#the way tumblr didn't show me those ask responses. they hate fun

[talentforlying]

@normaltothemax / continued.

the thought process is simple: it's a pointy stick with a doodad on the end of it, what's the harm in spinning it around a bit? ( well, a lot, going off that reaction. ) even the strength of clint's reaction and the resulting clench in the pit of his stomach doesn't stop constantine from scowling as it's snatched away, yanking his hands back like he's been stung. ' oi! proprietary, ennye? '

ah, well, exploding. that'll explain it. actually, no it fucking won't, and how does he always end up hanging around the sort who meddle with projectile bombs?! like the immaterial and intangible isn't bad enough already.

' exploding and unstable. ' he looks between the arrow and clint, back to the arrow. back to clint, with an eyebrow raised like a judge's scorecard after a high dive, and the number on it is disgracefully low. ' and you play with those in yer flat? don't you lot have lairs and shite? '

no comment on holes; just an insouciant grin out the side of his mouth as he edges around the table — on big, dramatic, scooby-doo tiptoes for effect — to snoop through the rest of the apartment. preferably as far away from anything more flammable than bad wiring as he can get. ' it's no bloody wonder the news is always talking shite on you vigilante types. calling yer little flying boomsticks a fuckin' trick, jesus wept. anything else i should be minding, 'sides the pizza boxes? trapdoors? pressure plates? 'orrible taste in music? '

[factual-fantasy]

24 asksss :}}} ⭐⭐⭐

@ardent-38

You are my favorite person

@wolfie-777

Cassie does not exist in my AU. But hypothetically-

If Roxanne found this lost child she would report it to Vanessa and have her help Cassie. As is the protocol for children that are found on the premises after hours.

If Roxy found her while she had the "bug" in her system? She would have attacked and maybe even killed Cassie :x

Had to google what that was, <XD It looks beautiful! And I image that he has seen it before yeah :)

As for their favorite songs, I'm not sure :0

That's.. actually a really good idea.

For a long time I never went back to the comic because the writing I did was awful. Everyone was acting out of character, it was SUPER dramatic. I wrote Peso's character all wrong. Uhg, awful awful awful.

And then I was kept away from going back because people would not stop asking me to finish it. "Why did you abandon this comic?" "Are you gonna finish it?" "Why did you stop drawing it" "Go back and finish the crab comic" Like, it was so frustrating.

...Buuuuutt,, rewriting it? Hmmm... I'm way too wrapped up with projects to start this anytime soon. But I wont lie this ask really got me thinking about it-

Also thank you so much! I'm glad you like my art!! :DDD

@smilegirl64 (Post in question)

Thank you! I'm so glad you noticed! That was my favorite detail to add XDDDD

@elegysonnet

I dug into the series a bit and took a look around the fanbase. And I decided that it just wasn't really my thing.

Although I did love the character designs and I think they'd be really fun to draw, I didn't think I'd get along with the fandom. I can see myself huddled in my own little corner with all my headcannons and stuff, and I wouldn't really want to interact with anyone else. :/

Also my favorite character is probably Julie or Howdy XDD

I use an XPPen Artist 13.3 Pro. Its a tablet with a screen! :))

As for my drawing program I use FireAlpaca. Its free and really good for beginners and pros! Highly recommend if you're just getting into digital art. Also thank you!! :D

@baokim80

@burningmusicfunnygiant

I disagree actually. The "bug" aside, they are in no way programed to hurt anyone. They are programmed to have full obedience to staff and Managers.

They could try to stop them, and they could physically stand in their way. But you wouldn't see Freddy straight up punching an employee to keep him away from Bonnie.

Now with the bug in their systems? mmm.. Okay yeah they would. BUT ONLY WHEN THEY'RE NOT IN THEIR RIGHT MINDS-

@cudlycorncornsworthcoberson

XDD Offended Bibi noises can be heard in the background

@curiousskelekitty

<XD I'll do my best!

I feel that my responsibility as an artist on this platform is to tag my art appropriately. Tag it for blood, gore, injuries, things like that. So that people who are disturbed by those subjects don't have to stumble upon it and have their day ruined. :(

What is NOT my responsibly is to prevent little kids from seeing my bloody Octonauts artwork. That's the parents job. XD THEY should be keeping an eye on their kids and making sure they're not browsing sites like Tumblr XDD

Tangle and Lolbit are not a part of my AU actually.

But Mangle? Just because she hasn't made an appearance of any kind yet, doesn't mean she wont in the future.. 👀

Thank you! :DD

Thank you! I'll try to not rush through my projects so much <XD

Thank you for respecting that! :D

Also uhg. I hate pinterest. I would rather people just never found out about me then find me through a pinterest post with my stolen artwork.

@whereismycupofcoffee

YEESSS!!! I always love it when people decide to give Octonauts a try :))) Its a really neat show!

THANK YOU SO MUCH!! :DDDD

XD My first thought was Peso or Shellington for some reason. They're just too polite to make a fuss XDDD

@kymbird

Wanna know a good place to start if you genuinely struggle with that? Make 1 character that is based off of you. And then make a second character that is based off of someone in your life that you have 0 romantic interest in what so ever. Like your Mom, or your Dad, siblings, Uncle, dog literally anyone. It should be impossible to twist those 2 characters together because they are modeled after you and ur mom. You should look at them and say "thats me and my mom" or "thats me and my brother" Those 2 should then be characters that are 100% protected from becoming a ship. :0

This actually reminded me of my transformer ocs. I modeled the characters after the drivers/owners. And people wanted to ship them together and I was like "for 1 they are my OCs so thats kind'a odd but 2 those two characters are based off of siblings. They absolutely should not- in ANY universe, be paired together"

Personally not a huge fan of the bright blue color he has. Seeing his Bonnie Bowl artwork everywhere I expected him to be his usual purple..

As for my Bonnie I think he'd get along pretty well with his Glamrock counterpart! But when it comes to the Bowling ally they'd be rivals. >:)

Also thank you! :DD

@trains-of-thought

aaaa thank you so much!! :DD I'm so glad to hear that you've liked my Mario artwork!! And that you read the info aaaa!! I spent a lot of time writing all that so I'm glad to hear that you read it! As for your questions,

1: Yes! My Peach, Daisy, Wario and Waluigi are all the same species, which is not human. They are this incredibly tall elf like species that closely resembles humans and has many biological similarities.. but ultimately they are very different species.

2: Its hard to say.. I've been known to change my mind a lot so maybe? Honestly I hope that someday these feelings towards fanart will vanish and I will be able to engage with my fans more. But for now,, noooo fanworks :(

OH MY GOSH I LOVE THAT FNAF VIDEO XDD Very well animated and funny! Here's the link in case anyone is interested!

I drew it myself! :)

[ninyard]

i am a BIG supporter of create what you want for your own joy, so absolutely do what you would like to do for the trial!! no one should be pressuring you to do it a specific way unless that’s how you Want to do it.

but if you were asking about what we’d like… personally i would love to see the whole trial as much as possible (i really don’t want you to overwhelm yourself) especially for higgin’s and nicky’s parts!! i like when we see more than just Big Main Parts, especially bc you flesh it out so well <3 sometimes it’s even more hard hitting when it’s Not from the people we expect, you know?

also, thank you for making the socmed aus!! they make me giggle and kick my feet every time, and also wail in agony and clutch at my chest… you have the range <3

GOD i wrote a whole long ass response to this and i didn't realise until too late that my phone was going to die </3 and it died </3

But it was something along the lines of I'm really glad that the general consensus seems to be to do all five days of the trial, or however many days it ends up being, from start to finish. For me personally it'd feel unfinished if I skipped parts just to get to the ~interesting~ parts, and I think if I'm going to make something like this then I want to show it all.

It's not this deep, but I guess it's like... It's fucked up. People are making memes about a murder trial involving rape and other things that are just not funny at all. And skipping parts just to get to "GOD NEIL IS SO CHAOTIC ON THE STAND" or whatever feels,,, insensitive? Unjust?? I don't know

but people are also doing that shit in real life. About real people, real trials, with real victims and real perpetrators. Sensationalising trials just because it's a celebrity on the stand, or it's an "interesting" murder trial or whatever. People are making memes and jokes about them. And people are making their own minds up about the verdict because of it. I want to show people who think Aaron's guilty because of something the cop who arrested him said. I want to show people who think Andrew is an unreliable witness because of something Higgins says, somebody who thinks Aaron isn't guilty because a forensics team mentioned something about the crime scene that they don't think sounds right. I want to make this from the outsider view on the publics reaction to a trial, and specifically people who almost idolise Aaron, or Kevin, or Neil, or Andrew. People who don't see them as human, but as celebrities, as people who are supposed to be perfect. People who see a trial like this and think, "it's okay for me to make jokes about this, or to post about this, because they're just famous people. They're not like real people to me."

People are at home becoming twitter lawyers and making up their minds based on what they read or see online, and it almost separates the reality of the situation from the "characters" that people create out of defendants and victims. You see people hopping on bandwagons or hate trains or whatever when it comes to these kind of public trials. People making clips of something "funny" a lawyer or witness said for the sake of content. People making temporary celebrities out of the judge and jury and legal representation. For what? For likes?

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I want to show the different sides of how people actually react to trials like this without becoming insensitive to the fact that trials like this,,, do actually happen. But by making a fan tweet a joke about murder, I'm making that, I'm thinking of the words that go into the tweet. So it's tough. And again I know it's not that deep, but that's kind of... most of the reason why I've been putting it off? Because it's hard. It's hard not to feel like it sensationalises those kinds of things. It's hard not to feel like "God, am I just making fun of this situation here?" while also being reminded that yeah, maybe, but people actually react like that.

So is it worth the tumblr post to make memes and tweets out of something that happens irl, and affects real people? Is it insensitive, or is it just fandom stuff that isn't perceived in an insensitive way at all, because it is just that, a fandom post?

[miquella-everywhere]

Along the lines of previous asks, some people have been saying there's something degrading about Malenia identifying herself as Miquella's Blade in the base game, but I don't think that's the case.

Malenia had being the Goddess of Rot shoved down her throat her whole life, an identity that she very much did not want. She did not want to become a god, and she was probably expected to be in competition with Miquella because he was also an empyrean. Sure, in any other world a woman identifying herself by her relationship to a man would be off, but in this case it's an act of rebellion. No, she is not the Goddess of Rot, no she is not to be defined by her status as an empyrean or even as a demigod, something she did not choose. She is Malenia, Blade of the one that cared enough about HER that he abandoned his religion when it couldn't save her. She aligns herself with the personification of a resistance movement, of autonomy, as a very much disabled woman. She will fight and win against those who resist the change that desperately needs to happen in the Lands Between. That, to me, makes it so much more upsetting that the dlc decided to walk back all of what was so interesting about her and Miquella.

The Battle of Aeonia could have been a tactical move, a show of power after being insulted by Godrick, to prove that physical might meant nothing against her and her forces. A cry that change would happen, like it or not. It could have been in response to threats of conquer by Radahn, the war and conquer guy. It could have been about anything. Hell, Freyja could have given us an ounce of insight while under the charm about Radahn's inner workings. From's content is heavily about the horrors of war, give us something negative about the war guy. Malenia gets so much shit about being "unfair" and about being a "bitch" for nuking Caelid, or she's outright sexualized. It's so frustrating that while they suggest how awful Miquella's resistant godhood would be, because of the "cycle", they offer nothing about the cycle of war through Radahn. They had every opportunity to demonstrate how war worship and perpetuation would worsen the world, and did not. They made the implicit suggestion that the movement to resist is worse than the war worship, of the nostalgia about prior wars, of the hero worship of conquest personified.

I would have been so okay with a complicated, nuanced, grey Miquella. I would have been okay with Radahn getting additional lore and characterization. I would have been okay with a lack of Godwyn even though it's disappointing. I would have hated incest regardless of who's taking part in it (I didn't mind Lothric and Lorian because they're just like that, they were presented to us that way and not two years later for shock value). But the thing that peeves me the most about this dlc is how it bastardizes Miquella and Malenia to make the petty argument that God Bad and to justify another Radahn fight.

"Something degrading about Malenia identifying herself as Miquella's Blade"

I sincerely have to laugh at that, what an atrocious take, I can't believe people would think such a thing. But everything that you've said is absolutely correct and I cannot even begin to tell you the damage that has been done to her character thanks to the DLC, it is legitimately distressing to me whenever I foolishly decide to wander off of tumblr to see what other people are saying about Malenia with the response to her now ranging from "she's a psycho who nuked Cealid for fun" and that "she has nothing on r*d*hn and is pathetic compared to him" and all of these takes make me want to tear my fucking hair out.

If there's anything that degrades Malenia the most its the retconned lore of the DLC that spits on her bond with Miquella, spits on Millicents quest and Malenias pride and resolve, and goes out of its way to make r*d*hn the gary-sue chad of Elden Ring and tosses her aside like she's trash.

It's a damn good thing her presence is so minimal in the DLC because I am convinced that they would have fucked up her character even more horrendously.

And one other thing, I know this ask is mainly about Malenia but the retcon and disrespect done to Miquella reflects directly onto her, because in the base game Miquella and Malenia are inseparable; she is his loyal blade and he does everything in his power to try and cure her, and most importantly Miquella's creation of Unalloyed Gold.

Malenia's rejection of her role as the Goddess of Rot directly parallels Miquella's Unalloyed Gold. They both rejected Godhood in their own way, and they both rejected the Golden Order and left to establish their own paradise outside of the confines of the ruling order.

Miquella and Malenia were the Empyrean Twins who rejected their roots, their curses, and the Godhood that was forced upon them at birth.

But the DLC fucks that up irreparably and turns Miquella into a God which contradicts his and Malenias entire characters, and now we have completely shattered and contradictory lore.

Nothing in the Base Game means anything anymore, and I will die mad.

[wellofdean]

Just breaking up this post before it just gets out of hand, but want to reply to these notes from @ironworked :

#I was reading the transcript of a panel Kripke did in 2008#he gets asked about Jo and at the end says they 'don't have any plans to bring her back'#and then: ''(audience cheers)''#then they cheer *for* Ellen#The impression I get is that a large portion of the fandom only ever cared about female characters that weren't 'a threat' to a ship#but who still were there for Dean and Sam#This show had its fumbles and mistakes and iffy stuff with female characters but I'm with Ilarual here - fandom has been significantly wors#the reactions to Mary and Amara are particularly interesting because they're pretty much exactly#the kind of nuanced female character fans *say* they want#and yet they get trashed and misrepresented regularly#funny that#Tv: Supernatural

Ugh. So gross. And to be clear, I am also with @ilarual : there is plenty of misogyny in Supernatural that's there just because it's the air we all breathe, but a lot of it is in the way if someone wants to belittle Dean in some way, they ALWAYS impugn his masculinity, and the way he is supposed to be ashamed of being the one who just wants to keep his family together, and the way he is unable to experience a tender emotion without embarrassment, or the way he can't say "I love you" so he says "I did not leave you!" and "Don't do anything stupid!" angrily instead. Or, the way Sam (soulless) and grandpa Samuel make fun of his nice house with Lisa, and he feels the need to defend himself by saying "Go ahead, call me a soccer mom!" as if the worst possible thing he could be is a feminized, domesticated man who's been tamed by a woman who reads girl magazines. THAT'S misogyny, but fellas, I think the show is attempting to point a thing out with that? All of those things are depictions of misogyny in a show that's about the way terrible patriarchal relationships fuck men up.

Dean's so-called misogyny is cartoonish and ridiculous and clearly a triggered performative response to stereotypical representations of performative femininity, because when Dean is called upon to respond to a woman as a human being, he is well able to do that, even in season 1.

Women who threaten the big ship are always hated in fandom after fandom. Personally, I loved Jo. I loved her crush on Dean, and his big brother act hiding a crush on her. I loved Amara because GOD'S SISTER? Dean's dark female soul image? The way their weird, skeevy connection resolved in mutual empathy, one caged thing to another, and also in giving each other what they most needed? Mary coming back to show Dean that his fantasy of a lost ideal family was just that? A fantasy?

Like, that is just rich storytelling and I am here for it.

I get why people didn't like Amara -- she is an antagonist and I cringed every time she touched Dean's face. She was a threat to Dean, but also? I fucking LOVED that she was there, making me super uncomfortable and fucking EATING, and against Chuck? I wanted her to win. Fuck that guy! I love the idea that a controlling author/father/god who locked his sister and feminine equal up so he could play with his boytoys and make them kill each other. I love that Amara is symbolic of nothingness as opposed to Chuck's being because I think there is a fundamental way in which we struggle to imagine ourselves, AS A CULTURE, without patriarchy.

I also get why people are mad at Mary. We love Dean! We want him to have what he wants! We want him to have fluffy mom-time to make up for all his years of pain. But, can we all just ask ourselves the important question of whether or not a grown-ass man should get what he wants at his mother's expense? Like, are mothers actual human beings with desires, needs and exigencies of their own, or are they slaves to their men and their offspring?*

*Side note: I feel like there are a lot of young people who are mad at their moms on tumblr, and yeah, not all parents live up to their responsibilities and that sucks, but yo: moms are people they make mistakes and have needs.

And, as story devices, which is what they ultimately are, Dean's weird feelings about Amara in a season that is all about Dean thinking about what his heart wants, really only supports the ship we all want to see sail. As for Mary, her death was the inciting incident and her return (and John's) was about healing by letting painful things be painful, and seeing that what you have is pretty fucking good, actually ("I have a family"), and then her second death tests Dean's commitment to holding his family together. Like, our heroes have to be put in situations so we can see their mettle! That's what stories do!

I dunno man. The other day someone I know in meatspace was like: "Oooh! I love Supernatural! Let's talk!" And I was like: "Oh! Cool! Yeah!" and then she says: "Sometimes it sucked though, especially in the later seasons, like when they brought Mary back," and I was like........."Actually, let's not talk."

[vvindication]

22, 23, and 45 for whoever you wanna talk about !!!!

OMG HI MINTT thank you so much I owe you my life :] these are fuckin fun questions I'm gonna torment my little guy Travart abt it.

you didn't rb the asks post would you like some questions in return :3?

FUCK TUMBLR MOBILE THIS POSTED EARLY. HOLD ON

22. do they have a fear they want to conquer, but haven't yet?

this is a fun question for him because I've actually been poking at that idea in my wips recently ... he's "technically" conquered his fear of being judged by his peers but it isn't even true. he actually just got better at being sneaky with being a hopeless bisexual in homophobia capital Revachol

his whole involvement with Antonin was a lot more public than he ever wanted or realized it would be so being investigated by the RCM over it spooked him pretty bad. doesn't stop him from a situationship with Harry but it's because he's got that chronic Savior Complex. being with him is something he hides so hard that when the dude gets amnesia he just pretends like it never happened 💖

shit is ruining his life basically he needs to quit being a pig NOW !!!!!!

23. how do they show fear? sweating, shaking, blankness, anger, etc?

Vincent has the most obvious fear responses it's honestly pathetic. guy who always jumps at sudden noises like a cat, every single time. guy who's literally scared of the dark. he's already bad with mundane scary things by getting quiet staring around wide-eyed while hugging himself but he doesn't have a fight or flight he just freezes. he would die in a firefight. (almost does).

anxiety also makes him shake like a leaf, can't forget that. I'd say that's a bit separate to general fear bc it involves him getting really emotionally worked up over things that are a non-issue

45. what's their dream job / profession? do they have one?

AUGH THIS ONE MEANS SO MUCH TO ME ... he hates working for the RCM regrets joining every day of his life but he really really does want to help people. he would be a perfect first responder if he could ease up on the freeze response a bit but it could also ruin his life with how little the coalition actually does to help people structurally. debatable. either way he would be happiest helping people with those he loves at his side

[norcumii]

Are you by any chance familiar with the Silmarillion? I read the tag "spirit of fire" at the bottom of the post about Killmonger and Zuko without reading the rest first, and couldn't help but think of Feanor (in case you don't know of him but are somewhat familiar with LotR, Galadriel's extremely spicy half-uncle who, among other things, invented divorce for Tolkien-Elves)

Short and probably most useful answer: Only in passing due to the fact that several Star Wars mutuals are also LotR fans. I watched a movie and gave some books a try, but it was never my bag, really. I wholeheartedly applaud anyone who gets into it and enjoys that level of Lore and worldbuilding; it just doesn't play well with my brain.

I recognize Feanor's name! :D That is a wildly delightful description, thank you!

long answer:

Look, back in high school, one summer The Hobbit was on the reading list. I hated everything else that was an option, and went for this.

The fact that I had to fake a book report was the only reason I got through it. The writing style was...not a good fit, and I had the damnedest time retaining information about names (which I'm admittedly not good at anyways). Some of that might have been for medical reasons, but regardless, I Did Not Get It.

Then one day the three guys I played D&D with were VERY EXCITED that there was now a MOVIE did I want to come with them to a midnight showing of The Fellowship of the Ring??? :D :D :D

I was genuinely just delighted to be included, so sure! I had a fun time in a full theater, still couldn't keep track of anyone's name, and the number of Dark Brooding Heroes + difficulties with facial recognition meant I still had difficulty with who was who.

But it WAS wildly pretty and my buds were excited, so I figured hey, if I tried reading the book I at least had something visual to compare to and maybe that would help!

For the record, Tumblr has been WILDLY helpful in explaining something I had no context for, that being WHY Tolkien was so fixated upon describing the green green trees, in the greenest forests to ever green, which at the time drove me halfway to despair. WITH said context, I think I'd have appreciated it more, but at the time I was just a cloud of questionmarks instead of going 'wow this is a fascinating trauma response to the Trenches.'

And I could not at ALL get my head around all the songs in the book. Like, my brain was dead-set 110% CERTAIN that if you are giving me song lyrics, it WILL be relevant by the end of the book but thanks to the movie I knew it WASN'T and I had three obsessed people who ABSOLUTELY WOULD have been frothing at the mouth if that plot line had been cut so WHY WAS THIS HAPPENING.

I asked one of them after I deathmarched my way through the book how on earth he dealt with all the songs and I'm pretty sure I hallucinated the 'someone sings a song about someone singing a song in which Some Historical Figure sang a song and here's the elvish lyrics' since that wasn't his kind of thing, and he had the temerity to give me a baffled look and go "oh, you just skip those. Skim until it gets back to plot again."

I didn't engage in bodily harm, but I don't think that's how it's supposed to go. Also, I would've liked to know that BEFORE reading the damn thing!!!!!

ANYway! So please, I cannot overstate how very, VERY much awe I have for folks who are willing and able to read and enjoy that times ten, which is what I understand the Silmarillion to be. That to me is a true Feat, which I shall admire from a long distance.

[orionsangel86]

Sincere question, your response to the like-scolding post doesn't make sense to me. I already reblog often, so I don't need convincing, but I also don't feel the need to convince others to and don't understand when people do.

If a blog was empty, you weren't going to follow them anyway. They have zero impact on your dash.

I don't understand why following the tags, following blogs that make stuff in the tags, using tumblr's orbit thing or blog suggestions wouldn't be anymore sufficient than asking strangers that may not even care who follows them to make your personal dashboard more interesting.

I was hesitant to answer this, because I try not to get too involved in general tumblr discourse and I already have had a few passive aggressive remarks about my response to that post. I don't wanna open myself up to hate here so please know that this is just my opinion at the end of the day. I am one person and I have been on tumblr a long time and my reasonings for all of this is simply that I love this stupid website and want it to thrive.

Let me start by clarifying that I have nothing against likes! Likes are great! Likes are exactly what it says on the tin - a way to tell someone that you like their post. So I didn't have an issue with the sentiment of the original post that likes are not meaningless and are instead a way to tell people that you like their stuff! That's great!

But your reasoning here is flawed because of how tumblr works. No matter how many likes someones post gets, if no one reblogs it it will dissapear into a void. Tumblrs tagging system is not great. Tumblr's "in your orbit" section is something that most people ignore and do not use. The userbase on tumblr finds posts by following blogs and relying on the blogs they follow to reblog posts. The posts that circulate far and wide on tumblr are posts that are reblogged by users. Posts that have plenty of likes do not help a post gain any extra traction or help spread it to those that may be interested in it. Posts that are just liked and not reblogged do not get circulated and will get forgotten about and never find their audience.

This isn't about lurker types who never reblog anything and therefore won't ever get followers (nothing against lurkers!), its about this strange mentality nowadays which tumblr never used to have which is that people seem to be more particular about the kind of posts they'll reblog. People seem more hesitant to reblog long posts, or writing posts, or anything that doesn't immediately grab their attention. There is an expectation that for a post to be reblogged it has to be of a higher quality that a post that you may reward a simple like.

I think it is heavily tied to cringe culture. There is a mentality that your blog should be heavily curated and therefore you should only reblog the highest of quality which you feel is worthy for your own blog - rather than just reblogging anything that you may like or find fun or interesting. It is very much an instagram mentality and its been creeping into tumblr over several years - and because of it, fandoms are dying, its far more difficult to find fandom content, and it is becoming much harder to engage and build community. People are hesitant to add comments onto reblogs nowadays - when back in the day that was kinda how tumblr worked! You reblogged with commentary and thats how legendary tumblr shitposts were born! That's how Supernatural fandom "always has a gif for that" started! Because back in 2014 people didn't care about what others on tumblr thought about their blogs, because their blogs were all about the fun, about committing to the bit, about engaging with each other and adding commentary and additions, and speculating about your favourite shows on long posts where you could have an entire community of meta writers each adding a bit of their own analysis so you ended up with a huge post that was absolutely mind blowing. That's how artists on tumblr could have thousands and thousands of notes and gain huge popularity and be able to make a living based on their fanart.

I miss it so. fucking. much.

This place is a graveyard sometimes. Even among my current fandom. I will post something and ask that people add commentary. I will state quite plainly for people to please engage and add their thoughts, let me know your opinions! There are no wrong answers! Lets joke, make fun of the characters we love, write dumb little thoughts and headcanons and engage with them via reblogs, add reaction gifs and images with speech bubbles and just soak up the joy that can be found in engaging with fandom in this way - and stop being scared that your reblogs will be judged by some external source, that you will somehow lose followers or make OP hate you if you dare to add a comment to their post (in which case OP can go fuck themselves as far as I'm concerned because I ADORE comments and additions on MY posts). Just ENGAGE. Because a like, whilst appreciated, is literally the bare minimum, and if all we are doing on this site is the bare minimum, then what is the fucking point anymore? If there is no real engagement and community, if you aren't interesting in actually talking to each other and sharing posts among each other and just interacting with each other, then tumblr will die. I find that so fucking depressing. So yeah, I had a bit of a moan on that post, because I don't think y'all newbies understand how good it used to be here. Quit with the instagram mentality and start actually engaging. Because if y'all actually listened and started doing that, you'll bring this place to life again, and find so much more joy in it.

[manonamora-if]

ave u seen the post on wip about likes? guess ur post is WRONG they DO matter!

/rambling again

Hi Anon,

Yeah I saw it too. And it may be true that like to matter in Tumblr's algorithm. I mean, Tumblr's engineers know more about their code than we, the users, do.

Granted, they do have an algorithm (used in stuff in your orbit and "Based On Your Likes!" settings options and the For you tab) that may add posts to your dashboard. And those algorithm are most likely taking into account those likes. Personally, those options and tab felt more intrusive to the enjoyment of my personal dashboard (curated with blogs I actually enjoy), and would show me posts that weren't for me or would have been blocked if it had been tagged properly. I would want to know how many people actually use those options, tho.

Still, I winced at their first point (Firstly, there is actually no imbalance between them, and, interestingly, people have come to believe there’s a problem here). Based on my own experienced and the experiences of other creators I talked to or who talked about this issue on their blog, it doesn't look that way. I didn't say this willy-nilly then and still not saying willy-nilly now. I see more views/play on my itch page when larger blogs reblog my content. If it is not a clear causal link, there must be at least a high correlation there. My goal for that post was more about if you like something and want to support it, here are some ways you can do it and here are some ways that are MORE effective to help a creator see their work being shown. If I didn't believe likes were part of supporting an author, I wouldn't have included it (and at the top too).

At then end, I wouldn't know how Tumblr could fix this issue. They don't think it is an issue based on their response of that ask. The more I think about it the more I see there is probably no good way to fix it to be honest. You can't (and shouldn't) force people to do or not do things on your website (aside from your ToS), same goes for those like/reblog functionalities or their settings options (I WOULD HATE IT if you couldn't disable those). But I think there could be some sort of Best/Better Practice, like encouraging their uses to use the reblog buttons more.

Side note: I glanced through the notes to see what other users are saying about it, some agreed with the response, some didn't, and some made fun of it. But I think it's interesting that one person mentioned how the user culture changed compared to say 10 years ago (same point I made a few days ago) where people rebloged stuff more consistently. I'm sure it was bound to happen, seeing how the use of Internet has evolved overtime.

(I'm not going to edit my original post, if that's what you wanted Anon.)

EDIT: Another point raised in the reblogs of that Staff ask : Reblogs give the opportunity to people to say things (as text or in tags), it creates conversations. Less reblogs, less conversation/interesting points

Reblogs>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Likes

[i-make-fun-of-spn-characters]

i actually did think you didn't like sam and cas for the longest time, but it's more than your bias for dean is evident. it took awhile to see through that and understand you are coming at sam and cas out of love and in a fun way and just happen to like dean more. there are a lot of other blogs that make digs at characters (esp sam and cas) in a NOT fun way, but pretend they "love all of TFW" and that's on me for lumping you in with them.

.

You know Anon, back when I used to post absolutely NOTHING except for memes, and also had a Sam banner and icon, someone asked me who my favorite character was, and I made it a poll because I was curious how good of a job I was doing keeping my content even. Lo and behold—they chose in order by vote percentage:

Sam

Cas

Dean

Jack

Then as the poll has stayed up ever since, I think Dean and Cas have traded places in the voting (but by now everyone knows Dean is my favorite). But a very large percentage of people did not know Dean was my favorite starting out. I was surprised, because I do indeed love Dean very VERY much. It isn't that I don't like Sam and Cas—but to me, Dean is possibly one of the greatest characters of all time. I could not possibly put into words how much I enjoy his character and all of the reasons why he's touched my heart. There is just no one out there quite like him in my mind. I think my bias for Dean has come through more in recent times—especially since the finale, because I miss him very much and his shitty death gutted (DON'T) me.

I think watching the show, when you look at the story only through one characters' lens, it's very easy to resent the others for not being perfect friends/family/brothers. I have even seen someone voice the sentiment before, "To some degree, to love Sam is to hate Dean, and to hate Dean is to love Sam" (paraphrasing). The thing is, when you genuinely look at your favorite (whether that's Dean or Sam or Cas) and look at their motivations and feelings and actions, it's clear that they love each other very much. That's an unavoidable fact in my mind. Both the best and worst things they've done have been at least partially motivated by the love they have for one another. I cannot, ultimately, dislike Sam or Cas knowing how much Dean loves them. To hate them would be to hate a part of Dean that is innate to who he is—his love for his family—and the choices and sacrifices he has made due to that love. It would be to say that there is something broken inside him that makes him unable to make the right choices about who should and should not be in his life. It would be to say that the foundation of the show, at the center of which is Dean's heart and how people around him are pulled inside of its orbit, is something tainted and unworthy.

It would also be to say that Dean's mistakes are okay and theirs are not, because you will find countless parallel events and threads tying their different actions together in ways that are different but also are often very much the same, if you get their motivations.

I think, for every stan out there of any main character... it would be a good idea to watch through the show trying to see it through a lens besides that of your favorite. I did this with Sam, and I am currently doing a rewatch where one of the goals is to focus on Cas's point of view more. Nothing can give you greater compassion and understanding than trying to step inside someone else's shoes, and having done this is one of the primary reasons I can't bring myself to follow many SPN accounts I have come across on Tumblr, because resentment runs rampant in many places, over characters or ships, and I don't care for that negativity. It's also the primary reason I started this blog to begin with. I wanted to carve out a positive space, where I didn't completely refuse to engage with the characters flaws (god knows fandom won't shut up about them anyway), but a place where I pointed out their flaws only to say those flaws are okay, don't make any one of them more unworthy of love than any of the others. Those flaws (at least—the ones I agree exist... there's a lot of flaws attributed to Sam, Dean, and Cas that I don't agree with at all) are what makes them human (err... or angel, respectively). I am not interested in Mary Sues (and I am definitely not interested in fans who sand down characters into Mary Sues to escape any semblance of their favorite being "problematic"). Just show me why they make the choices they do, even when those choices are broken, and I'm compassionate and I'm fascinated. I dare anyone to do better than the characters did with the cards they were dealt—with the lives they lived.

I can't say I've had the same experience on Tumblr as you with blogs pretending to like Sam and Cas while having a clear bias for Dean... I've tended to see quite a lot more of the opposite or worse. There are, after all, several blogs dedicated to absolutely nothing except trying to spread outright hate for Dean, and there was a time not long ago that you could not even go in the Dean tag without seeing countless ugly posts spewing vitriol about him (that has faded significantly since the show ended). But I think we're all bound to be most wise to the bias against our favorites (hell—I have picked up on someone's dislike of Dean from a gif blog before... and it was later confirmed that I was right). This is also part of what feeds the culture of anti-ism in the fanbase. People watched these characters for 12-15 years, and they latched onto one of them, and they know that character, and in many cases find identity and comfort with that character, and they see that character accused of terrible things that really aren't accurate at all, and the kind of innate human response to that is to want to do the opposite—hate their favorite because they hate yours. I think it's clear that that isn't what we're really supposed to get out of SPN. I don't think the intended narrative is that Dean hates Cas or Sam or that Sam hates Dean or that any one of them is unworthy of love and acceptance or is perfect or is too flawed. People can choose the narratives they want, but I'll continue vehemently disagreeing with them and making fun of them with the tag #don't feed the stans after midnight.

[wherestoriescomefrom]

[Click on the image for the image description. I'm not actually sure how the alt-text works on tumblr though, so let me know if I should add the ID in the body of the post]

maryam here is gonna have me spilling every thought in my brain and then watch how fast the cancel police comes after me. @aliens-correspondent take responsibility for your actions!!

anyway to be honest this is something i'd had in my drafts for a while, because like i said, i have very many thoughts. i thought i'd make a separate post instead of reblogging the ask and adding to it though, it felt more sensible.

i really do enjoy both the book series and the tv show, but very differently!! when you read the book series though, you can actually tell that the author is starting out, especially when you compare it to six of crows. it's got those standard YA writing tropes, a chosen one, interplays with dark and light, weird love triangle with an obvious right answer, one (1) cool and fun girl who is inexplicably mean to the main heroine; you know, the usual things. the book is inoffensive in the way it pulls of these tropes, kinda meh at times. i think the problem with the book lies in the central character, or more importantly, in her framing in re grisha racism.

bardugo actually does something cool with the grishaverse, in that she doesn't try to explicitly frame racism against grisha people along the same lines as real life racism. she makes it clear that the grisha are alternatively deified and vilified, and some of the patterns of discrimination repeat themselves. i've always always ALWAYS hated depictions of magical discrimination that do the "this is a parallel to racism" because it never makes sense. real life racism has no reasons for it to exist whatsoever, but if i met someone who could control water and lightning, i'd be scared. i'd think of them as a superhero if they were good, but i'd very much be a little scared. these representations (things like x-men, or superhero universes) lean very hard on parallels to immigration, homophobia or family friendly racism to make their point, and its always stupid. i like that grishaverse leans harder on witch-hunting parallels instead, its far more logical - this has played out in real life as well. bardugo also weaves some amount of neurodivergence coded traits into her grisha characters - again, things that make sense, given the history of neurodivergence connected to witchcraft and otherness. and it works! the grisha are hunted like witches, and eventually assimilated like gods or saints.

what doesn't always work is alina, actually. bardugo did something super weird with her, with people like mal telling her she should be queen because she would be able to represent the common people. but that's the thing - even within the world of the first book, it doesn't hold up. a lot of the grisha come from small families, and there's this argument that they forget their parents but even that isn't true! zoya goes for the trips across the fold so she can meet her aunt! a lot of them remember their brothers and fathers and sisters. even alina chose the orphanage over life at the little palace all those years back didn't she?

the grisha are supposed to be elite army of witches, glamorous and gorgeous. however, even within the world of the novel everyone who makes up the army are orphans and peasants, and everyone in the country is tested for grisha powers. in fact, the world the darkling has created was explicitly done because he saw how the grisha were hunted and abused. he made them indispensable to the king, made them strong and a powerful faction in the country.

alina's character really suffers thanks to the weirdness in this framing. she's supposed to be the orphan from keramzin who can really reform the army - but she isn't the only one who was lonely and orphaned even within the army. moreover, it's never actually clear what she would like to do with the grisha army - beyond the superficial changes of seating arrangements. there was this one moment where she sees the first of nikolai's flying ships and thinks "yeah this is what i want. magic and tech to work together!" but you don't actually find out how she wants to do it. nikolai does have a vision, and he has ideas to execute it, but alina really doesn't. plus i just. i just never got the sense that alina enjoyed being a grisha.

don't get me wrong, i know her whole thing is about the price of power and how much she starts to hunger for power, but i just. never saw her having fun with her power??? show alina does tho, and that's something that's really cool, but i'll get to her in a moment. here's the bottom line: it never feels like alina has consistent motivations or clear character foundations. i don't even get the sense that she is that committed to ravka really, just that she wants to defeat the darkling because it also means a slow rise of power for her. she just doesn't feel as realised a character because there are hints of what she wants and dreams of but it all gets really overshadowed by the angst she has over not belonging and then by feeling like she's becoming a more terrible person thanks to the entire power thing idk.

which is the second problem. y'all know why people don't like mal? no for REAL do you know? not because he's a teenage boy who's entitled with his crush, that's nothing compared to how manipulative the darkling is. the REAL reason this is such a debate is because the writer fucked up! barudgo kept framing the love triangle as a choice between more power and living a normal life, and that's the whole problem!!! mal himself is at best a little irritating, but no worse than other love triangle heroes. but because this is a YA story where the choice given to young, presumably female readers is to give up your cool powers because your boyfriend feels like its taking you further and further away from him - or unaccountable power, terrible power even with a hot villain to boot. which would you choose? i know which i would and i am fully cognizant of how manipulative the darkling is. that's literally why it doesn't work, because alina has to make this ridiculous choice and it feels stupid even to outline it!! why couldn't she have kept her powers?? unlike the darkling, they were actually natural and not a result of dark magic.

it's really sad because i 100% believe this whole problem is the reason why people seriously overlook how well leigh bardugo wrote the darkling as a VILLAIN. as a love interest, sure, but she just wrote one of the most menacing villains on page and we all forget about it because everyone's busy writing think pieces on whether mal is worse than the darkling. from the beginning, there's this sense of power that the darkling evokes every time he's on the page. the first time he meets alina he acts as an amplifier to bring out her power, he commands people, he commands armies. and the more time you spend with the book, the more bardugo rations his presence: appearing at the right moments, never pushing the boundary and becoming an active villain. yet there's this malcontent about him that's so much in the vibe of the man. he's called the darkling and he promises to rid the world of the fold. he thinks alina is the answer but would rather use an amplifier on her. i think about halfway through, before baghra's reveal - i just knew this man was trouble.

she did such a good job with him!! the darkling we meet is someone who's already at the end of his "you either die a hero or live long enough to be a villain" arc. he was a hero! he saved the grisha, but eventually his quest for power has made him hungrier, with less morals and fewer reservations. he's much crueler in the books, much more manipulative, so much more FUN. the show really missed out, because they focussed on making the darkling human and real - and they really fucked up, because even tho ben barnes did a really good job he was missing a lot of the edge and sharpness of the darkling. naming him early is just one of the problems, giving him the most basic back story is just another. i think the closest he felt to the book!darkling was when alina was attacked by fjerdans, and theres that out of focus shot of him coming with the cut. absolutely chilling. we stan. but thats the last we see of this darkling right up until he makes her the antler necklace and that panty dropping line, "make me your villain." generally i think both kaz and the darkling are a bit softer in the tv show, which is strange but i was so pleased with the changes to alina's character and the casting of inej that i let it slide.

the show does a really good job of giving alina proper characterisation!! i like that they made her half asian (they could have toned down on all the racism a little tho). and the worldbuilding done with the world war era inspired posters was really good!! at least this way all of alina's angsting has a reason. plus they retconned her to make her someone who fights more, against the world she's in and it makes sense. it really feels like even the adult alina just wants to be free. plus MAL, my beloved!! you can actually see his character development from a more timid young boy to someone who has dedicated his life to alina, to making the world a love letter to her specifically. the show fucked up on a bunch of lore things, but on the whole i think the bones of the book were good enough that they could pull of a really GOOD tv show.

the last thing i love about the tv show is how it lavishes attention on things young girls like reading. like it really leans into fantasy fiction in that sense. i never cared much for tolkien but in the last few years i have latched onto female written fantasy like a burr (side note, everyone please read Sword of Kaigen). its nice to see people care so much about women as a primary demographic in consuming fantasy fiction. increasingly, fantasy fiction is becoming more and more mainstream tho, which means i have to suffer through my friends (wrong) opinions on shadow and bone tho.

anyway all i want to know is who is going to be cast as nikolai. please hes my favourite character and he was already ignored so much in his own duology.

[yeonanak]

hi, sorry if this question bothers u but i want to genuinely ask bcs it’s been bothering me a lot. If u remember i posted about the misinformation on the saiki k fandom and when i saw ur repost and account i noticed that ur ace, so i want to ask u something.

The time when i posted the post i was only got 1-2 post/video on tiktok about ppl misinformating on their video or comments, But! now even tho its rare a saiki content on my fyp but almost evry time there is one the bideo pr the comment will be flooded with misinformation especially around ppl saying saiki aroace canon. i also see it on twitter or tumbkr on those “ur (character name) is canonly aro/ace”. And i Hate when ppl give misinformation to other ppl so i want to ask u, is it wrong to comment/reply “he’s not canonly ace/aro” or something like that to ppl comment saying saiki is canon ace/aro??

Bcs i dont want to hurt the aro/ace community with my words if i say that, or being seen as ‘ruining the fun’ bcs ik sometimes the ppl who says saiki is canon ace/aro is usually also ace/aro, and i dont want to hurt them. Sorry again for asking u this

Your question is no problem for me! Sorry if you had to wait for my response.

“I dont want to hurt the aro/ace community with my words if i say that, or being seen as ‘ruining the fun’ bcs ik sometimes the ppl who says saiki is canon ace/aro is usually also ace/aro, and i dont want to hurt them.”

I might not be able to speak for everyone in the aroace community, but I'll answer this how I would like to be responded to as an aroace person.

In my opinion if someone is just wanting some representation and it makes them feel good, the better move might be to take a step back and let them have it, because chances are they're not taking it that seriously. For example, I liked this one blog that was like "_insert character_ has ADHD is canon!" (but it wasn't canon) I didn't actually believe it was true, I just really liked the rep because I don't get it often.

It hasn’t been confirmed that Saiki is aroace, but it also hasn’t been confirmed that he isn’t aroace. Commenting “he’s not canonly ace/aro,” while true is very blunt and might seem like you’re shutting them down, even if that’s not what you mean to do. If you don’t want to be misunderstood, it could be better for you to ignore it or at least make sure your comment can't be taken the wrong way.

"Saiki can be aroace but I don't think it's been confirmed" or maybe even nicer because communication through text can be read negatively lol. If you're reacting to a creator's content I would suggest telling them what you liked about their work, offering constructive criticism, or not commenting at all. But again thats my opinion.

If you want to comment, I would just say to make sure the message you put out is respectful, and remember that sometimes commenting isn’t necessary anyway. Even if it would be false and can get annoying for someone to claim Saiki is canonically aroace, sometimes it’s not worth your energy or time to correct people because that would be a lot of people. People are going to have their own interpretations of the show regardless of whatever is canonically confirmed. Some people are open to debate, but you’re bound to find someone you disagree with so try not to let it get to you. Remember it’s a show that you enjoy so don’t let something minor ruin the fandom for you. What I like about the Saiki k fandom on tumblr and on AO3 is that there's a reallly wide variety of people with their hcs, and only the occasional bitter post about how Saiki should only be aroace.

I hope I helped somehow!

[thesharondefenseleague]

Fun fact the long asks are a new feature ! (Thank fuck)

But oh that last ask reminded me. I wish people would talk about fandom Racism and Black Panther. I remember both Star Wars and Captain America and Ironman franchise having discussions about how certain types of ships get popular. Like enemies/rivals, best friends etc. But then those ship trends exclude black characters.

Like for example Kylo and Finn after the first movie ( and before 2 and 3) were from the same side originally but then ended up on different sides, Kylo recognizes Finn without the helmet and zeroes in on him with the helmet. Finn understands the toxicity of the environment he in. Its the kind of thing that makes for really popular ships. And the one time it doesn't one guy happens to be black.

Same goes for say Rhodey and Tony bickering best friends so often are shipping fuel but not for these two.

But no one brings up Black Panther. Like M'Baku had a fierce rivalry with T'Challa and seemed to hate him but then saves his ass after Kilmonger and joins T'Challa in the fight to retake his kingdom.

The shipping potential here is crazy and its absolutely the kinda thing fandom on tumblr simps for. But despite everyone loving the movie and both these characters there was so little content. Same goes for T'Challa and Nakia it was one of the few MCU canon ships fandom was on board with as a concept but people didn't really do shit with it.

But when discussing fandom racism and how black people are left out of shipping these ships don't come up ever. And I do think a part of it is neither of these ships have non black characters. But I think a bigger aspect is there was no shipping drama.

I mean let's be fair even if fandom bigotry exists the only time its really discussed at all is in fandoms and about characters and ships with shipping drama. Ironman Captain America and Star Wars as fandoms all had shipping drama.

And using things like misogyny, homophobia, abuse and racism as concepts to tie to ships you don't like is what shipping drama often is now. And BP didn't have huge shipping drama. Because at the end of the day these people don't care about bigoted bias in fandom. They only care that their ship gets more content and ships they don't like get less. So they make you try to feel bad for liking things they don't.

Its unfortunate because I do things acknowledging bias in fandom and exploring this bigotry in fandom is necessary. But any time I see these things brought up in fandom I know its because of shipping.

Fandom misogyny was always a thing. But it wasn't brought up with strong female characters being damseled constantly or the sexualized objectified depiction of female characters fandom often has especially in art ( no those things are only brought up for m/m coincidentally the most popular type of fic in the fandom because there are so few relevant women in canon to begin with). No it only begun being discussed alot when the main canon ship wasn't acknowledged and fandom embraced a different ship that happened to be m/m. The gender thing is only relevant because the other ship is m/m.

Rinse and repeat for homophobia and racism. The actual homophobic and racist rhetoric and interpretation in fandom is ignored. It only matters as a way to make people feel bad for not making more things with your favorite ship.

You know who I saw shipped with T’Challa the most after BP was released? Motherfucking Darcy and Tony. Third was Natasha, fourth was Bucky. I saw zero posts about shipping him with any non-white character. Not even Storm, his canon wife. An absolute mess. This should have been looked down on, and yet it wasn’t. It was barely even called out.

Racist shippers are so fucked up. And there’s so many! I remember when Sam/Sharon became a thing, and we were promoting it, and those obnoxious anti blogs made racists posts in response. Like what the fuck? This fandom jumps the gun to be racist just as fast as they are misogynistic, but they’re less likely to be called out for it, and it’s fucked.

Misogyny in fandom on here hides well, but it’s easiest to find in fanfiction. The horrific tropes the women in fanfiction are given literally stopped me from shipping certain characters because the writers wouldn’t stop making shitty abusive versions of these female characters that were far from canon. Here, it’s easier to hide. In fanfiction, they’re impossible to ignore.

Homophobia doubly so too. It’s easy to identify in f/f ships, but m/m not so much. Yes, we know for a lot of you it’s a fetish, like straight men watching lesbian porn. But the line separating isn’t as clear as I’d like to think it is. Sometimes it’s obvious, but most of the time it isn’t. Hell, years ago, when I posted about a m/m ship and their sex life because the show they were on had them openly discussing it, someone tried calling me out as offensive. (Spoiler: it wasn’t.) That’s how thin the line is. But the racism in these ever-so-popular m/m ships are so easy to identify, that we can all see it for miles. Again, the bi Steve movement pushing out Sam as an option for a boyfriend was one major racist moment in this fandom.

This fandom should be more open about tackling the issues of racism, misogyny, and homophobia in it. The reason it keeps going as strong as it does is that a lot of young/impressionable people on here see what’s popular and emulate it, so it becomes cyclical. We need to find a way to cut it off here, because I’m not ready for the next round of shit we’re gonna have to deal with when F+WS comes out, and y’all do Sharon and Sam dirty and push shipping Bucky with Zemo onto us.

~Mod R

(PS love the new long ask layout, it makes answering these so much easier.)

[lihikainanea]

You've done a couple of asks about Tiger being insecure with her mind and body but what about Bill? What if Bill got so into his head that he thought Tiger was going to leave him and/or that she didn't want him anymore. -💜

Anonymous said: That drabble about Tiger getting insecure about her stretch marks, when Bill thinks that she might have changed her mind about them - you almost killed me. Could you make some angst about this? Like, Bill getting into his head, feeling insecure about his place in her life, also feeling dumb because he knows she loves him, but he can help it

You know what I love about you guys? I love how sometimes I am so black or white--like, thinking tiger is the only one who can be insecure about her body because it’s Bill and have you seen Bill what the fuck would Bill have to be insecure about? But then here you guys come with your 10,000 shades of grey that you throw at me and I go...oh. Oh. Because you bring things to my attention that my simple little brain never thought of.

Let’s be all extra here and say that you know what? Bill starts to feel a little unworthy, starts to doubt himself, whenever he feels like he let tiger down in his role in their relationship...like say, that awful time that he pushed her too far and she said her safe word. Or how about the time when she was really far gone, and he actually scared her? (also, le babie anon--I haven’t seen you in awhile. Are you okay? Where ya at?) The Tumblr search function is trash and the second part of that drabble isn’t coming up, but here let me just throw this one at you too--some insights into his occasional dom drop(s).

Because here’s the thing, right? Bill still can’t believe just half the shit that tiger lets him do to her. The amount of trust in him, just the way she is this big badass but she will let him spank her and reduce her to a blubbering mess of begging and pleading submissiveness....Bill is beside himself every time. He just can’t believe that she lets him--nay, begs him--to do that to her. But he also feels this incredible responsibility, feels the weight of that trust and knows the magnitude of it, and it’s something he takes very, very seriously.

So when he screws up sometimes--which is normal, because this dynamic is not without its hiccups--he gets really, really hard on himself. Because a tiny screw up for him is fine, but that tiny screw up could have devastating impacts on tiger and he doesn’t ever want that. And when he does screw up, he starts to think that maybe...maybe tiger should be with someone who can fulfill her needs more. Someone who knows more about this sort of thing. Somebody who won’t make nearly as many mistakes as he’s made. Somebody who will only ever make her feel incredible, without the horrendous drops of his fuck ups.

Because at the end of the day, he loves her. She means the world to him, and he wants nothing other than for her to be in the best hands--whether or not they’re his own. He wants what’s best for her--he just doesn’t always think he’s, you know, it.

She deserves someone who is around more. Someone who doesn’t have a spotlight on them, so that she can fade into the wallpaper like she’d much prefer to do. She deserves someone she can be affectionate with in public, without any associated risk or attention. Someone that maybe she can be small with all the time, if that’s what she wants. Bill internalizes just...all of this. And he beats himself up over it--and it’s totally ridiculous, because all tiger ever wants is just...him. He’s the only person who has ever made her feel safe, and because she feels so safe with him, she’s able to be her true self in their dynamic. She’s able to show a vulnerable side to herself that she never shows anyone, she’s able to be needy and whiney and to beg shamelessly for what she wants because she knows that she’s safe and that he’ll give it to her. She’s able to get fussy, to show her discomfort to him, and to trust wholeheartedly in the fact that if she does, he will make it disappear. He’ll make it go away, for her.

And I’ll bet, too--if we want an added layer of angst--I’ll bet Bill is indeed a little self-conscious about the way he looks. Because he’s just....like, he’s tall as fuck you know? And yes I think he’s very handsome, and yes most of us in this fandom do, but there is no denying that he’s freaky looking. In fact, the very first time I saw a picture of him I almost...recoiled. And I know that sounds harsh but his facial features are just incredibly striking, and VERY unusual when you first see them. I’ll bet he’s a little self-conscious about his big wonky eyes. About his height. About his clumsy, oaf-ness. Maybe every once in awhile those huge hands of his are such a nuisance--if he’s trying oh so carefully to clasp one of tiger’s necklaces for her, and he accidentally breaks it. He can’t do up buttons on her dress, because his huge ass fingers just can’t wrap around something that small and manoeuvre it. His extremities are always cold because there’s just not enough blood pumping through his gigantic body to keep him both alive and keep him warm. He speaks English fine but when he’s tired his accent comes back, and it is that stereotypical musical Swedish one that people love to make fun of. He’s too skinny. Sometimes if his clothes are too loose it makes him look straight up gaunt. Winter is hard, and he gets so pale that he looks like a fucking vampire. He can get really, really caught up in his head with these things and every now and then when he meets a new colleague or new friend of tiger’s and the person inevitably goes “holy shit you’re tall” or “holy shit your eyeballs” then it all just comes bubbling to the surface.

And for tiger’s part, if you were to ask her? All those things he hates are the exact things that get her so fucking wet for him, every time. Watching those huge, gentle hands try to manipulate something they are clearly too big for? Wet. Hearing him whack his head on a doorframe and cuss loudly? Wet. That little Swedish lilt and the way he forgets some English words when he’s exhausted? Wet. Those big eyes, and how they widen and just watch her every move sometimes? Wettttttttttt.

But I want to go back to the first point here, because god I’m just so weak for it. Bill being the only thing that tiger has ever needed, being so good to her, but also just berating himself when he fucks up. Berating himself to the point where he really does convince himself that he's just....he’s not good for her. She deserves more. Deserves better. And Bill sitting there quietly in bed, his arm wrapped loosely around her, spinning himself into a horrendous place in thinking that she just...she deserves more.

Does he leave? MY SOFF GIANT. I’ll bet he leaves. Runs off to his family’s lake house for a few days. And you know what? GOD IT’S A FUCKING MESS. Because maybe something in their dynamic went wrong--he scared her or something happened--and tiger needs him. She needs him, his safety, his comfort. And Bill thinking he needs to get away because all he ever does is hurt her or scare her, and she deserves more than that--so he leaves. And tiger is in shambles, and so is he, and IT’S JUST A FUCKING MESS AHHHHHHH.