#this isn't all of them. or even one thing from every run.

[actuallysaiyan]

Just What I Needed(Nanami Kento x Fem!Reader)

warnings: handjob, ball/testicle play, softness, fluff, Nanami is a bit of a sub here, gentle loving word count: 1k pairings: Nanami Kento x Fem!Reader summary: it's been a long week for Kento, so you surprise him with a handjob in the bath. a/n: The artwork of Nanami in the onsen isn't mine, I couldn't find the proper credits! If someone knows who made this lovely pic of Kento, plz lemme know so I can properly credit them!!! Dividers by the lovely benkeibear!

Taglist: @beneathstarryskies @an-ever-angry-bi @seireiteihellbutterfly @namikyento @benkeibear

@kenpachisbrat @adharadotcom @heyitsd1yaa @darkstarlight82

Kento feels the weight on his shoulders. It’s been a very long day at work on top of a very long week. Everything that could go wrong ended up being catastrophic. He found himself in all kinds of problems and issues. Gojo had often leaned on him for a lot of things this week as well, and Itadori-kun had been eager to learn so many new things.

So by this point in Nanami’s week, he is quite exhausted. The only thing he’s looking forward to is spending the evening with you. That thought alone is what keeps him going. He takes the train home, wishing to be close to you as soon as possible. His mind is filled with thoughts of greeting you at the door, covering your face in kisses and hugging you tight.

The minute he walks through the door, he’s bombarded with soft kisses from you. His heart flutters at the familiar scent of your perfume, the way your lips seem to soothe his weary soul.

“Welcome home, Ken!” You cheerfully greet him.

His tired eyes meet yours and he feels himself coming back to life. “Good to see you, darling.”

You gently help him out of his jacket, smoothing out the wrinkles before hanging it up on the peg at the door. Then he removes his shoes, slipping on the comfortable and well-worn house slippers. You lead him towards the bathroom, and this surprises him. He smiles and lets out a contented sigh when he notices the tub all prepared for him.

“I know you had a really rough week,” you explain as you help him out of his blazer. “I wanted to spoil you tonight. I’ve even prepared your favorite meal, it’ll be ready after your bath.”

Nanami swears he’s gone to heaven. He allows you to undress him, and he watches in awe as you make sure to properly fold all his clothing. Then you start kissing him, your soft hands caressing him all over. You’ve always made him feel weak in the best way possible.

Then once he’s completely undressed, you help him into the bath. You sit on a stool next to the tub, grabbing a soft cotton washcloth. Nanami sighs as the warm water and bubbles are already soothing him. His sore muscles begin to loosen as the water does its magic.

“Feeling a little better?”

Kento looks over at you, smiling shyly. “I am. You always know how to spoil me.”

You take your time washing and cleaning him. You use your fancy body wash, the one that smells like sandalwood, jasmine and vanilla. It invades his senses, making him feel so secure and safe in this bath. He doesn’t remember the last time he even allowed himself to feel comforted like this.

“You’re so precious to me, Ken.” You press a kiss to his temple as your hand wanders further down his body. “I need to make sure you’re well taken care of.”

He gasps the minute you caress his thighs. He feels his cock twitching to life. His amber eyes fill with softness and lust as you begin to gently begin to wash his dick. You smirk softly, letting out a girlish giggle.

“Does my sweetheart need a little TLC?” You tease him, but you’re already wrapping your fingers around his throbbing length.

“P-please, darling. Please don’t tease me,”

You lean over and begin to kiss him. He’s moaning as your hand strokes him slowly. The way you squeeze the tip gently every time your hand goes up, makes him shudder. Shivers run down his spine from the exquisite pleasure. He arches his back, desperate to feel even more pleasure.

The soap coats your hand so perfectly, giving it the most sensual glide. The bubbles cover his body, making him feel like he’s enveloped in the most cozy and warm hug. Then your other hand joins the other. First you stimulate the tip, making him moan. Precum dribbles from the slit, making things even more slippery. Then you drift down to his heavy balls that are just begging for attention.

“Poor sweetheart, you’re all pent up.”

Kento all but sobs the minute you begin to massage his balls. His cock twitches a few more times in your hand, reminding you of your first task. Slowly, you continue to stroke him. Kento lets out such cute moans and whimpers for you.

Your fingers tighten ever so slightly, and you speed up just a little more. His hips begin to buck up into your touch, begging and pleading with you not to stop. His cheeks and the top of his ears are flush and pink, his eyes are half-lidded and pupils blown with lust.

“You wanna cum?” you ask him, leaning in to kiss his lips.

“Please baby. Please please please,”

You continue to kiss him, your tongue gliding against his bottom lip. He parts his lips, groaning as your tongues touch. You don’t falter in your rhythm. It’s so perfect right now.

“Such a good man, you work so hard. You deserve some spoiling.”

Kento whines, “I’m—fuck, I’m close.”

You don’t slow down. You ever so gently tug on his balls, massaging them. Kento’s whines reverberate against the walls, and they grow in decibels as he gets closer and closer. You kiss him hungrily once more, praising him for being such a good boy for you. The minute you nip at his bottom lip, that’s all it takes for him to cum hard.

“Fuck! I’m cumming!” His eyes roll back in his head and his hips jerk with every spurt of hot cum.

Ropes of his seed begin to coat your hand. You feel every throb and jerk, and you even get to feel his balls draw up. You stroke him to completion, kissing him softly. You slowly pull away, giving him a few moments to breathe and relax before you wash him once more.

“You always know just how to make me feel better,” Kento says, smiling shyly at you.

“It’s because I adore you.”

[boba-beom]

model students | CHOI BEOMGYU NSFW MDNI

PAIRING. college students! beomgyu x fem!reader

GENRE. oneshot; smut, little fluff

WC. 1k

WARNINGS. oral (both rec.), making out, beomgyu’s filthy 🫠, college setting, petnames;(big boy, baby, pretty/good girl), car sex, kind of but nawt, subtle hair pulling, kind of academic rivals?, balls, cum swallowing, not cheating but reader was is seeing someone else :p not proofread and lmk if there's anything I've missed!

A/N. inspired by a scene in heartbreak high series s2 on netflix with a sprinkle of my own twists hehe the fact that I had a lot to drink this evening, I'm surprised my brain isn't so fried. or maybe it is idk lmao enjoy!

your legs found comfort—to some extent—over beomgyu’s broad shoulders. the heel of your shoes dirtying the white of his adidas jacket as you writhe under his hold. thankfully he brought that with him today otherwise your professors would have to ask about the subtle dirt stains along the middle of his back.

moans gradually pitching higher after every suck of his puffy lips on your clit or every flick of his tongue along your slit, a mess of slick of saliva combined dripping down your inner thighs to the leather of his seats.

your chest heaving and your eyes squeezing shut indicates how close you were to your release and you were closer than you thought. all it took was a couple more of beomgyu’s talented tongue lapping up at your core with his thumb rubbing small and quick circles on your nub.

“ah- oh fuck beomgyu, feels so good!” you borderline squeal, forgetting that the car door was open the whole time while he was kneeling on the ground.

“fucking hell baby, any louder and you’d get us both expelled.” he chuckles to himself, raising his head from between your quivering thighs with his glasses fogging up.

“oh shut up, don’t be so smug about it.” you let out an airy laugh, catching your breath from another one of your crazy good orgasms you get from the man before you.

beomgyu stands up fully, peering around to make sure no one else was in the parking lot apart from the both of you. you sit up and notice the bulge in his pants, your hands automatically attending to it and you almost moan at how hard he is.

“mmhm, lemme help you out, big boy.” you kiss him through his slacks, hands on his thighs as they tense under your hold.

“not gonna refuse that, let’s see what else that pretty mouth can do other than talk shit. model student my ass.” he scoffs, running his fingers through your hair and curling them to pull your head back, looking up at him and his shit eating grin.

“just admit you’re mad my team won that debate and you literally chat shit all the time, the fuck you mean.” you palm him harder, releasing his hold on your hair aggressively to unzip his pants.

“oh shut up and suck my dick- the only thing your mouth is good at.”

he pulls his boxers lower until his dick sprung out and you caught his tip in your mouth almost immediately. as much as you hated beomgyu talking shit, you loved watching him crumble from you sucking his girthy dick. he hisses when your tongue swirls around the head until you decided to take him in deeper, letting him lay his heavy dick on your tongue.

“mmphh, that’s it baby, such a good girl for me.” beomgyu looks down at you with hazy eyes, hands resting on the roof of the car while he tests out the movements in his hips.

at one point you stop lowering your mouth around his shaft and he takes it into his own hands to hold your head and fuck your throat until you were gargling spit on either side of your mouth.

if there was one thing beomgyu loved during a good head sesh, was that you have to be messy with him. make it super wet with your spit to push him closer to the edge. and at this point you knew he’d cum in no time.

and you needed that since you had around 5 minutes until your next class starts.

you fondle with his balls just the way he likes it—his staccato pace giving away he was about to cum. releasing him from your mouth your hands took over, maintaining that pace he had kept before.

“yeah? gonna give me all your load? c’mon, big boy, give it to me. only me right?” you look at him with wet doe eyes that pushes him over the edge; lips swollen, cheeks and chin wet.

he lets out the most sinful moan you’ve ever heard. and among all moans you’ve heard from him, that one has you rubbing your thighs, pussy fluttering over nothing.

beomgyu’s head is thrown back, eyes squeezed shut with his hands back to gripping onto the edge of the roof of his car. you love the way his lips hang open, letting you hear just how down bad he is for you. moaning a string of “so good,” and “good girl,” as he cums on your tongue, some falling on the sides.

he pants, looking down at you milking the last few drops while you stare at each other, swallowing with no questions asked.

“wanna cum on your face next time, will you let me?” he whines, wanting to see your pretty face covered in his thick seed.

“gonna have to invite me over or something. can’t have your cum on my face during college hours.” you roll your eyes at him, cleaning up your clothes and around your mouth. “also, I swear down, don’t fucking tell anyone.”

“or else what?” beomgyu bites back, shoving his face in yours.

“or else you’ll have to go find some other pussy to eat, baby.” you whisper by his lips, tapping his cheek gently with your palm until you give him a hard kiss, parting with his bottom lip between your teeth as he groans. “yeah, thought so.”

you scoot out of his car, flattening out your skirt and throwing your bag over your shoulder. he watches you run up to someone. from afar all beomgyu could see was the guy had one dimple and grown out hair in almost a mullet.

“tyun!” you hug him and he keeps an arm around your waist as you walk to your next class together.

“how did debate go?”

“we won thanks to you, for helping me prepare for it, of course.” you smile up at him sweetly, and he notices a little glow on your cheeks. either from the good weather he thinks, or just because you’ve been glowing a lot recently.

“proud of you baby,” he kisses your temple twice before you both walk away.

jealousy sparks in beomgyu’s stomach after seeing the pda, but he ends up chuckling to himself as he changes out his jacket.

“you may kiss her forehead but she just sucked my dick,” he whispers, fully smug of himself.

please leave your thoughts and feedback! it will be much appreciated <3

© BOBA-BEOM ; all rights reserved. do not repost, copy, alter or translate in any way or platform.

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[hollowed-theory-hall]

Do you think Snape stopped being a bigot by the time canon rolled around or do you think he still thought of muggleborns as inferior but didn't act on it cause he was always around Dumbledore?

We know his love for Lily won't change anything, Lily herself points out how Snape's completely fine with calling every muggleborn but her a "mudblood" and even participated in bullying them. He sees Lily as an exception so there's no guarantee that even her death would change his views on the rest.

He probably never outright voices it because he's tied himself to Dumbledore, but that doesn't mean he can't still hold those bigoted views deep down.

His treatment and bullying of Hermione doesn't make him look good either. Yes, she's an overzealous know-it-all who annoyed Snape, but I wonder if that was simply it or if his bullying of her was motivated by blood prejudice as well.

As far as I remember, there's nothing in canon that proves Snape is still a bigot, but there's nothing that disproves it either. Thoughts?

Honestly we aren't really told anything about his opinions about muggleborns and muggles during the books. If I had to guess, I'd say his opinions didn't change much. Lily was always an exception, so I don't think her death would change his opinion on muggleborns as a whole.

We see this outlook with Slughorn too:

“Your mother was Muggle-born, of course. Couldn’t believe it when I found out. Thought she must have been pure-blood, she was so good.” “One of my best friends is Muggle-born,” said Harry, “and she’s the best in our year.” “Funny how that sometimes happens, isn’t it?” said Slughorn. “Not really,” said Harry coldly.

(HBP, 70)

He knows some muggleborns are brilliant and talented (like Lily and Hermione) but he considers them exceptions, not the common muggleborn. The perfect special muggleborn. The talented ones he cares about.

I think Snape is a little similar, if for completely different reasons. Slughorn looks down on muggleborns because of how unfamiliar with the muggle world he is. He's a pure-blood who was raised to think muggleborns have lower chances of being talented and exceptional.

Snape, on the other hand, has something very different going on in his head. I think he also has this tendency to look down on muggleborns, and he always had, but not for the same reason as Slughorn. In Snape's case, it comes from his hatred of muggles. Snape hates his father and the circumstances of his upbringing. He probably holds some resentment towards his mother for staying and raising him in a poor and abusive environment. And, it's not like Snape's mother was overly involved in his life either, he was allowed to just run around the streets alone since he was seven (or younger) and that was pretty much it.

Snape associated the muggle world with pain, humiliation, and neglect. And while the Wizarding World wasn't free of pain and humiliation, it was better. The Wizarding World came with magic, the ability to at least have a chance to defend himself, a chance at belonging (we Lucius except Snape into Slytherin easily when he arrives), and pride. Snape is an incredibly talented wizard and he knows it, and takes great pride in it.

So the wizard side of things was always the better one for him. The one he preferred to associate himself with (calling himself the "Half-Blood Prince" is an example of that). And I think his outlook on muggles and muggleborns is still somewhat colored by this even as an adult.

I think it did tone down since his youth, I don't think he's as extreme as he was when he joined the Death Eaters as a teenager, but I think he's still prejudiced against muggles and muggleborns (more muggles than muggleborns though), at least to a degree. I mean, these sorts of outlooks don't just change overnight. So, while I think Snape isn't advocating for muggleborns registration anymore, he still looks down on them and expects less of them, like, a subtler sort of prejudice.

I think Snape's bullying of Hermione is mostly for her know-it-all attitude, being friends with Harry, and being a Gryffindor (a whole different prejudice). But I think there is a little muggleborn prejudice in there too. I don't think it's the main issue he takes with her, but, like I said, it's unlikely he just completely got over it.

And, we see that looking down on muggles and muggleborns is pretty common in the wizarding world as I mentioned with Slughorn and while Dumbledore wouldn't be happy if Snape called muggleborns "mudbloods" he himself is just as prejudiced against muggles. He looks down on them like all of the wizarding world does, in subtler ways than the Death Eaters. So Snape probably wouldn't make an active effort to change his opinions. Even the Weasleys look down on muggles:

“Are they doctors?” he asked Ron quietly. “Doctors?” said Ron, looking startled. “Those Muggle nutters that cut people up? Nah, they’re Healers.”

(OotP, 484)

“Are all your family wizards?” asked Harry, who found Ron just as interesting as Ron found him. “Er — Yes, I think so,” said Ron. “I think Mom’s got a second cousin who’s an accountant, but we never talk about him.”

(PS, 73)

All wizards, even the more muggle-accepting ones are pretty prejudiced, it's that ingrained into their culture. So much so that Hermione stopped talking about her parents even to her friends, the Weasleys' squib cousin is never mentioned, and confounding or obliviating muggles is considered harmless even though we saw it can cause harm even to wizards (Lockheart). The wizarding world is a very prejudiced place even if you don't go around shouting slures. So I think Snape still holds this baseline level of looking down on muggles and muggleborns their whole world seems to practice, but he isn't advocating for their registration and death anymore either.

[the-hydroxian-artblog]

Are Merch Mimics capable of using assimilation offensively against humans, for self-defense and otherwise? Like, if someone tried to break a toy/game/etc they were inhabiting, could the Mimic instead pull them in?

To a degree, yeah. I should mention though that Victor isn't "in" the TV in any magical sense; spoiler alert: he's the controller Vance is holding! Hence, the eye on the controller reacting to the dialogue. The Victor on the screen is actualy a model he rigged for a homebrew game he coded the old fashioned way, which responds to whatever inputs the controller sends to the Wii.

He actually is an active member of the homebrew community, and loves to mess with electronics the old fashioned way. Almost no one on the forums knows he's a toy bird, but are impressed nonetheless with his little projects, various rail-shooter games, and weird obsession with snarky anthropomorphic birds.

Victor could technically "jump into a game" on a tv screen, but it'd be a bit of a weird process if he doesn't know how to mod the game, so it'd look more like a shitty greenscreen effect rather than anything coherent. He'd need to learn in real time how the game is coded, how to inject arbitrary code into the system while it's running, etc etc. He CAN do that because he's a fucking NERD, but it wouldn't be a quick process at all.

I should also mention, mimics have an inherent ability to create dreams, since they come about from processing the thoughts and ideas of humans. If a human bonds with a mimic, such that the mimic now knows how the human thinks, they can pull a (somewhat) willing human into the dream when the human sleeps. So to wrap this all up: what Victor could do for a game he understands inside and out is pull a human into a dream that happens to match whatever he himself experiences as currently going on in the game. Basically the ultimate VR experience, with the mimic as a middle-man. Which might be something that'll happen in the comic soon....!

So that all seems a bit convoluted, right? Here's even more worldbuilding about matter assimilation by mimics below the cut. Stop here if you don't want a headache.

The reason so many hoops would be needed to pull a human into a game world is that assimilation is much easier on inert, inanimate objects that are not currently "in use" by a thinking thing, or something that relies on constant electrical signals to function. This can be something with brainwaves, or some other kind of animation like a normal robot. A mimic can convert a CRT TV that's turned off somewhat easily, but a TV that's turned on, with particles of every kind constantly moving into and out of it, is much harder to convert.

This means that humans and biological creatures in general are also trickier to convert, though it can still happen if done gradually enough. Hence, Victor wouldn't be able to rapidly convert Vance in one fell swoop, it'd be a whole process. It's easier to just pull a human into a dream instead, and if a mimic undersrands a video game, or a story in a book really well, they can basically make the fictional world into an extremely lucid reality for whatever human tags along with them.

I often describe mimics as just "jojo stands if they were corporeal and could just get up and move around on their own with no user"; you know how in jojo stand battles or old stories about magic curses, if you break the curse or kill the stand before its effect becomes permanent, all of the damage is magically undone? Like if you kill Green Day, the mold stand, all of the molding just instantly stops?

Mimics who use their powers of assimilation offensively work similarly; they can project their influence to a certain range, and partially assimilate matter in that range. If you knock out or kill the mimic, however, everything reverts to normal. A human who doesn't want to get converted can basically just turn around and walk away most of the time, or shoot the mimic, so the mimic in question needs to pull off some trick to get the human to stay within range for the assimilation to fully stick. A human can still break free and get out of range even if fully converted, but it's much harder, as assimilation usually means the mimic gaining greater control over the converted object in question. The exact range and effect mimics have is again like jojo stand ranges; it varies.

Different mimics have different affinities for different things. Victor can assimilate cheap electronics fastest because he likes them and understands how they work (it's why he's a toy bird mp3 player). Az can assimilate guns, and turn ammo into weird anomalous ammo with weird effects. Zachary is a genius who can assimilate any matter, including biological matter, faster than anyone... but he's also extremely picky and hates the sight of blood, so he only uses assimilation on things he really, really likes.

If I could somehow make another read more at this point, I would. It's gonna get messy:

What a weird power and setup though, right? Why? The true nature of mimics is unknown to most of them, but the deepest lore is that the first mimics were constructs made by a people long ago, who first made them as highly advanced machines that'd recognize the thoughts of their masters to fulfill any practical desire. Need a road built? Done. Need a ship repaired? Done. With physical needs all met, the people began to turn inward, and use the mimics to illustrate their own artistic ideas. Eventually, the will and consciousness of these people were assimilated and inherited by mimics, who themselves became people. Mimics spread, altered themselves, duplicated, deviated, fused, split, and wandered around. Getting into recreational wars, manifesting horrors and delights into reality because they could.

Somehow, after the dust settled, the strongest mimics, the angels, decide to set their sights to the stars, and observe other lifeforms develop technology and their own art. Did mimics come to earth millions of years ago, and simply watched humans grow, evolving with them in-tandem? Or did humans make the first mimics, and somehow became undone and set back to the stone age? The answer to this mystery is currently known only to the oldest of mimics. Except Zachary. He's old, but didn't care to remember.

This is generally why mimics seem so compatible with humans; they were made by either them, or people who were, for whatever the reason, very much like them, flaws and all. The ability to assimilate is basically the conversion of matter into a more malleable state of information. A virtually magical power, but this was achieved not through prayers and spells, but a very human-like obsession with developing technology to the point of exerting control over molecules, then atoms, then the lowest planks of matter. The obsession with scaling every mountain and crossing through every valley. To rip the natural world apart, and hopefully, put it back together before it's too late. Angels seek to ensure humanity walks the right path there, but with human's own desires and intent honored, for better or worse.

To answer your question: yes. A mimic of Mario can pull you into the game and you can jump with him and eat shitty low poly spaghetti with him.

The process for doing that is just convoluted and complicated, and you need to get to know each other a bit first. If he tries to use it as an attack though, it either won't work, or it might just wind up giving you mild brain damage.

[valsdelulucorner]

Floyd Head cannons<3

Floyd loves finding his little shrimp hanging out with their friend group or doing work in class, it makes his day. He normally runs over and pushes whoever is talking to you out of the way as he flings himself at you, squeezing you tightly in his arms before scurrying off like nothing happened, leaving you and your company very confused.

Hes 100% the type of guy to say "this ones for you" and completely miss the basketball hoop, instead hauling the ball at one of his teammates while looking so incredibly proud

To be honest if you came to twisted wonderland as a rock climber or a sprinter, he would have the time of his life chasing you around. He's never seen someone as fast as his little shrimpy, you actually give him a challenge. Can you imagine his shock if you just start to sprint up a tree or the side of the wall on campus. You catch his attention originally by climbing somewhere high to pull grim out of a tree, or even seeing you sprint by to try and reach class before the bell rings. You give him a challenge, it intrigues him

Because your a rock climber, your strong right? Imagine your just walking with your normal group before feeling something heavy lunge at you and hold onto you in the piggy back position. You can easily keep him held up right and he will just be a giggling mess, your friends worried for you as floyd remains completely supported on your back. They eventually call jade and azul and they are also shocked to see you just standing calmly, having a floyd full on bear hugging you with all four of his limbs. Maybe you would be a good security person in the Monstro lounge

If you were scared of him, his reaction would depend on how much he likes you. If he only likes to bother you every now and then, not trying to actually start a conversation or a friendship with you, he would 100% use this to his advantage, having you do things for him and azul

If he cares about you alot more, finding you interesting and wanting to be your friend, he would be so very pouty and probably ask you straight up if you actually like him or just hang out with him because your scared of him. If he is head over heals for you or if he sees that its actually bothering you badly, he will try his best to gain your trust better and have you not scared of him. It isnt fun if his little shrimpy avoids him because of his games

Ok hear me out, if Floyd gets to overwhelmed or just far to overstimulated, he turns back into his eel-mer form, just complaining and not wanting to be bothered. If you are with Floyd or if he trusts you a lot like a best friend, you might be able to comfort him in this state. Octavinelle has some massive tanks around its dorm so you will most likely be able to find him there swimming around in his true form. be careful when approaching the top of the tank, if you aren't careful he might try and pull you in. If you guys are dating or if you both are close, he will full on lunge himself at you and squeeze you, resting against you as his lower half remains in the water. Prepare to have some numb legs because you will not be able to pry him off until he stops ranting, you will leave when he feels like it shrimpy

Study dates normally end up as literally anything else dates. You guys are studying together to make sure you guys pass the upcoming exam? He will grow board and probably either lean against you or start making paper airplanes to throw at you. Its boring shirmpy!

Once he starts to fall for you, he will be confused why his heart beats so fast around you when you smile or laugh at him. Your defiantly not a threat, he can easily overpower you. He isn't scared of you, there is nothing about you that is intimidating to him. so why is his heart beating this quickly? He will go to Azul and Jade and just mope around, telling them that he feels funny whenever your around. Jade chuckles as he explains to floyd why he feels like that, azul just looks annoyed as they are both now slacking from their job

He likes that your quite calm around him unlike the other people he normally goes off to bother, you actually can be around him for long periods of time without making him board or annoyed?! He will never say it or even admit it to himself but he really appreciates you more then he knows, he likes having his little shrimpy around

I like the head cannon that floyd teeths (teevths?), he likes chewy types of food and stuff that he can just chew on. Calamari, mints, gum, chewy meats, carrots, really cheesy foods, so many different types of noodles, heck! even some types of edible coral. If he doesn't have anything around him to use, he will chew on your cheeks. He wont make you bleed necessarily, he Justs like to have that mouth stimulation

Calls you "shrimpy" "guppy" "Koebi chan" "Little shrimp"

I feel like he is the type of person to sit and lay in the most random poses during the most random times. Your in ramshackle together? His legs are folded together in the air while he lays on his back, arms splayed out as he just talks to you like its normal.

When the octo-trio first saw grass, jade and azul had to hold floyd back from taking a bite out of the grass

He loves to cuddle you when you two are alone, even deciding to cuddle you in public. He loves holding you in his arms while he rests his face against your neck, having your chin rest on top of his head while you play with his hair. In public, he will be more modest and probably just sit next to you and rest his head on you, he likes lettng the other little guppies see that your his

Floyd loves to randomly steal you away, picking you up easily before dragging you to the monstro lounge for some drinks and food

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I know this was abit different to my other fics and im sorry if it isnt that good. This was difficult to write because im in abit of a writers rut right now, but im enjoying the way it turned out! He was fun to write about but i do think i could have done better

Who should i do next?

[doodlejoltik]

the unwinnable game

[~2.7k words. Read it here or on Ao3]

Zugzwang (from German 'compulsion to move'; pronounced [ˈtsuːktsvaŋ]) is a situation found in chess and other turn-based games wherein one player is put at a disadvantage because of their obligation to make a move.

Centuries after their battle atop Mt Coronet, Rei confronts Volo in a nondescript forest, somewhere on Pasio. But the answers he's seeking aren't so easily given.

aka. a continuation of that one dialogue cliffhanger in the Mysterious Stones chapter because I'm extremely normal about these two

///

“There's something you'd like to say, isn't there… Rei?”

Volo turns around and Rei musters up the bravest expression he can.

Now that he's here, he doesn't know what to say first; all his planned questions bounce around his head, clamouring for dominance. Why are you here? How? Since when? You have a Togepi and a Togekiss? Why a tournament? What do you know about the mysterious stones?

Were we ever really friends?

That is, it takes an embarrassingly long time for Rei to respond. In the end, what he says isn’t a question at all. “That Togepi in the ruins was yours.”

Volo only shrugs. He's got a languid smile on his face. “It might've been. She likes running around.”

Internally, Rei is relieved. So he hasn't been seeing things. But he doesn't let it show on his face, and crosses his arms. “Why’d you hide from everyone for months, and only show yourself now?”

“Now, I wouldn't call it hiding,” Volo replies, waving his finger. “This is a big island, and I've made a good few acquaintances here on Pasio already! Perhaps our paths simply didn't cross.”

With the number of times Rei has visited the ruins for mysterious stone research, the odds of that are vanishingly unlikely. “But why didn't you even try? It's not like I've been keeping a low profile.” Of course, the reason is probably something like I tried to end the world and it would be awkward. And that's what Rei needs Volo to say.

The Arc Phone sits heavily in his belt satchel, recording every word.

“Oh, I was just preoccupied. The ruins here are simply fascinating! Even though they're replicas, teasing apart all the ancient cultures used in their construction is such a fruitful area of study. You know me.��

Yeah, I know you. “Find anything interesting about Arceus?” Rei snarks.

“Not particularly!” Volo shakes his head, looking disappointed. Then he perks up, and continues, “Now, Dialga and Giratina however…”

“Oh?” Rei seethes quietly. Of course he had been watching. Why hadn't Giratina said anything?

“It’s curious, isn’t it, how they have seen fit to partner themselves with new wielders?” Volo smiles. “And Palkia too, I’ve heard.”

“It is interesting,” Rei forces out, adjusting his scarf. He recalls Volo's last parting line about Arceus, all those months ago. “Nice to know that they've bonded willingly with people in this time,” he says pointedly.

Ignoring Rei's tone, Volo continues, “That man, Cyrus, who controls Palkia. What a character, wouldn't you say?”

Rei has a lot of thoughts about the Sinnohans’ decision to allow Cyrus - a man who has literally tried to remake the world and not disavowed said goal - to keep the embodiment of Space with him. He'd thought Adaman and Irida had to be joking, at first. What would the Captain think if she saw what her descendant had turned the Galaxy Team into…

“I suppose you see yourself in him.” Rei says flatly.

It's only the two of them here, in the middle of a forest, in the dead of night, so Volo should have no reason to be evasive. And yet -

“Hardly,” Volo laughs off. “Intellectual curiosity, nothing more.”

This is going nowhere. Does Volo seriously think he can fool him again? Probably not - every remark is undoubtedly purposeful, but with just enough plausible deniability to appear innocent. So maybe he just wants to mess with him. Great.

A different strategy, maybe. He’ll surely make a mistake at some point if Rei keeps pushing. “This… tournament that you proposed,” Rei says. “I suppose you're participating?”

“Naturally!” Volo says cheerfully. “Battles on Pasio are done in teams, are they not? Perhaps you'd like to-”

“No.” Rei glares at him. Oh, now, that was going too far. Going to shut that line of conversation immediately.

“So hostile,” Volo sighs. “A united Hisuian contingent would've been a sight to see. Well, the clan leaders should be more receptive, at least.”

“Not if I can help it,” Rei says, crossing his arms. He’s well aware of how childish it sounds, but the thought of his friends falling for Volo’s innocent merchant act, again, is too horrible to consider. Mentally, he rapidly revises his priorities - he has to meet with Adaman and Irida as soon as possible and explain everything. Tomorrow, ideally. Does he have the energy for that? It’s something like one in the morning, right now. He's dead on his feet. But he’ll make it happen. He has to, before Volo does.

But what if he’s already too late? When had Rei last spoken to them? The dance competition, that wasn’t that long ago, right? At least a week, maybe more, his mind supplies. He'd just been so busy… and surely they would have told him if they'd met Volo.

This little anxious spiral must be evident on Rei’s face somehow, because Volo chuckles, stepping closer. “The world doesn't revolve around you, Rei. Not here.”

“You don’t get to act all high and mighty,” Rei snaps. “Not when you’re pulling everyone along on your own strings. I suppose you think you make the world go ‘round.”

But Volo has a point, no matter how much he hates to admit it. Rei’s been assuming he was someone significant to this whole saga. The appearance of the mysterious stones coincided with his and Akari’s arrival to Pasio, after all, so was he really wrong for thinking that?

And Arceus spoke to him first. That had to mean something.

“On the contrary, I simply meant that we’re all on equal ground,” Volo says. For the first time, goes unspoken.

“I’ll still beat you,” Rei vows. He’d done it before, he could do it again. No matter if he was still favoured by Arceus or not. “Because my bonds with my Pokemon, and my friends, are real. And you don’t know what that feels like.” Though intended to be a sharp jab at Volo, instead, a deep bitterness colours those final words.

Volo’s expression twists into something briefly unreadable before it settles into a polite half-smile. “You’re quick to assume the worst of me.”

“Quick?” Rei barks out a harsh laugh. “No, it was exactly the opposite.” He’d been strung along so thoroughly, accepting every strange behaviour as simply one of Volo’s little oddities. Only up at the Celestica Ruins did those allowances start to crumble – and by then, it was too late.

Volo’s look at Rei is one of intrigue. The way Rei's seen him examining ancient ruins, like he's something Volo wants to observe, or study.

And Rei has had it. Enough dancing around the subject, trying to draw it out of Volo; clearly it’s never going to happen. “Is this all just a game to you? You tried to destroy the world! You want me to think you care about anyone?”

Volo raises an eyebrow. “That's a bold claim. Surely if that had happened, it would've ended up in the history books, somewhere.”

Well – okay. The only person who knew what happened was the Professor, sort of. And Cogita. Arceus knows how she found out. But Professor Laventon didn't know half of it, even, Rei had just incoherently vented everything emotional and hurting at him, swore him to secrecy, and then hoped that he'd never have to unpack that again.

Clearly Arceus had other designs.

“We were friends.” Rei’s voice cracks a bit, there; he hates how true it is. “I thought we were friends. But you were going to kill me for standing in your way!”

Volo frowns. “Now, why would I do that?” He takes a few paces towards Rei and smiles, purposefully, grin stretching tight across his face. “I wouldn't want to lose my favourite customer, after all!”

Stumbling backwards to regain the distance, Rei exclaims, “I’ve bought maybe one thing from you. Stop calling me that!”

“Recipient of free samples, semantics,” Volo shrugs, entirely unaffected, and Rei wars with the competing urges to punch him or bolt into the treeline.

“Play dumb all you want,” Rei hisses, “but you’ve already shown your hand. I could tell them everything. You won’t be able to fool anyone ever again.” Least of all me.

Volo tilts his head with a smirk. “Well then, why are you here?” he asks, calling Rei’s bluff.

And though he can’t know that the Arc Phone is listening in Rei’s satchel, Rei realises that his motivations must be laughably transparent. Maybe Volo thinks Akari, or Cynthia, is watching the whole thing from the treeline. The specifics of it don’t matter, really. Rei’s been outplayed from the very beginning.

Volo makes a little movement with his hand. There's a sudden rustle of movement behind Rei, and he whips around, hand on Decidueye's Pokeball -

But it's just Volo's Togepi, who warbles in alarm and quickly toddles past him.

“What would people rather believe in?” Volo says lightly. “The accusations of a boy who jumps at shadows?” He bends down to pick up Togepi. “Or in the innocence of their friend?”

In Volo's arms, Togepi lets out an adorable squeak.

Over the Pokeball on his belt, Rei’s hand is trembling with misfired adrenaline. He carefully drops his hand to his side and raises his head up high. “Cynthia trusts me. I’ve been here for months, and we’ve worked together on the mysterious stones since they were first found.”

“And so?” Volo shrugs. “A working relationship is hardly worth much. I thought you would've known better, with what Kamado did…”

Rei flinches.

The worst part about it all was that no matter what ulterior motives Volo might have had, back then, when he’d been thrown out into the wild with barely a few days’ worth of supplies – Volo had been there for him when nobody else was.

Volo had seen Rei fall apart and put himself back together with forced cheer. And so, he knew exactly where the cracks were, where to strike with his words to disassemble Rei all over again.

Of course Rei knows Cynthia is responsible, and smart, and has been nothing but friendly to him – but he doesn't really know her, does he? And Volo is her ancestor. Which is pretty obvious, honestly. She’d probably like him immediately.

Just like everyone else did. Including Rei.

“Besides, you're not the only one who's been making friends in high places,” Volo adds smoothly. “I’ve heard that Bettie’s word is quite well regarded.”

So now that Rei had wised up to Volo's true nature, he'd gone and found himself new people to use. “You’ve always been like this, then,” Rei huffs. None of it had been real; their entire ‘friendship’ had been predicated on Rei's usefulness. “They deserve to know the truth about you.”

“Truth? Or your own opinion?” Volo scoffs. “You think so highly of yourself, Rei, but you're not the beloved Hero of Hisui here. No…” he smiles. “You're entirely ordinary. Do remember, it was everyone in that stadium who heard Arceus' voice.”

Admittedly, that stings. He'd thought - maybe - that Arceus was finally telling him why He'd brought Rei here. What he was supposed to do in this strange new land. But he'd failed, unable to clearly hear Arceus’ voice.

Rei spares a thought for the Arc Phone, once a vessel for divine inspiration, now reduced to recording mortals’ petty feuds. His messages to Arceus have been left on read for months. He's probably allowed to be a bit petty, at this point.

Volo continues, “Imagine! Any one of us could become Arceus’ champion.” Togepi makes a little noise. “Yes, even you,” he says indulgently, lifting her up to face him, and she goes cross-eyed following his waving finger.

It's horribly cute, the sort of thing Rei would've been charmed by before. And it's clear Volo is no longer taking Rei seriously at all.

What starts out as a wavering thought suddenly asserts itself with startling clarity. “I don't need anything from you,” Rei realises. He'd told himself he was here for evidence, something concrete he could hold against Volo, and that was true. But beyond that, he'd been after something entirely more personal.

He can walk away.

“I don't need anything from you,” he repeats, with force this time.

Volo turns his attention away from Togepi, and this of all things is what finally seems to make him genuinely confused. “Leaving so soon, Rei?”

Rei doesn't elaborate. He turns on his heel to stalk through the forest back to civilisation. Now, because if he says anything more he doesn't know if he'll ever bring himself to stop. Because he's asking for something he'll never get.

Volo's saying something. He doesn't care to catch all the words, though some of it filters through - “challenge”, “tournament”, and “rivals” among them. The general shape of the message is clear. They'll meet again; Rei's powerless to stop that. But as best he can, he'll shake off whatever lingering grip Volo still has on him.

He doesn't stop walking as the trodden earth turns to paved cobbles under his feet, and he makes it all the way up his building's winding stairs to the little studio apartment that he's been given. Home, for now. Collapsing onto the lone armchair, he takes the Arc Phone out of his satchel and turns off the recording. Thank Arceus for divinely bestowed infinite storage, he supposes.

Rei knows that if he were to listen to it, there'd be nothing of use. Only hidden barbs and Rei’s own ugly, wounded anger. It feels fitting to delete it, to banish the whole encounter to memory, and perhaps eventually, less than that.

He doesn't, and instead tucks it away in a folder several layers deep.

Maybe Professor Laventon wrote about the whole disaster in his private diaries. Rei knows he has them, bless the man. He'd once stumbled into the Professor's office late at night, after an exhausting, terrifying escape from an Alpha, ready to tell Laventon off for sending him there – and startled the Professor fiercely, who quickly shut the manuscript he was writing with a blush. So even if Rei had sworn him to secrecy, he might have confided in the written word.

That's something he can set Cynthia on digging up, then. Even just the suggestion that Laventon, the First Pokemon Professor, had such personal writings, would probably send her into an unstoppable research frenzy. That much about her, at least, he knows. If it still existed in this era, Cynthia would almost certainly find it.

And maybe he doesn't need evidence. Not for the people who matter, anyway.

Akari’s only a few doors away, their apartments close neighbours just like back in Jubilife Village. If he wanted, he could wander over there once the sun rose, have her fantastic tamago rice, and tell her everything.

Is he ready to take that step into thin air? To trust that he'll be believed, in something that's infinitely more convoluted and improbable than the simple plea – “I don't know why the sky is red, it's not my fault, I only ever did what you told me to” –

Well. Volo might've been the last one to break his trust, but he was in no way the first.

Can he make good on those words that he’d levelled so confidently against Volo? That his bonds with his friends are real?

Akari had never doubted. And Adaman and Irida had gone against Kamado's will, risking the standing of their people, just to help him. He would be doing them a disservice if he didn't at least try.

And in this dangerous game, it might be the only winning move.

Even as he makes this decision, he feels the pull of sleep. It's offensively late, or early, in the morning now, depending on perspective, and all of this is Tomorrow Rei’s problem.

There's no energy left to even stumble to bed. Rei falls asleep right there in the lumpy armchair, hand loosely gripped around the Arc Phone, Adaman and Irida’s Poryphone numbers on the screen, ready and waiting.

And, though Rei will certainly wake up sore with a crick in his neck come the morning…

For the first time in a long while, his dreams are not restless.

[cynthiav06]

The entire Fandom needs to listen to this:

Percy having a thing for Rachel was so absolutely deserved like he should have been head over heels for her. Here's why?

First meeting? Runs her through with Riptide, and where anyone would have spent the whole time yelling and arguing, Rachel quickly gauged the situation, helped Percy hide, deviated the skeletons from their orignal path all at the same time.

Percy is so awed and he should be and Rick Riordan doesn't do justice to the whole thing.

It ends on Percy saying he owes her one, almost an indication that they would meet again.

Yet Percy is terrified of running into Rachel again because he isn't sure if he could answer all her questions, most definitely because he doesn't want to drag her into the whole thing. So much so that when he sees her at Goode, he calls her "my redheaded nightmare " .

Not only has he thought of her since they last met, but he may or may not have dreamed about her, not to mention he remembered her full name after listening just once.

When he does meet her again she yet again warns him about monsters hence saving both of them.

The most important thing is Percy, who all his life has been judged blamed ridiculed, and mocked is for the very first time understood so instantaneously by Rachel. She who has been put in mortal danger every single time she meets him doesn't blame him, doesn't judge him for it, and openly takes the blame for the burning school. Even Annabeth's first response to seeing the smoke is blaming Percy despite being around him and knowing well enough for 3 years; she chooses to blame him as if she doesn't know that it's never Percy's fault. Yet Rachel, someone who he has met only twice and that too for meager few minutes, understands him and his situation so well.

All the people in the Fandom ask yourself this: Will Percy Jackson not for all that he is be absolutely head over heels and in awe of someone like that?

He can barely give her any answers at the moment, but she agrees to a death quest to help him save the world.

Throws a literal hairbrush at the Titan King and stands her ground.

Stays by him and comforts him through his depressive thoughts about dying due to the prophecy.

Falls in love with him despite knowing he has little time left.

Does her best to help him while still keeping his mind off from spiraling into dark thoughts.

Rides a literal helicopter mid-apocalypse to get to him just to warn him of the dangers?

Percy would be so absolutely over the moon in love with Rachel, were Uncle Rick not so fixated on Percabeth agenda.

The last bit is for toxic Annabeth stans:

Rachel is a genius too.

She is ambidextrous and can draw with both hands and legs; probably has exceptional memory, and her composure and quick thinking are on par with Percy himself.

I hate bringing this to looks, but I will if I get to shut up toxic fans. Annabeth is certainly beautiful, and her grey eyes are quite unique, but Rachel is the most underrated and definitely the most beautiful out of all Percy Jackson females.

The woman literally won genetic lottery with red hair and green eyes, and the only reason Uncle Rick doesn't rave about her beauty is to not make Annabeth insecure.

Also, for those overly concerned about the Oracle celibacy thing, I will address that in my next post and how it's not a problem at all.

Expect more Pjo-centric posts along with Perachel headcanons and more.

[tokyo-daaaamn-ji-gang]

hii!! I love your hcs 💗💗

may I request naoto tachibana x fem!reader?

this has been rotting in my head for the longest time ever: so in the series, naoto said that his memory gets overwritten when a new timeline is created. so I was thinking imagine fem!reader who he loves, but every timeline she is always somewhere else, further away from him. so maybe after seeing the outcome of his sister's fate and discussing with takemichi when a new timeline is created, he also checks on fem!reader. one timeline she'd be living in another city, one timeline she'd not even remember him, and what if there's one where she is part of a criminal organization, tasked to kill naoto. what is the outcome gonna be? is she gonna be able to complete her task? or will she end up falling for him in the process?

THIS IS ALL I CAN THINK OF FOR WEEKS 😭😭 sorry it's quite long omg thank you and have a great day!! 💖💖

Ahh that actually sounds really cool! I kinda came up with this for it (it ends on a bit of a cliffhanger though)

You're always on his mind, everytime the timeline gets rewritten there are three things he does. 1. Check to see if his sister is alive 2. Find Takemichi and 3. Find you.

He knows he shouldn't be focused on you, that he should concentrate on saving his sister. But he can't help it, you won't leave his mind. He loves you.

Of course Takemichi only encourages this, always telling him to go after you and find you. And so that's what he does in every timeline. 

In the first timeline that he can remember, you were his neighbour. It was funny how that had worked out, the two of you attending the same school as kids then living in the same building as each other as adults. He didn't really talk to you much but you were always so kind to him. Helping him out here and there, always smiling at him. 

The second timeline was the one that really changed things for him though. He wasn't expecting to find a ring on his finger or a wife waiting for him. He didn't know what to think at first but he fell hard and quickly for you, his wife. You were just so understanding and loving towards him, even when he was out late with Takemichi trying to figure things out. He liked your company before but now he loved you and of course he wanted to keep you. Something that he would end up aiming for in every timeline.

He isn't so lucky in the third timeline, the two of you were married again so of course you were also dragged along by Takemichi as "moral support" for seeing Hina. Which lead to all four of you being in the car, he had to run off for work but he thought you would be safe. He didn't think you.....                        you and Hina were chatting in the car and waiting for Takemichi when Akkun drove into the car. You were killed instantly from the collision, leaving Naoto to organise your funeral as well as his sister's. He swore he wouldn't let something like that happen again to you after that day. 

In the fourth timeline you weren't around at all, Naoto searched and searched but couldn't find you not anywhere. It wasn't until he was searching through some old stuff of his that he vaguely remembered you leaving to study and work abroad after finishing school. He hated that you weren't around but was also somewhat relieved. With him working with Kazutora and Chifuyu he was putting himself in a lot of danger, he didn't want you to be at risk too. He vowed to find you in the next timeline though, in the safer one. 

He was wrong though, this timeline wasn't safer and he didn't find you, you found him. He knew he would be a target after shooting Mikey but he wasn't expecting you to come after him. He's not sure how you got mixed up with Kisaki and Izana but it's clear you worked for them and had no idea who he was or once was to you. 

You'd been tailing him for weeks, following him around and observing him. Of course he'd noticed you immediately but said nothing. Instead he smiled at you each time your gazes met, the same way you had smiled at him in the very first timeline. You didn't smile back this time though, each time you would turn away or go back to pretending to just be a normal person who just so happened to be near him. 

Until that one evening, he was at home trying to finish off a report when he thought he heard something behind him. He was too slow to react though, you were immediately on top of him, restraining him and searching for hidden weapons. He only watched you, didn't even try to struggle against your tight grip. You pointed the gun at his head and he closed his eyes. You hesitated, something deep down telling you to not kill this guy. You didn't really know him, you'd just watched him a few weeks but you couldn't do it. Something was stopping you so the shot never rang out. When Naoto opened his eyes again you were gone, leaving his apartment as stealthily as you came in. 

He searched for you so hard after that but nothing, it's like you had disappeared. He didn't get to see you again there but you saw him one last time. After raiding the club with Koko and Inui you came out to see two bodies lying still on the floor. Closing the detectives eyes for him, you wondered why you were crying

[sageistrii]

So like I said if nothing has changed with Jimin's next album, then I'll have to accept that certain members which includes him are happy with where they are and with one member being favoured. And if that's the case then I don't see why I should be be bothered about something he isn't bothered about.

I think one thing we have to remember now more that ever is that whether Jimin (or any of the others) is bothered or not by these things or has even tried to address them, there is likely very little he could do about it. Regardless of whatever influence or power people expect the members to have within the company, we are now very clear on the extent HYBE can go to to attack a person if they don’t do as asked.

While we have to accept that the truth of this situation lies somewhere between Min Heejin’s and Hybe’s statements, I do think that Min Heejin gave us a LOT of info about the dynamics at Hybe. All of this is happening to her because of a history of disagreements (whether justified or not). She didn’t act the way they wanted her to, she complained about unfair requests of theirs and they wanted to put her in her place. This was just the moment for them to find actual ammunition against her because she decided to poke around and mess with ILLIT (and bruise Bang PD’s ego).

So if they can do this much damage to a top executive/creative who spearheads one of the company’s most successful groups because of disagreements (and big egos), why would they not do this to one of their idols? Again, I do not think that BTS members have even a fraction of the influence everyone expects them to have within that company which, just like this Min Heejin situation, sets a very concerning precedent.

You're right and that is exactly my point. If the members themselves can't make a change probably because they don't feel too strongly enough about it to make that change then why should I care?. If Jimin and the others feel like their situation was unbearable then they would cry out right? Or at least push hybe to give them something better. But while their current situation might not be the best, they seem to not care enough to change it so why should I be worried on Jimin's behalf?

The support will always be there, but like i said I will not be advocating for anything if we have a repeat of face era. I will enjoy the music and ignore every other thing. No essays, no screaming at hybe, nothing. There's a lot of mental and emotional energy being invested into doing these things and running a blog like this. During face and especially set me free pt2's release I was at the forefront telling everyone it's going to be ok and Jimin's debut will be one for the books, regardless of how weird things seemed at the time, and it was but I was actually affected by the whole thing. I always felt anxious and I couldn't eat (I'm not joking), because it seemed like as much as I tried to remain optimistic everything seemed to be going wrong at every turn. Sorry but I don't ever want to go through that again. I will just have to accept everything as is... for now at least, because I know if Jimin doesn't get what he deserves this year he would still get it eventually, his solo career isn't coming to an end and he is destined to be known as more than just "Jimin from BTS".

But this time, I don't think I have it in me to be as emotionally invested as I was with face. I will be here but I don't know how many more "Hybe hates Jimin" and "he's being sabotaged" posts I have left in me.

But regardless of hybe not doing their job,he is still going to do extremely well, that's for sure. But the thing is face also did well, that didn't stop the chaos.

[tbcanary]

Dinah Lance, the Black Canary 🖤

[thedreadvampy]

Yes people are fucking dying and no I don't ever feel like. Great about people being killed in missile strikes.

But I also don't feel great about decades of civilians, including over 2,100 children in the last 20 years, being killed both by missile strikes and by being shot or beaten to death in the street.

250 people were killed in the Hamas rocket attacks on Saturday, which is around the same as the number of Palestinian people the Israeli security forces had murdered this year before Saturday, and significantly less than they've killed since Saturday.

look the people are not the state and despite Israel being an apartheid colony, being an Israeli citizen doesn't necessarily imply 100% agreement. It's been 70 years and 3 generations since Israel was established as a state and the majority of Israeli civilians now didn't choose to come, they're living in the country they were born (although the same is not so much true for people living in Gaza who have recently occupied the stolen homes of Palestinians). Israelis are human people with lives and hopes and passions and deaths of any person are tragic.

BUT.

Palestinians are human people with lives and hopes and passions and their lives matter just as much and are snuffed out without the international community batting an eye - I remind you again. 212 Palestinians including 38 children were murdered this year before this weekend's missile strikes and if you didn't give a shit until Hamas killed the same number of Israelis at which point everyone went OH MY GOD THE HUMANITY HOW COULD PALESTINIANS DO THIS (while Israel killed 300+ more Palestinians in under 24 hours) that's bc uhhhh you're fucking racist and don't think Palestinian lives are as important as Israeli ones

so like. sure we can acknowledge that 250 Israeli civilians' deaths are a tragedy, if we can also agree that the 300+ Palestinian civilians killed in retaliatory strikes are a tragedy and most importantly if we can agree that the 200+ Palestinians killed in 2023 before the Hamas strikes this weekend are not just a tragedy but a deliberate atrocity.

in January the Israeli government made it vocally clear before the UN than not only do they consider the occupation of Palestine permanent, they are explicitly focused on taking over as much Palestinian land as possible in perpetuity. Since then this whole year there have been a total of only FOUR (nonconsecutive) FULL WEEKS in which NO Palestines were killed by Israel (compared to only 8 weeks in which Israelis WERE killed, of which 2 incidents were friendly fire from another IDF member)

It's legitimately tragic when people are killed. And Israel has been systematically killing Palestinians to the degree there are Palestinian casualties recorded about 3 days in every 5 this year, usually multiple, with displacements, demolitions, injuries, arrests and beatings recorded almost every single day. I do not know how LITERALLY anyone can look at the numbers from this year, let alone the last 75, and conclude that Israel is the victim of unprovoked violence.

[weaselle]

it was too much i had to make my own post

line cook here. ACCURATE

if you don't get the hate, here's what you don't understand.

it takes up to 2 hours to close down the kitchen.

The last 60-90 minutes before closing time you do almost no cooking because the restaurant doesn't have many people in it and you've already cooked most of their diners.

So if someone walks in during, like, the last hour, the cook is in the middle of an industrial deep clean of the kitchen.

(these numbers can vary quite a bit from place to place but i have worked several restaurants with these actual times and the concept remains the same)

Say the place closes at 10. If you wait til the restaurant is already closed to start all your cleaning duties, you'll be there until at least midnight.

More than that your boss knows that on an average night you can start your clean up as soon as the last rush ends and get out of there around 10:45, even 10:15 on a slow night if you get lucky. That means there are plenty of restaurants where if you do take until midnight the manager is going to come up to you at some point that week and ask you what went wrong that night, and you'd better have an answer.

So this example restaurant closes at 10 pm. The dinner rush ends around 8:30, and shortly after that the cook is going to start getting every single dish possible over to the dishwasher because the dishwasher always gets hit hard and late, and the machine runs for 2 full minutes and only holds so many dishes, so the way that works out is if you wait an extra 30 minutes to give the dishwasher all your stuff it can mean adding like 60 minutes to the end of his shift. And you're gonna KEEP finding shit to send to the dishpit right up until you leave probably.

all these little square and rectangle containers in this cold table have to be pulled out and changed over into new containers, replaced by new full ones, or in some cases filled from larger containers in the back, which can result in even more empty containers to send to the dishwasher.

while it's all pulled apart to do this, you have to clean up all the spilled food and sauce and juices and stuff from the joints and ledges and shelves and drip trays

Once you get your line changed over in this way, and fully stocked, anytime someone orders something that makes use of a bunch of that stuff, you have to restock and re-clean it some. It might already be covered in plastic. Some of it might already be stuck in the back to make room to take apart your cutting board counter to clean. To cook a dish isn't TOO much of a problem at this point, but you're really hoping for zero orders because you still have so much other cleaning to do.

Meanwhile the salad bar and appetizer section and server station and everybody are all doing the same thing. Even the bartenders are stocking olives and lemons and sending back whisks and stir spoons and shakers and empty 4quart storage containers that used to hold the back-up lemons and olives and things. Every section is dumping their must-be-cleaneds to the dishpit as fast as possible because early and fast is the only thing they can do to to help that dishpit not absolutely drown into overtime.

The poor dishwasher is always the last to clock out, soaking wet and exhausted.

Around this time you probably scrub the flat top, which has turned black from cooked on grease and is still about 500 degrees. Line cooks are divided in opinion on water-based or oil based cleaning methods for this, but they all involve scrubbing with (usually) a brick of pumice stone using every ounce of your strength while you try not to burn yourself

you scrub it from fully blackened to gleaming silver and now if somebody orders something that needs the flat top to cook, you can either fuck up your cleaning job or fake it in a couple frying pans and pass that tiny fuck you down to your dishwasher (who usually understands, especially if you help them take the garbage out or clean your own floor drain later)

If there's deep fried stuff on the menu then the fryers have to be cleaned out, which includes straining the oil out into enormous and super-heavy pots full of oil so hot that if you spill on yourself then it's probably a hospital visit and if you slip and fall face first into it it'll be the last thing you ever do.

Then you gotta scrub out the fryer. Like you gotta take the (hot) screen out and reach your arm down into the weird rounded pipes and curved areas (so hot, burn you if you brush against them hot) and scrub off whatever is down there

Depending on your kitchen you might have to do up to four of these. Then you'll have to pour the (dangerously hot) oil back in

oh, and if you didn't dry the pipes and get ALL the water out of the trap and tank?

water reacts with hot oil in a sort of mentos and coke way that can send a tidal wave of oil past the open flame of the pilot light ...HUGE dangerous mess and/or burn down the kitchen if the oil lights up.

Unless! If the oil has been used too hard and needs to be changed, it's time to carry those open topped super heavy pots full of will-kill-you-hot oil and dump them in the barrel outside by the dumpsters so you can put room temp fresh oil in the fryers. whew!

The clean up is not just some light wiping down that can be easily interrupted, is what i'm saying.

You might have to do some kind of walk-in duty (moving around 50lb cases of lettuce and 50lb bags of onions to get to the stacks of five gallon buckets full of salad dressings and sauces to move so you can reach the giant metal pots and bus tubs full of prep and get it all organized and make sure it's all labeled and i have to stop now i'm having flashbacks)

THE POINT IS

by 15 or however many minutes to close, the line cook is doing an intense deep clean and probably has the whole stove taken apart to detail.

For some industrial stoves this means lifting off large cast iron plates that weigh like 20 lbs each and are still quite hot. Whatever metal burners are on there, you gotta take off and clean, you can see here the lines that indicate the large thick cast iron rectangles that sit on top of the burners to allow heavy pots to rest on. Those five (each has one front burner hole and one back burner hole, see?) have to be lifted off and cleaned with soap and a wire brush usually, and then the underneath area also has to be cleaned because a lot of shit falls through the burner holes on a busy night.

if you didn't do it when you did the flat top you have to do the grease trap (which can be like a full five minutes and is always disgusting).. You gotta clean out all the little gas jets in each burner with a wire or something so the burners all flame evenly, and sometimes you have to remove some of the natural gas piping that connects the burners to access where you have to clean.

you gotta clean out the bottom of the oven and the wire racks, and, oh gods, you gotta take down the filter vents from the hood fans above the stove.

See all the lined parts along the top of the wall?

those are hood vents, and as they pull air up they also pull a lot of grease and they have to be taken down and cleaned, then you gotta climb up there and scrub where they go before you put them back...

And then there's the mopping and floor drains and...

Anyway, that's what the line cook is doing when you walk in fifteen minutes before closing and order something that needs to be cooked on that stove. They are doing an entire industrial cleaning of a professional kitchen.

In some restaurants maybe one or two of these jobs will be every other night or even only twice a week, but in many, possibly most kitchens, ALL of these things happen EVERY night. You don't want to leave any food mess that might attract insects or rodents for one thing, so a really good kitchen is as close to brand new as you can get it every night.

IF YOU ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO ORDER SOMETHING ANYWAY, HERE IS WHAT TO DO

open with an apology and ask the server to go ask what the cook would prefer you to order.

Any good server will already know what the cook is hoping for and what will make their line cook go into the walk in and scream. If it's significantly less than an hour to close and they say some variant of "oh anything is fine" they are either telling the lie their boss wants them to say, or they actually do not know what their line cook wants, and you can either use human connection and a conspiratorial just-between-us tone to get them to drop the customer-is-always-right act, or get them to actually go ask the cook.

It might be as specific as "the lasagna is easiest on the kitchen" or it might be a simple guideline like "nothing that requires the flat top" or "any of the sautés are easy" but a good line cook will probably have a system for if they have to make a couple of the most popular items after they start their close, so the answer is likely to include something most people like and you should be good to order that.

but for the love of all that's holy, please only do so at great need. Leave that last 30-60 minutes to the truly desperate and the crew's duties.

[endusviolence]

Rowling isn't denying holocaust. She just pointed out that burning of transgender health books is a lie as that form of cosmetic surgery didn't exist. But of course you knew that already, didn't you?

I was thinking I'd probably see one of you! You're wrong :) Let's review the history a bit, shall we?

In this case, what we're talking about is the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, or in English, The Institute of Sexology. This Institute was founded and headed by a gay Jewish sexologist named Magnus Hirschfeld. It was founded in July of 1919 as the first sexology research clinic in the world, and was run as a private, non-profit clinic. Hirschfeld and the researchers who worked there would give out consultations, medical advice, and even treatments for free to their poorer clientele, as well as give thousands of lectures and build a unique library full of books on gender, sexuality, and eroticism. Of course, being a gay man, Hirschfeld focused a lot on the gay community and proving that homosexuality was natural and could not be "cured".

Hirschfeld was unique in his time because he believed that nobody's gender was either one or the other. Rather, he contended that everyone is a mixture of both male and female, with every individual having their own unique mix of traits.

This leads into the Institute's work with transgender patients. Hirschfeld was actually the one to coin the term "transsexual" in 1923, though this word didn't become popular phrasing until 30 years later when Harry Benjamin began expanding his research (I'll just be shortening it to trans for this brief overview.) For the Institute, their revolutionary work with gay men eventually began to attract other members of the LGBTA+, including of course trans people.

Contrary to what Anon says, sex reassignment surgery was first tested in 1912. It'd already being used on humans throughout Europe during the 1920's by the time a doctor at the Institute named Ludwig Levy-Lenz began performing it on patients in 1931. Hirschfeld was at first opposed, but he came around quickly because it lowered the rate of suicide among their trans patients. Not only was reassignment performed at the Institute, but both facial feminization and facial masculization surgery were also done.

The Institute employed some of these patients, gave them therapy to help with other issues, even gave some of the mentioned surgeries for free to this who could not afford it! They spoke out on their behalf to the public, even getting Berlin police to help them create "transvestite passes" to allow people to dress however they wanted without the threat of being arrested. They worked together to fight the law, including trying to strike down Paragraph 175, which made it illegal to be homosexual. The picture below is from their holiday party, Magnus Hirschfeld being the gentleman on the right with the fabulous mustache. Many of the other people in this photo are transgender.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of a group of people. Some are smiling at the camera, others have serious expressions. Either way, they all seem to be happy. On the right side, an older gentleman in glasses- Magnus Hirschfeld- is sitting. He has short hair and a bushy mustache. He is resting one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of him. His other hand is being held by a person to his left. Another person to his right is holding his shoulder.]

There was always push back against the Institute, especially from conservatives who saw all of this as a bad thing. But conservatism can't stop progress without destroying it. They weren't willing to go that far for a good while. It all ended in March of 1933, when a new Chancellor was elected. The Nazis did not like homosexuals for several reasons. Chief among them, we break the boundaries of "normal" society. Shortly after the election, on May 6th, the book burnings began. The Jewish, gay, and obviously liberal Magnus Hirschfeld and his library of boundary-breaking literature was one of the very first targets. Thankfully, Hirschfeld was spared by virtue of being in Paris at the time (he would die in 1935, before the Nazis were able to invade France). His library wasn't so lucky.

This famous picture of the book burnings was taken after the Institute of Sexology had been raided. That's their books. Literature on so much about sexuality, eroticism, and gender, yes including their new work on trans people. This is the trans community's Alexandria. We're incredibly lucky that enough of it survived for Harry Benjamin and everyone who came after him was able to build on the Institute's work.

[Image ID: A black and white photo of the May Nazi book burning of the Institute of Sexology's library. A soldier, back facing the camera, is throwing a stack of books into the fire. In the background of the right side, a crowd is watching.]

As the Holocaust went on, the homosexuals of Germany became a targeted group. This did include transgender people, no matter what you say. To deny this reality is Holocaust denial. JK Rowling and everyone else who tries to pretend like this isn't reality is participating in that evil. You're agreeing with the Nazis.

But of course, you knew that already, didn't you?

Edit: Added image IDs. I apologize to those using screen readers for forgetting them. Please reblog this version instead.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How I got scammed

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

I wuz robbed.

More specifically, I was tricked by a phone-phisher pretending to be from my bank, and he convinced me to hand over my credit-card number, then did $8,000+ worth of fraud with it before I figured out what happened. And then he tried to do it again, a week later!

Here's what happened. Over the Christmas holiday, I traveled to New Orleans. The day we landed, I hit a Chase ATM in the French Quarter for some cash, but the machine declined the transaction. Later in the day, we passed a little credit-union's ATM and I used that one instead (I bank with a one-branch credit union and generally there's no fee to use another CU's ATM).

A couple days later, I got a call from my credit union. It was a weekend, during the holiday, and the guy who called was obviously working for my little CU's after-hours fraud contractor. I'd dealt with these folks before – they service a ton of little credit unions, and generally the call quality isn't great and the staff will often make mistakes like mispronouncing my credit union's name.

That's what happened here – the guy was on a terrible VOIP line and I had to ask him to readjust his mic before I could even understand him. He mispronounced my bank's name and then asked if I'd attempted to spend $1,000 at an Apple Store in NYC that day. No, I said, and groaned inwardly. What a pain in the ass. Obviously, I'd had my ATM card skimmed – either at the Chase ATM (maybe that was why the transaction failed), or at the other credit union's ATM (it had been a very cheap looking system).

I told the guy to block my card and we started going through the tedious business of running through recent transactions, verifying my identity, and so on. It dragged on and on. These were my last hours in New Orleans, and I'd left my family at home and gone out to see some of the pre-Mardi Gras krewe celebrations and get a muffalata, and I could tell that I was going to run out of time before I finished talking to this guy.

"Look," I said, "you've got all my details, you've frozen the card. I gotta go home and meet my family and head to the airport. I'll call you back on the after-hours number once I'm through security, all right?"

He was frustrated, but that was his problem. I hung up, got my sandwich, went to the airport, and we checked in. It was total chaos: an Alaska Air 737 Max had just lost its door-plug in mid-air and every Max in every airline's fleet had been grounded, so the check in was crammed with people trying to rebook. We got through to the gate and I sat down to call the CU's after-hours line. The person on the other end told me that she could only handle lost and stolen cards, not fraud, and given that I'd already frozen the card, I should just drop by the branch on Monday to get a new card.

We flew home, and later the next day, I logged into my account and made a list of all the fraudulent transactions and printed them out, and on Monday morning, I drove to the bank to deal with all the paperwork. The folks at the CU were even more pissed than I was. The fraud that run up to more than $8,000, and if Visa refused to take it out of the merchants where the card had been used, my little credit union would have to eat the loss.

I agreed and commiserated. I also pointed out that their outsource, after-hours fraud center bore some blame here: I'd canceled the card on Saturday but most of the fraud had taken place on Sunday. Something had gone wrong.

One cool thing about banking at a tiny credit-union is that you end up talking to people who have actual authority, responsibility and agency. It turned out the the woman who was processing my fraud paperwork was a VP, and she decided to look into it. A few minutes later she came back and told me that the fraud center had no record of having called me on Saturday.

"That was the fraudster," she said.

Oh, shit. I frantically rewound my conversation, trying to figure out if this could possibly be true. I hadn't given him anything apart from some very anodyne info, like what city I live in (which is in my Wikipedia entry), my date of birth (ditto), and the last four digits of my card.

Wait a sec.

He hadn't asked for the last four digits. He'd asked for the last seven digits. At the time, I'd found that very frustrating, but now – "The first nine digits are the same for every card you issue, right?" I asked the VP.

I'd given him my entire card number.

Goddammit.

The thing is, I know a lot about fraud. I'm writing an entire series of novels about this kind of scam:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

And most summers, I go to Defcon, and I always go to the "social engineering" competitions where an audience listens as a hacker in a soundproof booth cold-calls merchants (with the owner's permission) and tries to con whoever answers the phone into giving up important information.

But I'd been conned.

Now look, I knew I could be conned. I'd been conned before, 13 years ago, by a Twitter worm that successfully phished out of my password via DM:

https://locusmag.com/2010/05/cory-doctorow-persistence-pays-parasites/

That scam had required a miracle of timing. It started the day before, when I'd reset my phone to factory defaults and reinstalled all my apps. That same day, I'd published two big online features that a lot of people were talking about. The next morning, we were late getting out of the house, so by the time my wife and I dropped the kid at daycare and went to the coffee shop, it had a long line. Rather than wait in line with me, my wife sat down to read a newspaper, and so I pulled out my phone and found a Twitter DM from a friend asking "is this you?" with a URL.

Assuming this was something to do with those articles I'd published the day before, I clicked the link and got prompted for my Twitter login again. This had been happening all day because I'd done that mobile reinstall the day before and all my stored passwords had been wiped. I entered it but the page timed out. By that time, the coffees were ready. We sat and chatted for a bit, then went our own ways.

I was on my way to the office when I checked my phone again. I had a whole string of DMs from other friends. Each one read "is this you?" and had a URL.

Oh, shit, I'd been phished.

If I hadn't reinstalled my mobile OS the day before. If I hadn't published a pair of big articles the day before. If we hadn't been late getting out the door. If we had been a little more late getting out the door (so that I'd have seen the multiple DMs, which would have tipped me off).

There's a name for this in security circles: "Swiss-cheese security." Imagine multiple slices of Swiss cheese all stacked up, the holes in one slice blocked by the slice below it. All the slices move around and every now and again, a hole opens up that goes all the way through the stack. Zap!

The fraudster who tricked me out of my credit card number had Swiss cheese security on his side. Yes, he spoofed my bank's caller ID, but that wouldn't have been enough to fool me if I hadn't been on vacation, having just used a pair of dodgy ATMs, in a hurry and distracted. If the 737 Max disaster hadn't happened that day and I'd had more time at the gate, I'd have called my bank back. If my bank didn't use a slightly crappy outsource/out-of-hours fraud center that I'd already had sub-par experiences with. If, if, if.

The next Friday night, at 5:30PM, the fraudster called me back, pretending to be the bank's after-hours center. He told me my card had been compromised again. But: I hadn't removed my card from my wallet since I'd had it replaced. Also, it was half an hour after the bank closed for the long weekend, a very fraud-friendly time. And when I told him I'd call him back and asked for the after-hours fraud number, he got very threatening and warned me that because I'd now been notified about the fraud that any losses the bank suffered after I hung up the phone without completing the fraud protocol would be billed to me. I hung up on him. He called me back immediately. I hung up on him again and put my phone into do-not-disturb.

The following Tuesday, I called my bank and spoke to their head of risk-management. I went through everything I'd figured out about the fraudsters, and she told me that credit unions across America were being hit by this scam, by fraudsters who somehow knew CU customers' phone numbers and names, and which CU they banked at. This was key: my phone number is a reasonably well-kept secret. You can get it by spending money with Equifax or another nonconsensual doxing giant, but you can't just google it or get it at any of the free services. The fact that the fraudsters knew where I banked, knew my name, and had my phone number had really caused me to let down my guard.

The risk management person and I talked about how the credit union could mitigate this attack: for example, by better-training the after-hours card-loss staff to be on the alert for calls from people who had been contacted about supposed card fraud. We also went through the confusing phone-menu that had funneled me to the wrong department when I called in, and worked through alternate wording for the menu system that would be clearer (this is the best part about banking with a small CU – you can talk directly to the responsible person and have a productive discussion!). I even convinced her to buy a ticket to next summer's Defcon to attend the social engineering competitions.

There's a leak somewhere in the CU systems' supply chain. Maybe it's Zelle, or the small number of corresponding banks that CUs rely on for SWIFT transaction forwarding. Maybe it's even those after-hours fraud/card-loss centers. But all across the USA, CU customers are getting calls with spoofed caller IDs from fraudsters who know their registered phone numbers and where they bank.

I've been mulling this over for most of a month now, and one thing has really been eating at me: the way that AI is going to make this kind of problem much worse.

Not because AI is going to commit fraud, though.

One of the truest things I know about AI is: "we're nowhere near a place where bots can steal your job, we're certainly at the point where your boss can be suckered into firing you and replacing you with a bot that fails at doing your job":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/15/passive-income-brainworms/#four-hour-work-week

I trusted this fraudster specifically because I knew that the outsource, out-of-hours contractors my bank uses have crummy headsets, don't know how to pronounce my bank's name, and have long-ass, tedious, and pointless standardized questionnaires they run through when taking fraud reports. All of this created cover for the fraudster, whose plausibility was enhanced by the rough edges in his pitch - they didn't raise red flags.

As this kind of fraud reporting and fraud contacting is increasingly outsourced to AI, bank customers will be conditioned to dealing with semi-automated systems that make stupid mistakes, force you to repeat yourself, ask you questions they should already know the answers to, and so on. In other words, AI will groom bank customers to be phishing victims.

This is a mistake the finance sector keeps making. 15 years ago, Ben Laurie excoriated the UK banks for their "Verified By Visa" system, which validated credit card transactions by taking users to a third party site and requiring them to re-enter parts of their password there:

https://web.archive.org/web/20090331094020/http://www.links.org/?p=591

This is exactly how a phishing attack works. As Laurie pointed out, this was the banks training their customers to be phished.

I came close to getting phished again today, as it happens. I got back from Berlin on Friday and my suitcase was damaged in transit. I've been dealing with the airline, which means I've really been dealing with their third-party, outsource luggage-damage service. They have a terrible website, their emails are incoherent, and they officiously demand the same information over and over again.

This morning, I got a scam email asking me for more information to complete my damaged luggage claim. It was a terrible email, from a noreply@ email address, and it was vague, officious, and dishearteningly bureaucratic. For just a moment, my finger hovered over the phishing link, and then I looked a little closer.

On any other day, it wouldn't have had a chance. Today – right after I had my luggage wrecked, while I'm still jetlagged, and after days of dealing with my airline's terrible outsource partner – it almost worked.

So much fraud is a Swiss-cheese attack, and while companies can't close all the holes, they can stop creating new ones.

Meanwhile, I'll continue to post about it whenever I get scammed. I find the inner workings of scams to be fascinating, and it's also important to remind people that everyone is vulnerable sometimes, and scammers are willing to try endless variations until an attack lands at just the right place, at just the right time, in just the right way. If you think you can't get scammed, that makes you especially vulnerable:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/24/passive-income/#swiss-cheese-security

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[getvalentined]

An open letter to @staff

I already submitted this to Support under "Feedback," but I'm sharing it here too as I don't expect it to get a response, and I feel like putting in out in public may be more effective than sending it off into the void.

The recent post on the Staff blog about changing tumblr to an algorithmic feed features a large amount of misinformation that I feel staff needs to address, openly and honestly, with information on where this data was sourced at the very least.

Claim 1: Algorithms help small creators.

This is false, as algorithms are designed to push content that gets engagement in order to get it more engagement, thereby assuring that the popular remain popular and the small remain small except in instances of extreme luck.

This can already be seen on the tumblr radar, which is a combination of staff picks (usually the same half-dozen fandoms or niche special interests like Lego photography) which already have a ton of engagement, or posts that are getting enough engagement to hit the radar organically. Tumblr has an algorithm that runs like every other socmed algorithm on the planet, and it will decimate the reach of small creators just like every other platform before it.

Claim 2: Only a small portion of users utilize the chronological feed.

You can find a poll by user @darkwood-sleddog here that at the time of writing this, sits at over 40 THOUSAND responses showing that over 96 percent of them use the chronological feed*. Claiming otherwise isn't just a misstatement, it's a lie. You are lying to your core userbase and expecting them to accept it as fact. It's not just unethical, it's insulting to people who have been supporting your platform for over a decade.

Claim 3: Tumblr is not easy to use.

This is also 100% false and you ABSOLUTELY know it. Tumblr is EXTREMELY easy to use, the issue is that the documentation, the explanations of features, and often even the stability of the service is subpar. All of this would be very easy for staff to fix, if they would invest in the creation of walkthroughs and clear explanations of how various site features work, as well as finally fixing the search function. Your inability to explain how your service works should not result in completely ignoring the needs and wants of your core long-term userbase. The fact that you're more willing to invest in the very systems that have made every other form of social media so horrifically toxic than in trying to make it easier for people to use the service AS IT WORKS NOW and fixing the parts that don't work as well speaks volumes toward what tumblr staff actually cares about.

You will not get a paycheck if your platform becomes defunct, and the thing that makes it special right now is that it is the ONLY large-scale socmed platform on THE ENTIRE INTERNET with a true chronological feed and no aggressive algorithmic content serving. The recent post from staff indicates that you are going to kill that, and are insisting that it's what we want. It is not. I'd hazard to guess that most of the dev team knows it isn't what we want, but I assume the money people don't care. The user base isn't relevant, just how much money they can bring in.

The CEO stated he wanted this to remain as sort of the last bastion of the Old Internet, and yet here we are, watching you declare you intend to burn it to the ground.

You can do so much better than this.

Response to the Update

Under the cut for readability, because everything said above still applies.

I already said this in a reblog on the post itself, but I'm adding it to this one for easy access: people read it that way because that's what you said.

Staff considers the main feed as it exists to be "outdated," to the point that you literally used that word to describe it, and the main goals expressed in this announcement is to figure out what makes "high-quality content" and serve that to users moving forward.

People read it that way because that is what you said.

*The final results of the poll, after 24 hours:

136,635 votes breaks down thusly:

An algorithm based feed where I get "the best of tumblr." @ 1.3% (roughly 1,776 votes)

Chronological feed that only features blogs I follow. @ 95.2% (roughly 130,077 votes)

This doesn't affect me personally. @ 3.5% (roughly 4,782 votes)

[pierregazly]

but mama, i love him ꨄ oscar piastri smau

oscar piastri x leclerc!reader

the one where oscar's girlfriend has been soft launching their relationship for ages. and he's okay with it, especially if it means he can keep hiding in plain sight from her three overprotective brothers.

ynleclerc

tagged charles_leclerc

liked by charles_leclerc, arthur_leclerc, oscarpiastri, and others

ynleclerc omg omg omg... charles leclerc signed my hat? should i add it to the shrine? give them something to sacrifice?

view all comments

username any non-f1 fan would automatically assume ynleclerc is a crazy fan page for charles

username or a charles leclerc hate page... all she does it make fun of her brothers here

username she's offering her signed hat for the tifosi to sacrifice for a CL16 win??? that seems like pure love all around

arthur_leclerc i also signed your hat?

ynleclerc i also do not care? will a hat signed by you get me millions if i sell it for sacrificial purposes?

charles_leclerc what's next? my personal belongings?

ynleclerc is that an offer? if so, oui. i will take what i think will make me the most money next time i'm there, merci <3

scuderiaferrari if it gets us a 1-2 finish, sacrifice everything ynleclerc... please 🙏

username being a Ferrari fan is so satisfying when you remember ynleclerc is an automatic inclusion in everything and anything charles does

username the things i would do to have her as a McLaren fan... she's too beautiful for Ferrari 😭

oscarpiastri a piastri hat will get you good money in straya btw

username oscar??

oscarpiastri

liked by logansargeant, landonorris, mclaren, and others

oscarpiastri 'stop hitting me with the ball on purpose you jerk' was said more times than it should've been, by someone who really just sucks at tennis. had an awesome week back home, time to get back to it 💪

view all comments

logansargeant no wonder you're so worried about getting run over

username the coordinating outfits?? i'm gonna scream, who is she!!!

username what does logan know, tell us your secrets girl logansargeant

username oscar is gonna soft launch this relationship until the end of time. show us her face, you coward!!

ynleclerc did you pay her for all the bruises that tennis ball left?? poor girl

oscarpiastri it's not my fault she's a terrible tennis player, we all know i've offered to pay for a trainer

landonorris so this is why you couldn't come to bali with me 🤨

username lando really said i'm the third wheel??

username to be fair i'd probably pick oscar's girlfriend over lando for a week away too

username girly you don't even know who she is!!! she could be the devil

username i wanna be included in oscar's post week home photo dump :(

ynleclerc has posted a story

liked by oscarpiastri, logansargeant, pascale.leclerc.355, and others

replies

oscarpiastri you can call me pookie whenever you want if you're gonna post things like this

ynleclerc i'd call you pookie with or without your permission, mon amour

charles_leclerc who is this

charles_leclerc why won't you tell us who you're dating

charles_leclerc we won't hurt him

charles_leclerc answer my texts

ynleclerc

liked by oscarpiastri, pascale.leclerc.355, arthur_leclerc, and others

ynleclerc get you a man who can do both, luckiest woman in the world whenever you're around. mon amour 🤍

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username people involved in formula 1 and their obsession with soft launching everything NEEDS to be studied

username at least she posts her boyfriend and he isn't just a small figure in the background of every post (charles this is a direct hate comment)

arthur_leclerc this would have been very lovely if it weren't for the last photo

liked by charles_leclerc and lorenzotl

ynleclerc suppose it's a good thing you could easily ignore it. cheers :)

pascale.leclerc.355 trés belle, ma fille 💗

charles_leclerc maman?

username could you IMAGINE if ynleclerc told pascale but obviously hasn't told her brothers? i can FEEL the outrage

username starting to think this may be a driver, ynleclerc is at every race weekend and ALWAYS makes a post with her mystery man at some point during the week after...

username okay ms sleuth (i think it's lando)

username i'm like 65% sure it's oscar, and 35% positive it's someone that looks a lot like oscar

ynleclerc

tagged oscarpiastri

liked by oscarpiastri, logansargeant, landonorris, and others

ynleclerc someone exposed us on twitter, so i had to expose us on instagram 😮‍💨

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oscarpiastri love you <3

oscarpiastri i will love you even when a ferrari has run me over, of course.

arthur_leclerc is this your way of telling me i was right, without texting me back?

charles_leclerc this must be a joke, non?

pascale.leclerc.355 so very excited to finally be able to invite the both of you for dinner. trés belle 🤍

charles_leclerc maman, you knew?

ynleclerc oscar and i will see you for sunday dinner, maman! <3

tresbelleleclercspam

liked by logansargeant, charles_leclerc, alexandrasaintmleux, and others

ynleclerc live feed of oscar running away from charles in the paddock when he said he 'just wanted to talk, mate'

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charles_leclerc i truly just wanted to talk about the race

charles_leclerc i did not have a speech planned, non

arthur_leclerc i did have a speech planned

lorenzotl i just wanted to welcome him to the family, as a good big brother should

oscarpiastri my apple watch warned me of an overactive heart rate 5 times today. why did you do this to me. why couldn't you have three sisters???

ynleclerc so very sorry, in our next life i'll try to make sure you only have to worry about sisters and not three overprotective brothers

oscarpiastri as long as i get to spend every lifetime with you <3

i actually got a request for something like this ages ago, and finally got around to finishing it. i so hope you all loved it as much as i loved writing it. thank you for all the support!!

i'm not currently taking requests, but if anyone has lil suggestions or prompts please feel free to send them.