#we are sisters you and I

[titles-for-tangents]

With Cora and Ampersand very probably going off-world for a while, you just know there is going to be a moment of stabbing heartbreak with Olive.

Olive, an eight year-old terribly afraid of monsters in Axiom’s End and feeling incredibly betrayed when Cora tells her there aren’t any monsters and yet THERE SURE WAS SOMETHING RAIDING THE APPLE COMPUTER LAST NIGHT

Olive, whom we only hear about in concept from Kaveh in Truth of the Divine

Lindsay Ellis has a wonderful, heartbreaking way of incorporating her real-life experiences into her work, perhaps most prominently and recently with her frustrating search for a therapist in her area able to understand online harassment, because somehow in the year of our Lord 2022 nobody in the greater Los Angeles area has been trained to really understand modern-day online harassment. Multiple people have failed Lindsay. Cora too has a harrowing scene I won’t totally spoil here that lands Kaveh and Sol arguing with a head dick in charge because Cora can’t exactly just frolic to therapy sharing she’s the prime translator and diplomat for a whopping nine-foot alien with whom she has an equally whopping emotional bond and a wee little translator in her ear so he can tell her all his thoughts! Meaning of course, how on Earth is she supposed to heal?

Ellis recently shared her experiences at VidCon and how the people there talked about her like she was dead. Cora might find herself experiencing much the same surreality when she reappears on Earth after being off-world for many, many years, and the memory of her has been immortalized in just a photo.

The heartbreak too you just know is coming is when Cora at some point comes face-to-face with her little sister Olive, perhaps grown older than Cora physically is,

And she’s looking at her with the daggers in their mother’s eyes, like Cora was the worst possible monster Olive ever could have faced.

(“‘39” by Queen plays in the background)

[sheepgirlmaidtummy]

man. this whole thing pisses me off because like. even when people talk about staff having a history of hating trans women, that this isnt the first time, without fail black trans women are forgotten to be included again and again. im not surprised this caused such an uproar when the popular white woman gets deleted. nobody should be, its been that way like forever. some cunt in my inbox got annoyed i called rita a sex worker (lol? okay)

but i mentioned that in my post because so many black trans women have gotten removed from this site for their sex work alone, regardless of if it "broke community guidelines" or not, especially when tumblr live and the ads on this website are so fucking horny. idek what to say rn because like. this wont get as many notes as the posts talking about her will. the exploding car thing is gonna get more attention than the trans women on this site you dont actually care about listening to. ive been talking about how unfair it is to be a black tgirl on this site for years and nobody cares.

i love rita, we talked abit the other day and she's doing fine, dont get it twisted and think i hate her or some bs, she's a big fucking reason im not fucking homeless.

but part of why her deletion got to #1 trending on tumblr for multiple days in a row is that she's white

[chloesimaginationthings]

The FNAF Mikes with their (not so) little sisters

[andthebeanstalk]

Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".

Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"

And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".

Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.

At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.

So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!

Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!

Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!

Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.

[bowenoke]

I bet they used to sing along to worship songs in the back of the car on the way to church

[anxioussailorsoldier]

zelda: “no, but...I would also like this notarised”

the totk situation is a textbook case of royal marriage for appearances so that the gay zoras can be with their blonde hylians, and you can't tell me otherwise

the blond barbarian man is leeroy, a beefier and more himbo reincarnation of link. still waiting to see him in-game

[chiliger]

It’s a sibling’s job to kickstart that existential crises young.

[coldbrewpup]

actually i love all my trans sisters forever and ever no matter what

[inkskinned]

you're grabbing lunch with a nice man and he gives you that strange grimace-smile that's popular right now; an almost sardonic "twist" of his mouth while he looks literally down on you. it looks like he practiced the move as he leans back, arms folded. he just finished reciting the details of NFTs to you and explaining Oppenheimer even though he only watched a youtube about it and hasn't actually seen it. you are at the bottom of your wine glass.

you ask the man across from you if he has siblings, desperately looking for a topic. literally anything else.

he says i don't like small talk. and then he smiles again, watching you.

a few years ago, you probably would have said you're above celebrity gossip, but honestly, you've been kind of enjoying the dumb shit of it these days. with the rest of the earth burning, there's something familiar and banal about dragging ariana grande through the mud. you think about jeanette mccurdy, who has often times gently warned the world she's not as nice as she appears. you liked i'm glad my mom died but it made you cry a lot.

he doesn't like small talk, figure out something to say.

you want to talk about responsibility, and how ariana grande is only like 6 days older than you are - which means she just turned 30 and still dresses and acts like a 13 year old, but like sexy. there's something in there about the whole thing - about insecurity, and never growing up, and being sexualized from a young age.

people have been saying that gay people are groomers. like, that's something that's come back into the public. you have even said yourself that it's just ... easier to date men sometimes. you would identify as whatever the opposite of "heteroflexible" is, but here you are again, across from a man. you like every woman, and 3 people on tv. and not this guy. but you're trying. your mother is worried about you. she thinks it's not okay you're single. and honestly this guy was better before you met, back when you were just texting.

wait, shit. are you doing the same thing as ariana grande? are you looking for male validation in order to appease some internalized promise of heteronormativity? do you conform to the idea that your happiness must result in heterosexuality? do you believe that you can resolve your internal loneliness by being accepted into the patriarchy? is there a reason dating men is easier? why are you so scared of fucking it up with women? why don't you reach out to more of them? you have a good sense of humor and a big ol' brain, you could have done a better job at online dating.

also. jesus christ. why can't you just get a drink with somebody without your internal feminism meter pinging. although - in your favor (and judgement aside) in the case of your ariana grande deposition: you have been in enough therapy you probably wouldn't date anyone who had just broken up with their wife of many years (and who has a young child). you'd be like - maybe take some personal time before you begin this journey. like, grande has been on broadway, you'd think she would have heard of the plot of hamlet.

he leans forward and taps two fingers to the table. "i'm not, like an andrew tate guy," he's saying, "but i do think partnership is about two people knowing their place. i like order."

you knew it was going to be hard. being non-straight in any particular way is like, always hard. these days you kind of like answering the question what's your sexuality? with a shrug and a smile - it's fine - is your most common response. like they asked you how your life is going and not to reveal your identity. you like not being straight. you like kissing girls. some days you know you're into men, and sometimes you're sitting across from a man, and you're thinking about the power of compulsory heterosexuality. are you into men, or are you just into the safety that comes from being seen with them? after all, everyone knows you're failing in life unless you have a husband. it almost feels like a gradebook - people see "straight married" as being "all A's", and anything else even vaguely noncompliant as being ... like you dropped out of the school system. you cannot just ignore years of that kind of conditioning, of course you like attention from men.

"so let's talk boundaries." he orders more wine for you, gesturing with one hand like he's rousing an orchestra. sir, this is a fucking chain restaurant. "I am not gonna date someone who still has male friends. also, i don't care about your little friends, i care about me. whatever stupid girls night things - those are lower priority. if i want you there, you're there."

he wasn't like this over text, right? you wouldn't have been even in the building if he was like this. you squint at him. in another version of yourself, you'd be running. you'd just get up and go. that's what happens on the internet - people get annoyed, and they just leave. you are locked in place, almost frozen. you need to go to the bathroom and text someone to call you so you have an excuse, like it's rude to just-leave. like he already kind of owns you. rudeness implies a power paradigm, though. see, even your social anxiety allows the patriarchy to get to you.

you take a sip of the new glass of wine. maybe this will be a funny story. maybe you can write about it on your blog. maybe you can meet ariana grande and ask her if she just maybe needs to take some time to sit and think about her happiness and how she measures her own success.

is this settling down? is this all that's left in your dating pool? just accepting that someone will eventually love you, and you have to stop being picky about who "makes" you a wife?

you look down to your hand, clutching the knife.

[hamsternamedmarinette]

Anyway,

[fleetn-crab85]

so funny story: during the pandemic my sister and I were so bored we recreated the pro-shot of Newsies in LEGO stop motion. We never finished it, but we got through the entirety of Act One and King of New York. So please, enjoy this small part of the Seize The Day dance break!

(If enough of you people want to see the rest I may post more...)

[lesbaurinkos]

genuinely there will never be another show like this ever again. nothing as wacky and campy and unafraid to take massive swings. that does musical episodes with a cast they didnt bother to ask about singing abilities (camp and beautiful forever). that's a love letter to art and the truest adaptation of comics as a medium as we could ever ask for.... that works overtime to make every character gay in some capacity just for fun.... that runs 7 entire seasons for 6 beautiful years.... that forces cole sprouse to sing and somehow managed to unlock actually good singing one single time for his origin of love verse and then never again ever. that has god's most beautifully campy dialogue delivered with utmost passion and sincerity. that's as unabashedly FUN as this. that has cheryl blossom my most beloved cheryl blossom. NO ONE'S GONNA DO IT LIKE THIS EVER AGAIN!!!

[annabelle--cane]

out of curiosity, what are people's favorite sex scenes in tv/movies? the results and notes on the polls are broadly telling me that most people's pov is "the majority of sex scenes are cringe as hell except for like two or three that rule," so what are the ones that actually work for you? in replies, tags, reblogs, asks on or off anon, whatever.

[bvckleydiaz]

BUCK (accidentally) COMING OUT TO MADDIE 🥺

[asmilinghopelessromantic]

Anthony: Colin let me give you some advice

Colin: don't fuck it up like you did?

Anthony: ah, yeah that's about right

Colin: Anthony help, I fucked it up

[skeletoninthemelonland]

a glimpse of what their early dynamic looks like