#this entire post is about

[sorry-i-like-romantic-fabriz]

This post here lists everything that makes Riz "canonically AroAce". OP refuses to listen to anyone who doesn't agree with them, so I'm responding to it separately with my own post. This post isn't about denying his possible/potential aromanticism, this post is about debunking the "canon" everyone insists makes Riz irrefutably AroAce. As always, I'm not here to tell anyone Riz cannot possibly be aromantic. I'm just trying to push back against the concept that Riz can only be interpreted one way and one way only. Here we go!

"He doesn't want relationships. That is canon." He's disinterested in them, that is not the same as being against them entirely. He doesn't relate to his friends obsession with them, but moreover he specifically doesn't relate to being horny 24/7.

"He made up Baron because he wasn't dating anyone and felt pressured." He was feeling (unintentionally) alienated by his friends and didn't wanna seem "different". They were saying he'd understand the obsession specifically with sex, once he was in a relationship. They weren't saying he HAD to be in one.

"His entire nightmare forest experience was 'you are different from your loved ones because you don’t want romantic relationships like they do'. " That was by absolutely no means the entirety of his nightmare experience. His fear was being abandoned by his friends, something Kalina antagonizes him about throughout the ENTIRE SEASON. Yes his disinterest in relationships (which he clearly equates with sex) was part of his fear, but not the entirety of it.

"Baron is literally part of his imagination telling him that he does not experience romantic attraction." Baron appears for less than twenty minutes throughout the entirety of the season. While Baron is his "Roemaence Partener", and while yes Baron also antagonizes Riz about his disinterest in relationships, Baron is more a representation of Riz desperately trying to fit in rather than one saying "you don't experience romantic attraction".

"Everybody uses asexual to mean aro/ace, because they are not aware of the term aromantic." That's just straight up untrue. While it is a frequent misconception, insisting that that is what people ALWAYS mean is ridiculous. Which connects with your next statement:

"Brennan isn't exactly deeply entrenched in queer labels." While I can't argue about Brennan's knowledge of anything queer, Brennan knows about: sexuality being a spectrum, gender being a construct, polyamory (which I feel means he knows relationships are complicated), and he did a whole fucking campaign with drag queens of various labels.

I feel like insisting Brennan has absolutely zero concept of there being a difference between Ace and Aro is just to fit your belief that there's absolutely no way Riz could be anything but AroAce.

"Him using the word asexual does not and should not erase the explicit aromanticism of riz's character." There is no clear, canon information of Riz's romantic identity. Only his sexuality. Tbh if Murph made the conscious decision to make Riz asexual, I feel like he also knows Ace and Aro are not one in the same.

Look, I'm not denying that Riz could be AroAce. There's canon to support that interpretation along with the canon that states he's asexual. I'm not saying your interpretation is wrong, what I'm saying is your interpretation is not the only correct one.

Thanks for coming to my TedTalk.

[alanaisalive]

Now that Eurovision is over, I want you all, especially the Americans, to take a good hard look at how the voting results turned out when people boycotted the event.

In the UK, the viewing figures were down about 2 million people compared to last year. Up to 2 million people made the conscious decision to not watch and not vote because of Israel's inclusion.

The final results of the public vote, Israel came in first place in the UK and got 12 points. Because the only people watching and voting were people who backed Israel or at least didn’t care one way or another.

This doesn't matter. It's a music contest. The boycott was still the right thing to do because it is just a show at the end of the day, and the viewing figures have more impact than the results.

But it is also a good object lesson to show you what happens if you boycott a vote over something that does matter. Choosing not to vote in, let's say, a presidential election will have similar results.

[goldensunset]

did you know? if you do your laundry you can get your clothes back

[sushisocks]

i wake up and i am immediately thinking about those characters. i eat breakfast and i am thinking about those characters. i do chores and i am thinking about those characters. i do any work, i study, i walk the dogs, and i am thinking about those characters. i go to bed and i am thinkign

[inkskinned]

the thing about some men is that they want you to remember, at all times, that you are underneath them. that with one word or look or "joke", you will stay beneath them. that even "exceptions" to the rule are not true exceptions - the commonly cited statistic that one in eight men believe they could win against serena williams.

women's gymnastics is often not seen as real gymnastics. whatever the fuck non-euclidian horrors rhythmic gymnasts are capable of, it's often tamped down as being not a sport. some of the most dominant athletes in the world are women. nobody watches women's soccer. despite years of dancing and being built like a fucking brick, men always assume they're faster and stronger than i am. you wouldn't like what happens when they are incorrect. once while drunk at a guy's house i won a held-plank challenge by a solid minute. the party was over after that - he became exceedingly violent.

what i mean is that you can be perfect, and they still think you're ... lacking, somehow. i hope you understand i'm trying to express a neutral statement when i say: taylor swift was the possibly the most patriarchy-palatable, straight-down-the-line woman we could churn out. she is white, conventionally attractive, usually pretty mild in personality. say what you will about her (and you should, she's a billionaire, she can handle it), but a few things seem to be true about her: 1. she can write a damn catchy song, and 2. the eras tour truly was a massive commercial success and was also genuinely an impressive feat of human athleticism and performance.

i don't know if she deserves the title of "woman of the year," i'm not debating that in this post. what i am saying is that she was named Woman of The Year, and then an untalented man got onstage at the golden globes and made fun of her for attending her boyfriend's football games. what i am saying is that this woman altered local economies - and her dating life is still being made into a "harmless" punchline. the camera panned, greedy, over to her downing a full glass of champagne. congratulations taylor! you are woman of the year! but you are a woman. even her.

fuck, man. write better material.

a guy gets onstage at a college graduation and despite the fact like half the crowd is made up of women, he spends a significant proportion of it warning these people - who spent possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars on their education - that they were lied to. that the "real" meaning of femininity is motherhood. that they shouldn't rest on the laurels of that education-they-paid-for but instead throw it away to kneel at a man's heel. imagine that. sweating in your godawful polyester gown (that you also had to pay for!), fresh out of 4 years of pushing yourself ever-harder: and some guy you've never met - who knows nothing about you - he reminds you this "win" is a pyrrhic one at best. you really shouldn't consider yourself that extraordinary. you're still a woman, even after years of study.

god forbid you are not a pretty woman, but if you are pretty, you must be dumb. god forbid you are not ablebodied or white or cis or straight or good at swallowing. you must be beneath a man, or else they are not a man. the equation for masculinity seems to just be: that which is not a woman or womanly (god forbid). anything "feminine" is thereby anathema. to engage in "feminine" things such as therapy, getting a hug from a friend, or crying - it is giving up ones manhood. therefore women need to be put in their place to ensure that masculinity is protected.

this is something i have struggled to explain to terfs - they are not doing the work of feminism, but rather the patriarchy. by asserting that women and men must be (on some secret level) oppositional and in conflict, they also assume that being a woman is akin to being another species. but bigotry does not stem from observational truths or clarity - that is what makes it bigotry. there was nothing in my childhood that made me fundamentally different from my brother. we are treated differently nonetheless. to assert there is some biological drive that enforces my gender role is to assert that women have a gendered role. men do not see women as equal to them not because of biological reality - but instead because the core tenant of the patriarchy is that women aren't full, realized people.

we are told from a very young age to excuse misbehavior as a single man's choice - not all men. it is not all men, just that one guy. all women are gold-digging bitches who belong in the kitchen - but if a man is mean, bigoted, or violent to you, it's just that particular guy, and that means nothing about men-as-a-whole. it is only one guy who got mad when you gently rejected him. it is only one guy who warns her this trophy is heavy, are you sure you can hold it? it is only one guy who smashes her face into the cake. it is only one guy talking into a mic about hating our bodily autonomy.

i have just found that they often wait until the moment we actually seem to be upstaging them. you sit in a meeting where you're presenting your own findings and he says get me a coffee? or you run to the end of the marathon and are about to finish first and he pushes your kids out in front of you. you win the chess game and they make some comment akin to well, you're ugly away. we can be the billionaire and get the dream life and finally fucking do it and yet! still! they have this strange, visceral urge to say well actually, if you think you're so great -

it's not one just one guy. it's one in eight.

[catshinji]

hmm.

[stromblessed]

Mizu, femininity, and fallen sparrows

In my last post about Mizu and Akemi, I feel like I came across as overly critical of Mizu given that Mizu is a woman who - in her own words - has to live as a man in order to go down the path of revenge.

If she is ever discovered to be female by the wrong person, she will not only be unable to complete her quest, but there's a good chance that she'll be arrested or killed.

So it makes complete sense for Mizu to distance herself as much as possible from any behavior that she feels like would make someone question her sex.

I felt so indignant toward Mizu on my first couple watchthroughs for this moment. Why couldn't Mizu bribe the woman and her child's way into the city too? If Mizu is presenting as a man, couldn't she claim to be the woman's escort?

However, this moment makes things pretty clear. Mizu knows all too well the plight of women in her society. She knows it so well that she cannot risk ever finding herself back in their position again. She helps in what little way she can - without drawing attention to herself.

Mizu is not a hero and she is not one to make of herself a martyr - she will not set herself on fire to keep others warm. There's room to argue that Mizu shouldn't prioritize her quest over people's lives, but given the collateral damage Mizu can live with in almost every episode of season 1, Mizu is simply not operating under that kind of morality at this point. ("You don't know what I've done to reach you," Mizu tells Fowler.)

And while I still feel like Mizu has an obvious and established blind spot when it comes to Akemi because of their differences in station, such that Mizu's judgment of Akemi and actions in episode 5 are the result of prejudice rather than the result of Mizu's caution, I also want to establish that Mizu is just as caged as Akemi is, despite her technically having more freedom while living as a man.

Mizu can hide her mixed race identity some of the time, and she can hide her sex almost all of the time, but being able to operate outside of her society's strict rules for women does not mean she cannot see their plight.

It does not mean she doesn't hurt for them.

Back to Mizu and collateral damage, remember that sparrow?

While Mizu is breaking into Boss Hamata's manse, she gets startled by a bird and kills it on reflex. She then cradles it in her hands - much more tenderly than we've seen Mizu treat almost anything up to this point in the season:

She then puts it in its nest, with its unhatched eggs. Almost like she's trying to make the death look natural. Or like an accident.

You see where I'm going with this.

When Mizu kills Kinuyo, Mizu lingers in the moment, holding the body tenderly:

And btw a lot of stuff about this show hit me hard, but this remains the biggest gut punch of them all for me, Mizu holding that poor girl's body close, GOD

When Mizu arranges the "scene of the crime," Kinuyo's body is delicate, birdlike. And Mizu is so shaken afterward that she gets sloppy. She's horrified at this kill to the point that she can't bring herself to take another innocent life - the boy who rats her out.

MIZU'S ONE MOMENT OF SOFTNESS AND MERCY, COMING ON THE HEELS OF HER NEEDING TO KILL A GIRL TO SPARE HER THE WORST FATE THAT THIS RIGID SOCIETY HAS TO OFFER WOMEN, AND TO SPARE A BROTHEL FULL OF INNOCENT WOMEN WHO ARE THE CASTOFFS OF SOCIETY, NEARLY RESULTS IN ALL OF THEIR DEATHS

No wonder Mizu is as stoic and cold as she is.

And no wonder Mizu has no patience for Akemi whatsoever right before the terrible reveal and the fight breaks out:

Speaking of Akemi - guess who else is compared to a bird!

The plumage is more colorful, a bit flashier. But a bird is a bird.

And, uh

Yeah.

I like to think that Mizu killing the sparrow is not only foreshadowing for what she must do to Kinuyo, but is also a representation of the choice she makes on Akemi's behalf. She decides to cage the bird because she believes the bird is "better off." Better off caged than... dead.

But because Mizu doesn't know Akemi or her situation, she of course doesn't realize that the bird is fated to die if it is caged and sent back home.

Mizu is clearly not happy, or pleased, or satisfied by allowing Akemi to be dragged back to her father:

But softness and mercy haven't gotten Mizu anywhere good, recently.

There is so much tragedy layered into Mizu's character, and it includes the things she has to witness and the choices she makes - or believes she has to make - involving women, when she herself can skirt around a lot of what her society throws at women. Although, I do believe that it comes at the cost of a part of Mizu's soul.

After all, I'm gonna be haunted for the rest of this show by Mizu's very first prayer in episode 1:

"LET" her die. Because as Ringo points out, she doesn't "know how" to die.

Kind of like another bird in this show:

[hinamie]

long way home

[yasartmeme]

I had a vision

Also bonus:

[the-phantom-peach]

skyward sword… yeah <3

Crimson Loftwing

↻ ◁ || ▷ ↺

[kitamars]

doodles as i relive my spideyman phase from eighth grade

[paintedcrows]

Holiday Classics

Been thinking about Ford watching the 70s Animated Lord of the Rings Movies... (companion comic to this post!)

[alexanderpearce]

ship ask game 😁1 Who would be first to to bite down anc consume the flesh of the other, euphoric in the taste and the heft and the slide of the blood 2. who is the ant and who is the ophiocordyceps fungus? 3. who is the dog and who is the master? 4 when the roles are blurred or reversed who would be first to die and how? would it be by bulletwound? the phallic blade? strangulation? 5. Cocaine or Heroin? 6. who licks up the other’s cigarette ash? 7 who is julius caesar and who is brutus? 8. who is jesus and who is judas? 9. did jesus want it? did julius caesar know it was coming? are the betrayed ever proud? 10. who is irrumatus and who is irrumans? who is pedicatus and who is pedicans? 11. did they ever kiss and why not? 12 if they are two sides of the same coin who is heads and who is tails? 13. and if the coin was the holey dollar? 14. And if the dog bit back? 15 and if the dog bit back? 16 and if the dog bit back? 17 and if the dog bit back? 18 and if the dog bit back? 19 and if the dog bit back? 20. Who buys the other flowers?🥰

[shepscapades]

[dbhc flavored] Hermit a Day May: Day 14 — Doc!

Featuring both a current-day s10 doc and a verrry early s8 post-deviant doc! :]

[theradicalace]

i don’t know why my brain works this way

[dapper-lil-arts]

I'm not the kind of person that's like "Here let me fix the canon" usually but like holy crap gen 5 implied a lot of messed up shit about our hero Twilight Sparkle lmao