alhaitham leaks)! we don’t even know kaveh’s rarity yet, that’s how far he is from being playable, but there’s already this much information on just how smart he is! it’s the main thing we know about him — 1) he’s smart, 2) he’s passionate/driven by what he feels is right! why does that keep turning into “LOL HOTHEADED HIMBO”??!

okay look. this is all so extra i know. BUT. i must set the record straight now (god knows it’ll only get worse the closer we get to kaveh’s release) because this sudden-onset mass illiteracy within genshin players is going to send me to an early grave. feel free to use as a resource and educate the ignorant so kaveh does not end up reduced to a one-note meme dumb guy when literally that’s just… not even in the game. i mean at least other annoying OOC fandom interpretations have basis in the game but genshin literally tells u every time it gets the opportunity that Kaveh Is Just As Smart As Alhaitham Because Cold Rationality Does Not Equal Wisdom/Intelligence and losing that would be such a crime because it is by far the most interesting n promising thing hoyo has done with new characters in ages! like, not only are they funny and entertaining, not only are they fascinating incredible foils for one another, but they’re used to make a much-needed argument against the prevalent hegemony of mindless rationality and our “logical” society’s illogical fear of emotion/empathy. but yeah sure, theyre just itto & ayato 2.0, i guess. god. the lack of reading comprehension among genshin players is literally an epidemic

[comradekatara]

oh ur voltron essay is so incredibly true. it also provides some answers to the bafflement i have been experiencing when looking at zukka tags. like, i was THRILLED when zukka got popular bc i thought it would be freedom from the endless katara ship wars. but people have gotten so incredibly weird. the amount of racist mischaracterization in the tumblr zukka-sphere is out of control. i had accepted that the majority of zukka shippers do not understand the characters at all, and you have now made me realise: not only do they not understand the characters, they see them as. fucking keith and lance. this is horrifying i’m gonna have to sit and contemplate it for a long time

yeah no the katara ship wars are still waging on, people are also just racist about sokka now too. which is awesome. but yeah if not for the fact that i see people compare them to klants all the fucking time (even before zukka got popular, in fact) i would think that im somehow delusional and exaggerating these trends but i know im not because people are constantly admitting it. just saying it out loud. like i used to see people calling sokka and zuko “rivals” a lot and that is clearly a byproduct of klantsification because everyone knows that sokka and azula are rivals. sokka and zuko are simply not rivals in any way except for in the sense that they were trying to kill each other in book 1 i guess. but i’d hardly call that a “rivalry.”

its like. sokka hates zuko and wants him dead and then zuko comes to the western air temple and begs to be let into their group and sokka doesn’t trust him but aang says that he does and sokka knows that aang needs a firebending teacher so that he can defeat the firelord and win the war so sokka is like “okay if that’s what you want, aang” and then he still doesn’t really like or trust zuko at all (at one point he even tells him to go jump into a volcano, which is the TV Y-7 way of getting “kill yourself” through s&p) but he needs information on zuko if he’s going to rectify his mistake and then zuko insists on tagging along for his suicide mission and sokka doesn’t really care whether or not zuko lives or dies so he’s like “yeah fine whatever it’s your funeral” and then zuko demonstrates that he’s actually really earnest and sincere and charmingly awkward and willing to do anything to help sokka and always follows his lead so sokka is like “okay i like this guy now” and then they’re friends and that’s that. at no point does sokka view him as a rival.

as for zuko. zuko doesn’t really care about sokka because he’s hyperfocused on capturing aang and literally nothing else matters and then he decides that he would do anything to help the avatar defeat his father and then sokka kills the indestructible walking wmd of an assassin zuko had previously hired with just his boomerang and then zuko helps sokka infiltrate the boiling rock and proves that he would literally die for him for nothing in return except the reward of seeing him happy. so at no point does zuko consider sokka his rival because he just straight up knows that sokka is better than him in every possible way and he respects that (to an almost unhealthy degree) and just follows his lead unquestioningly. if anything zuko’s rival is also azula, because they were always competing for the same affections. (except azula considers sokka her rival, while zuko considers azula his rival.)

and ppl will frame ZUKO as being out of SOKKA’S league and it’s like. the whole POINT is that sokka is out of zuko’s league and zuko knows it the whole world knows it!!!! they’re not rivals, sokka isn’t a wacky flirty idiot, zuko genuinely terrorized him for months on end, their friendship is built on the intensity of zuko’s devotion genuinely outweighing his previous crimes. anyone who cannot see past the aesthetic similarities between what is a genuinely compelling dynamic between two very well-constructed, dimensional characters and personified shallow tropes written and shipped together in a cynical cash grab should not be engaging with zukka as a ship.

it was so much better in the beforetimes, when no one knew that gay people existed, and everyone who did even remotely ship them was like “awww I love their bromance. #brosforever” because at least then they actually kind of understood what their dynamic was even if they weren’t reading any sort of romantic subtext into it. but I do want to make myself clear. reading romantic subtext into sokka and zuko’s relationship is a genuinely coherent and informed reading of the text. it is not a “headcanon” or a “crackship,” it is a valid interpretation of what is depicted onscreen.

“the boiling rock” is truly the gay subtext episode of atla (and by that I also mean the azula mai ty lee love triangle, which was truly a life changing moment for me as a child) and while there are of course multiple valid readings of characters’ motivations and behaviors as grounded in and informed by the text, especially when it comes to unspoken romantic motivations, i really do think that it’s in no way a stretch to assume that due to factors such as — a) zuko knowing sokka and saying sokka’s name way more than he says any other gaang member’s name b) zuko risking his own life to blindly follow sokka on a suicide mission to an impenetrable supermax when he is literally wanted by the state for high treason, and trusting his lead unconditionally c) zuko just generally being so soft and docile around sokka when he’s normally a tightly wound ball of stress and rage who yells at anyone who so much as looks at him funny, and of course d) zuko literally flirting with sokka in the cooler??? because I don’t know how else to explain that scene that looks like it came straight out of a cheap porno — really do seem to indicate that zuko is down bad for sokka.

and seeing as a) reading zuko as gay is already such a logical way to read his entire character arc and the significance of his journey and b) pretty much everyone they meet is down bad for sokka (assuming they’re not already down bad for katara, that is), it’s really not an incoherent or fantastical ship. like, ymmv on whether sokka actually returns zuko’s feelings (I am mostly a proponent of one-sided zukka, but I also think that I could sort of see them getting together in their late 20s or smth. idk), it’s a genuinely compelling and coherent way to read their dynamic nonetheless. the problem is when people reduce their preexisting, compelling dynamic in service of conforming to narrow and often harmful (eg, racist) troping.

i am genuinely compelled by zuko’s uncharacteristic, almost hero-worship of sokka, his desperation to be his friend to the point of following him to the ends of the earth to prevent him from quite literally killing himself. and i think there’s something really lovely about the way these two teenage boys who have both struggled so much to conform to a harmful and militaristic masculinity could embrace their nerdier and more sensitive qualities (eg, zuko is canonically a theater kid who is apparently “quite the seamstress,” sokka is canonically a poet[ry appreciator] and likes to draw and carve) together.

i love the idea of a postcanon wherein sokka acts as zuko’s senior advisor and basically willingly puppets him and runs the fire nation from the shadows (while also doing the same in the earth kingdom simultaneously, because let’s be real, both zuko and kuei are out of their depths), and how that would also complicate their dynamic. but of course anyone who does subscribe to the “sokka works in the fire palace” hypothetical always makes sokka an “ambassador,” which is just stupid. sokka would not be satisfied merely doing ambassadorial busywork, he is literally an incorrigible control freak and he would be shadow running the fire nation, at zuko’s behest. and so on and so forth.

and yet, all the fanart of them is either wildly out of character, or sokka and zuko’s personalities have literally been reversed, which is somehow even worse. i won’t pinpoint exact examples, but im also pretty sure that if you took my hand and we went into the zukka tag together, i would just be like “nope. no. no. wrong. incorrect. wildly incorrect. egregiously wrong. no. incorrect.” and so on and so forth for every single post.

so yeah. the reason i don’t really discuss their dynamic anymore, despite still finding it compelling in its own right, is because the fans genuinely annoy me so much that they’ve turned me into a hater. it’s not even that it’s a bad ship, or that it’s not my personal cup of tea, or that’s it not grounded enough in canon for my liking. i think they’re fascinating to chew on as presented in the text. but what “fans” have done to “them” has warped whatever potential they actually have in the text into something that is both sinister and obnoxious. those aren’t sokka and zuko anymore. that’s lankka and keiko. and i don’t know those guys. they are total strangers to me. and they’re annoying and shallow and cliched and have i mentioned annoying. and i hate them.