#turning bl meta

[birb-catto]

Spoiler Warning: Meaning of the Name Yudrain

Yudrain roughly translates to "the beginning and the end," which can be interpreted as "forever."

Kishiar is an Alpha (first letter of the Greek alphabet; the beginning)

Yuder is an Omega (last letter of the Greek alphabet; the end)

If there is no Kishiar who gave Yuder a new name in the beginning, then there is no Yuder who harbors feelings for him and decides to save him in the end.

The beginning and the end.

Just like how two halves make a whole, how two ends of a thread make a circle, two people are needed to make the word "forever" meaningful.

Take what you will of this.

[nyxelestia]

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Fandom Community Spaces

One of my fandom servers recently imploded. I didn’t just want to post my immediate reactions and spend the next 3-5 business years litigating my feelings, so I took a few months to deconstruct what happened. Now I’m reconstructing everything into a case study on white supremacy culture in progressive spaces.

Below the poll, I’ve spelled out 17 traits of white supremacy culture, as they appear in progressive spaces, organized into four categories. I relied predominantly on the works of Tema Okun and Robin DiAngelo, whose works and websites expand upon everything I talk about.

I don’t want anyone to beat each other (or themselves) up if they’ve noticed these traits. Just fix it.

My goals with this guide:

Fans can put names to their observations.

Mods/Leaders of fandom spaces ask themselves, “how many of these have I done?”

Everyone gets an idea for what can be done about these traits.

Each listed trait has:

Definition of the trait

Common or fandom-specific examples

Suggestions to begin fixing it

Additional Commentary specific to this particular server incident

That makes this post very long, but it should be easy to skip over sections.

(If you are thinking of sending someone this post because they expressed a lot of these traits, first take a moment and identify how many of these traits you have practiced.

If someone sent you this post as an accusation, show them the above paragraph and ask what traits they recognize in their own behavior. If they say "none," ignore that person. I have will not facilitate the use of anti-racism as a smokescreen for bullying.)

I wasn't able to put this poll at the bottom of the post. I encourage you to wait until you get to the end and then answer the poll.

Because Tumblr polls expire in a week, I also encourage you to answer the same poll here on StrawPoll.

White Supremacy Culture Traits

Context (Basic Outline of What Happened)

In late Oct. 2023, someone on this server made an insensitive joke regarding Native American spirituality. They were quickly corrected by another member, and a third, indigenous member defended the gravity of their culture.

In DMs, a server mod (without the knowledge of the rest of the mod team) rebuked that indigenous server member for mini-modding, but claimed they would also moderate the person who made the joke in the first place; that person who made the joke was this mod’s friend.

This Inciting Incident Mod never did moderate their friend. When this came to light for the rest of the mod team in early Dec. 2023, the Inciting Incident Mod left before they could be ‘fired.’ Meanwhile, the Server Owner tried to cover up the preceding mess when announcing this mod’s departure.

The Indigenous Server Member used @everyone to explain to the server what had happened, dropped screenshots, and left the server.

When the community at large, including other mods, demanded more accountability and action from the mod team and the admins, the Server Owner doubled down on their defensiveness and denials for the next month.

Behind the scenes/in mod chats, the rest of the mods tried to advocate for the same things that the community was demanding. Most of their suggestions were shot down and input disregarded (primarily by the Server Owner).

Ultimately, all the mods were “let go” (fired), leaving only two admins. The second Admin largely followed the lead of the Server Owner, who was the one posting most of the announcements and engaging in the discourse.

The Admins unilaterally froze the server mid-conversations in late Jan. 2024.

They deleted the server on March 4th, 2024.

I. White Fragility

White fragility is the various phenomena by which white fans’ distress at discussions of racism take precedence over the actual occurrences of racism. This is not a conscious tactic, but the result of the layers of insulation from irl racism that white people are conditioned with, combined with white culture and experience being so pervasive as to become invisible.

1: Right To Comfort

Believing that white fans’ requirement for comfort in fandom spaces is more important than the on-going discomfort fans of color experience in the same spaces.

Examples:

Prioritizing the emotional and psychological comfort of some fans over the on-going experiences of other fans.

Scapegoating those who named the racism in the community and accusing them of ‘rocking the boat.’

These might sound familiar:

"This is just supposed to be a fun hobby."

"Can we get back to the good vibes?"

"Why can't we all just get along?"

“Hobbies/Fun shouldn’t be this much work.”

Treating any and all discussion of racism as acts of antagonism.

Fixes:

Learn to sit with discomfort before responding or (re)acting, especially if faced with an accusation. It’s an opportunity for growth, not an opening for attack.

Avoid taking criticisms personally, and avoid treating feedback as accusations. Yes, some accusations and call-outs are personal, but most are not. Even the ones that are personal need not be treated as final value judgments nor the end of the world.

Additional Commentary:

The white fan who’d made the insensitive joke in the first place did not lash out at being corrected. The discomfort was predominantly from some white mods who interpreted all mentions of racism as a conflict.

This trait is frequently found the trait called ‘Urgency.’

2: Defensiveness

Reacting to criticisms as if they were personal attacks, prioritizing comfort over growth, and using hurt feelings to derail discussions.

As author @xiranjayzhao put it in their video discussing a similar incident in the publishing industry, “If you are more concerned at being called racist than racism itself, that is an active hindrance to dismantling racism.”

Examples:

Treating criticism as threatening, inappropriate, or rude.

Focusing on making sure one’s own feelings or the feelings of community leaders are not getting hurt. This process often takes up more time and energy than addressing the actual problems do.

Spend energy defending against charges of racism instead of examining how racism might actually be happening.

White fans targeted by other oppressions (I.e. sexism, homophobia, etc.) express resentment because they feel that the naming of racism is erasing their experiences of marginalization from their other identities. This is especially prevalent in fandom as our communities are dominated by women and queer people.

Fixes:

Identify and understand the link between defensiveness and fear. When you recognize your own defensiveness, ask yourself what you are defending, and what you feel that you are defending against.

Develop culture of naming defensiveness when it arises.

Be honest with yourself and with the community about the power dynamics in the situation and respond thoughtfully. The person with greater power has the greater responsibility to name and move through their own defensiveness.

This is most important for small, online community leaders (I.e. Discord server mods). However little power we feel like we have, we still have more power than all the other members.

Additional Commentary:

Defensiveness was ultimately the biggest problem in this particular server’s implosion, and continues to be the most prevalent problem I observe in many other communities. The majority of the problems in these communities came not from actual acts of racism or patterns of insensitivity, but a few white fans’ defensiveness when these were named.

3: Fear of Open Conflict

When discomfort with talking about racism begets outright avoidance. This becomes “toxic positivity,” creating a pattern of suppressing any and all disagreements with a fixation on “keeping the peace.”

Examples:

Ignoring or deflecting conflict, no matter how minor.

Emphasis on tone, performing friendliness, and on everyone ‘calming down’ once even a hint of conflict arises.

Scapegoating people who bring up racism or equating criticisms with ‘rudeness.’

Fixes:

Role play, discuss, or plan for ways to handle conflict before it happens.

Don't require hard issues to be raised in `acceptable' ways.

Once a conflict is resolved, revisit it and see how it might have been handled differently.

Additional Commentary:

This particular server’s admin team was understandably hypersensitive to conflict; the server had been previously wracked by fandom dramas unrelated to racism. However, this sympathetic feeling metastasized into an unsympathetic habit of total conflict suppression. Had that Inciting Incident Mod not reacted to that faint hint of friction, or had the admins later been willing to name and acknowledge mistakes from the moderation team as an unintended instance of racism, almost none of this final drama would have happened.

4: Denial

Insistence that racism is an individual problem that requires intent; refusal to see or acknowledge systemic problems brought to one’s attention.

Examples:

A pattern of downplaying or denying what POC are saying about their experiences.

Insisting intent is more important than impact.

Insisting that if someone did not mean to be racist, then the harms they perpetuated cannot have been serious.

Insisting that a person or group can free from racialized conditioning, leading to statements like "I don't see color," “I don’t care what anyone’s race is,” “we can’t even tell race on the Internet,” and "we're all the same."

Fixes:

Learn to acknowledge any fear that naming racism brings up; the feeling is not wrong or right.­ Move through the feeling and address what has been raised.

Assume that any naming of racism is on target. Instead of asking, “is it racism,” ask, “how is it racism?”

Learn not to take accusations of racism or white supremacy culture as personal attacks or criticisms.

Get into the habit of saying, “tell me more,” instead of jumping to denial and counter arguments.

II. Exceptionalism

AKA “the Illusion of Control.” The belief, conscious or subconscious, that one knows the right way to do things and is uniquely qualified implement it. This might literally mean one’s self, or just people similar to one’s self.

5: Paternalism

The belief that one can dictate what is ‘best’ for everyone or make decisions on others’ behalf without their input.

Examples:

Deeming it unnecessary to understand the viewpoints and experiences of people for whom one is making decisions.

Labeling people for whom one is making decisions as unqualified.

Majority of community members get marginalized from decision-making processes. Either there is no mechanism for community input, or community input is disregarded by those in power.

Frequently, these decisions also have the most outsized impact on those with the least power, e.x. members who don’t have personal friendships with mods.

Fixes:

Realize that everyone has a worldview, including you. No one’s experiences or education (or lack thereof) disqualifies them from having agency in your community.

Always include those most affected by community decisions in the brainstorming and decision-making processes.

Build in an understanding that every approach yields unintended consequences; even the most strategically made decisions will have unanticipated consequences.

Additional Commentary:

The Server Owner consistently made unilateral decisions on other people’s behalf. They also required members to be 21+ in this server, despite the show it was for only being 18+

In the interest of living up to my own standards, I must acknowledge that I was also being paternalistic.

When I first joined the server, I questioned that age requirement. The Server Owner claimed that they felt uncomfortable talking about mature topics around 18-20 year olds…and “joked” that they viewed 18-20 year olds like children. Their defensiveness reminded me of elementary school children insisting kids in the grade immediately below them are babies. On the spot, I thought the Server Owner must be in their early 20s at the oldest. With zero evidence but a lot of confirmation bias, this feeling cemented into an assumption due to some of their moderation choices (e.x. pinning messages by their whims, thus confusing newcomers). I even wondered if they grew up in a cult environment due to unusual gaps in their knowledge (e.x. being surprised that it didn’t snow in most of Thailand). I thought I could and should, over time, convince them of 'better' ways to moderate, and attributed my disagreements with some of their moderation choices to their youth.

Then the Server Owner mentioned having been to uni nearly 20 years ago, making them almost double the age I’d assumed they were.

Looking back, this was an act of paternalism on my part that spanned over a year and a half. I’m not proud of this, and I would like to think I would still come to be ashamed of this even if the Server Owner actually had been as young as I thought they were. Regardless of their actual age, this was an incredibly paternalistic viewpoint for me to have about any adult.

6: Power Hoarding

People scrabbling to hold onto whatever little power they have; resisting anything which makes them feel threatened in their position of leadership or influence.

Examples:

Feeling threatened when someone suggests changes in how things should be done in the community.

Suggestions for change often get taken as an indicator of poor leadership.

People with power insisting they do not feel threatened or defensive in the face of suggestions for change.

Assuming that anyone wanting a change are ill-informed or malicious.

“Blaming the messenger,” such as focusing on the person advocating for change rather than the substance of what change they are trying to make.

Fixes:

Leaders should expect challenges and change and learn to see this a sign that someone cares about the community enough to want to stay and reform it. Because our spaces are predominantly for hobbies, people have less need to stay, even if they have a strong desire to. If someone truly thought we were hopeless leaders, they would not be advocating for change; they would just leave.

Adopt a “tell me more” approach when someone suggests a change or challenges an existing structure * even if the thing they are trying to change is something you care deeply about preserving.

Make friends with your ego. Everyone has one. You’ll do better in the long run when you know what will automatically kick up your defensiveness; don’t try to pretend nothing will.

Additional Commentary:

The admins caused many of their own problems by consistently disregarding others’ input; they not only ignored the criticisms of the community, they ‘fired’ the entire rest of the mod team for giving suggestions that the admins did not want to hear.

7: Individualism

Believing that one can be immune from social conditioning and systemic biases, or that individual actions are sufficient to change a community.

Examples:

Believing that one can be “isolated” from the conditioning of the culture they were raised in.

Not seeing the ways dominant identities * in gender, class, sexuality, religion, able-bodiedness, age, etc. * are informed by belonging to a group that shapes cultural norms and behavior.

This one is also hard for people in fandom to recognize. Many of us are marginalized in one aspect of our identity, and marginalization in one area can make it incredibly difficult to recognize or acknowledge privilege in another.

Accusing people advocating for change of “not being team players,” because one does not recognize the large groups on whose behalf they are advocating for.

Focusing on whether or not an individual “is racist,” while ignoring systemic racism in the community’s culture or leadership.

Fixes:

Get into the habit of acknowledging both your marginalizations and your privileges. For example, I am a queer woman of color, which are three traits of marginalization. I was also raised middle-class, I have a college degree, and I am cis; three traits of privilege. All these traits inform my experiences and world view and make me subjective in different ways.

Learn how our dominant identities and how our membership in dominant identity groups informs us both overtly and covertly (while realizing too that these identities do not have to define us).

Realize we all have internalized conditioning, including racist conditioning. Commitment to anti-racism is not about being ‘good’ or ‘bad;’ it’s a commit to challenge one’s own conditioning and subconscious biases on an on-going basis.

Focus on collective accountability as much as individual accountability.

Because many people, especially on social media, use ‘accountability’ as a euphemism for ‘punishment,’ I want to be clear that this does not mean collective punishment. It means recognizing that people react to their peers (dis)approval on even the smallest scale, that people want to fit in, and that people often fear standing out. We are often not making individual decisions so much as “going with their gut” or “going with the flow.” When that’s the case, that means we need to re-condition what our gut tells us and change where that flow is going * both of which are community actions, not individual ones.

Additional Commentary:

In the Individualism page on her website, Tema Okun shared a personal story about how her upbringing had blinded her to the very real risks her POC colleagues faced even while working with well-intentioned white leaders. This story resonated with me and my experience in this fandom server.

The white admins either did not understand (or did not care) what it would cost a POC like me to try to help them. I was attempting to mediate rather than prosecute, and speaking gently as I did - which I was only doing to try to balance the need for change against the admins’ need for white comfort. Multiple people blocked me during this time period, and most did not see what came after. I try not to assume I’m more important or relevant than I am, but I and many others noticed the drastic change in the admins’ behavior once my rhetoric shifted from ‘benefit of the doubt’ to ‘naming mistakes and suggesting changes.’ I was trying to help the admins, but it came out to nothing and I still ended up paying a price and losing friends.

8: I'm The Only One

The assumption that one knows best; therefore, they have the unique right and responsibility to take unilateral action.

Examples:

Believing that the only way to get something done right is to do it one’s self. (Related to ‘One Right Way.’)

Believing that only one person is entitled or qualified to determine the right way and take action, typically in isolation from the people who will be impacted by our decisions.

Often goes hand-in-hand with micro-management (or in the case of online communities, micro-moderation).

Attempting to downplay or cover-up flaws or mistakes in leadership, fearing that the community cannot survive people discovering leadership isn’t perfect.

Fixes:

Hold ourselves and each other accountable for mistakes without assuming that we need to be perfect to lead.

Focus on collaborative and collective strategies for responding to mistakes, including accountability but also growth and inner development.

Leaders should make an effort to take in input from as many sources as possible, including the people saying things they do not like, do not want to hear or are challenging their leadership.

Especially the individuals who hold the most power, such as server admins and owners (who have more power than other mods). The higher up in this hierarchy that we are, the more likely that anyone who truly thinks we’re hopeless would simply opt to leave…which means the higher up in the hierarchy we are, the more likely that anyone who is challenging us still expects both themselves and us to stay where we are. Their challenges are not a threat, but an opportunity for growth.

Additional Commentary:

Those last two bullet points under Examples and Instances are what kicked off the entire server-ending drama in the first place. Even though the Inciting Incident Mod made a truly disappointing mistake, I don’t actually see them as having made the biggest misstep in this mess. This mod micro-managed someone and abused their power to shield a friend, but had the admins been willing to acknowledge those mistakes directly, most of the ensuing drama would not have happened.

When I asked the Server Owner to let someone else take over the server instead of closing it off completely, they claimed all the people I suggested were not equipped to handle the server. The only person they were willing to let take over the server was someone who had uncritically supported them during all the discourse. (Though I later found out that this entire discussion was never in good faith to begin with; explanation in the Final Feelings section below.)

9: Entitlement.

Assuming a right to something without any consideration for the possibility that one may not have the right. This assumption frequently is unidirectional and/or implicitly only functions as long as most other people do not have a similar right.

This trait was not core to either Tema Okun’s work on white supremacy culture nor Robin DiAngelo’s work on white fragility. However, it is an underlying component of racism (who is entitled to what), white supremacy culture (entitlement to other people’s works), and white fragility (entitlement to comfort).

Examples:

Assuming that one does not need to ask (or wait for an answer) to use someone else’s work for one’s own purposes. (Related to the trait ‘Urgency.’)

Believing that people’s boundaries regarding their work or creations do not matter. I hope I don’t need to spell out why this problem gets so in fanfic-based fandom spaces. That can of worms would need its own post and I’m already exhausted from this post.

Related to Right to Comfort: believing one is entitled to a peaceful community, even when it comes at the expense of everyone else’s sense of safety and belonging.

Fixes:

Assume one does not have permission until and unless told you do.

Graciousness if someone does not want you to use their works.

Their reasons may have nothing to do with you, so also learn not take someone else’s refusal personally.

When you do assume a right, take a moment to imagine it’s reversal (I.e. everyone else having the same rights to your work or output). How comfortable are you with this prospect of everyone ‘borrowing’ from you that which you are currently trying to borrow from someone else?

Additional Commentary:

I detailed my direct experience with the admins' entitlement down below under the trait titled ‘Urgency.’

This trend continued with their behaviors towards what server content they did and didn’t delete prior to deleting the whole server. When fans who left or were banned insisted all their own messages in the server be deleted, they were refused on the basis of ‘preserving’ the server. Yet the admins had no problems deleting every channel that had even a shred of discourse in it. They later deleted a few other channels on the grounds of people’s personal information potentially being in those channels and putting members at risk…except that if there was any such information, it had always been present in this channels; why did it suddenly matter now? I concede that they eventually deleted the individual members’ messages per their requests, and that the fear-mongering about private information came from another member altogether. However, between nebulous accusations that an admin had been party to a past doxxing of this member in the first place and the on-going problem of the admins behaving with false urgency (another trait below), I’m having a very hard time being sympathetic about this or giving them any more benefit of the doubt. Their selection of which channels to delete look less like protecting server members and more like a failed attempted to protect their own reputations.

III. Binary Thinking

This is not just a futile attempt to simplify reality, but an entitlement to a simplified reality and a habit of attempting to force others into one’s own dualistic constructions.

10: Either/Or

Polarization of issues and assumptions, categorical thinking, and viewing everything through this binary lens.

Examples:

Positioning or presenting options or issues as either/or -- good/bad, right/wrong, with us/against us, pro/anti, good/evil, safe/dangerous, etc.

Related to Perfectionism: a suggested solution must be either perfect or it’s useless.

Tendency to escalate instead of de-escalating, especially in a context where de-escalating is viewed as dismissing a problem.

Generalizing individual experiences or statements to the collective, or attempting to dismiss a claim because it is coming from an individual; either “everyone” is saying something or “no one” is saying it.

Fixes:

Cultivate a habit or community culture of looking for multiple ‘takes,’ viewpoints, and conclusions.

Break the habit of trying to sort people and ideas into two or a few categories.

Practice taking situations with seemingly only two possibilities and identifying points between them or alternative options altogether.

Be willing to set a future date or deadline for continuing a disagreement in order to de-escalate emotions in the moment. We have more options than either fixing everything in the moment or ignoring problems forever.

Additional Commentary:

When asked for transparency, this server’s Admins acted as if mistakes had to be either ignored or turned into a big production. This left no room to acknowledge a mistake, learn, and move on, since that was neither ignoring the mistake nor treating it with sufficient drama.

11: Perfectionism

Belief that there is a single right way to accomplish something. Belief that individuals must implement only correct, successful actions (and that missteps and mistakes represent fundamental character flaws).

Examples:

Mistakes are seen as personal, i.e. they reflect badly on the person making them.

Making a mistake is confused with being a mistake; doing wrong is confused with being wrong.

Believing a problem can be permanently resolved with the correct or ‘perfect’ course of action.

Fixes:

Develop a community where the expectation is that everyone will make mistakes, but those mistakes are opportunities for learning, not value judgments.

Accept that, when faced with a systemic or deeply entrenched issues, community leaders will need time to address the problems.

They will probably need to try multiple ideas, some of which might not work. That’s okay; it does not have to be a failure if you learn from it and try again.

Additional Commentary:

In the case of this server’s implosion, perfectionism appeared with the Admins’ fixation on looking for a solution that would ‘put the matter to rest.’ They ignored or actively derided suggestions that did not ‘solve’ the problem in its entirety.

12: One Right Way

The belief that there is a particular correct or ideal way of doing this (and that fault lies with others for not following this particular correct way).

Examples:

Assuming that once people are introduced to the right way, they will ‘see the light’ and adopt it.

Believing that when one’s way is not working, the fault lies with everyone else for not ‘converting,’ not the method itself.

Related to perfectionism: believing there is a singular or permanent solution to on-going, systemic problems.

Believing only certain people are qualified to address or resolve problems. This is especially prevalent among people whose post-secondary education was mostly institutional (i.e. college).

Fixes:

Create a culture of support that recognizes how mistakes sometimes lead to positive results.

Challenge notions of what constitutes the "right way" and what defines a "mistake."

Catch our internalized assumptions about being ‘qualified’ to fix a problem on our own or take on a large responsibility.

Additional Commentary:

Once again, in the interests of living up to my own standards, that means admitting when I’m doing or did the very habits I’m castigating. While my intent was not to behave as if I thought there was One Right Way, I recognize that my actions had the same impact as if I did believe in One Right Way. I presented a solution (collection of rules, guides, and channels) from a server I owned in another fandom entirely, and implied that there was only one right way to ‘fix’ the server.

That said, their conduct in utilizing this also reflected Entitlement and Urgency (which is where I elaborated).

13: (Belief in) Objectivity

The belief that there is some neutral, unbiased experience or viewpoint a person can have.

Because patriarchy so often uses claims of emotionality to dismiss women, many women become oversensitive to claims of subjectivity or identity-based bias. This can make recognizing the invalidity of objectivity difficult in communities whose leadership is dominated by women, especially white women (as white men tend to be most likely to rely on accusations of excess emotion in the first place).

Examples:

Fixation on prioritizing facts over feelings, or thinking feelings can be disregarded and ignored.

Requiring people to think in a linear fashion or otherwise expecting others to perform only the type of logic validated by those in power.

Those in power get to be scared, hurt, or angry and still viewed as rational/logical, while marginalized people who are visibly scared, hurt, or angry are deemed irrational/illogical.

Refusal to acknowledge when a certain line of logic is covering an emotional bias, perspective, or agenda.

Fixes:

Own up to one’s subjectivity; instead of assuming that one can have some arch-neutral worldview, be clear about your background, experiences, and potential biases (whether you believe you actually have these biases or not).

Recognize your own worldview will be as subjective as everybody else’s. If your view of society is also part of the dominant view of society (e.x. if you are white and/or cis and/or male and/or…), this means you were probably conditioned to believe certain assumptions are objective when they are actually subjective.

There is no way to be human without being biased by one’s identity and experience; some identities are just so privileged or normalized by institutions that they are the “invisible” default or norm.

Get into the habit of trying to determine what a situation you are in looks like from the outside, what information others do and do not have, or getting diverse perspectives on various situations.

By “get into the habit,” I mean we should practice doing this even in situations without confrontation, crisis, or argument. Analyze successful incidents and events this way to get the practice for handling unsuccessful incidents and crises.

Utilize ‘I’ statements and make sure not to assume that your personal experience is the same as everyone else’s experiences.

Community leaders have to take extra special care with what we say about our communities and how we present our assumptions and experiences. When we claim a community is trustworthy or safe, we just make it even less trustworthy or safe for anyone feels otherwise, because this disconnect between our experiences (that we generalize) and theirs (that we individualize) creates a barrier against further feedback.

Additional Commentary:

This was also related to at least one admin struggling to disconnect their own experiences with everyone else’s experiences. To the admin, because so much of their own time was consumed by this discourse, they spoke and behaved as if this were consuming the entire server. They did not realize that most of the members of the server had nothing to do with this discourse, and many did not even know it was happening…until the admin started repeatedly utilizing @everyone. This implies the admin viewed their own experience as “objective” and thus projected their own experience onto everybody else.

VI. Validation Seeking

I called this collection of traits ‘validation seeking’ because they all trace back to appeals to external authorities or claims of external pressures.

14: Progress = More

Assuming solutions always require “more” of something; never considering that existing resources could be sufficient or that “less” might be a solution.

Examples:

Assuming the goal is always to grow membership, rather than maintaining an enjoyable community

Assuming that “more” will fix a problem (e.x. more moderators will fix a moderation problem)

Disregarding the costs of growth (such as how increased number of channels can make a community overwhelming to newcomers)

Valuing people who have achieved a certain milestone or objective metric of progress more than those who have not (e.x. valuing older members over younger ones, valuing college-educated members over those without college education, etc.)

Fixes:

Try to make sustainable decisions, with an aim not for endless growth but maintaining the actual goal of the community.

When pursuing “more” of something to solve a problem, first evaluate what you actually need and determine why the existing number of resources is no longer sufficient when it previously had been.

For example, are you actually pursuing more moderators because there is an increase in activity and the existing moderation team feels burnt out and falling behind? Or are you just assuming that you need more moderators regardless of activity levels?

15: Quantity Over Quality

Believing that only things that can be numerically measured have value (and that things which cannot be measured have little to no value).

Examples:

Fixation on things like number of members in a community (quantity) over the members’ relationships and experiences in said community (quality)

Treating quantified milestones as a goal in their own right, rather than means to an end or a guideline (e.x. acquiring a certain number of moderators or maintaining a certain number of channels in a server)

Discomfort with emotions and feelings (as they cannot be measured objectively)

Fixes:

Determine traits and practices important to your community which cannot be easily quantatively (safety, respect, mutualism, etc.) and think of ways to evaluate them (for example: open-ended questions in a survey instead of relying exclusively on numerical ratings or menu options)

Focus less on output goals and more on process goals, such as how many new ideas were considered or how many people felt fully heard in a meeting. Even if, in the short run, this feels like leading to a bunch of unproductive meetings, in the long run this creates a more robust decision-making process.

Treat ‘accountability’ not as a euphemism for punishment (which social media tends to do), but as an opening for receiving support.

Additional Commentary:

The admins fixated on obtaining more moderators, but the reality is that the problems facing the community did not need more moderators, but rather a shift in culture altogether - a thing which could have easily been engendered by the admins on their own, even without additional moderators.

16: Worshiping the Written Word

Fixation on knowledge provided by institutions over people’s lived experiences and on-going, dynamic realities.

This one is hard to recognize in virtual communities because most or all of our interactions are “written” in chats and social media.

Examples:

Attempting to use dictionary definitions of words as arguments in and of themselves or treating them as the end of an argument.

Refusing to acknowledge that the way people use a word in daily living may not match up to the institutional definition.

Using errors in spelling, grammar, or language to justify dismissing someone’s arguments.

Over-valuing people who can write well (or just write a lot), and undervaluing the contributions from people who rely on other media formats or informal documentation.

Fixes:

Treat encyclopedia articles and dictionary definitions as a conversation starter, not an argument ender, e.x. “This is my understanding of that word; what’s yours?” or “In what ways does this ‘official’ definition fall short?”

Focus less on using resources (articles, videos, guides, etc.) as an appeal to authority in an argument, and more as a starting point from which you develop your own community guidelines.

Additional Commentary:

I had an out-sized impact on discourse simply because I could write a lot in one go. Some of that was me anonymously relaying other people’s words on their behalf and some was original on my part; most of what I said simply reiterated what others had already conveyed. However, as I did so in a pseudo-academic manner, my word was given more weight.

Sharing of resources like educational articles or videos were treated as the end of a discussion, rather than the start of one.

17: Urgency

Applying extremely short deadlines to action, giving no time for rest or consideration. Utilizing the overarching urgency of racism as an excuse for short-sighted, short-term actions.

Examples:

Related to Quality Over Quantity: prioritizes measurable actions over impact.

Fixation on appearing to address racism moreso than actually doing it.

Uses expediency to justify poor-decision making processes or lack of consideration (related to Entitlement, Power Hoarding, and Conflict Aversion).

Often relies on perpetuating the idea that racism can be “solved” (which in turn implies that future accusations of racism cannot be made, nor community problems discussed).

Creating a culture of anxiety as people believe they must act immediately or they will never get to act at all.

Related to Right to Comfort: rushing decision-making in order to rush towards an idealized state of no further conflict.

Fixes:

When the feeling of urgency arises, slow down and encourage people pause, restate the goal, and dive deeper into alternatives.

Avoid making decisions under extreme pressure.

Work to distinguish what is actual pressure and what is pressure that you or others are creating.

Establish plans ahead of time for how decisions will be made during times of urgency, and how crises can be handled in the short-term while leaders evaluate ideas for long-term change.

This is related to Conflict Avoidance. When community leaders are uncomfortable with conflict, this also means not wanting to think about potential conflicts, and thus having no plans when conflict arises anyway. Becoming comfortable with conflict also allows planning for conflict management.

Additional Commentary:

When I showed the admins my fandom wank resolving set-up from another server (as mentioned in my additional commentary on One Right Way), they asked me if they could just use it as it was. However, they were too impatient to actually wait for an answer and used it, anyway, before I could respond. It was very clear that my answer never actually mattered to them. Had they waited, I would have explained how this exact set-up was not a good fit for this community and its current problems; I was sharing it assuming they would use it as a source of inspiration to brainstorm their own ideas for their own server. In addition, while I did not mind sharing, these were not my sole creation, but the product of a team of mods in my other server. Even if it had been a good fit, I would have checked with other mods whose labor had gone into this set-up to see if they were also alright with its wholesale reuse.

My experience is only one example. Ultimately, the admins kept fumbling, and increasingly claimed it was all due to the pressure and demands from the community that they ‘handle it’ - refusing to acknowledge that community members weren’t asking for an immediate solution to every problem. This urgency was self-inflicted. The server admins disregarded all their remaining mods’ suggestions that would have given them more time to address these problems carefully. Server-wide slow-downs, channel trimming, temporary server freeze, etc. - the admins had multiple ideas given to them, but shot them all down. The admins’ goal was not to address the problems, but to suppress discussions of racism as fast as possible because they were uncomfortable with admitting its existence in the first place (see Right to Comfort at the top).

Final Feelings

What Took Me So Long To Say Anything?

I didn’t want to risk the admins prematurely deleting the server out of spite. They were already unilaterally and suddenly taking away a community space from hundreds of fans entirely for their own benefit. I could not count on them being above robbing people the final opportunity to recover the last shreds of their materials and memories from the server.

I also, quite frankly, just had a lot going on in my offline life.

I continued to take my time even after they deleted the server because I was hurt and furious. I needed time to turn what was originally a soliloquy of my sorrows into an educational guide.

This was exacerbated by finding out that the admins faked the ‘death’ of the server:

As you can imagine, I was furious - and to be honest, I still am. That anger was precisely why I made myself slow down. I did not want to burn down the fandom for the sake of keeping only myself warm.

Complicated Feelings

I feel hurt and betrayed by the Admins and disappointed in the Inciting Incident Mod…but one thing I will say for them is that they expressed interest in learning the language and culture of the country that our fandom’s show came from.

They showed far more interest than that aforementioned Indigenous Server Member ever did.

I don’t begrudge this indigenous fan for defending their cultural tradition, nor their anger over how it was handled. I also acknowledge that in fandom and irl, Asian diaspora often end up partaking in white supremacy culture and entitlements. However, I do find this fan's umbrage at the initial ignorance to be tremendously hypocritical given this fan’s approach to Asian cultures, traditions, and histories. Their fanfics, server interactions, and other fanworks in this Asian media fandom demonstrated incredible disregard about Asian cultures - one which this fan never showed any interest in undoing or challenging.

I doubt it was a coincidence that this fan blocked me on Discord right around the time I started talking about the westernization of eastern characters and settings. Even if it was, that doesn’t lessen the pervasive apathy towards Asian culture in their fandom activities.

I routinely see fans call for the decolonization fandom when it comes to BIPOC people settings, only for these same fans to turn around and perpetuate the colonization of fandom when it comes to Asian people and settings.

This does not mean western fans shouldn’t participate in an eastern fandom! This participation is the best way to learn about a new culture. Mistakes and missteps are parts of the learning process, both at the individual level and at the collective level.

This is also not to pass a judgment on that specific fan or their creative works. That would be hypocritical of me in turn, given I’ve enjoyed some of those stories and fanworks, anyway.

I am bringing this up to demonstrate why solidarity is difficult for fans of color.

As an Asian diaspora fan in particular, I hate feeling like my choices are “BIPOC fans with ignorance and apathy that they don’t want to unpack” and “white fans with supremacy culture that they don’t want to unpack.” Either way, I’m going to have to put up with a ton of entitlement (never mind the rampant fetishization of Asians from all sides, which is its own can of worms I can’t even open right now).

And if I try to speak up about any of this, I will get blocked or I will be accused of being an anti-fandom killjoy.

Again.

Final Thoughts

People change for the better, and communities change for the better.

I know fandom can change because I’ve seen how it’s already changed. Fans take social justice issues and racial justice issues far more seriously than they did 20, 10, or even 5 years ago, and that’s just my own living memory of fandom.

We should always take a moment to recognize and celebrate how much better we are today than we were in the metaphorical yesterday.

But being better than yesterday does not mean being good enough for tomorrow.

And we still have a long way to go.

-

Thank you for reading this monstrously long post all the way to the end. Please remember to answer the poll at the top. Please reblog, and I encourage you to add your own experiences when you do.

[magicaldreamfox1]

KINNPORSCHE TWO YEAR ANNIVERSARY EVENT

— Ep 9: Favourite Outfit

[bl-inded]

So... I'm pissed? I feel like we're taking the wrong lessons here guys! Why is Mohk the one apologizing again??? He apologized like thrice in this episode and each one made me more upset than the last. He did not pity Day! Never has. Never will.

Honestly I'm kinda just mad about how they handled the whole three year break. Why is it that Mohk came back and they're back to being flirty from minute one??? What about the heart break? What about the absolute negligence for what Mohk wanted? What is happening??

I kept waiting hoping for an explanation. But nope. When he wanted to stay the first time for Day it wasn't okay, but it's the okay the second time? WHY?? It doesn't make sense. I don't get it.

And that ending??? What I'm saying IS THAT THEY COULD HAVE DONE ALL OF THIS IN EPISODE 11 WITH A SMALLER FIGHT AND 4/4 (aka happy) COULD HAVE BEEN ALL OF EP12?? Y'all pick up what I'm putting down??

Sorry this isn't an analysis. I'm just mad

I caaaannnooottt put into words how fucking mad I am.

*immediately starts writing a fic*

[waitmyturtles]

Okie-dokes: I'm very late to reporting on Dangerous Romance, episode 3, and listen -- listen. A lot of you know I'm in a compromised life state at the moment, --

(I'M MOVING. HOW. IN THE HELL. DO I OWN. SO MUCH. JUST. FUCKING SHIT. HOW DID I FIT SO MUCH SHIT INTO THIS PLACE THAT I AM LEAVING. OH MY GODDAMN WHAT THE FUCK. LET ME BECOME A MONK AND GIVE UP ALL THIS CRAP.)

-- yes, compromised life state, lol, and can't give too much thought to good meta at the moment. (I had to pause Not Me for the Old GMMTV Challenge because even just three episodes in, I knew it was SO GOOD that it deserves my undivided attention.)

So, yeah, brain is out of service at the moment, and then we have THIS episode of Dangerous Romance, and let me just note: y'all, Dangerous Romance was trending on Tumblr even through Only Friends Saturday last weekend (with Only Friends NOT trending, mind you). DR is clearly serving something (.....sigh, ships) that OF is not giving the fandom girlies, and man, did DR just lay it on THICK this week, huh?

I will admit. I'm a touch bummed. I LOVE PERTH AND CHIMON. I LOOOOOVVVVE THEM, YER HONORESSES! UNABASHEDLY. Yes, I love their faces. I DO, NO SHAME. I love their acting, too! I love them, like ::waves hands in circles:: all of it, all of them. I was hoping they'd chomp into a meatier show.

This is not that show. The puppy music, the reeeeeally fast swings into sympathy and "oh, you're my tutor now, bro, and I will spill all my feelings to you," IN ENGLISH AND KOREAN -- and just a touch of a class division conversation by way of Kang homey buying Sailom homey an extra dinner to-go. Sailom is now Kang's... confidante? Kang wants to make someone, anyone, proud, and it looks like Sailom is the guy.

I mean, this episode was all over the place, but....

Forgive me, meta angels, because this is EXACTLY what I need right now, omg. I'm mentally done, I'm toast! Not to say that I'm not going to enjoy Only Friends tomorrow! I am going to totally eat OF up.

But I will ROBUSTLY ADMIT to ALSO being okay with PerthChimon fan service at the moment. Unfortunately for any of my hopes of them being in a more dramatically complicated series: they still have hilarious chemistry. They're actual real bros in real life (Papang smh lol). They're clearly having fun doing this together, like OhmPerth in Double Savage. Chimon's facial expressions are outta control (that look on his face when Perth/Kang accelerated the bike? I cackled).

This is fluff! As @lurkingshan noted -- a recalibration of expectations is in order for this show. I'm taking this show right now as 100% fan service from my PerthChimon wub woobies. Perth and Chimon (and really, the co-director of this show, Lit Phadung of SOTUS and SOTUS S) -- these dudes know the score. Perth and Chimon have been around for a minute. You need two dudes to dial up to 10 on fluff BL? They have those tropes so memorized that it's burned in their bones. Put 'em in coach, they're ready to play.

If I take this show on THAT tip, then -- as an aiming-to-be-classic romance BL, then it's doing something.... if not right, then at least aligned to some tropes simply by mood. I'm curious about Sailom's flashbacks to Kang's bullying, but I don't have the strength or mindpower to read into it. If a reference back to the bullying comes -- or not -- then, whatever. This show is clearly, at the moment, trying to achieve a more simple goal than I expected of it, but I'm not gonna write it off. I'll thoroughly enjoy Perth and Chimon being poodles to each other -- gimme.

I was wondering to @lurkingshan and @neuroticbookworm earlier today that I had previously wondered WHY GMMTV would air Dangerous Romance during the Only Friends run, especially with ALL the marketing hype around Only Friends before it premiered. At the time, it seemed to me to be a pre-emptive gong strike on Dangerous Romance. Now it makes me wonder -- did GMMTV want to cover its bases by placing a classic fluff BL on air, to protect the network from losing fandom points through Only Friends? I can only wonder. If some ships are exploding through OF -- then the network can hand PerthChimon over and say, hey, we haven't forgotten our shipping roots, girlies.

Kinda makes me think. In any case -- Shan is right. I'm recalibrated on Dangerous Romance, I'm watching this literally to see PerthChimon ham it up, annnnnddd yeah, that's about it! At this point, give me the make-out sessions, give me pool time, gimme. I unabashedly stan and simp. If we get some real drama out of this show -- it will be a wonderful surprise. I just hope the show doesn't veer into totally unwatchable territory.

[heretherebedork]

The love that is between them has turned into a wall because Yai has to send him to follow his dream, he can't keep him, but Mangkorn would give up any dream for his love if he asked or accepted or even merely let himself feel but he cannot argue with being sent away and he cannot fight against the cold and Yai's certainty that he will always be left, that he will always be the one alone, cannot be comforted by Mangkorn giving up his own wishes for him.

There is so much love but there is also so much pain, so much in the past, so much that has built to this moment and cannot be fixed with love alone.

Yai turns to Mangkorn to tell him to go but he's not looking at him, he's already looking at the future without him.

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - Screw everything else inject On1y into my damn veins

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

Aug 2024 Week 4

Ongoing Series - Thai

Monster Next Door (Thai Thurs Gaga ) eps 5-6 of 12 - Extreme introvert dealing with a very hot, very drunk, very affectionate extrovert was an excellent experience all around. “I was drunk and talking out of my ass, but I wasn’t lying” maybe one of the world’s greatest confessions. How meta that he’s checking out the book of the story that he’s in. Carry on boys, very enjoyable, very Thai BL.

My Love Mix-Up Th (Fri YT) ep 12 fin - It’s cute. They are all very cute. I do like it when high school BL gives us a coming out sequence. I know it’s old-fashioned, but it’s a trope that goes with this particular setting really well, and I just like it when it’s done nicely. I’m not sure I needed it to totally dominate the final episode of the series. But it was fine.

I gotta say, Fourth is an absolutely outstanding actor. He really did knocked it out of the park in this last episode especially. 

In conclusion:

It was fine and it was charming, but it was also a little lackluster. Thailand managed to take one of Japan's softest cutest most bonkers BLs in recent memory and make it softer and cuter and... dull. They did this by watering it down. JBLs almost always have an edge to them, even the rom-coms, by dulling the edge, MLMU lost a great deal of the sparkle and tension as well. What an office setting managed to mostly maintain in the consummate hands of TayNew felt somewhat lackluster when handed off to the next generation and a high school setting. Cherry Magic was a lovely reinterpretation, Mix Up was an amateur's watercolor rendition of a colorful oil painting. Am I being harsh? G4 tried their best, and Fourth turned in some outrageously good acting in the latter half. But the show? It was fine. If you like water colors and you haven't seen (and loved) Kieta Hatsukoi. 8/10

This Love Doesn't Have Long Beans (Fri iQIYI) ep 8 fin - This was the first hint we got that the lead's relationship was anything more than sexual. And it was utilized for a breakup?! JJ and Wan's friendship is the best thing about this show. PWan selling JJ out to Methas was great. I was modestly delighted by the big fuck off ownership engagement ring. I admire a boy who likes to mark his territory with bling. I actually thought this was a decent final episode. If very rushed. I know, in general this ending was objectively weak, but I grinned the entire time, so I can’t really complain that much.

Final thoughts?

A story about a kid who infiltrates a cooking competition under false pretenses and then has to deal with the consequences when he falls in love with the head chef. The side couple is a poor little rich boy meets physical therapist (morality chain). The core friendships are excellent and the chemistry cannot be faulted across the (charcuterie) board. What this show lacks in substance it makes up for in health code violations. It was all chili all the time. Considering that the plot centered on betrayal but the romantic relationship never sweetened enough to balance that bitterness; one could be forgiven for throwing this one in the compost. But I got over all its weaknesses in flavor balancing for an ultimately satisfying meal, with a great dessert course. I've always loved spicy food. Plus the blooper reels were fantastic. 8/10

Addicted Heroin (Thai Tues WeTV) ep 2 of 10 - I like the side couple a lot. It’s nice to see that dynamic developed (as it wasn't in the CBL version). Of course, Thailand leans into a secondary couple, but I also like the super popular jock + geeky boy who couldn’t care less. You know what? I’m actually really enjoying this. And yes, I AM biased because it's August. (Wait, that could be taken several different ways this month. But you know what I mean.) Anygay, this is a lot softer than the original, and so Hero is much more of a pining character and less harsh. But I'm still enjoying it. I like the stepbrothers trope (we don’t get it very much from Thailand), and I enjoy the beats and pulses of this particular story. We will see if it derails into inconsequence and lack of conflict the way My Love Mixup did.  

Sunset X Vibes (Sat iQIYI) ep 11 of 12 - I’m enjoying this show but it should’ve been just 10 eps. It’s feeling bloated at this juncture. That said, I loved our little GL kiss. Very pretty. I also really like the bit with Sam and Yo flirting with each other. Sam trying to get Yo to call him P'Sam was fucking brilliant. And then slipping in all of those nongs. Delightful. Linguistic negotiation, it's what's for dinner... along with Sam's d**k apparently. I frankly did not think they would take this couple that far. So, thank you very much everybody involved.

Battle of the Writers (Sun YT) ep 4 of 12 - I do enjoy watching Yim freak out and fall in love all over again. The reality is still better for me than the fantasy parts, but it’s all fun enough. The magic mushrooms bit was odd. In fact, there is definitely a core tenor of ODD going on with the show. Which I’m accustomed to from Japan but I’m not really sure about from Thailand. Thus I remain engaged but suspicious of this BL. 

I Saw You in My Dream (Weds Gaga) ep 6 of 12 - Yu wants to take his baby on a trip, gets thwarted by his younger brother. Ouch. I really do think it’s time for Ai to tell Yu what’s going on with his dreams! Drunken boyfriend bolster pillow is a fav trope of mine. As usual, I’m catching second lead syndrome. What? I liked the rich boy badminton player. And then he picked up a guitar. Oh well.

The Trainee (Sun YouTube) ep 8 of 12 - No one cares about the hets. He was jelly? Cute. Also kinda an arse, by hey this is BL. 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

The On1y One (Taiwan Thurs Gaga) eps 1-2 of 12 - announced in 2023, high school, stepbrothers, and is reputed to be high heat. Based on a novel Mou Mou + the Your Name Engraved Herein team.

ARE YOU READY? I'M GOING TO NOT SO QUIETLY LOSE MY DAMN MIND

This is old-school BL and it’s bloody fantastic. Tsundere seme to beat all tsundere (smartest + tallest + bestest at everything but people) meets socially-ept cutie smart-ass protag.

They living together by end of ep 1 and start kissing by end of ep 2.

There is an Unknown quality to this, and that I love. Also, and ironic to say this while Addicted Heroin Th is airing, but this REALLY reminds me of Addicted. It’s so fucking good. I am all in on this show. Shut up while this eats my life.

Cosmetic Playlover (Japan Tues Gaga) eps 5-6 of 8 - Of course! The POV shift to the seme character at ep 5! How could I forget? Japan loves this beat! AND.... The running of the gays. And a use of a first name! So darling. Also some crazy great communication and conversation that is NOT a hallmark of Japan. Sahashi is so very possessive. I loved the switch that went on in his brain and the mania in his eyes when he thought someone else was interested in Natsume. I continue to love this.

I Hear the Sunspot AKA Hidamari ga Kikoeru (Japan Weds Gaga) ep 10 of 12 - I’m never going to like Maya. Sorry. And the leads were separated for most of this episodes so it was largely disappointing. I did like the insight into the way T sees the world, and sees the alienation of a disability and what it's dong to his friend. It’s very empathic. He’s such an appealing character in his obtuse bull-headed way.

Seoul Blues (Korea Fri? YouTube) ep 2 of 8 - It’s intriguing, and I'm happy to have anything from Korea on my dash. But, like Blue Boys, I’m not entirely sure if I like it or not.

First Note Of Love (Taiwan Mon Gaga) eps 3-4 of 12 - This may be Taiwan but I’m still in the "no singing" camp. I’m getting a slightly better chemistry feel off the leads in this episode. I’m not sure if they’re keeping it stiff because the younger character is under age or if it’s just that the actors aren’t there yet? (In other words is this a directing choice or a performance issue?)

Takara's Treasure AKA Takara No Vidro (Japan Mon Gaga) ep 8 of 10 - I've finally come down firmly on the fact that it’s the uneven power distribution (in terms of interest and enthusiasm for the relationship) that I dislike about this show. Generally, I like a power dynamic differential, kinky and all that. But this particular dynamic, when it’s the weaker personality that’s so much more into the stronger one? I never like it, unless it engages a serious pivot at some point. (See My Personal Weatherman or Takara & Amagi.)

It's airing but...

Sugar Dog Life (Japan Sun grey) ep 3 of 10 - I was really loving this one but I can't find ep 3 anywhere so I guess I gotta wait it out. I hope I get to see it eventually.

4 Minutes (Sat Gaga) eps 1-6 of 8 - Gaga picked this one up so we can watch it there. If I have time, I'll get caught up and put it into rotation.

In case you missed it

Meet You at the Blossom (China) - I'm eating crow, binging the fucker, and live blogging.

The Time of Fever AKA Unintentional Love Story 2 (Korea movie) trailer IS COMING IN SEPTEMBER!!!! (Yeah this is gonna sit here until then).

Next Week Looks Like This:

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

Coming Next Month:

The Time of Fever (Korea)

9/1 Live in Love (Thai)

9/3 Happy of the End (Japan)

9/6 Kidnap (Thai)

9/7 The Hidden Moon (Thai)

9/9 Jack & Joker (Thai)

9/14 Love Sick 2024 (Thai)

9/17 Love is Like a Poison AKA Doku Koi: Doku mo Sugireba Koi to Naru (Japan)

More deets next week. It's late and I'm tired.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

It was pretty. I am very shallow.

Even more pretty. Petition to have Tenon with his shirt off and hair back in every subsequent Thai BL? Just because.

(SunsetXVibes)

(Last week)

Streaming services are listed by how I (usually) watch, which is with a USA based IP, and often offset by a day because time zones are a pain.

The tag BLigade: @doorajar @solitaryandwandering @my-rose-tinted-glasses @babymbbatinygirl @babymbbatinygirl @isisanna-blog @mmastertheone @pickletrip @aliceisathome @urikawa-miyuki @tokillamonger @sunflower-positiiivity @rocketturtle4 @blglplus @anythinggoesintheshire @everlightly @renafire @mestizashinrin @bl-bam-beyond @small-dark-and-delicious @saezurumurmurs

Sigh, Tumblr in its infinite wisdom doesn't like too many tags.

[bird-inacage]

Love Sea (Episode 1): Tongrak's Striking Sensitivity

I'm really intrigued by Tongrak's characterisation so far. He's more openly sensitive than I had pictured. Yes, there's some unyielding arrogance, but it's often coupled with noticeable self-doubt - which is what really has my attention. This is not the confident, suave, uppity writer I anticipated from the trailers.

Peat has a talent for conveying fragility. And there's something about Tongrak that feels distinctly helpless. It's early days but there were a couple moments in Episode 1 I felt were worth dissecting.

Shaken but not Stirred?

"Don't you feel anything at all? Not a single bit?" "My charm didn't work? Someone like me failed?" Tongrak is upset when he thinks Mut isn't enticed by him sexually (though we see this isn't the case later).

"Don't you feel anything at all when I look down on you?" He says again when he tries to get under Mut's skin by refusing every dish he brings to the table. When Mut doesn't respond in the way he'd hoped, Tongrak falters, deflates, and is agitated by how unbothered Mut appears to be. Mut isn't easily ruffled, riled or offended. He takes everything in his stride. Nothing Tongrak has said or done has deterred him from doing his job.

To me, there's an undertone of shame in many of Tongrak's reactions, which funnily enough Mut makes a point of saying "Ever since you've got here, you've only displayed two faces. Arrogant and embarrassed." What is Tongrak embarrassed about? Could it be:

Why do I feel so powerless in my ability to affect and control the situation/people around me?

Why do I have so little purchase over my own feelings? Why can't I be more cool/collected, indifferent or nonchalant?

Each time Tongrak gets flustered, it seems to be because 'things are not going the way that I want them to.' Which is interesting when you consider the appeal of being a writer. The very profession that allows you to take control of the narrative into your own hands.

Expect the Unexpected

Tongrak is clearly shaken up when he thinks Mut has fallen off the boat. He accuses Mut of playing with him, that perhaps this was an appalling joke at his expense. The fact that Mut warned Tongrak moments ago not to lean too close to the side, proves he isn't the type to do so. No matter how you look at it, Tongrak's accusatory tone is surprising, considering how little he knows of Mut at present.

Because this is MAME, I don't want to always assume there's trauma involved, but it definitely comes across that way. I think the average person would probably go 'Jesus Christ, you scared me, I thought you'd fallen in, thank god you're alright!', rather than 'Is it fun messing with me like that? Do you want to see me die from a heart attack?" It makes me wonder if Tongrak has some form of survivor's guilt or has been witness to a life in danger before, where he was powerless to help them.

You can also consider his reaction through the lens of shame (feeling exposed) by getting so worked up in the first place. He panics. He cries. Maybe he feels like he's made a fool out of himself and wildly over-reacted. Even more so when Mut always seems to be so calm, rational and level-headed in his presence. He's angry at Mut for not giving him a heads up before going into the water, but he also seems upset at himself for reacting so intensely as well.

Tongrak doesn't seem to deal well with situations that don't go as planned. Especially when it subsequently causes a reaction in him that is perhaps a bit more revealing than he'd ideally like. His sensitivity to and in almost all things appears to be his undoing.

This is just my attempt to extrapolate my thoughts on Tongrak from this episode, which really had my gears turning. The two points above may or may not be related at all. I can tell there's going to be tonne to unpack in the coming weeks.

You can check out bird-inacage’s BL meta directory for all my other posts around Love Sea.

[ikeoji-subs]

Zettai BL Ni Naru Sekai VS Zettai BL Ni Naritakunai Otoko 2024 - Episode 2 Eng Sub

VS SMELLS and VS AGE GAP RELATIONSHIPS

For downloading instructions and where to find the raw files please check our masterpost

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translation notes:

about Fish Cake Man (7:28)

As we state in the subtitles, this guy’s monologue isn’t something we’re equipped to translate and if we did, it probably wouldn’t make much, if any, sense to English-speaking viewers. We learned from Snow’s Japanese friend that he's a comedian who is famous for doing this particular bit. After we had already finished most of the subtitles, I rewatched seasons 1 and 2 of the show and found that he was also in the other two seasons. In the first season, when Mob is explaining about how he's a side character and intends to keep it that way, he looks at a gardener on his university campus who is pulling weeds, illustrating that the world of BL needs to include some people who are unlikely to ever become main characters. That’s this dude. He appears again in season 2, when Mob is scouring the university for signs of Kikuchi after reading his goodbye letter. In every appearance, he's shown wearing the same sort of nondescript work clothes and cap and seems to work in some kind of maintenance or cleaning capacity at National BL University. –Towel

His name is Nou Misoo (脳みそ夫) which means brain tissue. I believe there's a pun here I'm missing but you can check our his sillyness on youtube, instagram or tiktok. –Snow

about “the gods decided to smite me” (10:24)

The first version of this line said that Mob “received divine punishment” for his Mob Move. That was already a great line! But I thought it had the potential to be a little more specific and evocative in an English-speaking context. At first, I was just trying to think of something a bit more specific to replace “received.” I thought of a few possibilities, including “I was smitten by divine punishment.” But since “smitten” is barely used anymore except to describe someone who's in love, it had the wrong connotation. Then I thought about how another tense of the same verb, “smite,” avoids those connotations and has a kind of King James Bible quality. But if I was going to say “smite,” I’d have to change the sentence from passive voice to active voice (which is generally best anyway) and give the sentence a subject who is doing the smiting.

I thought a unitary, capital-G God would make it sound a little too Biblical, possibly tipping it over into sounding overtly Christian. I knew that some religious traditions practiced in Japan, like Shintoism, included multiple gods. So I tried “the gods decided to smite me.” This seemed to balance out the Old Testament-ish aspect of “smite” a bit. The end result seemed more vivid than the earlier version, and it seemed like something Mob would say.–Towel 

about “select shop” (11:30)

Observant English speakers might notice that when the guy who used the same shampoo as Mob talks about where he got it, he uses a term made up of English loan words. He says he bought it at a “serekuto shoppu" (in English, a "select shop"). While both parts of the word are borrowed from English, the term you get when you put them together isn’t commonly used in the US. I ended up replacing it with “boutique,” which gets across some of the meaning. But I’ll explain in more detail here. 

It turns out that a “select shop” is a kind of smallish shop with carefully curated items that all fit a certain aesthetic. A business like this might be called a “lifestyle boutique” in America, but it’s slightly different from any business model used widely here. The big selling point of a shop like this is the fact that they’ve already vetted and coordinated these products. Their offerings are tailored for a particular niche, so that if you’re into the general idea a select shop is going for, you’re likely to be interested in a lot of what they’re selling. The items for sale will also have been hand-picked by a professional who’s able to find just the right thing in a way that a typical consumer wouldn’t be able to. 

You can imagine what kind of college student would not only shop at this sort of place but declare it proudly. Even if Mob was going to fall in L with a B, this guy would be a bad fit.–Towel

about “a listless ne’er-do-well” (19:04)

The more literal translation of this part goes “a man like this, without ambitions or vitality.” It’s a nice turn of phrase, definitely, but I thought if I could localize it a bit it might evoke more of the right feeling. I thought it would be more typical in English to express this in terms of an adjective plus a noun describing the kind of person he’d appear to be, rather than saying he was without these qualities. From “without ambition” I got “ne’er-do-well” and from “without vitality” I got “listless.”–Towel

Tag list: @absolutebl @bengiyo @c1nto @come-back-serotonin @lurkingshan @my-rose-tinted-glasses @porridgefeast @sorry-bonebag @twig-tea @wen-kexing-apologist

[aliceisathome]

My Stand-In and Ming's redemption arc is GO! Main priorities:

Make Joe the happiest he could ever be - for life

Make Tong the most miserable he could ever be - for life

Simple yes?

In the love nest Joe is asking all the pertinent questions and Ming is answering honestly. It suits him. As do the matching pjs . And look at our cat trying to be puppyish, while our puppy is trying out some cat standoffishness. So cute.

Scared, vulnerable (half naked) Ming is very sexy - Joe held out longer than I would have. And his reaction when Ming stopped him turning over? Oh man.

This was very slapstick - loved it.

Bonus meta moment with the title of the film Ming's funding for him.

You can see Joe melt when he realises that Ming gave up his privacy on the off chance he would be found by Joe again. Lovely little moment.

Tong, you smug, stupid bastard.

This isn't the old Ming who'd do anything for you - this is new, improved, boyfriend-protecting Ming who's grabbing this second chance with both hands (and other body parts) and not letting go.

The conversation back at Joe's place reminded me of this conversation from Utsukushii Kare

Tong is making a massive mistake getting Ming's mum involved (and interesting staging - he's virtually hiding behind her). She seems like another piece of work, possibly better suited to Tong than lovely Mai.

Ming's wearing a jacket Hilary Clinton would be proud of and he's not going to let this manipulative, narcissistic bastard or his mum get away with this so he spikes their guns by telling his dad himself. What a star.

Next week looks grim, even considering the usual Episode 11 of Doom standards but I have faith that Ming is absolutely stubborn enough to get his parents on board and Joe is absolutely smitten enough to help. Now if the BL gods would just grant us a miracle and send Yoryak from Wandee Goodday over to give Tong a proper beating followed by Charn to ensure that he gets zero in the divorce, that would be grand.

Both Up and Poom have acted their socks off in this series - they've done brilliantly. And Mek has managed to make himself completely loathsome. So good.

[ninjakk]

Hi..

As much as I wanted to love the novel (original version), that r*pe jokes author threw in that extra chapter really put me off. She's so good creating the plots in her stories, but why did she has to put that jokes in? She was so insensitive about that issue.

I want to know your thoughts about this :)

Hi anon,

I'm sorry to hear you've been put off the novel, but each to their own.

So, you see the thing is it's not a joke to WWX and LWJ, they are just roleplaying to their kink. There are hints throughout the novel that WWX is not opposed to this forceful behaviour and he even makes a 'joke' about such things back when they are trapped in the Xuanwu's cave.

I think one thing that a lot of people forget is that this was a web novel on a site with author's notes and tags. So if the noncon, or in this case CNC (consensual nonconsensual), was an issue for readers, they might have been able to see this and not read on. It is also something often found in BL and she was targeting a specific audience who would mostly be aware of such things possibly appearing in her chapters anyway. Because of this, I don't think MXTX was being insensitive about such topics.

In fact, I think due to noncon and dubcon being a common trope in the BL genre, MXTX has (as she so often does) turned this trope on its head and actually made it something I would consider healthy. LWJ holds himself back from doing anything without WWX's consent (bar his momentary laps with the kiss, which he feels terrible about afterwards) and consent is actually a running theme throughout the novel. LWJ refuses to do anything WWX doesn't want - to the point he does not take him back to the Cloud Recesses in his first life. It only becomes CNC because WWX wants and encourages it at the end of the novel. Even the apparent dubcon bath scene where WWX thinks he's taken advantage of LWJ, was actually consensual because LWJ had sobered up before this point and it's subtly shown as such by LWJ's speech pattern changing from childish to a more forceful tone. Obviously LWJ's dream is technically noncon and was quite a shock to some, but this was a dream and you can't control dreams. I won't go into the dream scene because there is already a lot of meta on this and I'd just be repeating!

Overall, CNC is a part of WXs shared kinks and I actually found it refreshing to see it handled quite respectfully, in the sense of it being a kink that can have a bit of a bad rep. MXTX showed her readers how a loving couple can have such a kink, yet be so tender and sweet as well.

Naturally I understand why this might make some readers uncomfortable, especially if they are unaware such things are in a novel and it may be triggering. There is an argument here for some sort of warning being included for such content that may pose as a possible trigger and something indicating as such somewhere on the novel cover - as it does not have any on the official volumes I have. Especially considering some readers may have come from the CQL or donghua and aren't aware of such things being present.

As such, I would say that if anyone handled such things insensitively, it would be the publishing companies, not MXTX - as she is just an author catering towards a certain audience and genre. It is the publishing company's responsibility and choice to safeguard the general public from reading something that may be triggering, but most publishing companies do not do this because they fear it may impair sales. There is also a huge argument about adding warnings being a form of censorship and trigger warnings actually doing more harm than good, so it seems to be a very difficult line to tread.

[mikuni14]

The last 2 weeks have provided me with amazing experiences from the BL series fan community. Moments when several series with very active fandoms are aired at the same time are very rare, and with the end of 2 series this week, I'm already mourning this wonderful, one-of-a-kind experience.

I have been camping in the following tags for many days and each one is different and unique: Love For Love's Sake I can't put into words what this show and fandom has given me. The number of absolutely insane analyses, meta, touching declarations of love to this series from moved viewers, and beautiful gifs is staggering. The series is excellent, the audience's reaction is also wonderful, it was such a great experience. Which doesn't surprise me, because it was people's reaction to real ART, which is always something special. The series itself is 10/10 for me in every category: love story, plot, actors, emotions, my investment in the story, quality, execution, even the "heat", because even though there were no love scenes, the guys were able to convey that they are very into each other 🥰

Dead Friend Forever I also enjoy the fandom experience immensely, the tag is full of great analysis and meta. The plot is so interesting and full of surprising twists and turns that there is always something new to discuss and come up with wild theories. The series is still ongoing, but for this moment it's also perfect for me and 10/10: love story (hehe), plot, actors, emotions, my investment in the story, quality, execution, also the "heat" (hehe).

Pit Babe I rate the fandom experience as *chef's kiss*. Tag is also full of interesting analyzes and meta, amazing gifs of Way. The fandom is generally very cheerful and unhinged, which is GREAT ✨ But what's most interesting is that if someone who didn't know Pit Babe checked the tag now, they would never guess who the main character and main couple of the series are (and this doesn't only apply to tumblr!). I find this incredibly funny 🤡 I'm not that interested in the series itself, so I won't rate it. I treat it as pure fun and entertainment, so I have zero expectations for the finale, especially since, of course, I've already stumbled upon possible spoilers. Personally, what I will take away from the entire series is my deepened love for Nut and a fascination with Way, whom I want like little girls want a new Barbie doll.

Last Twilight Another wild fandom experience lol I practically didn't visit the tag of this series at all, but I spent the last two episodes there in full camping mode, in a tent and cooking coffee after coffee over the fire 😄 Fans have once again soared to the heights of perfection, writing amazing analyzes and meta responses to the crap of the last episodes. The criticism was precise, justified, systematized, methodical and accurate 👩‍🎓 As with LFLS, it was an intellectual experience. The fans provided better entertainment than the series itself lol

The Sign hmm, for several weeks the tag has been dominated by BillyBabe, which is not strange because only this couple is responsible for BL aspect in this BL series 😄 I rate my fandom experience with The Sign in two categories: "until episode 7" full of amazing meta, analysis, beautiful gifs and enrichment for me as a fan, overall 10/10 and "after episode 7" which I spent mainly on… liking BillyBabe's photos and videos . Which is ok, because, well, I do like them a lot 😉

Two of the above series have already ended, although fans are still present, two more are ending this week. That's why I would like to take this opportunity and say THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart to all the fans, those who wrote emotional entries, deep and thoughtful meta, funny posts, created beautiful gifs, analyzed endlessly the smallest details and posted photos and videos of their favorite actors. You all made these last few days so interesting and fun. I hope there will be more days like this in 2024! 🥰

And now I'll only have DFF…

[happypotato48]

GMMTV 2024 PART 2 Unhinged Tangent Thoughts (Only The Queers Though)

Ossan’s Love Thailand รักนี้ให้ "นาย": oh here we go again for the third times. i'm still skeptical about it and Chakrit Yamnam definitely is not an ossan yet but... damnnnnn my inner slut for older men sense is tingling, i know gmmtv just gonna keep doing this boring BL idol pairs nonsense, but like can we get more older gays/age gap BLs? i haven't seen Chakrit in ages and that man still so damn fine! he and our honorary uncle earth could've been something that thai BL is currently lacking, a sloppy hotmess Daddies. but alas that will remain a dream for now.

The ​Heart Killers เขาจ้างให้ผมจีบนักฆ่า: i haven't watch the Eclipse yet and really didn't liked both Star In My Mind and Hidden Agenda and definitely never gonna watch Only Friend (seen all the sex scenes though.) i loved the chaotic energy the trailer giving and i'm always a sucker for black comedy (don't know if this show gonna be that but fingercrossed) when it done correctly. also this show better serve us so many leather bad boy looks. i may have not be completely sold on this show yet, but i'm horny for it.

สายรหัสเทวดา Perfect10 Liners: "Too Many Cooks repeated for several minutes" i'm going to be there for forcebook and juniormark but like wtf in frash glee hell is this, most of these mofos are pushing 30. let them be adults god danm it, i know that the target demographic for gmmtv is young adults and teenagers and that they really love/good at??? school settings. but come on let's our peter pans and wendies fly free. they're probably bored out of their fucking minds by now.

Us รักของเรา | GMMTV 2024 PART 2: i'm gonna be a good little homo and let's all the great wlws do all the talking for this show. i'm not keen on the sibling's lover stealing trope but hey as the great Lucille Bluth one said, good for her.

Thame - Po (เธม-โป้): HEART THAT SKIPS A BEAT: hehehe, Est is so pretty, ok i'm sold i'm easy like that. i was never into any boy bands as a teen, but there like a lot of former thai boy bands members that came out as gay in recent years so maybe i shouda had. anywhoo i probably not gonna mind the singing and dancing in this show since most of them going to be done by singers/dancers and not actors turned idols.

REVAMP THE UNDEAD STORY: i'm really not into serious vempires so this show is kinda meh for me. the goofy ones though those i'd have eat up. this one probably a pass for me.

แฟนที่ทันตแพทย์ส่วนใหญ่แนะนำ Sweet Tooth, Good Dentist: all my blorbos are here we get mark, baby ohm, poon, and หมอjim. ahhhhhhh!! i need it now. i also don't mind dentists like most people especially when they're good looking guys, those handsome doctors can put anything in my mouth😉

เพราะแฟนเก่าเปลี่ยนแปลงบ่อย The Ex-Morning: is this going to be our second coming BL? idk i never there for first one 😝this show either going to be a good meta commentary about the whole business that gone down or its head going be so up it own ass that will take several bottles of lube to get the head out to see the sunlight. we'll see.

[waitmyturtles]

Pain, Trust, and Separation in Some Asian Dramas (The Second Post In a Series of Utterly Un-scholastic, Highly Personal Big Meta)......

AKA, Turtles Catches Up With Old GMMTV: The Bad Buddy Rewatch Edition, Part 2 -- How Themes of Pain, Trust, and Separation Create Structure and Narrative in Bad Buddy and Other Asian BLs

[The following is a preamble I use for my Old GMMTV Challenge posts, here we go! What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far.Today, I offer the second of four posts on Bad Buddy, and the second in a Big Meta series on pain in some Asian dramas, including QLs and/or het romances. I'll look today at how ideas of pain in love, trust in love, and separation of partners/family members creates narrative drive in Bad Buddy and other Asian BLs. THIS IS A LONG POST, caveat emptor.]

Links to the BBS OGMMTVC Meta Series are here: part 1, part 2, part 3a, part 3b, and part 4

Well, after a lot of titles and a chewy preamble (thank you for getting through that, y'all!), I'm here to say that I'm combining my two ongoing meta series into one big ol' post here that I've been dying to write for months. In the course of my watching the shows on the Thailand-based Old GMMTV Challenge watchlist, as well as watching shows from my BL gateway of Japan, I've noticed that the themes of pain and trust in love, along with voluntary or involuntary separation, have been used to create dramatic and narrative structure within Asian dramatic stories to many emotional effects.

I'm celebrating the incredible Thai BL drama that is Bad Buddy in my OGMMTVC series at the moment, and within my Big Meta series on pain in Asian dramas, I examine how themes of pain so very often harken back to artistic, and even traditional, viewpoints of how pain, suffering, and melancholy are natural cultural assumptions within many collectivist Asian societies. In my first Big Meta on pain and suffering in Asian dramas, I wrote that "accepting pain and suffering is a part of the life we decide to live, from an Asian cultural perspective." Suffering is a naturally assumed part of life, a very distinct and identified part of a Buddhist's lived life, and even outside of Buddhism, accepting and living with difficulties of all kinds -- wealth disparities, the struggle for a good education and/or a successful career, the struggle to conform to collectivist familial and/or social expectations, etc. -- are extremely common themes that are unwound on in Asian lives on a minute-to-minute basis. The idea that an Asian must live with pain is often a root of intergenerational trauma, passed along from generation to generation of Asian children-to-adults. The social mores by which Asians are raised and live, to assume what Westerners might call a lack of unconditional parental love and affection, are certainly in part rooted in an assumption that living with pain and without the, say, luxury of turning over one's emotions at any given moment, are an automatic given.

As I've plodded through the OGMMTVC watchlist, I noticed very often that separation of people -- whether those people are lovers, children/parents, or simply just adults within a group -- is often a major narrative turning point in the course of a dramatized relationship. Of course it would be; it's a common trope within the romance genre, for instance.

But I find the separation of people otherwise connected to each other -- and the assumed pain of that separation, and the trust that people may have to return to each other -- particularly fascinating within the realm of Asian dramas, for reasons relating to the assumption of pain and suffering in one's life within Asian cultures that I mentioned above. In other words, the pain of separation, and the trust that one might have that one person will come back to another person -- are givens within the scope of Asian life.

In the following dramas, I note that separation is either a central storytelling point, or is a central focus of side characters:

1) The Thai filmmaker, Aof Noppharnach, has explored separation of people/lovers in many of his shows, including Still 2gether, A Tale of Thousand Stars (in multiple forms), and in Bad Buddy (also in multiple forms, romantic and/or familial).

2) Also from Thailand, Until We Meet Again and I Promised You The Moon are two non-GMMTV dramas in which separation of lovers plays an important concluding narrative role.

3) From Japan, the movie version of Cherry Magic: 30 Years of Virginity Can Make You a Wizard?! captures an important central narrative of separation that leads the franchise's two protagonists, Adachi and Kurosawa, to explore depth in honesty and intimacy that they may not have otherwise achieved in their everyday lives.

The painful separation that occurs in Aof Noppharnach's shows is most often related to the outside forces of life as it needs to be lived -- very often economically -- within or external to Thailand. In Bad Buddy, Pran leaves for Singapore for two years. I'm going to unwind much more on Pran leaving for Singapore in the final installment of my Bad Buddy OGMMTVC meta series, particularly by way of how he can do it, emotionally. But I want to offer a quick note about Pran's departure that the show gives a hint to (despite the pain that we feel in our hearts for Pat's loneliness from Pran, as depicted so beautifully by Ohm Pawat and his silent and longing existence as Pat in the first half of the Bad Buddy series finale). The BBS finale has Pran stating that he'll only be away for two years, and that the pay and the opportunity for an excellent architecture job were better in Singapore. In conversation with the fabulous Thai blogger, @recentadultburnout, RAB mentioned that this is a common occurrence among young Thais -- to move overseas for better job opportunities.

In spite of my heart breaking a bit for Pran being away from Pat when I first learned about his leaving for Singapore -- when RAB put Pran's departure in that context, I had to slap my cheek a bit. Because! I'm a child of Asian immigrants. Separation from family for better economic opportunities is a HUGE part of our paradigm of life between continents. As my Asia-based uncle, my mother's brother, once put it, in regards to my mother: "one of the children in our families always had to move away." For my mother's family, it was my mom who shipped off. Besides individuals seeking better economic opportunities for themselves, the economies of many Asian countries are dependent on the reception of remittances from overseas family members sending money back to their home countries, as my mom did for years; the Philippines is particularly notable for having a nearly 9% contribution from overseas remittances to its gross domestic product. In other words? The separation of loved ones is literally built into the financial frameworks of many Asian nations.

The separation of children or partners to overseas locales for the sake of better salaries and/or opportunities is simply a more assumed part of the cultural paradigm, I'd argue, in Asia than in the West. Family separations for jobs are extremely common in Asia; in the West, I'm not sure they are as assumed, especially for extensive separations, as the value placed on keeping a family unit together for cultural or spiritual reasons seems to be more a part of the Western fabric of life (despite our high rate of divorce).

We see an even more permanent economic separation happen in Still 2gether between two side characters -- Type, played by Toptap Jirakit, who is Tine's (Win Metawin) brother, and Man (Mike Chinnarat), who is Sarawat's (Bright Vachiwarit) friend. Man chased after Type during the first 2gether season; in Still 2gether, they're navigating their committed relationship, as Type contemplates, then accepts, a permanent job offer in Phuket, hours away from their home base in Bangkok.

As @lurkingshan put it, I might be the only person on the planet contemplating Type's and Man's relationship (lmao, it do be true), but I found Type's last conversation with Man, on the beach, to be particularly direct and moving for someone who has no immediate plans to move back to the side of the person he's dating.

I think about this scene against the structure of the short series that is Still 2gether, which is centered around the protagonists of Sarawat and Tine being temporarily separated as they prepare to compete in a university-wide tournament. Sarawat has the most lovely contemplation on love during this separation, and even Aof Noppharnach himself admits that the glance that Sarawat and Tine give to each other as they pass each other in the lead-up to the ultimate tournament is his favorite scene he's ever filmed (!!!) (and that scene is sooooo reminiscent of Pran's and Pat's pinky-hold after their public "break-up").

In other words: Still 2gether is ALL about separation, and contemplating the strength of love relationships in the face of those separations. While Sarawat and Tine will get back together, after that tournament -- Type and Man are separated for the foreseeable future. There is no end indicated to the patience that Type wants from Man. The conversation is just, THERE, and hanging -- there's an acknowledgment that long-distance relationships are tough, but Type isn't offering to quit his job and move back to Bangkok. Instead, Type and Man are left to accept the reality that there is no end in sight to their separation.

And I think this was incredibly bold of Aof Noppharnach to include in a GMMTV BL that otherwise ended happily for Tine and Sarawat, the main protagonists. What I admire about Aof's works are these sly inclusions of open-ended, sometimes melancholy non-resolutions, either for his main or his support characters, that leave us as viewers often slightly unsatisfied or unfulfilled. He did this in particular with the character of Aof in Gay OK Bangkok, a web series that he screenwrote in 2016; and many might say that Pran being away in Singapore is also not the most satisfying of endings for our beloved PatPran in Bad Buddy. To me, these decisions to do this artistically are just incredibly reminiscent, again, of the kind of pain that we as Asians have been culturally attuned to accept, for the sake of economics, and/or for the sake of the betterment of our loved ones.

Besides economic separations in Aof Noppharnach's works, we also have separations related to family demands and desires. In A Tale of Thousand Stars and Our Skyy 2 x A Tale of Thousand Stars, we see Tian leaving Phupha's side for two years to study for a graduate degree at Tian's mom's insistence; and we see Phupha refusing to join Tian, after Tian has graduated and moved back to Pha Pun Dao, on trips Tian takes back to Bangkok to celebrate his birthday with his parents.

When I rewatched ATOTS earlier this year, I noted that both Phupha and Tian were remarkably bad communicators throughout the original series -- and I posited that, in large part, their terrible communication was borne out by way of the both of them being raised in traditionally masculine Asian households that seemed to not allow for leeway regarding emotional revelations. BOTH Phupha and Tian were expected and intended to follow in the footsteps and demands of their family members. To the end of the ATOTS storyline in Our Skyy 2, Phupha brings up his parents -- and he hears what he has been wanting to confirm from Tian's parents, in their desire to have Phupha take care of Tian for the rest of their lives.

Phupha in particular needed to have multiple gateways opened to him, vis à vis Tian's family, in order to properly and openly confirm his permanent love and commitment to Tian. If Phupha didn't have that? He was willing to be separated from Tian, either temporarily, or at length. Phupha needed a kind of culturally accepting door opened to him -- as a man raised in what we assume to be a rural and traditional environment that may very well have not allowed for a gay man to live openly and honestly. Phupha indeed follows in his father's footsteps, to the extent of never leaving Pha Pun Dao, and demanded that he have Tian's family's approval before making the final commitment to Tian to love Tian forever.

I find the cultural nuances of nuclear family separation, or separation encouraged by nuclear family, to be particularly heartbreaking in many of Aof Noppharnach's works. We know that Jim and Jam, brother and sister in Moonlight Chicken, ran away from their Isan hometown as youths to find their lives in Pattaya, where we meet them in the context of that show. But separation either from nuclear family, or more impactfully, done by nuclear family, is most evident in Bad Buddy.

Besides Pran voluntarily leaving for Singapore, we know that Pran has been involuntarily separated from Pat before -- when Pran was transferred to a boarding school in 10th grade by his mother, Dissaya. Before that transfer, Pran and Pat were technically "separated" by their parents in so far as they were not supposed to become friends -- all while competing heavily against each other in every category of life.

That boarding school transfer? That wasn't just separating Pran from Pat. What I found remarkable about that separation during my recent BBS rewatches is that Dissaya HERSELF chose to be physically separated from her own son, for the sake of her rivalry with Pat's father, Ming.

I'm thinking about this particularly from the words she used with Pran as they sat at breakfast together before Pran started his second year at university, when Dissaya said that Pran could date anyone, men or women, as long as he "didn't date [the next door kid]."

My interpretation of that perspective is that Dissaya did not want Pran to relieve the heartbreak that she herself experienced when she was close with Ming in her teenage years.

In other words: she chose to send her son away in the face of her ongoing, lifelong fear that Ming and his family would once again wreak havoc on her and her clan.

In the continuation of the intergenerational trauma wrought upon Pat and Pran by their parents -- as a mother myself, this seems to be particularly egregious. Dissaya would have rather had her son AWAY FROM HER, than to contemplate her son even being WITHIN physical proximity to Pat in the context of her hatred of Pat's father, Ming, and the fear that she had that the Jindapats would negatively influence the Siridechawats again.

(The wonderful @telomeke reminded me, in conversation on this topic, that the first question Dissaya asks Pran, after learning about the first faculty fight in episode 1 when Pran re-encounters Pat for the very first time, was, "Did he hurt you, Pran?" Dissaya cannot bear to allow the Jindapats to hurt her son, or her family, ever again.)

I wrote in my first Big Meta on pain and suffering that Asian parenting expectations and mores are far more conditional than they are in the West, as parenting mores in the West are centered around unquestioned and unconditional love from parents to children. So much of Bad Buddy meta out there focuses on the internal experiences of Pran and Pat. When I sat back to think about Dissaya making the decision for herself to be separated from her son for years -- and then to also contemplate pulling Pran FROM COLLEGE when she learns that Pat goes to Pran's university -- I mean. We know Dissaya and Ming both tried their best to embody their hatred of each other into their children. But Dissaya takes it a couple steps further, by attempting to literally control Pran's physical existence vis à vis Pat, which -- and I'm going to sound like a judgmental Westerner here, even as an Asian -- strikes me as out of line by way of just pure emotional projection onto one's children.

When Pran goes to Singapore, at the end of the series, it's out of his own volition. Again, I'll write more about this at the end of my BBS OGMMTVC meta series. But what he experienced by ways of many TYPES of separation from Pat throughout his life -- competitively, emotionally, and then physically -- are extensive. He was physically separated from Pat by Dissaya. He was theoretically "separated" from Pat emotionally, by being discouraged in having a friendship with Pat. He is physically separated from Pat *again* when he goes to Singapore. And I posit later in this piece that Pat and Pran had another theoretical "separation" when they are pretending to be broken up throughout the course of their relationship.

When I think about what teenage Pran must have felt to be *physically sent away* -- BY and FROM his own family, for their sake of his family's desires to avoid ANOTHER family -- it explains a hell of a lot more about Pran's tendency to dissociate, particularly during stressful times. (We see this when he's alone at the demolished bus stop, and cutely in Our Skyy 2, as Pat encourages a grumpy Pran to go to Pha Pun Dao.)

And where Pat balanced Pran out -- where Pat could offer the kind of companionship, and relaxed and equitable communication that Pran had never had with his family -- was where Pran could finally experience truly open and SAFE love from and with another person, another person who wouldn't *send him away* if Pran didn't play by their rules. Instead, Pat fought by Pran's side, and Pran was willing to fight, too, and they remained together, and safe in their love and trust.

Whew. Dissaya separating Pran from his own family, from herself -- to leave him alone at boarding school -- seriously punches me in the gut, especially as a mother myself. I'm thinking about a teenager, on the cusp of adulthood, alone to contemplate his unending love for Pat, and I'm like.... I wouldn't leave a kid alone like that for a moment. But for Dissaya, her husband, and their pride? It seemed to be a worthwhile decision in that moment. A decision that we know would blow up in their faces in episode 10 of Bad Buddy.

In Pran's first separation from Pat -- Pran did not have personal agency. He did have agency later on, as he moved to Singapore, which again, I'll contemplate in a further meta.

Two instances where I was impressed by protagonists leveraging their agency vis à vis temporary separations from their partners was in Until We Meet Again and in I Promised You The Moon.

UWMA's Pharm was first and foremost presented as a blushing maiden. HOWEVER: Pharm demonstrated quite a bit of sexual agency early in the series. He was forward in his crush on Dean. He contemplated openly being gay. And he wasn't afraid to push Dean away when Dean was moving too fast sexually.

At the end of the series, after Dean and Pharm have resolved their spiritual connection vis à vis the embodied spirits of Korn and Intouch meeting once more -- Pharm wants to know if the love between him and Dean is real, and independent of the influence of the spirits of Korn and Intouch. So: Pharm asks for a break.

Throughout UWMA, Dean is the obvious seme, and Pharm is the blushing uke. I squealed in DELIGHT when I first watched Pharm asking for the break. Yes, Pharm loved Dean -- and what I saw in Pharm's asking for a temporary separation was truly out of that love, to confirm between the both of them that their relationship was very much indeed a forever relationship. God, I get chills thinking about it: Pharm was safe enough in his sphere with Dean to ask for and to GET the agency-driven space that HE NEEDED to feel fully confident in the relationship. That was a risky move that paid off for the two guys in dividends in the end. Dean had no choice but to say yes there.

The fabulous Oh-aew in I Promised You The Moon goes even further than Pharm. He fucking breaks up with Teh! After Teh cheated on Oh-aew! YES, HOMEY, YES! No wibbling on Oh-aew's end. Oh-aew was devastated, yes. But he knew he had to have Teh out of his life in that moment, for the sake of Oh-aew's own happiness, growth, and development. He even rejects Teh's reach-out at the end of their college careers.

What stuck me as so golden about the ending of IPYTM was that that break-up wasn't actually presented as temporary. They were apart for OVER A YEAR (thank you kindly to @shortpplfedup for the temporal fact-check!). Oh-aew held his ground. He needed his time and space. He needed to grow! And he valued that, individually.

I'm celebrating these two instances of agency-driven separations because of the style of their intention vis à vis the protagonists asking for, needing, and leveraging these separations. With the economic and involuntary separations I talked about earlier -- it's like there was a higher need, whether it was for money, a better career opportunity, fear, or selfishness on the part of a family to create the separation.

With Pharm and Oh-aew: the separations they demanded were purely personal and for their own growth. We know now that Pharm and Oh-aew get their endings with their partners. Pharm has a purely happy ending with Dean in Between Us. Oh-aew's ending with Teh is open-ended -- we don't know what chaos Teh will wreak next -- but at least we know they're navigating that chaos together again.

The last drama I wanted to take a look at regarding pain, trust, and separation is the fabulous movie continuation of Cherry Magic: 30 Years of Virginity Will Make You a Wizard?! (I always love writing ?! whenever I talk about Cherry Magic, lol).

The central separation in the movie of the two protagonists, Adachi and Kurosawa, comes about when Adachi is transferred to Nagasaki for work. As @neuroticbookworm and @lurkingshan can attest to: a Western viewer of Japanese BLs will often find themselves screaming to a screen, "JUST TALK ALREADY!," and a uniquely common aspect of Japanese doramas is that so much of communication in Japanese culture is silent, unsaid, kept internal by collectivist social pressures to not make waves with another person -- which automatically creates ongoing questions of trust between partners. When Adachi (Akaso Eiji) shares with Kurosawa (Machida Keita) that Adachi will be moving, Kurosawa shares in words that he's happy for Adachi, but through very simple body language, communicates that he is feeling otherwise.

Later in the movie, Adachi gets into an accident in Nagasaki, and Kurosawa rushes to be by Adachi's side. Kurosawa is clearly traumatized. And Kurosawa finally reveals his feelings about the entire situation -- a rare display of direct emotional confession.

We think that Adachi moved to Nagasaki for this job opportunity -- separating himself from the incredibly devoted and head-over-heels-in-love-with-Adachi Kurosawa. Adachi knows well enough that Kurosawa is suffering in this separation. But later in the movie, after Adachi has moved back with Kurosawa, do we learn Adachi's true intentions. Adachi wants to make himself invaluable at work -- so that Adachi's and Kurosawa's shared company will not separate them if the company finds out about their relationship.

This particular conversation between Adachi and Kurosawa -- after their separation, after they've moved in together -- is a huge turning point in the movie for Adachi, who had usually been the reluctant uke in their relationship prior to this moment. In this conversation, Adachi expresses his fear that outside forces will eventually separate them, and he wants to do what he can to ensure the safety of their relationship.

To me, this is incredibly reminiscent of the compromises Pran and Pat make in Bad Buddy to keep their relationship secret -- another theoretical "separation" -- from their parents for the health, safety, and viability of their relationship.

As well, this conversation between Adachi and Kurosawa moves forward into Adachi's desire to come out to their families. He was inspired by the immediate aftermath of the accident, in which Kurosawa was the last person to find out that Adachi had gotten hurt -- only after Adachi's family and company were notified.

The nuances of this separation between Adachi and Kurosawa -- and what the separation LED TO, which was an eventual and permanent commitment between Adachi and Kurosawa -- are incredibly layered. Adachi made an economic separation from Kurosawa. But it was also rooted in his desire to acclimate his company to his company's dependence on Adachi, so that the company would choose Adachi's contribution to the company over the potentially taboo reality of his same-sex relationship with a colleague in Kurosawa. In other words: he wanted to leverage the separation and his work performance upon his return, to render the company no choice in choosing Adachi's economic performance over his personal and private choices.

(One insight into Japanese culture is that for decades, Japanese corporations have wanted their employees to be married, to complete a seamless connection between household and "office" families. The Japanese BL Kinou Nani Tabeta?/What Did You Eat Yesterday? makes reference to the fact that the main protagonist, Shiro, becomes an independent lawyer because, as a gay man, he may have been pressured to take a wife in another, more group-oriented corporate setting.)

AND, following this, Adachi wanted to come out to his and Kurosawa's families, to also acclimate them to their relationship, so that their families would also not threaten the sanctity and safety of their relationship. And his gamble worked -- and their families accepted them, and they were able to make a permanent commitment to each other.

Without a strategically economic separation, Adachi and Kurosawa could not have achieved key moments of communication that led to their ability to find safety in their external environments, and make a personal and private permanent commitment to each other. The separation to Nagasaki was Adachi's lever to move their relationship forward.

It's so nuanced, so layered, and so strategic on Adachi's end, to use the work separation and his commitment to his company as such a motivator to propel his relationship forward and permanently with Kurosawa -- especially vis à vis the unique nuances of spoken and unspoken communication in Japanese society, which are remarkably different than the styles of communication we see in Thai dramas.

In Pran's and Pat's conclusion in the Thailand of Bad Buddy, they go in the opposite direction: for the sanctity and safety of their relationship, they act out a break-up scenario (with Dissaya telling Pran, "come back to your family," ha), and keep their committed relationship a secret. And this happens *two years* before the context of an actual, physical separation when Pran decides to move to Singapore after graduation.

It's a bit of a switcheroo from what we'd expect by way of open vs. closed communication between Japan and Thailand. But both scenarios, from Cherry Magic to Bad Buddy, work brilliantly well to ensure that all relationships are safe and solidified.

I'm not sure that I can say, globally, that separation from one's nuclear family, or separation from a partner, are common occurrences in manifested everyday reality. As I mentioned before, the economies of many countries are dependent on the physical separation of their citizens to other locales to send back monetary remittances. But more often than not -- when partners are partnered, they tend to want to stay by each other's sides.

I love that many Asian dramas do not shy away from the many realities as to why partners or children may be voluntarily or involuntarily separated from loved ones. Our beloved dramas show us the devastation of involuntary separations, as rendered by Dissaya unto Pran. We see that economic separations can actually LEAD to a solidifying of relationships in the case of Adachi and Kurosawa. We see that family-motivated separations, in the cause of Phupha and Tian, simply needed the investment of time for their relationship to reach a point of comfortable commitment. We see that agency-driven separations by Pharm and Oh-aew can lead to emotional clarity. And, we see that theoretical, secret-kept "separations," of the kind that Pat and Pran created for themselves, to protect their relationship, were risks worth taking, simply for them to be together and happy.

Pain and happiness are not emotions independent of each other. At least in the eyes of my Asian cultures, human beings embody all emotions, all the time. Humans are certainly primed, internally and socially, to seek happiness and balance. But as I've posited here in this post -- is there pleasure without pain? The pain of separation, the trust that partners and family members can learn from each other through separation, and the lessons and communicative ability to solidify relationships after the obstacles of separation, are all themes of life that, I think, are worth unwinding on, in glorious emotional detail. And I love that our beloved Asian dramas do not shy away from these examinations.

(Tagging @dribs-and-drabbles and @solitaryandwandering by request! If you'd like to be tagged, please let me know!)

[Well, this one was a doozy -- if you got through it all, I thank you! Next up, next week, is another post I've been dying to write for months. I had the opportunity to engage in lengthy conversation with a number of FABULOUS Asian Tumblr bloggers, all of us Bad Buddy stans, to reflect on our experiences as Asian reviewers watching BBS and to talk about what we related to. I have a list, a WHOLE LIST! of themes to expound on. I'm calling it Asian Cultural Touchpoints Within Bad Buddy. And I may need to split it into two posts, because there's a lot to talk about. Join me and my friends next week in our continued Bad Buddy brain-rot sesh!

Here is the status of the Old GMMTV Challenge watchlist. Tumblr's web editor loves to jack with this list; please head on over to this link for the very latest updates!

1) The Love of Siam (2007) (movie) (review here) 2) My Bromance (2014) (movie) (review here) 3) Love Sick and Love Sick 2 (2014 and 2015) (review here) 4) Gay OK Bangkok Season 1 (2016) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 5) Make It Right (2016) (review here) 6) SOTUS (2016-2017) (review here) 7) Gay OK Bangkok Season 2 (2017) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 8) Make It Right 2 (2017) (review here) 9) Together With Me (2017) (review here) 10) SOTUS S/Our Skyy x SOTUS (2017-2018) (review here) 11) Love By Chance (2018) (review here) 12) Kiss Me Again: PeteKao cuts (2018) (no review) 13) He’s Coming To Me (2019) (review here) 14) Dark Blue Kiss (2019) and Our Skyy x Kiss Me Again (2018) (review here) 15) TharnType (2019-2020) (review here) 16) Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey (OffGun BL cuts) (2016 and 2017) (no review) 17) Theory of Love (2019) (review here) 18) 3 Will Be Free (2019) (a non-BL and an important harbinger of things to come in 2019 and beyond re: Jojo Tichakorn pushing queer content in non-BLs) (review here) 19) Dew the Movie (2019) (review here) 20) Until We Meet Again (2019-2020) (review here) (and notes on my UWMA rewatch here) 21) 2gether (2020) and Still 2gether (2020) (review here) 22) I Told Sunset About You (2020) (review here) 23) YYY (2020, out of chronological order) (review here) 24) Manner of Death (2020-2021) (not a true BL, but a MaxTul queer/gay romance set within a genre-based show that likely influenced Not Me and KinnPorsche) (review here) 25) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) (review here) 26) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake Of Rewatching Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (re-review here) 27) Lovely Writer (2021) (review here) 28) Last Twilight in Phuket (2021) (the mini-special before IPYTM) (review here) 29) I Promised You the Moon (2021) (review here) 30) Not Me (2021-2022) (review here) 31) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) (thesis here) 32) 55:15 Never Too Late (2021-2022) (not a BL, but a GMMTV drama that features a macro BL storyline about shipper culture and the BL industry) (review here) 33) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) and Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (2023) OGMMTVC Rewatch (The BBS OGMMTVC Meta Series is ongoing: preamble here, part 1 here, and more reviews to come) 34) Secret Crush On You (2022) [watching for Cheewin’s trajectory of studying queer joy from Make It Right (high school), to SCOY (college), to Bed Friend (working adults)] (watching) 35) KinnPorsche (2022) (tag here) 36) KinnPorsche (2022) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For the Sake of Re-Analyzing the KP Cultural Zeitgeist 37) The Eclipse (2022) (tag here) 38) The Eclipse OGMMTVC Rewatch For the Sake of Re-Analyzing an Politics-Focused Show After Not Me 39) GAP (2022-2023) (Thailand’s first GL) 40) My School President (2022-2023) and Our Skyy 2 x My School President (2023) 41) Moonlight Chicken (2023) (tag here) 42) Bed Friend (2023) (tag here) 43) Be My Favorite (2023) (tag here)  44) Wedding Plan (2023) 45) Only Friends (2023) (tag here)]

[bengiyo]

Hi!!

Quick question: Is the level of regular engagement/posting/meta for BL series right now (particularly Step By Step and La Pluie, but others as well) a typical amount of engagement for a show in this little Tumblr corner? or above average? (or below average??)

Is it increasing because (from what I understand) things are changing and there's more to talk about nowadays?

As a newbie, I am having a FABULOUS time with reading and seeing everyone's different thoughts and perspectives and insights and learning new things. 'tis excellent. I don't think I've ever enjoyed watching TV more.

However, from what I understand the amount of BL coming out right now is actually in a bit of a lul? and so if this level of engagement is typical for the majority of shows (or only good shows idk) I'm going to have to put some time management stuff in place.

I just want to be prepared! Because this is Awesome!

Oh, this is a complicated one. I'm going to tag @absolutebl, @so-much-yet-to-learn, @lurkingshan, @ginnymoonbeam, @liyazaki, @negrowhat, @respectthepetty, and any other old fans reading this to also weigh in.

I think we are a shell of what we once were. At the height of 2gether, Bad Buddy, I Told Sunset About You, and a few other big shows you were getting banger after banger in the tags. I feel like I've been writing more lately because I miss that era and feel like I have to directly contribute to fostering it with new fans entering the space.

On the real, in 2020 @asianmade organized fans to submit letters and other content and assembled books to thank Bright and Win for the work they did on 2gether. We even got confirmation from Bright that they got the books.

I think good storytelling begets good reactions. The more invested we are, the more we're going to talk about it. I think fandom really only works when we're all actively contributing to it in some way. Reblogging and leaving fun comments in the tags. Writing crack posts. Sharing clown theories about what might be happening. Making gifs. Making fan vids. I genuinely think that the experience of watching the show improves when fans come together to share their ideas and build each other up.

Still, there used to be a lot more of us on tumblr. I hope that we continue to be this invested in the shows that follow. I feel like we're about to turn a lot more of our attention to Be My Favorite.

So, if you're enjoying the experience of having so much to read, please add to the stream! Write your thoughts down! Love the shows loudly! Tag us if you write something! Message us if you have questions!

[heretherebedork]

The way Kawin just looks at Pluem, still in love, while Pluem looks away because he's hurt and he's aching and Kawin doesn't understand and he doesn't know what happened and he loves Pluem so much. But Pluem's pain has taken over and all that's left is that hurt, that emptiness, the loss of his family, that loss of so much.

Kawin loves him so much, he wants to be there for him, but he is a source of pain now and he has nothing else. nothing but to try and face the loss that Pluem has suffered.

It's a loss that has become a gulf and they're both on other sides of it now, both with loss, both alone and afraid and without the one person they had just begun to turn to, the one person that had offered comfort in darkness.

And then Pluem sending Kawin away with the wish that he'd never met him? Sending him away with the worst thing anyone could say to him. Sending him away from the love he'd thought he'd found, the home he'd thought he'd be able to turn to and to be safe in...

To leave them both alone and hurt, hurting each other on accident and on purpose, leaving broken hearts and aching spirits and loss, loss all around on so many levels that it is unimaginable, that it is incomprehensible, a loss that can break both of them and leave them desolate.