#they should have left those tweets out in the public with no comment

[gunsatthaphan]

force is still queerbaiting huh people like him truly never change

he... was queerbaiting before? lol I didn't know.

But what I was laughing about with those tweets was the fact that those fans were acting so petty over a very obvious april fools joke to the point that F&F felt the need to write lengthy apologies for disrespecting the lgbt community like hello????? this is really the world we live in. if you consider this queerbaiting then idk what to tell you lmao.

[mariacallous]

Last week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that the country’s presidential election, that in peacetime would be expected next March, will not be taking place while Ukraine remains under martial law and is in a state of war with Russia.

Western right-wing social media personalities predictably greeted this news as confirmation of their prejudices against Ukrainian democracy. Failed politician and 2020 U.S. election denier Kari Lake was among those who complained, saying on X, formerly known as Twitter, “Zelensky is considering canceling elections in Ukraine. I didn’t realize that Democracy could just be turned off & on like a TV.” Not wanting to be left out, reactionary Michael Tracey dedicated several tweets to misunderstanding Ukraine’s constitution while furiously denouncing his own followers for correcting his mistakes via X’s Community Notes feature, claiming that “it’s totally false that holding elections during Martial Law is ‘banned’ by Ukraine’s constitution.” (The Community Note is, in fact, correct, and Tracey is, of course, wrong.)

So while, I hope, everyone knows not to take such figures seriously, Americans might still have qualms over the failure to hold elections. The United States itself has a habit, rare among democracies, of keeping the vote going even during wartime, as in 1864 and 1944.

Thus, it’s worth going into detail as to why the Ukrainian government has taken this position and how the Ukrainian electorate is responding to that. This news certainly didn’t come as a surprise to anyone in Ukraine, and the pressure surrounding wartime elections has been entirely external, leaving many Ukrainians baffled. The most prominent of these interventions was made by U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, who on a visit to Kyiv in August said he believed the Ukrainian government should hold elections in 2024. While it should be noted that, in responding to Graham, Zelensky appeared to hold the door open for elections next year, he also stressed that they were legally prohibited under martial law in the same interview.

These opinions are not confined to American conservatives either, with the president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Tiny Kox, telling European Pravda in May that Ukraine is expected to “organize free and fair elections,” shortly before walking those comments back in a subsequent interview.

For the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians, the idea of holding elections next spring is absurd. A recent poll conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology found that 81 percent of respondents thought that elections should not be held until after the end of the war. This view is shared across the country, with those in the eastern and southern regions most impacted by the ongoing conflict also overwhelmingly opposing holding elections during the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Ukrainian civil society has also reached the same conclusion, with more than 200 civil society institutions, NGOs, and human rights networks officially declaring their opposition to holding wartime elections. The prospect of holding elections next year had already been deemed “impossible” by Ukraine’s leading election monitoring NGO Opora in July, long before Graham arrived in Kyiv for his moment in front of the cameras.

For those who are unaware of what martial law is, in most countries it entails the suspension of a civilian government, replacing it with a military administration enacted during times of war, and it normally involves the curtailment of peacetime political freedoms such as freedom of speech and the freedom of assembly. While martial law is never a positive political development for a nation-state, at times of war, such as the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, such legal measures become unfortunately necessary to save lives.

Both constitutionally and legally speaking, the Ukrainian government is simply following Ukrainian law. The Ukrainian constitution and martial law legislation clearly prohibit presidential, parliamentary, and local elections from taking place under martial law, and Zelensky’s comments last week were merely a repetition of what other Ukrainian government officials have said on this topic in recent months. Other European countries, such as Germany, have similar provisions for postponing wartime elections.

In response to Kox’s comment in May, Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, said: “The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe should clearly understand that there is a Constitution and laws of our country that we have to live by, and we will figure it out on our own. No elections can be held during martial law.”

Similarly, in June, Ruslan Stefanchuk, the speaker of Ukraine’s parliament, said: “If elections were possible during martial law, it could lead to the rupture of the state, which our enemy is waiting for. That is why I think the most correct and wise decision is to hold elections immediately after the end of martial law.”

Speaking in August, Ukrainian Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said: “It will be very difficult to hold elections in the country under such conditions. Indeed, there is martial law, there is war. When we end the war, then we will talk about elections.”

Some might dismiss the position of Ukrainian officials due to their own self-interest in remaining in power. If Zelensky were trying to cling to power against the wishes of Ukraine’s electorate, martial law would seem to provide the Ukrainian government with the legal and constitutional power to do just that.

However, this theory collapses on contact with Ukraine’s opinion polls. A survey taken this summer on a potential presidential election in Ukraine showed that more than 70 percent of respondents were planning to vote for Zelensky, with more than 50 percent of respondents supporting his ruling Servant of the People party.

The scale of the commanding lead that Zelensky has over his political opponents is nearly unheard of in any democracies, let alone Western ones. Few leaders around the world have the same level of popular support and legitimacy that Zelensky’s government currently holds. This is not a government that is in doubt about its democratic legitimacy, and if there were elections in March, the results would be almost guaranteed to be a landslide victory.

It is also true that Zelensky’s government under martial law banned 11 opposition political parties last March. However, the part that is often left out by those complaining about this is that these parties had explicit links to the Russian government and were in many cases actively assisting the Russian invasion. It’s hard to imagine any country not responding the same way when under invasion. For example, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s government banned Oswald Mosley’s pro-Nazi British Union of Fascists at the outbreak of World War II. Again, none of this means that Ukraine is no longer a functioning democracy—it is merely a democracy that is currently fighting off an invading army.

The final point is also the most overlooked by external observers pressuring the Ukrainian government into violating its constitutional obligations: the matter of safety. Holding elections while Russia continues to bombard civilian targets in Ukraine on a daily basis is not just dangerous; it is outright irresponsible. The Russian military has a track record of systematically targeting any large congregations of Ukrainian civilians. In October, Russia bombed a cafe where people had gathered for a wake, leaving 59 people dead.

In any wartime election, polling stations would become high-value targets for a Russian dictatorship that is hellbent on destroying Ukrainian democracy and a Russian military that carries out war crimes against civilians as its modus operandi.

Furthermore, 20 percent of Ukraine’s territory is under Russian occupation, and those citizens have just as much right as those living in Kyiv or Lviv to participate in Ukrainian elections, but trying to organize those under Russian occupation would put participants and organizers under mortal peril. Ukraine does not have the means of ensuring the safety of its electorate during this democratic process, and it’s arguable that no democratic nation could ensure the safety of its citizens under these conditions.

Lastly, while this situation has not arisen in Western democracies since the end of World War II, the United Kingdom also did not hold elections between 1940 and 1945, and at no point during that time were substantial parts of Britain occupied by Nazi Germany. Most of democratic Europe was occupied during World War II, but during World War I, France and other nations suspended elections. I have never heard anyone try to say this meant those countries ceased being democracies. The United States was able to hold elections during wartime because the front line was mercifully distant; Ukraine does not have that luxury.

Given that the overwhelming majority of Ukrainian politicians, Ukrainian civil society, and the Ukrainian electorate have categorically rejected the notion of holding elections while the country remains locked in an existential war with Russia, there is little excuse for external observers to be piling additional pressure onto Kyiv to hold a dangerous, illegal vanity contest with an already foregone conclusion.

[hankbot0-9]

Disappointment and frustration

Hellop. Never done something like this before, but here we go. This is going to be basically a large splurge of disappointment and frustration on one, particular person, Vivienne Medrano.

So to start this off, I've known about, and have been a fan, of Viv for a long while, ever since the Hazbin Polit. I've followed her work, been inspired by it, and found great fun with the characters and world.

Without Viv, I would not be a furry (debatable if this is good or bad), I would not have found characters I've found comfort in (Jackson Wells, Zoophobia), or other creators in the indie community. However, for a while now I've been seeing how Viv and her works have greatly fallen from there highs, and how Viv has, really dropped the ball in being professional.

Her tweets and general attitude have given off all the wrong vibes, and show a person who could care less about being professional. From the whole "Cain, I am your bitch" situation, how she handles ANY form of criticism that is even slightly negative, the way she tweets and responds to others etc. It all just compounds on her image, basically holding up a mirror.

Her show (or shows, Hazbis quality is to be debated when it releases), started out, in my opinion, rough yet charming, clearly having passion behind it and a fun time to watch, has degraded to a point of being a bland, misguided and unplanned mess where the main character now feels like a side character to another character who's derailed the premise and show as a whole. Don't get me started on the inconsistent animation quality, cause holy shit.

There is also the leaked, behind the scenes, screenshots stuff that, yes should be looked at skeptically, is slowly, and in some cases basically confirmed, to be true. Largely owing to her on twitter and some behind the scenes stuff that should make you do a double take. I.e. Treatment of female characters, the constant hiring of new employees, etc.

This also ties into how the Fandom treats these characters and situations, and is where a lot of my frustrations come into play. To explain, the Fandom surrounding Viv and her works is one of the most apparent toxic fandoms I have ever seen, all it takes for them to turn on you is a couple of tweets or posts about something you disagree with or being slightly critical of Viv, and they turn on you. The amount of harassment and death threats flung around is concerning to a high degree and Viv, doesn't do anything about it, not even an ask to stop, largely because she encourages it. Sure, it's not a tweet saying to attack someone, but all the likes she gives to her fans on any post talking about what someone said or done that didn't align with the greater fandom opinion, it encourages them because they see it, they see that the person they look up to has liked what they said and so they keep doing it, so they get more likes form her. It's, sad to see really. The Fandom treats these characters above people really, holding them up and parading them around like they can do no wrong, and the same is for Viv.

There's more I could say, but many have already said it before and will continue to say it until, Viv basically fades away, because the way Viv handles herself, the Fandom that surrounds her and much more, wont survive the fact that when Hazbin drops, and is reviewed, and those critical comments and reviews come about it that are even slightly negative, the Fandoms going to get bloodthirsty and destroy any good will left or they would've had with the general public.

Sincerely, Hankbot0-9... tired of, alot.

[louisisalarrie]

i guess he’ll have to stop singing “i love him, i hate it” then. who else would it be about? simon cowell? like please.

This whole thing is weird, everything about it.

yep! Such an obviously timed denial that it’s basically transparent. I will reiterate my points here again, because this has frustrated me dearly as someone who is actively in the industry and has seen successful pr stunts and coverups. His team can’t crack the larries tho.

1. Timing - pre recorded denial dropped for promo as he left LATAM to go MIA before going back to tour in a few weeks + everyone will cool off by then

2. Urgency - there are no current media publications or any GP chats suggesting Louis and Harry are together, and there hasn’t been for a long time now, so there’s no damage control to be done (unless something hasn’t come out yet and it’s in preparation for said thing, BUA perhaps)

3. Content - drops the “my son Freddie” during it as well, boosting that stunt because it’s been pretty quiet since AOTV and a couple of tweets ages ago. again, no explicit denial and poor body language

4. Blacklisted Topic - we saw the other interviewer shut down the F thing, and he’s had many interviews where Larry and F aren’t brought up at all. It’s a topic put in there when it’s useful

5. Relevancy - not relevant to tour or current media presence whatsoever

6. Consistency - all interviews we have gotten recently have been strictly about his career, his festival, tour, inspirations etc., and we have one very personal and touchy topic randomly brought in with no context whatsoever

But I think what is making people stressed about this particular denial is because there was nothing calling for it. No media stir, no mentions of their names together or directly tied in media, no scandal or damage control (unless something breaks), so it seems more genuine and not just like he’s trying to clean up a mess like so many times before. But it’s also very obvious promo. Dropped as soon as he leaves LATAM? And everyone will cool off by the time he’s back. Absolutely standard and poorly done PR.

I don’t think managers know what they’re getting into when they start handling a 1d boy, frankly because our fandom is truly one of a kind. But, as much as I hate to say it, the Azoff’s have done what louis’ team should have done too. Stay silent about it, it’s not necessary to comment unless something big happens and it needs damage control. you’re only attacking your fans here, bud.

so, anyway… the patterns of every other denial have led to a BUA, a scandal, or their names being tied together and Larry being of public interest. Or have come from those things prior. However, this denial will probably pick up in the media, and tie louis’ name to Harry’s once more, to boost him a bit to sell some tickets.

everything was going so well, it was great to see him not talk about his personal life. so, it’s foreshadowing and a poor promo move, or just a poor promo move.

[fiyasgideon]

With @elhnrt (Lena) opening her Patreon I would like to inform those who might not have seen my original call-out post (which you can find here) of the current situation going on between her and me, so that they may be more informed of her professionalism before giving her their money.

I do recommend for those who haven't seen the original post to go read it now, but the short story version is that I paid Lena for a commission back on August 4th, 2022, and she has since cut all communication with me since trying to contact her about it on October 24th, 2022.

WARNING: Just like with the original post, this post wasn't made to have people harass her, (and I discourage anyone from doing so) but simply to inform those who plan on doing business with her of her unprofessional behavior.

Click "Keep Reading" to see what has happened since.

As of today, June 3rd of 2023, I still haven't heard from her, despite my many attempts to get a response. Since creating the original post linked above I have tried 3 more times to contact her through DMs or Tumblr asks before I ultimately decided to block her Tumblr and Twitter for my own mental health, leaving my discord open to her for communication should she finally decide to reach out to me.

And right up until just over week ago I had been doing pretty well with trying to forget about this whole thing and moving on. But then someone who was aware of the situation between Lena and I contacted me. They told me that Lena was opening her Patreon and asked if I had heard back from her about my commission, of which I had not.

With advice from some friends I decided to try to contact Lena once more, in a more public way. I unblocked her and left a comment on her post that announced her Patreon, asking her once more about the commission. It has been 9 days since then and I still have not heard from her, despite her heavy activity on Twitter and her Patreon since my posting of that comment.

But, since she has not been active yet on Tumblr I decided to try one more time to have her reply to me. This was an option I had not wanted to try previously due to how public this attempt was, but I did not want to leave any chances for people to claim that maybe she never saw my messages. So I went to her Twitter and unblocked her before tagging her in a tweet asking about the commission again, and just over 24 hours later, and despite her active on Twitter, she still hasn't responded to me.

With this I have now been left with no more options in which to try and get her to respond to me in any way. So I, once again, am making a post to inform others so that something like this doesn't happen to them, as she clearly doesn't care about those who try to support her.

[beardedmrbean]

Okay am I the only Gen z who got the messages of hunger games and Percy Jackson?

The pjo books pointed out how the Titan Kronos exploited the shitty system the main 12 Olympians created and the much needed reformation the Greco-Roman pantheon needed in their treatments of lesser gods and demigods

The hunger games pointed out how BOTH sides exploit people like Katniss and was as bloodthirsty the capitol leaders.

Y’all remember how district 13 hides bombs in packages which lead to the death of innocent CHILDREN including Katniss sister prim right

Oh and the revolutionaries were planning on doing another hunger games with capitol kids as revenge.

Almost like revolutionaries are as shitty as the oppressors?

*cough* Killmonger *cough*

I mean PJO and Hunger Games gave as much nuance as they could while being published under Disney Hyperion and Scholastic .

But y’all didn’t get the memos

Oh right right my family issues so that why I got it.

Also another thing, the majority of enemies Percy Jackson and other demigods are monsters and gods going like “Your godly parent did something terrible to me so I’m going to take it out on you!”

Just like how for some goddamn reason, a poor white trailer boy is responsible for the evil shit the pilgrims did

But the Benin and Muslim people are A okay despite being the direct descendants of the Dahomey and

*check wiki*

Hmm, the Kashmir genocide, 9/11, the on going rampant killing of Nigerian Christian children by Muslim extremists

Obviously not all of them, but a lot of Gen z doing understand they have the mentality of VILLAINS rather than good people

Oh and my generation saying Osama Bin Laden was right. As a military brat and if I was heard someone say that in public

I will make the hunchback of Norte dome look like Prince Charming after the face rearranging I would do to those wokies

I never read any of those and only saw the first movies of the series's so I can't comment much on that.

Just like how for some goddamn reason, a poor white trailer boy is responsible for the evil shit the pilgrims did But the Benin and Muslim people are A okay despite being the direct descendants of the Dahomey and *check wiki* Hmm, the Kashmir genocide, 9/11, the on going rampant killing of Nigerian Christian children by Muslim extremists Obviously not all of them, but a lot of Gen z doing understand they have the mentality of VILLAINS rather than good people

With the not all of them, yes you're 100% right it's a oddity we get people online making 30 tweet threads about how black Americans are not a monolith but individuals each one being the sum of their own lived experiences which are different from each others.

And then Simone Biles smashes through the record books again (girl is unreal, just wow) and all of a sudden it's melanin power and all that jazz firing right back up. Or god forbid Tim Scott says something

the root: we don't do the HN shame

Also the root: but......

Not so bad as Atlanta Black Star can be but still. ______________

the people cheering on the various Islamic groups confuse the shit out of me, if they think white Europeans were harsh with them they should look up slavery in the middle east.

there were some bright spots yes, but mostly it was slave labor till you could labor no more and then you get left to die

Last place to make slavery illegal was Mauritania in 1982, it was lip service though since having slaves wasn't actually criminalized till 2007.

Still "bonded" servants there too, fancy name for slave/indentured servant for those that may not know that one.

[beyondtheindigosky]

About this Build Poi situation

This entire situation took an extremely tragic turn. And everyone who harped about morals and justice are making memes . I don't have a high sense of morality but I honestly don't think that this is something to rejoice about. Now so many things have come to light after this whole situation. So many lives are being ruined. Poi, Build , the kids who posted slanderous comments, all their lives have been ruined. Now that Poi is the defendant in the case most people who wanted to destroy Build don't care anymore. Because now that Build has left BOC , there's 'no point in fighting for justice.' The sheer irony of this all.

Now people are coming forward and apologizing to Build for spreading fake allegations. And all who have publicly apologized until now are underage. There's even a 12 year old apologizing. These are children. But now they have obtained criminal records even before they became 18. And they are being dragged all around social media for what they have done.

Poi's plaigarism allegations against Build have been debunked and now ,it seems as if she hasn't even filed a lawsuit against him. Now she has become the Defendant of this case. The charges against her are criminal charges and if undisputed she will definitely get a criminal record. This has even gone to the Thai national media and now her reputation is also in ruins. People are making fun of her contradictory tweets and openly mocking her.

People are making fun of all these people involved. Some hate Build for his tweets,other hate Poi and those convicted children for their actions and now all of them are being dragged to hell and back.

Even though I sided with Build and disliked Poi no one truly won here.

Apo's own fans turned against him and flung racist, homophobic comments at him all because of a filter.

Regardless of what we feel about them, these are all real people who are involved.To make fun of their lives ,to joke at their expense isn't a morally superior thing to do.

What's the point in talking about 'justice', 'morals' and 'victims' if we dump the case the moment the tide turns?

I honestly had concrete beliefs too. I didn't even knowthat there was something called 'imperfect victims' until this case happened. I didn't realize that we have to give a voice to the victim ,(no matter how imperfect they are) first. That was my mistake.

Everyone who made documentations and discussions about it has abandoned it . People mocked Build for crying and now they are mocking Poi for what's happening to her. It's very clear that Poi needs medical intervention.

If Poi can be considered an imperfect victim so Build. If Build is innocent until proven guilty so is Poi.

This entire thing has become a nightmare .With more and more lives being ruined. The court of Public opinion is an extremely ruthless place and we all are a part of it.

What all these people have done might be inexcusable in someone's book but this situation should have been approached in a more humane way.

The court of Law forgives but The court of public opinion never does .The same people who stand by you will abandon you in a second.

There's one thing common in all these people involved ,they have all become social outcasts. We have pushed them out of society with no remorse.Because all of us ,from both sides decided to hate each other and drag all these people to hell.

Most of us just needed a scapegoat to hate .Now that Build seems to be the victim, Build has been replaced by Poi and the other people involved .

We all tried to force all these people to be picture perfect and when they don't fulfill it we get angry.

Build,Poi and everyone involved will have to live with this until they die. There's no escape for them.

At the end of the day everyone including me were complicit in spreading hatred and anger and dividing ourselves and expelling all these people.

I should have looked at this case in a humane manner ,but I failed to do so. We can find their actions inexcusable but they are inevitably paying for everything that they have done.

Degrading ,mocking ,rejoicing about their downfall is not the way to go in my opinion.But then again how can I talk about morality when I myself am not a good person?

This actually showed me that people truly don't care about things like justice and the victim .They will care only care if it affects them. That's the reality and human nature. They will discard the person the moment the victim becomes the defendant.

I am no better either.

The truth is a bitter pill to swallow,but I can accept it when I am wrong.

Poi,Build and the other 3 kids are a product of their society. Their experiences would have shaped them to take all those decisions that they took. They are all imperfect. They are all human.We don't care about the real issue here.

But people can't be imperfect right?

Everyone has to be perfect right?It's easy to mock them right?

It's easy to ignore these problems right?

Build's tears are crocodile tears because he's a devil and not human enough to cry, am I right?

Poi shouldn't be sympathized with because she is crazy and delusional right ?

Those children and their parents should be shamed and mocked because they committed crimes right ?

It's easy ignore their struggles and not care because they no longer matter to us right?

We only need them as scapegoats just to hate them right ?

It's fun to see them dragged to hell right?

Degrading them, Dehumanizing them , sensationalizing this whole situation,dropping them when we can no longer seem to care , Ignoring how they feel because they are wrong feels good right ?

Let's not give them a voice because they are monsters right?

Their feelings don't matter anymore because we hate them right ?

How we failed them all. It took me a long while to accept this all but this is the bitter reality .And I was complicit in it as well. So I am no better .

Initially this was made under a meme about Build's resignation but now I made my own post about it. People shouldn't make memes out of the destruction of a person's life no matter how much you hate them.

[rosewould]

cynics; jns

part vi

masterlist

words; 7.1k

genre; angst & smut

warnings; hate comments mentioning suicide, revenge porn(?), depictions of rotting food, vomiting, sex w/ Jungwoo again, choking, rough sex, long dick!Jungwoo

preface; This took to long because I rewrote this about a dozen times and I'm glad I did. If I released that first idea I had, it would've been real bad lmao. I'm really proud of this chapter and if it flops more than usual I will experience a tragic ego death. Also first full smut scene whoo! It still feels weird putting on in this fic...

"you stupid piece of shit"

"rot in hell!"

"you should just fucking kill yourself"

"you'll pay for what you did"

Johnny couldn't focus on anything else. He tried to get more information but his phone kept buzzing. His shaky fingers turn off notifications for all the social media apps on his phone. No way those fucking idiots did this.

After getting no valuable information, Johnny opted to distract himself. No amount of video games, movies, or books could do the job. His heart never slowed. His hands wouldn't stop shaking. The words he was sent kept cutting through each thought. They have no proof it was YangYang or his friends, but a couple of streamers at the party reported seeing Naeun with YangYang, Lucas, and Johnny that night. YangYang seems to be public enemy number one since he was seen entering and exiting the bathroom by multiple witnesses. The biggest nail in the coffin being Dejun.

He was never involved in drama. When he was dragged into it, he approached the situation with objectivity and empathy. There were very few streamers unanimously loved and respected by the community. Whether it be their fandom, content, or questionable takes, there's always a caveat. Not Dejun. Everyone trusts Dejun.

"I did see her leave the bathroom with YangYang. Listen, I don't know much about the people involved. I don't want to stir up drama so carelessly like this, but there were only streamers at that party. Someone is responsible for this... disgusting deed and they should be held accountable. This could ruin Naeun's life. I don't care what you think about her or her content, this is completely unacceptable."

It was his biggest stream to date. This was one of the biggest scandals to hit the platform. This was bad. Extremely fucking bad. And it somehow got worse.

"What? What group chat?" Dejun searches google for everyone to see. Tens of thousands of people watch in awe as the shocking news is revealed. "There's a group chat for sharing female streamers' nudes?" Dejun raises his voice, face contorting in revulsion. "The source says it was started by streamers..."

That's when all hell broke loose. People had already made up their minds that YangYang took the pictures. Screenshots show the culprit confirming they were taken at the party. But now there were more culprits to be caught, and the pitchforks were out.

For once, the parasites had left Johnny's home. The one time he was afraid to be alone with his thoughts. How could they do something so reckless? So foolish? So rotten?

And Johnny associated himself with people like this. Let them in his house. Like it was instinctual, Johnny's eyes move toward the black sludge on the floor. His house was a pig sty. The smell was stomach wrenching. His flowers had all wilted. He stumbles toward his fridge, eyes watering as soon as he opens the door. He pinches his nose as he watches a hoard of flies flee from the rotting food. Unable to take it anymore, Johnny keels over, retching into a nearby garbage can. His stomach lurches as he empties its scarce contents. The smell of the garbage is no better. He can't escape the smell of rot as he heaves.

He continues to dry heave with nothing left to purge from his system. Unable to lose the overwhelming nausea.

-

You refresh Naeun's Twitter profile again. Her last update was the night of the party. You refresh again, unable to ignore the sinking feeling when no new tweets come up. You started following her on Twitch to see if you'd get a notification for a stream. Nothing.

"Whenever you feel up to it, consider telling your part of the story. No pressure."

It seemed like a no-brainer. Naeun probably feels alone right now. Her silence is beyond worrying. So why isn’t the ‘okay’ rolling off your tongue? Why does your face pinch up at the thought of doing so?

You feel even more guilty looking at your notifications. You’ve grown by thousands of followers. Your comment sections are all filled with love. You’re thriving.

“Our audience really loved you and we’ve been thinking, why don’t you join the Dreamies?”

No matter how much you tried, you couldn’t give anyone a clear answer. You couldn’t give yourself one. Touching either subject felt like touching fire. The more thought you put into it, the more you felt like recoiling from the subject altogether.

You refresh Naeun’s account again, letting out a heavy exhale at the lack of an update.

-

"I know you're still not happy with me after what I said that day." After a long, suffocating silence, Jisoo finally speaks, making you pick your head up.

"I don't really like how we left things either."

"Jisoo, I told you it's fine." You don’t look directly at her, just in her general direction.

"You don't want to talk about it, I can tell, but we have to. I don't like how I worded it, but there's a point at the core of what I said that I need you to understand."

You shut your eyes, face tense.

"I made it about me being frustrated with your relationship with those guys and I shouldn't have. The point I tried to make is this worrying cycle. No matter how poorly they treat you, you somehow end up around them. I don't think you've put enough thought into that." Jisoo leans closer to you from her spot on your bed, placing her hand on your knee. Her sincerity is difficult to ignore, it's difficult to keep up your guard. You still try, tensing up from her touch. You didn't want to have this talk. Not right now with all this going on.

"All the times I've run into them after I broke things off were not my doing. If anything they somehow end up around me." The lie was big enough to linger in your mind long after you spoke it. She didn't know you invited them in that night. She didn't know you were briefed about their presence at the party. There was a loud insistence in your mind that there was nothing to address. The sheer existence of the lie muffled that insistence.

Jisoo opens her mouth, hesitant to say what's on the tip of her tongue. "With the Naeun situation-"

"Ugh- Fuck! I don't want to talk about this! My pictures aren't in that group chat! YangYang didn't touch me! This has nothing to do with me!" You insist defensively. The root of the defensiveness perplexed you. If what you said was true, what was there to be defensive about? Never mind your trembling hands and increased heart rate. And that horrible feeling you got after saying the situation had nothing to do with you was formidable.

"Please, just listen!" Jisoo urges. She clenches her eyes shut, biting her quivering lip. "Who knows how many other girls there are? How many more girls are at risk to end up like Naeun?"

Her words gnaw at you, deepening the ache the guilt already caused. "Jisoo, I can't bring myself to understand why you're forcing me to think about this."

"It's because I think you're staying quiet to protect them." Jisoo answers quickly. She swallows hard. That feeling that she's hurting you is back, and without her frustration, it stings a lot more. "You have to understand that saying that is not easy. But you see now why I'm so worried, right? There is so much on the line if you stay quiet, but you're so adamant about it that my mind only went to one place." Jisoo says in a delicate voice.

"No. Absolutely not." You state bluntly. On the surface, it was downright ridiculous. What would you gain from protecting them?

"Okay, that's a relief," Jisoo breathes, "I just want you to think about it, okay?" She rubs your back and you nod. "And... just remember. The girls are probably afraid to speak up because they don't want their pictures to be leaked as well."

You grow rigid again when she brings the topic back up. "You don't have any material they can blackmail you with. Just... promise me you'll think about it?"

There it is. More reason for you to feel ashamed of not speaking up. There’s no excuse.

The air grows cold between the two of you and you pull away from her, all to Jisoo's dismay. "Can you leave, please? I'd like to be alone." You murmur.

Quietly, Jisoo stands from your bed. Once she reaches your door, she turns back to say something but decides against it. After you hear two sets of doors close you let out a shaky exhale. You ball your fists, trying and failing to contain your paralyzing concern.

-

"Look what I found!" You sing before flashing a toothy grin. Clasped in your fists were two bunches of pink and white larkspurs. Johnny gasps, pushing himself off the concrete ledge onto the plush grass.

"Oh my god... where did you find these?" He asks, excitement gleaming in his eyes. He cups his hands around your fists, gazing fondly at the flowers.

"That garden we saw out the window! Do you remember? Seventh grade?" You giggle, blissfully unaware of what you just admitted to. Johnny shouts your name before moving one hand to cover his mouth.

"So you stole?" YangYang stands from the spot he was sitting next to Johnny, an amused smirk on his face. You look at him, this stranger that just accused you of a crime, in disbelief.

"I did not! I mean... I did! But they won't even notice! They had tons! Show-offs." You counter defensively before blowing hair out of your face with a hardy puff of air.

"Yeah, that's still stealing. I didn't know the friend he's always going on about was a thief." His smug face still suggested he found humor in your reaction to his accusation.

"Who is this... guy?!" You turn your head slowly to look at Johnny with a bewildered expression.

"This is YangYang. And this is the girl I was telling you about." Johnny says, still pensive about the questionably acquired flowers.

"I kinda guessed as much. She's just like you described her-- well," YangYang turns from Johnny to you before pressing his lips into a thin line, "minus the thievery."

"Okay that's it. I'm going to the vending machines and when I come back! There better be no more troubling assumptions. But first," You lean forward to Johnny, whispering in his ear. His face turns red hot. "your hand, lovie."

Johnny looks down, his face searing even further if that were even possible. One of his hands was still firmly wrapped around your fist. He pulls away like he just got scorched. "Sorry!"

"Here." You press the flowers to his chest before smiling and kissing him on the cheek. If it were possible, his head would be engulfed in flames. YangYang watches you get a fair distance away before looking at Johnny.

"Dude, do you like her?" YangYang asks in genuine inquiry. Johnny clenches the flowers in his hands tighter before looking around the schoolyard.

"No! Of course not."

"I have never seen someone get so red in my life." He says with a knowing look.

"No! I don't! Why would I?" He whispers insistently.

"Why not?"

‘Why not?’, a straightforward question that complicated Johnny's thoughts. Realizing how reprehensible it was to say you were ugly like the other kids do, Johnny was left speechless. He didn't think you were ugly.

Noticing his struggle to answer, YangYang pats his arm. "Look, if you like her, what's so wrong with that? Liking someone isn't about pleasing everyone else."

His words stun Johnny even further, so he purses his lips and pats his arm a second time.

"YangYang! You comin' or what?" A group of boys that beckoned him earlier yell from across the field.

He walks backward as he sends Johnny a short wave. "Just some food for thought. See you later man."

-

"It wasn't me! Everyone is already accusing me with no substantial proof!" YangYang shouts, frenzied from his boisterous voice to his irregular body language.

"So you didn't take the photos." Taeyong's eyes linger on the computer, the reflection of the screen projected onto the lenses of his glasses. Only at the sound of YangYang's stammering does he calmly look up at him.

"I-I- You know what I mean! I didn't post the pictures on Twitter! That was someone else, probably a stupid fucking fanboy!" He only grows more frantic at Taeyong's indifferent accusation.

"So you did take the photos." He says with a look of disgruntled inquisition. YangYang panics, rushing closer to Taeyong, whose eyes follow him at every step. He raises his eyebrows, awaiting an answer. An answer that was already apparent by the time it took to be issued.

"You have to understand. I'm losing thousands of followers, I'm getting death threats, I've lost a shit-ton of sponsors, and streamers have come out to publicly denounce actions that haven’t been proven! Including that fucking snake, Mark." Each attempt of his to redirect his worry into anger fails once he notices Taeyong is still staring stonily. He's quiet for so long that everyone in the room feels like they're being held hostage. Taeyong opens his mouth, taking a quick inhale before speaking.

"Is that a yes or a no?"

"Please!" YangYang falls to his knees, clasping his hands together.

All Johnny could think about was all the good times he and YangYang had through the years. Comparing the YangYang from the past with the one he's been coexisting with for months now was near impossible. He seemed like a cool dude. Johnny would go as far as to call him a genuinely kind person.

How could his judgment have been so off? He knew he was up to no good, but this? This was too far, this was too much... There was no way it was in front of my eyes this whole time.

It was a throwaway thought to try and ease some of his bewilderment, but as soon as he put an ounce of thought into it, the proof kept coming.

The way he continuously belittled your emotions. His amusement at your misfortune. How eager he was to take advantage of you when he knew you were in a vulnerable state, twice.

But how was Johnny supposed to know that would amount to this? He’d never seen him treat anyone else that way. Maybe Lucas and Doyoung, but not YangYang. No, Johnny never saw this coming.

“Well, we got her ready for you.”

Nausea rumbled in his stomach, threatening to send him kneeling over a trash can again.

"I'm gonna take that as a yes." Taeyong stands from his dining room table. "I've been doing some damage control, I think I have things under control. One of my contacts was able to get in touch with an executive at Twitch. Bans have been lifted."

Lucas, Doyoung, and most importantly YangYang let out a sigh of relief. YangYang collapses to his hands and knees. "Thank you Taeyong! Thank you so much!" He sits up and rushes to open Twitch on his phone. Johnny looks around, the other two are on their phones as well. So that's it? The situation's over?

Naeun's voice early that morning kept ringing in his ears.

Suddenly YangYang's face falls. "How long is it going to take to lift the ban? It says I'm still banned for 30 days-"

The loud slam of Taeyong's laptop makes everyone in the room flinch. Even Nayeon looks pensive. He lets the silence linger as he throws his glasses on the table before glaring at YangYang.

"Don't you get it? You fucked up bad. There's no fixing it. When I said bans have been lifted, I didn't mean for any of you raging dickheads." Taeyong's voice booms, hitting every corner of the room. "Now I have to, essentially, rebuild this group from scratch."

"B-babe! I just want you to know that Johnny had nothing to do with this, okay? One less person to replace!" Nayeon rubs each of Taeyong's arms in an attempt to soothe him. He sighs, pinching his nose bridge.

"Doesn't matter. Johnny's reputation is salvageable. The only evidence against him is him talking to Naeun at the party. Everyone knew they were friends, so that can be explained away. These three?" Taeyong starts, gesturing at the three in question.

"My sources are estimating at least one hundred women with first-person accounts of being propositioned by you absolute idiots. You're about to be investigated for a crime. You're done." He stresses.

"Wait- what about her!" Doyoung frantically points to Nayeon. "She was in on it too! At least with ___!"

"She wasn't stupid enough to get caught. I don't care about what you do. Just how you do it. This was messy from the beginning, all it takes is common sense to know that starting a group chat was moronic. At least share them with each other. And for pictures of naked girls? You can find those for free!" Taeyong stresses, stunned and in disbelief.

"They make money off their bodies, why can't we?" Lucas finally speaks up after stewing in anger. He clenches his jaw, challenging Taeyong with his glare.

"Is that what's happening? What are you, an incel vigilante? And on top of all this, you did it for some extra pocket change?" Taeyong shows no interest in his challenge, instead looking at him like he's pathetic.

"We've made at least a hundred thousand total for access to the server. It's more than what you've ever done for us. And look how quickly you're turning your back on us! You'd be nothing without us!" Lucas shouts.

"Let me make sure I'm getting this right. I've barely done anything for you and-- in fact-- I'd be nothing without you? That's what this is?" Taeyong smiles menacingly. Everyone can feel how foreboding his words are, except for Lucas it seems.

"Yes! You practically begged us to join your streaming group! You promised to link us with sponsors and big streamers and then you just stopped!"

"Lucas shut the fuck up you're not helping." YangYang whispers angrily, pulling Lucas by his shirt. Lucas tugs his hand away, his anger and glare still directed at Taeyong.

"No! And the fact that you guys are still sitting here and taking this shit is downright embarrassing. Have a little self-respect." He fumed, looking around the room at his friend group and continuing to ignore the warning in their eyes.

"Poor, stupid Lucas. Always needing someone else to do all the work. It was hard, wasn't it?" Taeyong flashes Lucas a pout before his face grows rigid. "I can always show you what hard is really like. Do you want to see me at my most unhelpful? How about I make that happen for you." He spits with a scowl.

The threat clearly got to Lucas if his face was anything to go by. "W-whatever. I'm out of here. You guys can stay here and be his little lap dogs if you want." Taeyong puts his head down, letting the tall man pass. Once the door slams he speaks again.

"One thing's for sure, you guys were all quick to take control after I gave you a boost. That guy was doomed to fail." Taeyong straightens his tie before properly regarding the two of the stooges that were left. 

"If somehow the two of you make it out of this alive, I have no doubt you'll be just fine. However, I can't help you anymore." He presents them each with a tight smile and firm handshake. "Now get out of my house."

The two of them leave with one last apology and their tails between their legs.

"You were right to kick them out, babe. I could tell they were no good-"

"You know, one of the first things that impressed me about you was your intelligence. You pretend to be ditzy, but you know how to play your cards right. So it's baffling to me that you got yourself caught up in this." Taeyong doesn't turn to face her, he just stares out the large bay window illuminating his pristine living room.

"I'm sorry, it's just- she kept trying to make a move on you! Even you complained about it!"

"Exactly! I'm the one who has to deal with this bullshit! I've had to deal with it since high school!" He swings around to look at her, the anger he's held on a short leash getting closer to breaking free. "I've had to stomach her for years! I think you could deal with a little jealousy." He drives his finger into his own chest before pointing sharply at her.

His words shocked both Nayeon and Johnny, but for entirely different reasons. Nayeon nods, a blank stare all she could manage after being chewed out.

"Oh and darling, do yourself a favor and pretend to be the most outspoken activist you can possibly be for at least a year. I don't need to remind you what female viewers call you, right?"

"No. And will do." Nayeon mumbles and tries to smile, but it looks closer to a grimace.

"Good." Taeyong breaths. "Now we have to worry about convincing Mark and ___ to come back. She's the big one. Once she comes back it'll look like those three were the reason she left. Johnny, I'm counting on you for that."

Johnny feels like he hasn't been truly present since YangYang confirmed his involvement. All he could focus on was how much harm had been done.

"If you can't do it, I could probably convince her pretty easily-"

"No." Johnny says, looking as if he's just come to an earth-shattering realization. After everything that's been done, now he wants to drag you back here to make you suffer again. "Taeyong… she told us flat out she was miserable here."

Taeyong exhales amusedly, looking at Johnny like he just doesn't get it. 

"If that's what the two of you choose to believe, have it your way. At the end of the day, there's a reason we all ended up together. She's the one that invited me to be friends with the two of you. You invited YangYang. Doyoung and Lucas came on their own but you two welcomed them in with open arms. Nayeon is the only person the two of you didn't approve of. So don't stand there and act like these horrible people were forced onto both of you."

It felt like deja vu, the way Johnny felt himself getting more hysterical with each word Taeyong said. "I didn't know they were capable of this!"

"So you're drawing the line now?"

Johnny was ready to argue, get years worth of pent up anger for this man off his chest. Yet, with just six words, all that fighting spirit was ripped from his body. Seeming content with Johnny's silence, he continues.

"Deep down you knew who you associated yourself with. Besides, you're not so innocent yourself." Taeyong reaches for Nayeon's arm, watching with pity as Johnny grapples with his guilty conscious being pulled to the forefront. "Leave whenever you're done sulking."

-

"EVEN IN HER ABSENCE, EUNPRIL'S SUBSCRIBER AND FOLLOWER COUNTS SKYROCKET"

"VIDEOS SHOWCASING TWITCH STREAMER EUNPRIL'S NUDE PHOTOS SPREAD ON ADULT SITES"

"POPULAR STREAMER EUNPRIL'S PARENTS BEG INTERNET USERS TO STOP SPREADING HER EXPLICIT PHOTOS"

Attached to each and every new article is a blurred picture of Naeun's body. People are posting the photos on Twitter as a joke. Miles away from each other, both you and Johnny torture yourselves. Your eyes were straining from staring at your phones all day. You both could barely sleep, not with the potent feeling of remorse churning in your stomachs. The only difference is that Johnny was alone.

"Why are you torturing yourself, babe?" Jungwoo reaches over and covers your phone screen. You shut your eyes and sigh. By now they were uncomfortably dry. You lock and drop your phone on your nightstand. Jungwoo waits for you to respond but you don't say anything. "Beating yourself up isn't gonna solve anything, okay?"

"She still hasn't said anything.” You respond weakly as you stare at nothing in particular. “Radio silent."

\\ | //

Johnny: remember when we were talking about our school experiences?

Johnny: you told me you’d rather cut off a limb than go back to high school

Johnny: I thought about that a lot after you said it. I mean, yeah, who wouldn’t, unless you peaked back then

Johnny: I guess I felt validated by that a tiny bit. I know it’s hyperbole and you probably wouldn’t actually do that

Johnny: but I don’t think that’s such an absurd sentiment

No answer. Not even a flash of a typing animation.

Johnny: I just found out they were charging people for entry into the group chat

Johnny: it makes me sick to my stomach

Johnny: I can’t

Johnny: I can’t process this at all

The screen is filled top to bottom with his unanswered messages. The longer he stares, the more he’s faced with the possibility of her ignoring him.

\\ | //

"She's probably just waiting for everything to die down. That's normal for situations like this. I'm sure she's okay."

Not even a short tweet giving her fans notice that she's taking a break. No Instagram story with an immediate reaction. Nothing. "If I come out against YangYang..." You start, making Jungwoo shift forward from behind you on the bed. "Won't it just make everything more complicated? I don't have proof, so what will I contribute, really?"

Jungwoo lets the silence after you speak linger as he figures out an appropriate response. His mouth hangs open, really giving his words thought to avoid overwhelming you further, lest you stay bedridden.

"I'm gonna be honest. I haven't known you for a huge amount of time, but this doesn't sound like you talking." Jungwoo says, resting a warm hand on your side. When you don't answer he sighs, sitting up on his knees. "When I first met you, you had some problems with self-esteem. You'd claim that the things you said were stupid and agree with insults directed at you. But you still didn't let anything get in between you and the things you believed in. The woman I met freshman year did whatever she could to stick up for people who couldn't stick up for themselves. She didn't let anyone pressure her out of it, either."

There were so many moments during your school years when you begged, hoped, and prayed for things to change. That you'd wake up, get on the bus with Johnny, and not be afraid to enter the building. But time after time, you were shown how truly powerless you were.

Seeing other people in similar situations like that felt like you were watching yourself. Or worse. It felt like you were witnessing Johnny in pain all over again. You wish you could say your passion ceased once you came to terms with your past and that you stopped caring about Johnny.

Putting things into perspective, your decline of passion coincided with the berating starting to get to you. The more the boys belittled you, the less confident you were in your actions. It wasn’t long until you started questioning everything you’ve done, or if you’re actually helping the people around you. Did you actually ever help Johnny?

\\ | //

Johnny: if you’re seeing this, please just give me a sign

Johnny: anything

Johnny: you don’t even have to answer, just let me know you’re there

There was no one there to soothe Johnny’s thoughts. If he were in school again, you’d be there to pet his head and tell him not to worry about Taeyong. But you weren’t there. So Johnny continued to recollect every nasty action he ignored or even encouraged.

Johnny: you deserve justice for what happened to you

Johnny: people are on your side, if you came out and confirmed that you slept with YangYang that night and he asked for a picture, that’ll be the end for them

He drops his hand by his side, finally looking up from the screen after what seemed like hours. He sank his head into the plasticky pillows of his hotel room, looking up at the ceiling. The material crinkles right next to his ears, but its impact fails to penetrate his overworked brain.

I didn’t know.

What could I have done?

It wasn’t me.

Every attempt was a shot in the dark. Why wasn't this feeling fading, would it ever fade? Would he feel like this forever? The thought of that sends Johnny spiraling, desperate for a temporary buffer for this suffocating feeling. There was one place he would go that always helped him when he was alone. Imagining he was in a familiar pair of arms with your voice playing into his ears like a soft melody.

“Johnny, why are you crying? Please don’t cry. We’ll be okay, everything will be okay.”

Johnny takes a deep breath and holds it, letting his mind drift away for at least one moment. 

Everything will be okay.

He brushes away a tear with his thumb before lifting his phone back up. Upon catching a glimpse of the typing indicator, Johnny sits up straight. His thumbs are frantic as they type.

Johnny: hi!

Johnny: I’m so glad to see you’re here

Johnny: I’ve been so worried, you haven’t been updating any of your socials

Being faced with Naeun’s silence once again, the guilt spreads further than can be ignored. There's only so much he can do with your memory before the guilt from that tears away at him as well. Tears stream down his face as he stares at his texts.

Johnny: please, do anything but ignore me

Johnny: yell at me, tell me I’m a piece of shit

Johnny: I’m dying here

Through his tears, he is forced to face the facts. She doesn’t want to talk to him. Not even to chide him. What if this is it? If she quits? Never speaks to him again? Never shows her face publicly?

With the suffocation at full force by now, Johnny succumbs to it, collapsing into the bed.

Johnny: I’m so sorry

\\ | //

“You’re not speaking again,” Jungwoo says defeatedly. You let in a fractured inhale, softly shutting your eyes in an attempt to ground yourself. With a slow exhale, you let them open again.

“I’m sorry. Where were we?” You turn around in your bed to face Jungwoo before leaning in for a kiss. It’s short and tender, efficient in its job of distracting you.

“We were talking about Naeun.” Jungwoo says in a low voice, wariness evident in the raise of his brows. Your grin stretches wide as you wrap your arms around his waist and pull him closer. “No, before that.”

“We were cuddling if I recall correctly.” He tilts his head to the side and peers down at you with narrowed eyes.

“I recall neck kisses. Why did you stop?” You expose your neck invitingly, raking your fingernails up his sides and causing him to shiver. He quirks his jaw, privy to what you’re pulling. Still, he swiftly shifts the two of you so that you’re on your back and he’s hovering over you. You gasp when he grabs your legs and pulls your crotch level with his. When he grinds down you inhale sharply.

“Don’t think you’re getting away scot-free.” Jungwoo grunts, the way his hips rock into you is rough, but how hard his cock is already shows how much he’s craving you as well.

“Yeah, yeah, we’ll talk of course. You owe me this anyway.” You purr the last part before wrapping your legs around his hips and pulling him harder against you. He coos, pouting as he brushes your hair out of your face.

“You must’ve been so needy without me here.” He tugs your shorts down, stretching the drawstring hem over your hips. He slips them off one leg, lifting the other higher to finally free them. He turns his head to plant a wet kiss on your calf. You hum, making quick work of your underwear before pulling Jungwoo back down by his shirt. With your left hand, you rummage through your nightstand before coming across a condom. He shoves his own underwear down, just enough to free his dick. After grabbing the condom from your hand, he rolls it on before brushing his tip against your clit. You shudder at the feeling.

Being filled with a comforting fire, you pull Jungwoo in for a hungry kiss, wasting no time licking inside his mouth. He eagerly kisses back, the force of his actions pushing your body flush against your bed. You moan inside his mouth as he pushes past your lips and enters your wet and swollen hole. You pull back to look at him with pleading eyes, attempting to communicate how painfully in need of this you were. He answers by capturing your lips again and thrusting you into the bed.

You yelp, Jungwoo was just a little too long for his own good. Each thrust brings his hips slamming against yours and you bite your lip. “T-too much.” you squeeze out.

“Hm, thought you wanted my cock?” He chuckles, shallowing his thrusts before leaning next to your ear. “Can’t handle all of it?” He snakes a hand up your chest and wraps it around your throat. You whimper as tears well up in your eyes. Your thighs clench around his hips subconsciously. Jungwoo huffs.

“Sending me mixed signals, darling.” He uses his grip on your throat to hold you against the bed as he leans away. His tongue darts out to moisten his lips as his dark eyes gaze into yours. “Is it too much or do you want me to really give it to you?” He quirks his brow as he watches you struggle. Jungwoo only fucks you like this when one of you wants to blow off steam or when he really needs to fuck. Right now it must be somewhat both since you know he can tell this whole situation is bothering you.

For the past week, you’ve been buzzing with a complicated emotion. You’ve barely had a moment to rest, physically and mentally. Actually, you can’t remember the last time you completely relaxed. There has always been at least one pressing issue weighing on you since middle school.

You’ve always been wary about, well, a lot of things. Scared of getting hurt. But thinking logically, what would actually happen? You won’t die, that’s for sure. Why shouldn’t you indulge in the things you really want to do?

“I wanna do it.” You grunt, pulling Jungwoo’s hand from around your neck. “I’m joining the Dreamies.”

“Wait, what?” Jungwoo’s entire aura changes as he’s filled with confusion.

“I’m just so sick of being worried about the things I want. I want a thriving career. I want to exist in a non-toxic environment. I want trustworthy friends who treat me well!” You ramble at the confused man above you.

“Okay, that’s great! What about what we were-” You cut him off by tugging him closer by his collar.

“I want you to fuck me hard and deep.” You hiss.

“You’re okay? I know I was trying to be sexy earlier but I actually wanna know if you can take it-”

“Just fuck me Jungwoo.” You say exasperatedly. He chuckles before flipping you over and hiking your hips higher.

“That can be arranged.” He grunts as he carefully inserts himself back into you. “Any updates on opening up about the Naeun thing…” He trails off, expecting you to cut him off.

“We were finishing what we started first, remember?”

\\ | //

The sudden noise of his phone ringing makes Johnny flinch. He sniffles, wiping away his tears before getting a better look at the name. He answers and slowly lifts the phone to his ear.

“Jaehyun? It’s been so long man!” Johnny says before clearing his throat, scrambling to sit at the edge of the bed.

“Indeed it has! I just heard about all this stuff and wanted to check up on you.” Jaehyun sounds just as sprightly as Johnny remembers. Johnny chuckles awkwardly.

“Y-yeah, it’s been a really… revealing situation.”

“I bet. As soon as I heard about it and heard about the accusations against you I thought, “no, couldn’t be Johnny”. I knew you’d never do something so despicable, that’s what I told Dejun.”

Is this why Dejun hasn’t been accusing Johnny? He’s been following him closely, waiting for his name to come up, but Dejun has yet to say anything regarding him. It was something Johnny started to think was inevitable. Any moment now, Dejun would end Johnny’s career for good. But he didn’t. And the hate has been ever so slightly clearing up. Which should make him feel better.

After Johnny doesn’t respond, Jaehyun continues. “Anyway, I also wanted to see if you were down to hang out like old times, maybe even stream together like we did at the very beginning. Without our old shitty webcams, of course.” Jaehyun says, jokingly assuring Johnny.

Johnny forces a short laugh. “Right, of course. Just like old times. I’d be happy to hang out with you again.”

“Cool. Ooh! Speaking of old times! How’s ___ doing? Think she could meet up too?”

\\ | //

“Ah- fuck!” You curl your fingers into your sheets as his cock barrels deeper than you thought possible. At first it was uncomfortable, then something primal unleashed within you the more his tip smashed against your cervix. “So fucking good-” You keen, pushing your ass back to meet his thrusts.

“I can feel you clenching. Gonna cum around my dick? Hm?” He reaches for your head and tugs at your hair. You moan embarrassingly loud, never answering him in favor of babbling nonsense. “Don’t go dumb on me now.”

He doesn’t help when he pounds into you harder than before, focusing less on speed and more on the power of his thrusts. You can feel him in your stomach, rearranging your guts like you’ve heard people raving about. It truly is all it’s cracked up to be.

“Make me cum please I want it so bad!” You mumble through sobs, feeling the intense pressure build up in your stomach. When he pushes your head into the bed your moans increase in pitch. Each thrust makes your legs quiver with more fervor. With an especially hard thrust, Jungwoo sends his tip so deep you can feel it in your toes. A sharp shriek flies from your throat as your hips fly backward and push flush against his. You jerk against him as your walls squeeze around his cock, gushing cum until it drips down your thighs.

“That’s it. Cum all over me.” He breathes, continuing to push your head into the pillows. You whimper as you come down from your high, feeling overcome with exhaustion. You plop down, collapsing into the covers. “Ah ah, I’m not down with that cunt of yours.” He plops down with you, hips finding yours again while his dick easily slips back in. You wince, but you love the feeling of his warmth as he ruts against you. Your phone rings and you smirk as you slap your hand against it.

“Be good.” You look back and mutter before answering. “Hello?”

“Hey! It’s Jaehyun! Remember me?”

You gasp, hoisting yourself up on your elbows. “Jaehyun?! Oh my god, it’s been so long! Of course I remember you.” You say incredulously, trying not to laugh at Jungwoo’s careful thrusts.

“Just checking, just checking. Seems like so much has changed. What’s this I’m hearing about you and Johnny not being in touch?”

Your smile falls, you maneuver your phone into your shoulder. “Yeah, things happen I guess.”

“Things happen?! You guys were the definition of inseparable! And friends since middle school? That’s a bond that’s hard to come by.”

You couldn’t blame him for being shocked. He wasn’t there to witness the transition. Seeing the two of you as high school seniors versus now is like witnessing two completely different sets of people.

“You know what I always told you, right?” Jaehyun says, and you could see the leery look on his face. He really hasn’t changed.

“I remember. You told us our friendship was too special to throw away.” You repeat, trying not to sound as unenthusiastic as you feel.

“I meant that then and I mean it now. The two of you just felt like you really got each other. More than that, you really helped each other.”

“Yeah.” You say louder than you meant to, desperately wanting to change the subject.

“Now that I know you guys are going through all this without each other, I definitely need to come. I’d hate to see you guys struggling.”

Again, the sincerity is really hard for you to ignore.

“It means a lot Jaehyun, and I really want to see you, but I think Johnny and I are a lost cause.” You explain earnestly.

“No way. I just can’t believe that, I’m seriously floored right now. Did you guys kiss or something? Because everyone was banking on you guys getting together.”

“No! Oh my god- it was nothing like that!” You start to blush at his words, and not at the fact that Jungwoo was cumming into his condom behind you. “Me and Johnny? No!”

“Why are you guys talking about Johnny?” You ignore Jungwoo who’s throwing away his used condom.

“Whatever happened, we can talk about it when I’m in your city. We’re gonna see each other at TwitchCon anyway, but I’d like to hang out with you guys before then.”

“Oh yeah definitely. I’m just not so sure about hanging out all together.” You report joylessly.

“For sure, I understand. I’ll make an effort to swing by your place whenever you’re free or go meet up somewhere else, just let me know.”

“Will do, I can’t wait to see you again.” Your previous excitement was completely wiped clean despite your efforts.

“Talk to you soon!”

“See ya, Jaehyun.”

You end the call and place your phone on your nightstand. It wasn’t the first time you’d heard someone say that. Everyone had teased you two about dating or liking each other. You thought it was just that, teasing. Especially since watching Johnny vehemently insist you weren’t dating seemed amusing to them. Never did you think it was serious.

“I ask again, why were you talking about the dickhead?” A puzzled Jungwoo asks as he puts his clothes on.

“I was talking to an old friend. He didn’t know about everything that happened.”

Jungwoo hisses knowingly. “That must be so awkward for both of you.”

“I-it’s like very awkward.” You shake his words about you and him dating out of your mind.

“I’m gonna jet, but I’ll text you later.” Jungwoo says as he pockets his phone. You sigh and roll your eyes.

“This simply won’t do. I need someone to fuck that doesn’t have a girlfriend.”

“Good luck finding someone who’ll make you scream like I just did.” Jungwoo says before your door clicks closed.

When he leaves, you’re able to fully reminisce about your times with Jaehyun before he moved away. Johnny solidified your love for gaming, but Jaehyun ignited your love for streaming. It was extremely fun, and even more sad when he left.

They were good times, but they were in the past.

taglist; @baehaechannie @maximumdreamchild @safariria

[dylanobriengossip]

Dylan O'Brien's new problematic girlfriend Rachael Lange (2023) I Part 2

Part 1 I Part 3 I Part 4

Just when you thought things couldn't get any worse…. more disturbing things came to light.

Taylor Swift, Harry Styles & Selena Gomez

Everyone knows Dylan is a Swiftie and also starred in Taylor's "All Too Well: The Short Film" and they have also been friends for a couple years now. Let's see what Rachael thinks of Taylor:

Interesting... because back in 2011 she claimed to be a Swiftie. 🙃 Rachael (2nd from the left) with friends at what seems to be a Taylor Swift concert. The caption of the pic that one of her friends shared (fb): "Taylor Swift! Never grow up…stay this little.."

Dylan is also a fan of Harry Styles.

And many years ago Dylan used to have a crush on Selena Gomez.

After Rachael got exposed:

She went private on Twitter and deleted over 400+ Tweets (which is already an insane number) but yet still hasn't managed to delete all problematic ones 🤦‍♀️

Blocked those who called her out on all her social media accounts

Deleted the Instagram post (she had during that time) where everyone commented and called her out

Restricted the comments on all her Instagram accounts so only the ones who follow her can comment now

She also censors the comments, only those comments that praise her and whatnot are accepted to show up in the comments

Untagged herself from all the posts she was tagged in where you can see her with Dylan at the Ami Paris Fashion Week Show

Rachael deleted this video after she got backlash for it

Deleted the TikTok video where she was called out but forgot to delete the comments on her other videos

Deactivated her TikTok account but made it public again recently

The Apology

January 23, 2023 After doing all these things to hide what she did/said in the past she posted this Apology on her Twitter (obviously it had to be shared there bc that's where it happened) but it was also good enough for her to share it in a 24h TikTok Story.

You probably ask yourself why are people still upset about it. She apologized and everything is okay now. No not really because she never shared it on her Instagram account where her most followers are and obviously people also called her out on there too and not just on Twitter and TikTok. And let's be honest after all those things she said more than just that apology should have been done. So if that doesn't speak volumes... And not to forget all those marginalized communities she offended and hurt by those words. Do you really think they will be like: "She was young and didn't know better.", "Now she apologized. Just let us brush it under the rug." Even if you're not someone from those communities just take some time to think about how you would feel if you were in their position. Doesn't feel great right? So don't expect them to just accept that apology and forget about what she said. It doesn't matter what age you are. There never was and never will be a time when it's okay to say any of those things. So many other people in that age know that this is wrong and never did. So please stop defending her. She was old enough to know saying these things is wrong but kept doing it anyway. Was that apology (if she even wrote that herself or got somebody else to do it for her) genuine or not? That's up to you to decide and if you accept that or not. Everyone thinks differently about this and has a different opinion.

But think about this. What does it tell you about a person who:

After being exposed was like: "Oh no. Wait let me quickly go private on Twitter to try to remove all of that so no one can hold that against me anymore." (Screenshots exist for a reason so that didn't make things better for you or made ppl forget that js).

Again never shared that apology on her Instagram, the place with her most followers

Waited until things cooled off and didn't post anything until like a month later and came back with a post to make promo for her brand (Seriously!?! You've got to be kidding me). 🤦‍♀️

You would think someone who said all those things would do more to prove to people that they changed especially after that big amount of disgusting things. But what is Rachael doing? She keeps ignoring the elephant in the room and went back to regularly posting as if nothing happened. And remember that part where she untagged herself from posts about her and Dylan? Well.... the more and more she felt safe and made people think she changed the more she made their relationship public on her Instagram. While (as always) keeps ignoring the fact that this is damaging her & her boyfriend's reputation/image even more thanks to all those things that came out about her. How? Read that here

And as if all of that hasn't been bad enough already. They also found these:

TikTok

Rachael posted this video on her TikTok account back in 2021.

"I’m grossly proud of my scrunchie and bag coordination #fyp"

Funny you say that Rachael because...

x, x, x, x, x, x

Source

Her old AskFM account

Ana (Logan Lerman’s girlfriend) you should keep an eye out on your new bestie Rachael. 👀

Her Family

Rachael with her parents Michael and Shirley and her brother Kyle Lange.

Her brother

"In 2014, a warrant was issued for the arrest of Kyle who was 21 at the time of Friendswood, for Aggravated Assault with a Deadly Weapon. Kyle and his girlfriend were fighting in the driveway of Lange's residence in the 2000 block of Pebble Lane on August 12. The girlfriend called a friend to pick her up, but when the friend arrived, Lange allegedly threatened them both with a handgun. His bond was set at $80,000 for the Aggravated Assault with a Deadly Weapon Charge, but no bond was set for the drug charges since Lange was serving two years of felony probation for Possession of Psilocybin." Source I x

Then there are these 2 Instagram Stories of him from 2023: x, x

Rachael and her mom

and then there's this more recent one of Rachael from a couple years ago.

[discluded]

Hi discluded,

This is about your post about Build Poi situation. This is me asking permission to make my own post and reblogging with yours .

I just wanted to address some things in your post . I want to continue from where you left off. Is it ok if I reblog your post with the new addition?

The most important thing is the medical misinformation in your post . Anti depressants don't cause abortion and if they do the doctor and the entire hospital will be held accountable. Depression and stress may lead to abortion but not antidepressants. I want to clarify this in a clear and detailed manner.

And about your sources from Twitter,

There is a credibility issue. I want to clarify all these issues in my post.

I am not contesting the fact that Build made terrible tweets.

But the sources are unreliable.

1. @allecsirp48 has been caught committing identity theft. They have been making racist comments against Chinese people , Islamophobic comments and mysogynistic comments using stolen pictures from another person. This is an ongoing issue with them.

2. @idcabuu account has now been deactivated most probably fearing the legal consequences. All their tweets have been deleted. They also spread a lot of fake allegations. So they will also most probably have a lawsuit now.

I just want to update this situation and determine the truth. We can all stand with whoever we like,but at the end I think we should present the truth.

Though Poi is the defendant now,she is still innocent until proven guilty.

I wanted to ask you permission to update this, because this documentation was initially started by you. I just want to continue from where you left off. I didn't want to reblog your post and address all those issues without your permission.

And I didn't want to ask you this behind an anonymous mask.I will respect whatever decision you make. If you don't like it,I will make my own post about it,but please make sure to address that medical misinformation in your post.That is a very serious thing.

Thank you very much for reading .

please make your own post... you can link mine but I'm not looking for additional notes on the post. thanks!

edit: also I don't care about the case but I do work in public health so I care about medical misinformation and I want to correct that you said about increase risk of miscarriage with anti depressants. the results are mixed but here's some more recent research using the Danish registries and a more specific analytic plan to tease out the results.

Conclusions: Antidepressant use in the first trimester is associated with an increased risk of miscarriage when compared with either nondepressed or depressed unexposed women, even after accounting for induced abortions. The [increased] risk of miscarriage relative to unexposed, nondepressed women was 30% for antidepressant-exposed women and 10% for unexposed depressed women. The miscarriage [increased] risk for antidepressant users compared with unexposed depressed women was 20%

citation: Almeida ND, Basso O, Abrahamowicz M, Gagnon R, Tamblyn R. Risk of Miscarriage in Women Receiving Antidepressants in Early Pregnancy, Correcting for Induced Abortions. Epidemiology. 2016 Jul;27(4):538-46. doi: 10.1097/EDE.0000000000000484.

Epidemiology is one of the preeminent public health journals. Often, there aren't data to corroborate whether or someone should stop or start medication and leave the advisement to personal choice and/or what their personal physician thinks is best.

[random-thought-depository]

Are these comments the revealing glimpse into far-right brain rot I think they are?

"Newsom's reparations committee will recommend handing out $223,200 per person to all descendants of slaves in California for 'housing discrimination' at cost of $559BN"

Can't tell much about this proposal, because we're learning about it from a screenshot of a tweet. If this were a real thing, I would indeed have some issues with it. A wealth transfer that massive should really be done on the basis of class/wealth/income, not race, and it would probably be better to give smaller payments to more people ($223,000 per person instantly makes the recipients upper middle class). But this pales in comparison to the most important and obvious fact about this proposal: it's never going to happen.

Sanity check: the U.S. political class hates giving poor people nice things and does so only in stingy and grudging ways. This is a country where a public option for Obamacare was considered unacceptably radical. This is a country where Yangbucks ($1000 per person per month, basically a poverty income UBI) is something between radical and utopian. This is a country where the closest thing to UBI accessible to people who aren't elderly or disabled is a few hundred dollars per month per person that can only be spent on cold food (this is in "blue" California). This is a country where one of the great leftist policy triumphs is old age Social Security payments, which for my mom is... a little more than $1000 per month (at that rate it would take more than 16 years of SS payments to add up to one of those hypothetical $223,000 checks). This is a country where we have a massive housing affordability crises but the obvious Keynesian center-left solution of having the government build lots housing (that isn't a sort guaranteed to instantly turn into wretched crime-ridden hovels) and sell or rent it at or near cost is so pie in the sky you almost might as well ask for full communism. This is a country where the government's eagerness to stop paying people to stay home in the face of a plague was palpable. I've been talking about class, cause slavery reparations would probably structurally resemble a welfare program (it's the government mailing checks to people, probably after some eligibility testing) and one of its main selling points is that it would functionally be an inefficient welfare program for the black poor, but if we want to talk about race, this is a country where affirmative action, which is basically a right to work program that doesn't involve any direct subsidies, is massively controversial.

The government of California is never going to write every black Californian a $223,000 check. No serious politician will have "write every black Californian a $223,000 check" as part of their platform. If Newsom runs for President, "slavery reparations of $223,000 per person" will not be part of his platform. At least, none of these things will happen in the foreseeable future. I make these predictions with great confidence because these scenarios are totally inconsistent with the rest of how the US government and US politics works. The accusation of virtue signaling is the closest these right-wingers get to the truth of the matter: an uncharitable diagnosis of a totally politically unrealistic "proposal" like this is it exists to lend centrist liberal politicians and political institutions an appearance of radicalism while imposing no substantial commitments on them; it's a relatively safe thing for establishment centrist liberal politicians to make non-committal approval noises toward precisely because it's politically impossible and will never happen.

But these right-wingers (pretty sure that's what most of them are) seem to think this is a serious proposal that might actually happen. They seem to believe this is a thing that might happen, or at least a thing that might be seriously advocated by a major politician and plausible Presidential candidate. They seem to believe they live in a country where "the government writes every black person a $223,000 check" is a thing that might actually happen, or at least a thing a major politician might actually advocate for.

Like, damn, are their intuitions about what is and isn't politically plausible actually that badly calibrated? I know a lot of right-wingers are firmly embedded in a fictional alternate universe of misinformation, but I didn't think it was that bad.

[longlivelindsay]

My Twitter Rant

Okay, so I won't say I'm done with Twitter. That would be a lie. I don't have many followers (nor do I care how many followers I have) on my Taylor Swift account.

But I have 22k on my political account and it's very important. People trust me to do research and give them unbiased news. And, yes, I DO give my VERY biased liberal opinions as well, and they listen to those, too. But it's really important to me that I have 22k people who actually care what I have to say, care about my opinion, especially since I have a political blog that's very important to me. (I would love to write about politics for a real publication!) Politics is an issue that's very important to me. I'm involved in politics in my city, and Twitter is just another way I can get the word out there.

And Elon has been ruining Twitter for a while now. When I go to my home page, the minority of what I should see are my friends' tweets. Now, mostly what I see are right-wing tweets. I'm fine with hearing other opinions because I think I can learn from them, but 99% of what I see should be tweets of who I follow. I follow them because I WANT TO HEAR WHAT THEY SAY. But I rarely see their tweets now. Twitter wasn't political before Elon was in charge. I didn't see left-wing political posts on my home page from people I didn't follow. I just saw my friends' tweets. Honestly, what is the point of using Twitter when I can't even see what the hell the people I follow are saying? I follow them for a REASON.

And if I can't see them, they can't see me. Which bothers me because I loved the interaction and civil debates we would have. It made me more well-informed and intelligent. It often changed my mind and made me a better person.

So here I am on Tumblr. I don't want to make a political Tumblr because I want to save interesting issues to write about for my political blog. Twitter has been a great source of interaction for me.

So I started a Taylor Swift account. And that was a great source of interaction for me, too! I met some very cool people! And just like Twitter, I honestly don't give a shit if people like or reblog or comment on my posts because I'm' 37 and I have better things to do than worry about stupid shit on social media -- and this isn't going to be the same kind of topic where I have well-informed, civil debates, and conversations about our country. (I mean, I love Taylor, but seriously.)

But I really miss interacting with people. I miss talking with people. I'm an extrovert and NEED to interact with people. And I'm just not finding that here.

And, okay, I might not. Because I'm doing Tumblr MY way and not the way I think I'm supposed to. But, like I said, I'm 37 and I don't give a shit about what I do on social media.

I just hope I do. So If you want to interact with a crazy lady, I'd love to talk to you. (And I promise I won't talk politics!)

[veruz29]

David Crosby, Byrds and Crosby, Co-Founders of Stills & Nash, Dies at 81

Singer-songwriter and guitarist David Crosby is the founder of two of the most popular and influential rock bands of the 1960s: The Byrds and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Nash (later Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young). was a founding member, his representative said. he was 81 years old. No motive of loss of life has been announced.

His death came as a surprise to those who followed his highly active Twitter account. One of Crosby's last tweets the day before he died was a typical joking comment about heaven.

"I heard this place is overrated... it's cloudy."

Former CSNY partner Graham Nash, who has been estranged from Crosby in recent years when their groups have gone their separate ways, paid tribute on his social media. "I am deeply saddened to learn of the passing of my friend David Crosby," Nash wrote. “People tend to focus on the explosiveness of our relationship, but what David and I have always treasured above all is the music we create together, the sounds we discover together. , and the sheer joy of the deep friendships we shared, over the years.  

“He left a huge void of character and talent in this world. He spoke his heart, heart and passion through his beautiful music and left an incredible legacy. My heart goes out to his wife Jan, son Django and all the people he touched in this world."

Eight months ago, Crosby announced he was done with his live performance, saying, "I'm too old to do it anymore. I don't have stamina. I have no strength." But he recorded as hard as he could, said:

"I was making records really fast. …I'm 80 now, so I'm going to die soon. That's how it works. December when he changed his mind:

“Can I say it? … Maybe we should form another band and go to a live show.” 



In recent years, when CSNY seems irrevocably estranged, it's clear that what Crosby wants above all else is to reconcile with these bandmates. That didn't happen, but Stephen Stills said in his own statement on Thursday night that their relationship ended peacefully.

Stills wrote, via a series of tweets, “This morning I read a newspaper quote attributed to composer Gustav Mahler that made me pause for a moment:

“Death entered the room on gentle cat feet. I should have known something had happened.

“David and I have hit our heads a lot of times over the years, but mostly stares, but it still numbs our skulls,” Stills continued. "I'm happy to be at peace with him. He is certainly a great musician, and his sense of harmony is second to none. The glue that binds us together as our voices soar, like Icarus, toward the sun. I am deeply saddened by his passing and will miss him immensely.

In recent years, when CSNY seems irrevocably estranged, it's clear that what Crosby wants above all else is to reconcile with these bandmates. That didn't happen, but Stephen Stills said in his own statement on Thursday night that their relationship ended peacefully.

Stills wrote, via a series of tweets, “This morning I read a newspaper quote attributed to composer Gustav Mahler that made me pause for a moment:

“Death entered the room on gentle cat feet. I should have known something had happened.

“David and I bumped our heads a lot of times, but mostly staring but still leaving us skulls numb,” Stills continue. He is certainly a great musician, and his sense of harmony is second to none. The glue that holds us together as our voices soar, like Icarus, toward the sun. I am deeply saddened by his passing and will miss him immensely.

Crosby returned to the public consciousness strongly in 2019 with a theatrical documentary, “David Crosby:

Remember My Name,” narrated and produced by Cameron Crowe. Crosby opened up about his own death in the film, and Crowe pointed that out in an interview with Variety, saying that the singer thought about ""telling the truth in the last big interview that he did. I will probably never do"... In the second Question from the first interview we did with Crosby," Crowe noted, "he immediately brought up the question 'Time is simple. the last money eyes as if he were on a hospital bed. He's not in a hospital bed at all! Maybe it's all a hoax, as he says at the end. You do not know.

Along with bandmates Roger McGuinn, Gene Clark, Chris Hillman, and Michael Clarke, Crosby set the template for L.A.'s '60s. folk-rock in the Byrds during his tumultuous 1964-67 tenure in the band.

In association with Buffalo Springfield's Stephen Stills and Hollies' Graham Nash amid the glitzy Laurel Canyon scene of late '60s Los Angeles, Crosby launched CS&N, the 1968 multi-platinum debut that ushered in rock supergroup era.

The addition of another unstable member, Stills' former colleague in Buffalo Springfield, Neil Young, added to the commercial appeal of the action. However, an ongoing conflict of egos within Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, fueled by the rock excesses of the time, toppled the band in the '70s, despite the members' It has regrouped sporadically over the years as a recording and touring unit. Crosby's most stable relationship is with Nash:

The duo recorded and toured regularly into the new millennium.

While he was never a lead songwriter for the Byrds or CSN&Y, Crosby was an integral part of the dense mix-and-match frontline that has spawned many of both bands' hits.

A hedonistic embodiment of the sex-drug-rock-roll lifestyle of the 60s, he has struggled with addiction for years. His sensational 1982 arrest in Texas for drug and weapons trafficking landed him five months in prison in 1986. Devastated by years of cocaine and alcohol abuse, he underwent a transplant. Although he never returned to the fame of his early years, Crosby recorded and toured profitably in the 2000s.

Crosby is a kid with Hollywood privileges. He is the son of cinematographer Floyd Crosby, who won an Academy Award for his work in the 1931 F.W. Murnau. He turned to theater and music at an early age.

Dropping out of Santa Barbara City College to pursue a career in music, he entered the commercial folk music scene through a brief membership of Baxter's Balladeers, a Limeliters-style unit run by the house. Well-known composer-arranger organization.

He started working in folk clubs in Los Angeles as a soloist; During a gig at the Troubadour, his sharp tenor caught the eye of Jim Dickson, an interior engineer at Richard Bock's World Pacific Records in Los Angeles. Dickson began recommending Crosby as a solo artist, but these sessions eventually led to the formation of a band.

The young singer-songwriter scene of L.A. then gather around Folk Den, the centerpiece of the Santa Monica Avenue club, The Bard. One evening in 1964, stubborn Crosby stepped into an exchange attended by two young, traveling folk singers. McGuinn (who was then known by his birth name Jim; he quickly changed his name to Roger after joining the Subud spiritual movement) previously worked with urban folklore Limeliters and Chad Mitchell Trio, and met Crosby at a tour in Santa Barbara. stop at the previous action. Clark was once a member of another deprived folk group, the New Christy Minstrels. Although McGuinn was skeptical of Crosby's oversized and obstinate personality, he was still enamored with The Beatles and considered forming a new band; Crosby's free spin at World Pacific led to McGuinn, Crosby, and Clark's first lessons under the collective direction of Jet Set.

As Beefeaters, the trio released a flop single on Elektra Records, but quickly reformed as a full-fledged rock group that reflected the influence of The Beatles' 1964 debut, 'A Hard Day's Night'. . The lineup is complete with the addition of rookie bassist Chris Hillmen, former mandolinist of bluegrass-oriented The Hillmen Pacific World band, and unskilled but photogenic drummer Michael Clarke.

Renamed the Byrds in an apparent imitation of the Fab Four, the band was signed to Columbia Records in late 1964 based on the promotional efforts of Dickson, who now manages the group. Immediately, well-connected Dickson pushed his number to cover a new song written by one of his friends, folk music star Bob Dylan.

[beardedmrbean]

California lawmakers are pushing legislation that would impose a new tax on the state’s wealthiest residents — even if they’ve already moved to another part of the country.

Assemblyman Alex Lee, a progressive Democrat, last week introduced a bill in the California State Legislature that would impose an extra annual 1.5% tax on those with a “worldwide net worth” above $1 billion, starting as early as January 2024.

As early as 2026, the threshold for being taxed would drop: those with a worldwide net worth exceeding $50 million would be hit with a 1% annual tax on wealth, while billionaires would still be taxed 1.5%.

Worldwide wealth extends beyond annual income to include diverse holdings such as farm assets, arts and other collectibles, and stocks and hedge fund interest.

The legislation is a modified version of a wealth tax approved in the California Assembly in 2020, which the Democrat-led state Senate declined to pass.

The current version just introduced includes measures to allow California to impose wealth taxes on residents even years after they left the state and moved elsewhere.

Exit taxes aren’t new in California. But this bill also includes provisions to create contractual claims tied to the assets of a wealthy taxpayer who doesn’t have the cash to pay their annual wealth tax bill because most of their assets aren’t easily turned into cash. This claim would require the taxpayer to make annual filings with California’s Franchise Tax Board and eventually pay the wealth taxes owed, even if they’ve moved to another state.

California was one of several blue states last week to unveil bills to impose new wealth taxes. The other states were Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, New York and Washington. Each state’s proposal contained a different tax approach, but they all centered around the same basic idea: the rich must pay more.

Lee’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment for this story. However, he’s made public statements echoing the message that wealthier residents should pay higher taxes.

“The working class has shouldered the tax burden for too long,” Lee wrote in a tweet. “The ultra-rich are paying little to nothing by hoarding their wealth through assets. Time to end that.”

According to Lee, the tax would affect 0.1% of California households and generate an additional $21.6 billion in state revenue, which would go to the state general fund. California has among the highest taxes of any state in the country.

Advocates argue that the money could boost funding for schools, housing and other social programs. Perhaps more importantly, however, Lee hopes it could help address California’s massive $22.5 billion budget deficit.

“This is how we can keep addressing our budgetary issues,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “Basically, we could plug the entire hole.”

However, experts counter that the bill will have the exact opposite effect through high administrative costs and by causing an exodus of people to flee the state.

“It brings significant administrative challenges with respect to asset and liability valuation, high and distortionary effective rates, among other problems that make it an inefficient revenue source,” Gordon Gray, director of fiscal policy at the American Action Forum, told Fox New Digital.

Others echoed this point, also arguing a new wealth tax would likely lead many wealthy residents to leave California.

“The proposed California wealth tax would be economically destructive, challenging to administer and would drive many wealthy residents — and all their current tax payments — out of state,” Jared Walczak, vice president of state projects at Tax Foundation, told Fox News Digital. “The bill sets aside as much as $660 million per year just for administrative costs, more than $40,000 per prospective taxpayer, giving an idea of how difficult such a tax would be to administer.”

People are already moving from high-tax states into low-tax ones, according to a recent analysis by James Doti, president emeritus and economics professor at Chapman University. He found that the 10 highest tax states lost nearly 1 in 100 residents in net domestic migration between July 2021 and July 2022, while the 10 lowest tax states gained almost 1 in 100.

California lawmakers pushing the wealth tax think they can “get around” the problem of residents leaving “by trying to tax people even after they leave the state,” said Patrick Gleason, vice president of state affairs at Americans for Tax Reform. However, he, Gray and Walczak all questioned the legality of such an approach or labeled it outright unconstitutional.

Past studies have shown that the top 1% of taxpayers pay about 50% of state income taxes in New York, California and elsewhere, raising the question of how damaging a mass exodus of wealthy residents could be to tax revenue.

Walczak noted that a wealth tax would be especially problematic for California, joking that the people most excited about such a law should be people in Texas, where some high-profile Californians have relocated in recent years.

“A wealth tax could be particularly destructive in California, home to so many tech startups, because the owners of promising businesses could be taxed on hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of estimated business value that never actually materializes,” said Walczak. “Very few taxpayers would remit wealth taxes, but many taxpayers would pay the price. The only people who should genuinely love a California wealth tax are the ones who work in Texas’ economic development office.”

However, some proponents of wealth taxes argue they’re necessary to combat economic inequality.

Maryland Democrat Delegate Jheanelle K. Wilkins, for example, has proposed a bill so that families would owe taxes on inheritances over $1 million rather than $5 million, as is the case today. She said such ideas will now gain more support after the COVID-19 pandemic exposed inequality between the rich and poor.

“That’s quite a bit of funds that we’re leaving on the table,” she told the Washington Post.

Other supporters say wealth taxes are small and the rich can afford them. But experts note that because the rates are on net worth, not on income, they have an outsized effect.

Walczak illustrated the point in a recent blog post, using as an example a $50 million investment, held for 10 years and earning a 10% nominal annual rate of return in an environment of 3% annual inflation. Without a wealth tax, that investment would yield $46.5 million in investment returns, in current dollars, after 10 years. With a 1% wealth tax, however, it would yield $37.3 million, wiping out nearly 20% of the gains.

Wealth taxes “cut deeply into investment returns, to the detriment of the broader economy,” wrote Walczak. “Average taxpayers may not care if the ultra-wealthy have lower net worths. But they will certainly care if innovation slows and investments decline.”

[madchild-dennis]

Illuminati, Obeah, Plandemic...I DO NOT CARE!!!

So, I accidentally retweeted a tweet (IDR what it said but couldn't find it to screenshot it) but it attached this Youtube Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LFRLz9A1Do

How I got to that video:

So yesterday a tweet was recommended to me that spoke on Kanye's recent outburst. It didn't specify it was him nor had the video on the original tweet. It more more along the lines of:

I've heard of celebs selling their soul, Illuminati & sacrifices but to hear one outright admit it is scary.

Or something like that.

So I got curious & went to the comments. Which led me down a DEEP rabbit hole. From seeing the vid of Kanye to seeing something about KIM. Which made me curious. WHich Kim? what about Kim? But I saw my finger slip & retweet it when I was trying to click the link. BUT I could SWEAR I unretweet it. I am CERTAIN. Because it was the second time that day I slipped & retweet something. But I undid it; I'm sure.

(I wonder why it was still there afterwards?)

SO, YES I WATCH illuminati videos, those 3, even SOME gossip columns on celebs. I do NOT do that all the time or watch all gossip YouTubers. I went from the Kim to Tia Mowry, to Beyonce & Jay, then Richest Artist to other video I DON EVEN REMEMBER. Hence that led me to the women fixing men blog,

ANYWAY.

Let's talk about it.

DO I believe it all?

Do I believe in Illuminati?

Do I think they are illuminati?

Do I fear it ALL?

Well:

I remember being told as a child; "Not every rumour/gossip is true but all have some truth". SO I NEVER fully denounce anythign told BUT I NEVER runn off with it. Hence the retweet was WAY OUT of MY Character.

I believe EVIL exist. IN FACT, 1 John 5:19 says, "We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one." [NIV] So, OKAYYYYYY. NOTHING NEW. Based on all the illuminati talks, what I hear is NOT the works of God so it got ot be the works of the Evil ONE. So, words from over 2,000 years ago already said so.

OK now that THEIR business, unless they make it mine or it involves others/the general public or there are injustices, OR they are trying to force me, my children or loved ones into their thing. If it's not ANY of the above. Well that's THEIR BUSINESS. I mean I wouldn't recommend it BUT what should I do? Preach to them...oh, well if that's what you want to do instead of spreading rumours or gossip, THEN we'll talk on that SOON.

WHYYYYYYYY. THE FUCK? DO YOU NOT KNOW WHO GOD IS!!!! Oh that's maybe the problem RIGHT THERE!!! You don't know GOD & letting FEAr that the devil worked hard to make control you & to be the king of your heart SO...hence the outrage.

BUT LETS BREAK IT ALL DOWN THEN.

As the title states: Illuminati, Obeah, Plandemic...I DO NOT CARE!!!

I really DO NOT care. Why should I? If I do then I'd also have to fear just TURNING MY HEAD to the right or left. Well all these rumours of Plandemic, Illuminati & corruption seen & heard. Then facts like crime, serial killers, witchcraft/science/voodoo/obeah or whatever else. They all prove the bible verse of "We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one", right. By the way, THE WHOLE WORLD includes your bedroom.

To believe that. Then to fear those things. Would mean fearing my own spit or drinking water or my ouwb feet. I could drown myself while drinking. I could trip, fall & then die. I could fear being possessed by some smell or something.

What the FUCK.

What kind of life is that? Surely, NOT mine.

So if that part of the bible is true. But makes me paranoid. Why not hold unto hope. Like the parts of the bible where God says, He's the GREATEST and SHOWS IT!!!

I LEANED IN THE KNOWLEDGE from the age of about 14-16.

So while the Illuminati stories about Rihanna, Beyonce, Jay Z, Kanye & more came strong. Especially from church. I heard it, acknowledge it & carried on. Cause if that's evil well based on the bible even the greatest church is ruled by it; unless they let God rule. But we keep forgetting the human nature that at it's core is sin. So even the leaders at church. They may have good intentions but many time MARRED with sin. So leaders who are power hungry. Head of departments who use their lack of public sin/how someone dresses as a status symbol. So much more that's sin-based, hence EVIL.

So Illuminati may or does exist. These individuals may be or may not be in the organization. However, I will NOT fear it. God doesn't even want me to isolate myself from these individuals. In FACT, from I was about 14-16 I could envision myself being their friends. Yes, those mentioned & more. I always thought I'd be something, maybe an actor, despite not working towards that career goal at the time. But I knew.

Here I am with a planned wedding list with many of those celeb names. Yes, I do. God told me to. Back in July or June before telling me I'd be future Queen. Hence it all making so much sense.

Plus how many of y'all would do dismal or already doing dismal things for fame &/or fortune; social media. In fact, doing anything out of your character is selling yourself. Many do it for likes or views or followers.

Now if given the opportunity would you turn it down? Really? Many speak on it haven't been given the opportunity to turn it down.

Or let me ask, are you sharing, posting or gossiping about Illuminati for what reason? To create fear? Or warn others? Kool then you should add that the news is evil too. Social media is evil. Pastors are evil. Every single room is evil. Yes. Because of 1 John 5:19. Or it's just because they are popular or have fame & fortune you yourself desire but are jealous. Maybe, jealous you didn't get the chance to choose it too?

I am not agreeing or encouraging it but I think my point is clear:

So fucking WHAT!!!

I nor you are not better than them because we sin differently.

They ARE loved by God & like you their sins are already forgiven, if they choose Christ as their lord & saviour.

That's why even Kanye's recent outburst didn't get anything out if me. It's like whatever. You're saying that for attention now. Not because people are out to get you. Where was the outrage when it happened. Why now after you've profited off it. Is it because you're falling now. Or is it because you loosing everything & trying to appeal to the black community you've betrayed & disrespected to try & regain something/anything. Especially attention. I now believe Kanye is a narcissist. Think about it. He does it ALL for attention or more.

[carolinemillerbooks]

New Post has been published on Books by Caroline Miller

New Post has been published on https://www.booksbycarolinemiller.com/musings/the-end-of-tribalism/

The End Of Tribalism

I sat down to brunch with a married couple I’ve known for years.  The friendship is so comfortable, we dare to talk about religion and politics.  Mostly we discuss books. The husband told me he was working through the novels of a Japanese woman who wrote fantasy.  He couldn’t recall her name. After my friends and I parted, I returned home to sit in my easy chair, hoping to discover a topic for an upcoming blog.  As luck would have it, I came across an article about a Japanese woman writer who wrote fantasy, Sayaka Murata. (“A Planet of Her Own.”  by Thu-Huong Ha, Oct. 2022, Wired, 30.16, pgs.  69-75.)   Below the title, the blurb read, “…in her novels, she devises worlds where women reinvent sex, marriage, childbirth—and the boundaries of human existence.” Women in charge of their lives? Now that was fantasy.  Contrast that fiction with the morning’s headlines about American journalist Christiane Amanpour. She walked out of an interview with Iran’s President in New York because he insisted she wear a hajib. Melinda French Gates, in another article, commented that 100 years would pass before women approach equality with men. She’s right. The history of testosterone is long and pervasive. For example, Republican Senator Josh Hawley, in a tweet against LGBTQs, insisted schools should teach that there is only one gender. As a former educator, I have strong feelings about people like Hawley–book banners and parental rights extremists. Their goal is to put blinders on young minds. I have a similar objection to homeschooling, charter schools,  and religious schools. They balkanize the public system which is meant to provide the basis for a common culture.  In part, our fractured nation is the consequence of a fractured educational system. A population divided in what it accepts as facts threatens democracy. With no common denominator, we are left with opinions, as many as there are grains of sand upon the beach. Unfortunately, some of those thoughts come from elected leaders who should be wearing prison garb.   Incumbent Raphael Warnock, Georgia’s senator, has served his constituents without a breath of scandal. Even so, he is in a close reelection campaign against a challenger who admits to multiple personality disorder, has threatened his wife with guns and knives, and remains so menacing that three years after their divorce, she maintains a court protective order against him. One pundit explains, voters no longer care about fitness for public office.  They choose to support tribal interests, instead. Political affiliation is one of them.  Donald Trump, our 45th president, is right when he says he could shoot a person in the street and retain the loyalty of fellow Republicans. Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is tribal.  He complains his neighbor is too friendly with his enemies in the west.  He feels threatened. So, in his fantasy, the world should see him as a victim, not an invader. Few nations share his delusion, including allies like Chia and India. At a recent gathering of members of the United Nations, virtually all of the 15 members of the Security Council and the vast majority of U. N. members condemned Russia’s actions. They have reason to be concerned. Putin’s aggression threatens national sovereignty, a nuclear war, and worldwide famine.     Climate change, much of it human-caused, already endangers traditional food sources. Putin’s war exacerbates the crisis. Ukraine’s agriculture supplies 40% of the world’s wheat. Destroy its crops and discover how quickly starvation becomes the new reality.   Facts aren’t compliant. The truth will prevail.  When dreamers awake to it, will there be time to save democracy?  The Planet? The 2022 midterms could be a flexion point for the United States. I sense a longing for a return to sense and sensibility. Exhausted by fantasy, people of many persuasions want a world that works.  They want to be safe.  They want their children and grandchildren to be safe, also. A dream of empire is one they can’t afford. Inalienable rights are what they require.  That hope isn’t tribal.  It’s human. When equality is the norm, tribalism becomes irrelevant. We may also find that when tribalism disappears, we create more room for mercy.