#without having something to keep My Internal Narrative in check

[atypi-cals]

This is genuinely a good place to start, but does anyone have any suggestions on... how to do some of the above activities without creating? Like, these are good ideas, and I want to try them. A few of them are good to go as is; would be very difficult to create during them and all that. But, genuinely, how does one start reading or watching media without creating something at the same time. As in, if I try to read a book or watch something I get the itch to create and I can't focus on the media unless I'm also doing something (tm). Does anyone have any tips or tricks for overcoming that feeling?

im so serious about this but if youre autistic and especially if youre chronically ill creative labour cannot be your only way to relax. working on a creative project is still working. take time to do nothing. its good for you i promise.

[gardenvarietygay]

Book Review* - On Guerilla Gardening by Richard Reynolds

I don’t read many books, I prefer audiobooks, and I don’t read many nonfiction books in any format. I’m a person who prefers to listen to a fictional story or at least something narrative. However, my husband very sweetly got me this book for Christmas since he knows I’ve been curious about the topic.

The subtitle to this book is “a handbook for gardening without boundaries” but I think that the title alone, which suggests an academic treatise on the broad strokes of a subject ie “On Medieval Chivalric Codes of Honor” or “On Governance” is more fitting. (I believe the actual title Reynolds is referencing is the manual On Guerilla Warfare by Mao Zedong, make of that what you will.) The first 117 pages of this book are pure tedium. If someone needed to be convinced that planting flowers by roadsides was worthwhile, I think the author might talk them into it and back out by the end. Reynolds spends his time detailing real guerilla movements, chastising people for making gorilla/guerrilla gardening jokes, and explaining that flowers are prettier than concrete. I found it muddled, condescending and boring but when I looked up reviews of this book people seemed to think it was refreshing or something.

From page 121 onward, we have the practical advice. Actually, we have some very impractical advice surrounded by way more introduction than necessary. Even though Reynolds has spent 117 pages bashing you over the head with war metaphors, he still feels the need to include yet more war imagery before every bit of advice. I wasn’t offended by the WMD jokes or the frequent references to guns, it was certainly and odd choice but whatever, I was just annoyed that he kept this stupid gimmick up for all 247 pages. Sometimes jokes aren’t bad because they’re offensive, they’re simply not funny.

Writing style aside, the advice is pretty middling. The plants recommended are just based on the author’s personal experience growing plants on medians in London. Gardening is like politics, extremely local. I’m not begrudging the man his foxgloves and daffodils but they’re just not a good choice for an internationally-distributed book. He actually recommends planting invasive plants (as in plants that he knows are invasive in most places including the UK) so that they take over. He includes the barest of caveats about making sure you keep them in check, however the gordian knot of finding that balance will not be untied for us. Since specific gardening advice becomes useless before it even crosses a time zone, it strikes me that rather than spending 12 pages on plant recommendations, they should’ve simply cut this section or suggested broad categories for the international release.

We are told that seed bombs are the preferred method to scatter seeds and that some people put them in eggshells, some people mould them into guns (just like in war!!), some people put industrial binding agents into them, and some people use a device that somehow uses laughing gas. There are no recipes or real instructions, just anecdotes. There is no explanation of how laughing gas aids in seed spreading, that one might be a joke. On subjects such as water, tools, choosing locations, etc. the advice is very basic but solid enough.

To be frank, once I got into the anecdotes without advice section I started skimming and never stopped. There’s every possibility that on page 240 of this book he really turns things around and makes this mess into a manifesto but I don’t think that would save it for me.

This book left me generally unimpressed. The concept was cute until it was aggravating, the writing was such a repetitive slog that I ended up skimming over paragraphs, and the advice seemed either so specific that it couldn’t be generalized or so basic that it needn’t be printed and sold. The cover is cute, that’s a good thing because it will be staying closed on my bookshelf for a long time. I believe the first edition of this book came out in the early 2000s and it shows. Maybe if I read this book in 2008 I’d have been charmed but in 2024 I’m just annoyed and confused.

*Inspired by @plantyhamchuk’s gardening book reviews.

[izamationbroker]

For the writing asks: 13, 14, 37, 38!

I know this is almost a whole year late but like. I dunno I'm vibin' so here:

13. What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?

This is super specific to personal style and craft but I was struggling with a fic in another fandom once, trying to manage a heavy tonal shift that didn't seem to want to happen because I was stuck in the head of a character whose plans and control on the situation was rapidly spiraling out of control. A big part of writing for me is how deeply I get into the heads of the characters. I like to pick their brains and elaborate on what they're thinking and feeling, but in this particular fic there came a point where the focus character had to finally give up and let go and it just wasn't happening because I wanted to make sure he was still lucid enough to have those elaborate descriptive thoughts.

@wawawawawawawawawawawawawa advised me to not worry about the loss in descriptive power to instead go whole-ham into the tonal shift and slam that tonal shift of the focus character giving up into the reader like a train as he just stops paying attention to the plan and instead starts focusing on other, more menial things because he's given up.

Immediately fixed the problem, and now I've internalized it as another tool in my personal style of sticking so heavily in the heads of my focus characters. If there's a sudden change in the way a character thinks or feels, then the narrative reflects that and starts abiding by the new status quo. It's very powerful, I think, to actually show the cognitive dissonance. Wa-kun's an amazing writer tbh and mooooost of my writing style is derived from their powerful craft.

The funniest part though is that they actually forgot they were the one who gave me that advice, and complimented me on that stylistic choice once while rereading what I'd written. I got to joyfully inform them that it was their idea in the first place, dumbass.

14. What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across?

I'm not entirely sure honestly, because I get like 99% of my craft advice from Wa-kun and they. Like. Live and breathe the craft and it's honestly amazing to learn from them about the subtle intricacies of writing.

But like, I guess in the general sense, I didn't really mesh well with the advice to not show people your stuff until it's done to motivate you to actually finish it. I don't think it's bad advice, per se, it just doesn't work very well for me personally due to accessibility reasons more than anything.

I have this problem where it's actually really difficult for me to get my thoughts out on paper without some kind of prompt or trigger to help keep the ideas flowing. As such, when I create, it ends up being mostly collaborative in nature, either bouncing ideas off of Wa-kun or getting input from others or asks like this one. It's something that I really don't like because it bars me from a lot of stuff that I'd like to do.

I'd like to write more, I have ideas, but it gets near-impossible to solidify those things outside of the esoteric transience of my brain without someone else to help me. If I don't have someone to help me along, it just doesn't happen, so I have no choice but to show my work to people and talk about it and essentially beg for attention so I can jog the rest of it out of my head. Makes me feel bad, though, so I end up just. Not doing anything about it instead. Rip.

37. Talk about your current wips.

Unfortunately, most of my wips and such that I'm really trying hard to work on are on my Danganronpa blog, @lockpickingliar. Please check it out if you have some interest! Most are heavily ask-interactive AUs and character ask formats to try to mitigate my accessibility problems I've mentioned above, but no one seems to be biting so I've been kinda upset about it while stuck in a rut trying really really hard to write something, anything the proper way.

I still have some Durarara!! things on the backburner, like Severance, an AU where Izaya's spinal cord injury was a lot more severe than in canon, resulting in him being paralyzed from the waist down; or a Psyche/Tsugaru fic exploring Psyche's BPD/ASPD comorbidity that I had an idea for and tried to start for BPD Awareness Month (May).

But if anyone wants to hear about the Danganronpa AU train I have going, I have. Truly so much over there. Mostly Kokichi-centric, but also I subscribe to Rantaro Amami Conduct Disorder (Baby ASPD) Trutherism, so like. I still got my roots, y'know?

Although part of what brought me back on this blog enough to answer a random ask from 10 months ago is that I was just thinking about how Izaya and Kokichi would be like. THE Father/Son duo. They were made to be. I don't make the rules.

38. Talk about a review that made your day.

Listen. Severance was my first attempt at something so heavy, so I was nervous about getting the Vibe I was going for. Even though it's just the first chapter, the reception there made me really happy. In-depth responses that talk about specific parts and tell me what the readers were feelings as they engaged are most helpful to me with my issues to write. I especially love ones that ask questions. I got a lot of helpful and encouraging reviews like that on Severance, and because of that I definitely intend on continuing it when I have the space amid Danganronpa special interest hell!

A highlight:

However, there was one reviewer I had back when I was in the BNHA fandom that I will never forget because they had this extension to be able to write their comment as they read like they were annotating it and some of their shit will stick with me forever because of the Live Slug Reaction air to it:

Get yourself a guy like this lmao.

[variousqueerthings]

We were going to see them all. But he was too busy burning them. I don’t think she ever saw anything // No stars. I hoped there’d be stars

OKAY IT'S HAPPENING IT'S FINALLY HAPPENING! WE HAVE WATCHED world enough and time/the doctor falls

alright, let's keep the yelling to down below (EDIT: yeah these rambles got looooooooooooong)

sexism rank objectification (female character is ogled/harassed/turned into a sex joke by the doctor and/or a lead we’re supposed to root for and/or the camera): 9/10

sexism rank plot-point (lead female character is only there to serve plot, not to have her emotional interiority explored, or given agency to her emotional interiority): 6/10

interesting complex or pointlessly complex (does the complexity serve the narrative or does it just serve to be confusing as a stand-in for smart, this includes visually): 7/10

furthers character and/or lore and/or plot development (broader question that ties into the previous ones, at least two of these, ideally three should be fulfilled): 9/10

companion matters (the companion doesn’t always have to be there, but if the companion is there, can they function without the doctor– and overall per season how often is the companion the focus or POV of the story): 4/10

the doctor is more than just “godlike” (examines the doctor’s flaws and limitations, doesn’t solve a plot by having it revolve entirely around the doctor’s existence): 6/10

doesn’t look down on previous doctor who (by erasing or mocking its importance, by redoing and “bettering” previous beloved plotpoints or characters, etc.): 8/10

isn’t trying to insert hamfisted sexiness (m*ffat famously talked a lot about how dw should be sexier multiple times, he sucks at writing it): 9/10

internal world has consistency (characters have backgrounds, feel rooted in a place with other people, generally feel like they have Lives): 7/10

Politics (how conservative is the story): 6/10

FULL RATING: 76/100 (if I can count….)

I'd have to check, but this might be M*ffat's highest-rated finale (of course there is the finale that comes after this one, but um... that one will definitely be rated lower). I genuinely like quite a lot of what's going on here. and then there's some things I'm going to poke with a stick...

also at this point we confirm: Gomez!Master is simply perfection, she is this era to me!

OBJECTIFICATION: I note that Simm!Master is pretty darn sexist throughout this episode and yes, Simm!Master was definitely a misogynist in his original tenure too, it's just taken to an extreme degree in this one I think, specifically in a strange sort of "see how far we've come now" way, that feels echoed in the next episode with the first Doctor

I'm not sure if this is just me, but it felt jarring and a little out of character, but perhaps he's just reverted to the most extreme type after being a dictator on this spaceship for x amount of years idk. he was generally a little flat for me, but that's something we'll talk about further down

I wish Bill had been allowed to smack him or something at least, because oh boy was there a lack of satisfaction in that part of the narrative in my opinion

PLOT-POINT: okay I was writing this down in "politics" and maybe it is, but the blur is very big in this episode in many ways, so I've decided to put this up here instead -- ALSO THIS IS A RAMBLE TO TRY AND ORGANISE THOUGHTS BE PREPAAARED

if I had a nickle for every time steven m*ffat turned a Black character into a cyberman after being basically killed by a random happenstance that's never addressed again and then they decide to essentially commit suicide rather than keep living as a way to end their stories I'd have two nickles, which... I mean I don't know. it's weird that that's been his go-to twice, possibly not as a conscious choice, and maybe this doesn't even belong under politics, so much as a bit lazy in the absence of signs of it being an intentional callback or recurring thematic event (I mean this may be more about the fact that Danny Pink is a hard done by character as well)

I do think this is one of the worst things to happen to a companion in nu!who (the worst? hard to say, that's subjective, but in the sheer detail of its depiction it's certainly brutal), and I can't say Bill is offered much in the way of agency in the narrative, and listen, I like a tragedy, I like "you missed her by two hours," I like characters feeling so so sad, but I do feel like these episodes dropped the ball on being about Bill, rather than Bill being a cog in Simm!Master's ongoing game with the Doctor (and I'm not even entirely onboard with Simm!Master's characterisation in this episode as being much more than a prop to make Gomez!Master seem better or something by comparison? or maybe John Simm was just up for coming back and they were trying to make him fit in there), and I think that's a shame. I can't place it very easily, but it's kind of a letdown for a character that did feel very go-gettem throughout the season

in these episodes things happen to Bill and around Bill, but not really because of Bill or with Bill driving anything, with the exception of one moment (which we'll get to over in companions matter), and while we do have Bill reacting to those things toooo some extent, I personally don't feel like her emotional interiority is given much focus

in the first one she's more central and there's promise in the second episode when she wakes up and discovers she's a cyberman, but after that she fades into the background for me, which is wild, because she's gone through something so violent and has been betrayed so badly by the Doctor in favour of the Doctor's fucked up little dance with the Master, but she spends her time waiting around and being spoken to with incredible cruelty by Simm!Master and treated with suspicion by everyone else and it's just not even about any of that, except for how it convinces her to die

it's an interesting comparison to, say, Clara whom the Doctor fucked up the universe to save (and Bill's not even dead), but perhaps it's because the Doctor also wants to die/give up and Bill at this point was the big factor stopping that from happening. a lot of her saving him was specifically related to his being self-sacrificial and now she just accepts that death -- but then at the end she begs him to not be dead, but also we don't really see her during the proper battle scenes, which was an odd choice

if she's the Doctor's protector, as she has been often, including at the beginning of this episode, I think she should have been very visibly so

this is very rambly, but I think what I'm getting at is simply that Bill fades into the background of part two of this, in a way that feels particularly sad for the fact that it's such a violent fate

BUT WAHAIT! we do have Heather then coming in to save the day, and I personally like that. Bill was going to head out with her eventually, so I'm pleased. I think one thing about this season as a whole is that I think Bill deserved two and/or more episodes off the back like Martha for example had, but I know this was the final season. this is probably another post, but there's so many interesting underlying things to Bill's story that deserved more space (as it were), but also do I think m*ffat could have done all of that justice? (no)

so with all that in mind, I'm glad she went with Heather (let's hope next episode doesn't undermine tharthjgdksjdflkfjhöjsdlkfjgshjdf)

(my other note, which may also be politics, is that both of the Black female protagonists had the essential function of saving the Doctor from himself, and while Bill also got to be held somewhat by the Doctor in return, ultimately she wasn't the focus of this story as much as the Master was -- which I do think s3 balanced the Master/Doctor madness while also allowing Martha some development, but we may be coming down to subjectivity)

COMPLEXITY: the first part of these episodes is a rare example of a bit complex on M*ffat's side without being too stupid and indulgent -- there's a mystery (in the sense that you might recognise the Mondasians but Bill doesn't know them and the Doctor doesn't know), there's the slow creeping dread, there's the Master. I wish there had been more scenes of Bill trying to escape or figure out what's going on, because ten years and she just hung out there??? and accepted that this was what everything looked like??? no exploring??? really????? (this is companion matters actually, but it does stretch suspension of disbelief on my part)

second half is then a simple "getting attacked trying to stop it" story in which the cybermen are hyper-developing while this little farming community has to be prepared in a very short space of time, which is all fair enough. I think the second half overall is weaker than the first, and I couldn't tell you exactly why. I think a lot of it is quite good, but ultimately some of the character-work gets lost for me, even though it does nail it at the very very end

and I think a reason I'm overthinking a lot this season is because it's the final season -- it's m*ffat's last companion writing, Twelve's (second) last hurrah, Gomez!Master's last outing (and Simm's) and so it feels like I'm not just looking at this episode but how well everything built to this episode, which may not be quite fair, but also... such is the fate of a final-ish episode

it's a good episode. it's also a bit of a microcosm of some of the core Stuff in m*ffat era (although not as much as the next episode will be) -- it ends on a lot of very fun, interesting points, but it's a bit of a rocky road to get there that struggles to give the companion much to do. it feels like this season as a whole was getting to a pretty good place on a lot of these points (if one looks at this rating's system it jumps this season) and it feels like this development was cut short

I can't believe this me making the case for more of the M*ffat era, disgusting. hateful. this isn't who I am I promise!!!

CHARACTERS/LORE/PLOT: I mean yeah! boy ohhhhkay let's list!

Simm!Master returns, reveals he was killed by Gomez!Master and that she in turn was killed by him, but if she remembers that then I'd hazard that's how she survived that, but I don't think we've ever been told how. I love how many blank spots there are in the Master's history, this isn't a complaint. the master just comes back, that's what the Master does

Bill is turned into a cyberman, then Heather pulls her out of the cyberman and they go travelling together

the Mondasian cybermen origin story

the Doctor is going to regenerate but maybe refuses to!

Gomez!Master calls someone a bitch, which I had no idea where to place, but this was my note when it happened: CALLS HIM A BITCH!!!!???!!

(which on that note, that blue guy never returns, he just shoots Bill, gets flipped on his back and disappears from the narrative entirely, feels like a bit of a miss, considering how all of this happened because of something essentially pointless... shot by some random dude... the other main link between Bill and Danny, both seem to be random events, and I'm not sure M*ffat is a deep enough writer to be doing this intentionally for any thematic reason, because Danny isn't that important in the end RIP)

COMPANIONS MATTER: there's a lot I covered in the earlier point about Bill, but she does do soooome stuff, specifically she saves the Doctor's life in the beginning of episode 2, and also pulls him out of the debris at the end and into the Tardis somehow (sidenote, I really feel like the Tardis is so fond of Bill, in a very particular way. the Tardis has favourites and Bill is one of them I believe!)

I think. those are the two main things? otherwise she acts as bait, and then as... I suppose plaything to the Master in a way? summed up like that it's a bit bleak

“GODLIKE” DOCTOR: okay I wasn't sure where to write about this, but let's talk the Doctor and the Master! because this episode is attempting to do three stories, fundamentally

the origin of the Mondasian cybermen

Bill's final story (sort of)

wrapping up this era's exploration of the Doctor and the Master

and of these, I feel like the third is, funnily enough, the least compelling to me in the second half of the story (the first half, where the Doctor is convincing Bill to travel with Gomez!Master, I liked that!)

I actually wasn't a big fan of Simm!Master in this episode for the most part (not the whole part, I liked some of it too -- Gomez and Simm kind of wanting to get it on but also wanting to kill each other feels good, feels right), I felt like a fair amount of the writing wasn't quite... right for his character or went for his most exaggerated traits without any nuance. which, Simm!Master was absolutely a misogynist in his original s3 run (and then just mostly unhinged in the specials), so it's not out of the way that he'd be casually cruel to Bill especially, but Idk. I felt like the dynamic between Simm!Master and the Doctor was minimised to make Gomez!Master seem like her desire to try to get on the Doctor's side is somehow shocking (which I may be reaching but that tying into the continuous derogatory comments at WoMEn didn't sit right with me, like she was "more" emotional or less rational or more prone to Empathy/Feelings than before because of the regeneration, one episode after we've had the line about being past gender concerns), whilst in the same breath stripping Simm!Master of some of the stuff that made him fun to watch and the nuance specifically of his relationship with the Doctor back in the day, because now Simm!Master seems to just not care for the Doctor at all

it's not just cackling and evil-doing that made Simm!Master fun, in a similar way to how the first Doctor wasn't enjoyed despite apparently constantly talking about how women needed to be dusting in the Tardis (did he ever do that, I don't remember that ever... next episode questions, don't jump ahead)

now why do I talk about this in this section -- it's because of how it feels like there's a lot of heaaavy lifting- straaainingly heavy lifting to get the Doctor to make some philosophical points and have some growth and for Gomez!Master to figure out her moral stance that meant that potentially compelling ideas around the Master and Bill (Bill saying she's afraid of the Master in the first episode, Simm!Master pretending to be her friend before selling her out, the cruelty at her after she's turned) weren't realised

and it didn't have to be Simm!Master and Bill as such, but I noticed how excessively cruel the Master is to her without any sort of impact on the plot or the Doctor's relationship with the Master or Bill herself

this episode suffers from trying to get to this point with the Doctor, and with the (as anyone who's been reading these rambles of mine) compelling relationship between Gomez!Master and the Doctor, in a way that flattens Simm!Master into purely villainous and has Bill's emotional journey fade into the background

It's not entirely all the time, but when the Doctor makes a big speech about kindness at both Masters and Simm!Master reacts by saying he wasn't paying attention, it was kind of a letdown. it didn't feel like the big moment I think it wanted to be, and it also felt like everything was building towards giving us this era's Doctor and the Master relationship conclusion and it didn't quite land for me on the Doctor's side (Gomez!Master was great though), because of how lazily Simm!Master was written and a few quite big threads being dropped

I also feel like there was a bit of lack of continuation of the Doctor and Master relationship showing the Doctor's flaws, going waaay back to the 70s when the Master offered to rule the Universe together -- and in nu!who the Doctor's mourning the Master in s3 while the Jones family and Jack and Lucy grieved for themselves, the Doctor promising Bill it'd be fine, despite the Doctor knowing what the Master is capable of, and then Simm!Master doing all of that to her. there's just some... missing puzzle pieces where they're trying to make the Doctor look good, but it doesn't all work for me and as consequence the Doctor's emotional and philosophical journey doesn't land

PREVIOUS DOCTOR WHO: on the one hand super into the Mondasian cyberman origin story, on the other hand the disrespect towards unhinged Doctor/Simm!Master of yore!

on the third hand this line from Gomez!Master at Simm!Master that did feel like the vibe: "I loved being you. Every second of it. Oh the way you burned like a sun. like a whole screaming world on fire" self-destructively destructive is exactly it!

“SEXINESS”: okay so Simm!Master and Gomez!Master being horny is allowed. I actually wish they'd been more horny, specifically about the Doctor. can't believe you dropped the ball here m*ffat I was gonna be okay with it this time! I was giving you a pass! let them be even fuckin weirder!

I also want to note here because of bathos that Nardole is still there mostly doing comedy in a way that annoys me, and I now stand firm on the opinion that this whole season could've functioned without him. I put in my notes that I didn't mind him as much in the second half, but he's just not a character I enjoy

INTERNAL WORLD: I think the concept of the ship is very cool, with down below goes very fast versus up above going very slooow. it does fall a teensy bit apart with some of the journeying, I'm confused about the lifts, especially in the "we can't make it to the Tardis" part where I feel like some of the scifi ideas were streeetching to let the plot happen in the way the writers wanted it to happen, and this also a bit in the development of cybermen and what the timeline was there, but hey, maybe someone has done a rundown of parallel timelines and it all fits perfectly and I'm wrong

do like the idea that Simm!Master went into the downstairs world and completely fucked it up, sowed the seeds for the cybermen there and convinced them that up above was dangerous to the extent that no one did another mission to the up above since the first one. I almost wish that these two episodes had been supplemented by a third one (cut some of the dead wood from the middle-season 3-parter and make that a two-parter) to explore these societies more, give Bill more to do in this world than wait around for... ten years

ten years!????!!!!

but that says something to the fact that I thought these ideas were pretty cool and they made the famously silly-seeming Mondasian cybermen into something quite creepy

POLITICS: so is there anything I could add here that wasn't covered before? Unclear about the choice of sexism in this episode, think it was ill-conceived doing the "character becomes a cyberman" plot with Black characters twice, like that lesbians came into the fore at the end (there's a separate post where I'd like to ask how people feel about Heather in general, but in principle at least I do like it, and I think it's very much a "if only more time had been given to the plot and to Bill!" for me on the whole but I do like it)

*deep breath*

what about the rest of the episodes? technically not that political in feel? there's a dystopian choking society down below that's being tricked into being converted into cybermen, which is deeeply fucked up, there's a farming community up above that's not really explored much as a structure... I think that's it?

there's sort of an ethos about "helping people out of kindness" but I think that part is a bit rushed, but that's Doctor Who-ish. I would love some discussion on the ethics of the Doctor being like "Bill I respect your choice to self-sacrifice, because I will do the exact same"

a few little questionmarks is what I'm saying

FULL RATING: 76/100 (if I can count….)

AGAIN CLAP FOR MICHELLE GOMEZ! TRULY THE MOMENT!

AND ANOTHER CLAP FOR PEARL MACKIE WHO DID SO MUCH IN SUCH A SHORT SPACE OF TIME!

highlights: those two doing Acting, especially in their respective final sequences, spooky origin story and a few Neat scifi concepts, does feel like it emotionally wrapped up this era of DW, some beautiful speeches and lines, gomez!master and the doctor were beautiful

low points: didn't feel the Simm!Master inclusion on the whole, didn't feel like the Doctor entirely worked throughout in terms of feeling his development, Bill didn't get enough to do in the stories themselves

AND NOW! WE'RE DOWN TO ONE! WILL WE END ON A HIGH???

[omnifitense]

It began with the forging of the three-

I'll start again.

It began with BioShock Infinite.

Now obviously, it didn't all begin there. It's the third game in a series that itself is a spiritual successor to another series. But that's where we're starting our story. Or where I'm starting this one. Like most things that came out in the fucking early 2010s, it has not aged well. I'm not qualified to talk about the racism for reasons that would be blindingly obvious. Most people in this hellhole are too harsh on it, or harsh on it for what I consider the wrong reasons (hint: your internalized misogyny may be showing).

At the time, I really liked it. It 'woke me up' out of a sort of stupor I'd been in for a while. So I eagerly awaited the story-based DLCs.

They were dogshit. Or more accurately, the second one was dogshit and would be worth an entire essay on its own. In fairness it was made while the studio was being shut down because the lead "auteur" Len Kevine (not his real name) was taking his ball and going home in more ways than one. He started his own studio shortly thereafter, and is still working on the first game there almost ten years later because he's an indecisive both-sidesing hack who keeps getting distracted by the new craze in whatever video game he played last.

Anyway: they were dogshit. I decided to rewrite them. In Absentia was a meandering project that took me about two years, but it mostly holds up. While trying to get a handle on how to write the main character I did a search for 'omnichronal perception' or something along those lines, and ended up on the Power Listing wiki. One of the other listings on that page was for a set of contact lenses on the SCP wiki. That's a second rabbit hole right there, and one I spent many years thereafter browsing.

After In Absentia I started work on another project that didn't pan out for a variety of reasons. It and my time with the SCP wiki sort of came to a head with the release of SCP 3999, which is just monstrous and wonderful at the same time. Right from the quotation at the top of the page, which introduced me to yet another rabbit hole I'm still going down today*, and then finally closing out with (and I maintain this wasn't there when I first read it, though I'm not going back through the edit history to check) a triumphant rendition of 'Sunday (Finale)' from Sunday In The Park With George.

What is that third rabbit hole? Well, the SCP wiki has a neat little habit of cross-referencing other SCPs, whether by name or by some other aspect. Sometimes they're hyperlinked, sometimes they're not. The quotation I mentioned contains the phrase 'Eleven-Day Empire', which I took to be another SCP, so I googled it. Except...it wasn't. It directed me, of all things, to the Doctor Who wiki and explained that it was a reference to a Doctor Who spinoff I'd never heard of before, and with good reason. It's been described as 'Doctor Who without the Doctor', which isn't strictly accurate: there are a few Doctor-shaped holes in the texts, as people have noted. (Though for legal reasons, they aren't named.)

Maybe I've beaten around the bush long enough. It's Faction Paradox.

Toward the end of my attempt to write that project from before, I kept imagining someone standing outside the house where most of the narrative was taking place. Just watching. Then, in...I can't remember the year, or the month at this point, but I want to say it was either 2018 or 2019, I had a dream. I can only remember three things from it now: the Twelfth Doctor (who was only in it briefly), something about the TARDIS being a tree, and the phrase The New Omnifitense. The strangest part was, I'd skipped most of the Twelfth Doctor's run; not out of any moral stand or anything, I just missed one episode and even back then I knew that I'd be hopelessly lost next time around, so it sort of snowballed.

Each of those aspects I managed to work into Blood and Tears, in addition to the things from 3999. Blood and Tears is still close to my (pardon me for saying so) heart; it came out almost exactly the way I hoped it would, which is no mean feat given the scares I had in 2022.

If you somehow made it this far, thank you.

[cryptidspaghetti]

Review of The Idiot & Either/Or by Elif Batuman:

The Idiot: ★★★★

either/or: ★★★

*sigh*, yes, I liked the first one better. the idiot, which I read at the end of august, right before I started my first year of university (as a history/writing major), felt personal, topical and enlightening. the story followed Selin, a Turkish American student at Harvard University in her freshman year. (I liked Selin a lot - enough that some of her more annoying internal monologue was swept under the rug, as the child of European immigrants and a prospective author, much of her plight was something I'd experienced.)

Elif Batuman's work is characterized by beautiful description and dialogue that wraps you up in the colourful world of early 2000s Harvard. The romantized vision of college and intellectual companion ship is exactly how school looks in my dreams, "how brief and magical it was that we all lived so close to each other and went in and out of each other's rooms, and our most important job was to solve mysteries" (Either/or). If anyone loves the Yale era of Gilmore Girls, or wished Jess and Paris had more screen time together, you should check out this series.

As a novel without much plot outside of the passage of time, the story is carried by the characters we meet. most notably, there is Svetlana, Selin's blunt and sensible friend, and there is Ivan, a mysterious, unavailable, Hungarian senior who Selin is enamored with. this strange push-and-pull relationship is what stole the show for me in the first book.

Ivan is strange -- and he represents more of an idea and a body of growth for Selin than an actual character -- as he is experiencing his own novel-worthy drama in the background. he changes Selin's behaviours in ways that are dangerous and intoxicating, it keeps you on the edge of your seat.

we follow Selin's internal turmoil, academic obsession and more through the three season, until the summer term. this is without a doubt the best portion of the book - even if it had me groaning and checking the remaining pages at particularly long winded places. By the time the ending rolled around, I am absolutely destroyed - especially when nothing was tied up by the last page! I felt dispair, betrayal and texted friends melodramatically: "yes, perhaps this is realistic, but I cannot bare to go on!"

I had been under the assumption that this was a stand-alone novel, and was thrilled when I discovered the second book, even if I waited until the end of my year to read it.

(largely spolier free review, still, read at your own risk)

Unfortunately, all the intrigue I was excited by in the first novel is missing in this one.

Ivan is gone - quite literally, at graduate school in Cali - but narratively, he is also missing. This appears to be a bid to bring Selin into her own, to allow her to develop outside of this obsession - but none of the other characters can hold a peg to the on-page chemistry between Selin and Ivan (non-romantically and romantically). This novel as well, outside of every few pages of entire classic novel summaries, spends much of its 350-page count focusing on Selin's determination to lose her virginity.

as a reader, I am not entirely against this - I'm not a prude, and I think as a coming-of-age novel, it is exciting to see a young woman be put into the role that is commonly and casually filled by young men. if anyone's read Joe College by Tom Perrota, you have experienced the tiring monologue of a sex obsessed author and character. Selin is not this. sex is not the problem.

the problem, in my opinion, is that what made the dynamics between characters interesting in the first book was the intellectual debates, the carefully spun and realistic depiction of humanity. The most realistic thing in book 2 is that losing your virginity hurts. but the people? the men? they are so clearly on a page. Beyond that, Selin's quirky monologue occasionally veered into judgmental and righteous in ways that had me rolling my eyes. a lot of insecurity she expressed in this novel about her abilities felt mildly shoehorned, but I also experience able opposite problems, so it is possible I just personally disliked them.

Svetlana and Selin's new roommates are still fantastic, and the technical writing is stupendous, but in terms of closure from the first book and maintaining what made it special, Either/or drops the ball.

[existentialmagazine]

Review: Poison Oak share aching new alternative-rock single ‘Tell Me’, exploring a loved one’s disconnect from reality

The Townsville-based indie and punk-rock outfit Poison Oak have been hailing on the music scene since 2019, dominating with their ferocious sound and emotive songwriting. Since first starting up, the four-piece have released three EPs and their debut album ‘These Suburban Dreams’ with plenty more to come. As they set-up for the build of their new LP, the group share a striking new single ‘Tell Me.’

There’s a slow warmth to ‘Tell Me’ right from pressing play, tumbling along through steady drum beats, drawn-out electric guitar strings and a slow riff, setting the stage for something more intimate and aching. With deep bass, gentle drums and soft strings keeping the verse at a delicate lull, it’s impossible not to feel the weight of the narrative within ‘Tell Me.’ The vocals are perhaps the most emotive part of it all, mildly sulking through low and mid-toned spoken-sung lines in a slump that you can feel the sadness inside of. As the chorus forcefully shifts, Poison Oak thrust building drums, aggressive guitar strums and powering vocals together for a moment that’s filled with devastation. Cascading through higher notes and pushed moments of angst, there’s so much heartbreak to be heard and felt within your soul.

It’s no surprise that the soundscape mirrors their personal narrative, exploring the painful realisation that someone has mentally checked out. Despite being physically present, they’re no longer the person they used to be, disconnected and hollow as life feels nothing but bleak. From the perspective of someone close, perhaps a friend, family member or lover, the song heart-wrenchingly watches on as their loved one detaches from reality: ‘the sound of emptiness on your feet.’ Continuing ‘you disappear within your head, a complex maze that never ends’, you can feel the grief of what they’re experiencing, only able to watch on but incapable of helping in any way. As the chorus hook asks, perhaps even begs ‘tell me where do you go?’ , they’re left without answers to solve their pleas. As much as it affects them too as they yearn for them to ‘ease my heart’ , nothing can be done. Everything about it is rather bleak and melancholic, a raw reflection of the pressures of everyday life and the internal struggles we all often face alone.

Keep listening to ‘Tell Me’ for yourself here to feel the powerful narrative Poison Oak have penned.

Written by: Tatiana Whybrow

Photo Credits: Gavin Bain

// This coverage was supported and created via Musosoup, #SustainableCurator.

[cuetzpalin1234]

Chicano report back on International Day Against Police Brutality

Today is Friday March 15, 2024. It is International Day Against Police Brutality. Yesterday on Thursday March 14th, I decided to write this piece since there are several things going on this month. March marks Women’s Herstory Month, Social Work Month, the Cesear Chavez March, the historic Chicano blowouts, and so much more. This day also marks the 2-year anniversary of the murder of Kevin Johnson by police. It happened in March of 2022. If you are new to the story, you can find out the details here: Man killed by SAPD officers shot 12 times, including 8 times in the back, autopsy shows (ksat.com). However, I must say that the capitalist media has never been the greatest source of information. If you are familiar with Malcolm X you can remember he was quoted saying, “If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”

What happened to Kevin Johnson is a case and point. We can see another case and point currently going on right now with Palestine. They are portraying the colonized Palestinians who are the oppressed as the villain or terrorist and the Israeli Zionist colonizers who are the oppressor as the hero and victim.

Since we have been conditioned for some time now by the capitalist system, their narrative almost always goes unquestioned because people believe the working poor (working class) and “criminal” class (lumpen proletariat) are elements that should be looked down upon society. Whether it is within or without those classes, there are people out there who willingly advance reactionary ideas that were developed by the capitalist system to criminalize those very two classes.

According to Romero (2001), “Characterization of this population as super predators is socially constructed through a racial lens-the lens that reflects the images of White middle-class youth as “our” children and Indigenous/Latino (& African) adolescent males as violent, inherently dangerous and endangering” (p. 1084). Based on my research I found that John DiLulio was the “academic” proponent behind calling inner city youth “super-predators” and he described those very same youth as “growing up surrounded by deviant, delinquent, and criminal adults in chaotic, dysfunctional, fatherless, Godless, and jobless settings” (Romero, 2001). Is it any wonder why the following people who were also murdered by the police were portrayed the same way to the public? Marquise Jones, Charles Roundtree, Andre Hernandez, Norman Cooper, Jesse Aguirre, Darryl Zemault, Eric Mejia, Damian Daniels, Antronie Scott, and the list goes on unfortunately.

All this capitalist propaganda and/or "Copaganda" we see when something like this happens is designed to keep us from the truth and justice. The truth is the masses of working African and Indigenous people or even so-called gangs or street organizations are not the main problems that we face. Of course, everyone bears responsibility for keeping these reactionary ideas going, which is why I am involved in an organization working for justice to see that these ideas are checked. We should be directing our attention to the African and Indigenous/Latino/Hispanic petit bourgeoisie. The majority in that class who were not involved in the struggle benefit from the sacrifices made by people involved in social movements struggling for liberation. They don’t want us to focus on how they got to those positions off the backs of the masses of people, those two classes mentioned before. They don’t want us to focus on how it was the masses who pushed the capitalist system to allow programs to be created to have an African and Indigenous petit bourgeoise, which for the system meant protecting its interests and keeping the masses in check.

You can see this play out in the case of Kevin Johnson. After the day Kevin was killed by police there were news reports following the reaction from the police and the community. If you pay attention, you can see that the strategy of pacification was implemented. Just like how Malcolm X described the difference between the field slave and the house slave on the plantation. The slave master would use the house slave to keep the masses of field slaves in check when they would rebel. Just like when the community righteously rebelled against those officers for killing their family member, their brother, their friend. The capitalist media busts out the house slave, but this time it's the Black over seer. Former San Antonio law enforcement officer looks to bridge relations between police and community (ksat.com) This ex-police officer stated, "The community has gotten afraid of the police and, I believe the police became afraid of the community". When cops are not blatantly using their brute force under the "Iron Fist" approach, they are using community policing model as another tool under the guise of the "Velvet Glove" approach to infiltrate our communities to keep us from becoming militant.

Please don't take this out of context. The masses wanted us to gain knowledge and skills that would benefit our movement for justice. So, we must not avoid attending college, but we must become more conscious about our situation here in the US because it affects us politically, socially, culturally, and economically. For more context and background just look up the Kerner Commission report: 1968 Kerner Commission Report | Othering & Belonging Institute (berkeley.edu)

It is time to start challenging the dominant narrative and creating our own platforms to share our narrative so we can tell our own side of the story without it being coopted or watered down. The problem is too many people do not want to get involved in an organization working for justice for whatever reason they may have. I am always down to meet people where they are at, but we must challenge those reactionary ideas when they come up in our work. Most working-class people today are not class conscious. Instead of uniting together to defeat the capitalists to build a better society they want to be involved in that system and milk it as much as possible.  The criminal class whether it be from the African or Indigenous community is designed to exploit the people instead of uniting with the masses of their people to try and find collective solutions to the problems which come from the system that sets them up to be outlaws. If you understand how capitalism works you understand these paradoxes because the masses of people are propagandized in a certain way to see how the world operates and appears to be. This means we cannot hold our people in contempt. We must hold the capitalist system in contempt. We have to go beyond just being anti-racist. We must be anti-capitalist, anti-patriarchal, and anti-colonial. Why does this system allow a criminal class to exist in the first place? To keep us from organizing and fighting back against it. It serves the adversaries of the masses of our people. Just look at all the drugs coming into the community, for example. Just look at who makes up the masses of people who are incarcerated. That is why the so-called criminal justice system makes sure to keep crime going among our people. We tend to leave the system of capitalism outside of the analysis, thus always placing blame on the very same people who are being held in the grip of that system. Take for example, the 1033 program that is being implemented as we speak or the Project Safe Neighborhoods program. Did you know that these programs even existed? Do you know anything about them? If you do your research, you will understand that the situations people are put into like those mentioned above are not random. People are being systematically targeted. Particularly, the African and Indigenous community.

Thinking about brother Malcom’s words I thought to myself if people here are consuming news or information that is providing a narrative that is bought and paid for by big multi-national corporations then that must mean why so many people are so miss informed about so many things that are and should be important to us. This is why so many people must hear what reactionary entertainers have to say about our problems, or even your local/national news giving only a tip of the iceberg level of analysis if any instead of asking the hard questions and looking at the root of the problem. Fear is used to control us. It makes the masses afraid and portrays actual revolutionaries and revolutionary organizations on the frontlines bringing you information based on truth and justice as violent and loveless. This is how the system keeps us divided and dependent. It is love that guides us revolutionaries not hate. Join an organization working for justice today!

[clerkwithamouth]

Now this is only speculation on my part but my closest guess is that it was to check off the diversity box. Steph would've fit more perfectly in the narrative without having to change anything about the story. But she would've been another white character. Making the character an Asian girl would've appealed more to Chinese audience (something Hollywood is notorious for capitalizing on) and Cass is canonically a Batgirl just like Steph. But if they used canon Cass for the story they were telling (a Harley story, not a BOP story) she would've owned the entire movie. So they picked Cass for the international market and dumbed her down to keep Harley propped up. At least this is how it feels to me. Again this is only my theory. I have no evidence to back it up.

Why did they use Cassandra Cain instead of Stephanie Brown on the Birds of Prey movie? Like movie Cass is not Steph but she is more Steph than she is Cass.

[kelyon]

Name one plot element, trope or other literary or stylistic device that you don't think you could ever bring yourself to use or to write?

My drive to write comes out of curiosity, so it's hard to put up a limit. As soon as I say I'm not interested in something, there's a part of my brain that goes "but what if we were interested in this?" I've been coming up with answers for a week and I keep coming up with rebuttals.

In general, I would say anything that bores me, or is so far out of my experience that I can't latch onto it. My first thought was "hard sci-fi" because I don't have much interest in the realities of space travel or alien biology. Like, as much as I liked watching Arrival or The Martian, I could never write that material--at least not without spending a lot of time expanding my knowledge base.

I also have a bias against kidfic or YA stuff. This is a thing I'm struggling to rationalize my dislike for because it feels really invalid. From my personal experience being a child, I know that children and teenagers have real struggles, both internal and external. To this day some of the books I most highly recommend are from that perspective. The fic I am writing right now has a 15 year old as one of the main POV characters.

But if I open a fic and see that it's a high school AU, I click away. I can't handle it. There's an overwhelming feeling of "you don't have real problems, you're just 14." (Even while I'm aware that being 14 is a very real problem in and of itself.)

My biggest example of this is the teen drama in Stranger Things. No Nancy, you don't have to choose between these two boys, you need to get out of your podunk town and meet more people. No Will, the world isn't over because your straight best friend doesn't realize that you have a crush on him, you need to meet other gay people and also wear a condom because it's 1986. Yes Eleven, you have real problems and it sucks that you have to go to high school in addition to all of that, and that bitch is lucky you only broke her nose.

Anyway.

I guess it's just so hard to write young people right, so I'm repelled from consuming that material and intimidated to write it. Also with the fics I write, the risk of coming under fire for writing teenage sex scenes isn't worth the scant interest I have in exploring teenage sexuality. Like, people don't know what they're doing when they're adults either! I would rather the story of a 25 year old virgin (or a 45 year old mother of two feeling alive in bed for the first time in her life) than an 18 year old fumbling on a twin bed with another teenager.

This is getting long, but I do want to state my dislike of characters being mean for no reason, especially women being jealous or distrustful of other women. I read a fic (not Rumbelle ) where the heroine checks into a hotel for a tryst with the hero and her whole inner monologue was dedicated to assuming that the female check-in clerk was judging her and the heroine being bitchy in response. And this wasn't part of the heroine's growth or anything. It was a motivationless character detail that made me dislike the author more than any of the characters.

So just, why? Who does this help? What purpose does this serve in the narrative? Especially when I'm writing Belle, I really like to have her be someone who sees the good in people, or at least doesn't judge based on first impressions. (That's kind of her thing!) I just think the narrative is improved by having people work together instead of bickering. And I think you can judge a main character based on how polite they are to minor characters.

Thanks for asking!

[ashesandhackles]

iirc there was a post by you that said Hatori is a character to expand on Shigure's character. wdym exactly?

That was me being a bit petty, because of a few posts I saw that said "Shigure stans, if you like hot men, Hatori is right there." etc etc.

But regardless, I actually do have legit issues around his writing in the story, without the reactionary pettiness. I think i am going to rephrase the rant I had about this on reddit, lol.

From a writing standpoint, after his backstory that builds Akito as an antagonist, he is just there to clean up after Akito's messes and then to add more layers to Shigure. (Watch his scenes and see which character do you get more insight into, lol. Spoiler alert: it's not him.)

Kureno gets an explicit arc that really addresses his destructive altruism (How the story frames things matters a lot in how I feel about characters). Hatori doesn't even get that - instead Yuki apologises to him for resenting him for "following Akito's orders". Yuki gifts Hatori freedom from his guilt - thankfully, Hatori is aware enough as a character to realise that Yuki really didn't have to do it and that he is indeed very kind.

Basically, my problem here is narrative framing, and not necessarily the character itself. The story cannot commit to framing his inaction and irresponsibility critically, beyond "my hands are dirty too" with image of him touching the eye Akito wounded to indicate guilt and shame.

There are couple of places I really wanted an insight into Hatori's struggles for being complicit in an abusive system, or more of his internal life that is not related to his romantic life.

The places I have questions on and story gives very less indication of is:

1. Yuki stopped talking for some time. Haru intervenes when Yuki stops talking and begs Shigure to get him out of there. Hatori is Yuki's doctor. Where was he and what was he doing? What are his feelings about this?

We get Hatori and Shigure discussing Yuki in S1ep12 - but that scene is to set up differences between Akito and Tohru. The underlying message of that scene was Akito traumatised Yuki, and Tohru is helping him heal ("Akito doesn't understand.."). Nothing on Hatori's feelings here, zilch subtext.

2. Rin keeps running away from the hospital and there was a time where she completely disappeared, because she was locked in Cat cage. Kagura asks Hatori and Shigure about it, Hatori says something to the effect of him not knowing anything. We get Kureno's feelings about Akito locking Rin up ("no matter who you are, you can't do things like this"), we know Kureno gets chewed out by head maid for freeing her. We know through Kureno that Hatori drove her to hospital. Again, what was he thinking? What did he face? Because the next scenes we get of Hatori is him chastising Shigure for not being kind to Akito. Where is the connector between those two scenes, where are dialogues that indicates how he feels about things that have happened? Or did he take all this as just another day in the estate even as Kureno didn't? Basically I feel gaps in an otherwise potentially rich and complex character.

I know exactly what Kureno and Shigure are feeling because they get loaded dialogues and images that indicates their feelings. All of these scenes I mentioned here of Hatori are expansion of the Sohma cult, and other characters. Hatori becomes a device to establish those, and not someone with internal thoughts and motivations on his own (seriously, go check his scenes about the nature of abuse in estate: him narrating Kisa being beaten up is exposition. )

The frustrating thing is that there is material right there to develop, but it is just so half heartedly done - and because it is so half heartedly done, it barely comes up in any character analysis of him.

There is so much material in terms of his complicated dynamic with Akito. He loves her (not romantically), and one of the reasons he "refuses to blame Akito" is not just the compulsion of the curse. It's also who he is, and his own emotional history with her. The panel of Hatori picking up a crying Akito is so striking!

We get the first indication of Akito's danger as an antagonist with Hatori's backstory, and we get first indication of a new facet of Akito, with that specific image and Kureno's narration about how he can't abandon Akito. The story shifts perspective and gear with Hatori and Akito - and besides few pointed asides with Shigure about Akito's status ("God can have favourites among us" "Why don't you try to be kinder?") - we dont get more about this. We do get indication of how feels frozen etc, and how he can't cry (and therefore Mayuko cries) - it's good material to be worked with but the framing/treatment of this kind of monstrous passivity (even though it's enabled by his depression) is so meh.

Kureno gets an arc, Shigure is framed as antagonist, Ayame also gets an arc - all adults are complicit in abuse. No one is clean or morally in the right- what story does about it, and how it is told matters.

[blindbeta]

I just saw someone asked about making a character blind in their novel and you responded about ways to avoid it being portrayed poorly. I wanted to ask, could it also help if part of the arc is the character accepting becoming blind?

Like, even if it happens in some kind of accident, or like them becoming blinded as a sacrifice for the team, would it be a bad portrayal for part of the character's story to be realizing it's not the end of the world, that being disabled doesn't make them completely useless, etc?

Or is that sort of arc also ableist?

[Note: I used the words non-disabled and abled interchangeably here. Both refer to people with no disabilities. After a conversation with some of my followers, I decided to make an effort to be clearer about who I referred to when I used words like able-bodied, because able-bodied may, for some people, refer to people without physical disabilities or without any disabilities at all. There are times when the distinction matters, even when people said they can usually tell based on context whether or not able-bodied is meant to include them.]

Writing About A Character Accepting Being Blind After Going Blind - When You Aren’t Blind Yourself

An arc about a character accepting becoming blind doesn’t feel good to me and I’ll try to explain why.

I’d rather read a story about a character who happens to be blind, in whatever way that happened, than read a story where a writer who isn’t blind tries to write about a blind character accepting being blind. I just finished a similar book and it did not go well. There are some things that research cannot teach you. There are some stories that aren’t yours to tell.

I don’t want to read about a non-blind author, especially a non-disabled author, writing negative things about my disability.

A character starting out feeling overly negative toward their blindness already feels bad to me. Why? Because the author has to write negative, sometimes completely wrong things about being blind. When I read stories like this, I am bombarded with stereotypes or myths which are rarely corrected by the narrator, who is usually traumatized and somewhat isolated as they heal. Many of the things they think or say are not checked or revisited. Mean things other characters say or think about them are often internalized by the narrator. Things that, in real life, are said to blind and otherwise disabled people as truths. As tough-love. As part of the supposed -Real World-. As bullying. As ignorant, innocent questions. As rude comments.

All of these things are not even coming from a personal place. The author writing these things- while they probably don’t agree with them, of course- is still not blind at the end of the day.

Readers who aren’t blind may not understand the nuance of why some of the things they read were ableist if it isn’t called out in the narrative in some way, which can sometimes happen when the narrator says something negative about their new disability. This isn’t to say readers shouldn’t do their own research or examine the story more closely. This isn’t to say the author is at fault for the interpretations of readers who refuse to think beyond what is laid out for them. When I say this, I am being realistic. Not all readers are going to be proactive. Not all readers are going to approach a book about a person going blind from a good place.

Most of the time, this is just something the author needs to accept. It is impossible to anticipate the strange interpretations of every reader. However, this narrative can be dangerous to a reader who has never met a blind person. Keep in mind, most people aren’t doing what you all are doing. They just read what is given to them. And if what is given to them is a helpless or self-loathing blind person, they might believe in that image. That book may be the only expirience they have with a blind person and they may not read any other books with blind characters.

Another thing I thought of was that non-blind authors sometimes don’t understand how hobbies and skills translate to blind people. For example, in a story I read once, a character who was going blind practiced playing piano and typing on a keyboard blindfolded so they could learn how to do without sight. However, blind people can already play instruments even if they were born blind. Blind people can also easily type on regular keyboards and, technically, correct keyboard technique means typing without needing to look at the keyboard.

Authors who don’t understand what it is like to go blind often don’t get the nuances of what that person is losing and not losing. And it often shows. They also don’t often include the aspects of blindness that are actually challenging. Why focus your worry on typing on a keyboard when you can learn how to use assistive devices in the kitchen or learn to cope with anxiety you anticipate will get worse after losing vision? Why not try to find accessible copies of books you have or scan or Braille sentimental letters? Why not organize your closet so you can find things more easily?

Obviously this is related to characters who know they’re going blind, though.

It favors non-disabled readers, which is ableist.

Another reason this type of story bothers me is because it is so common. Or at least people expect it. This type of story is one abled / non-disabled people can swallow and feel inspired by. Showing the blind person accepting their blindness also favors non-disabled readers in ways I may not be able to articulate well.

Accepting disability is an arc non-disabled people are comfortable with. It is a feel-good type of story that usually doesn’t challenge people too much, other than to remind them not to bully people. Already, this story is not even for disabled people, or in this case, blind people. It exists to introduce people who aren’t blind to the idea of becoming blind, to blind technology, to inspirational ideas about how blind people actually can do things. Stories like this guide abled people along and prioritize their ideas about blindness. Because the narrator is almost always previously abled, the story is about adjusting to blindness in a way that caters to non-disabled people.

How does a story with this angle benefit blind readers? Even if a blind person has also recently gone blind and wants to see a character who on that journey with them, what can a writer who isn’t blind say that blind writer couldn’t say? Or say better? Or say with more power? With more nuancel? With more personal experience?

And it may seem like saying this arc is ableist is too much. Keep in mind, ableism isn’t just about being rude to or excluding disabled people. Ableism favors those who are able-bodied or neurotypical over those who are not. It favors those who are not disabled over those who are. This story is just another way of doing that. Often, people are ableist through what they consider kindnes. Authors are not exempt from that.

Disabled authors should tell their own stories

This is where I will get some pushback. (I already received some here if you think it will be helpful to know what this is like.)

There are a few parts to this.

First, I want everyone to know I am not telling you what not to write or that this type of story, at least with elements of this narrative, can never be done well. However, the more care you take when writing it and the more you know about why it can be ableist, the better you will be able to write it. I’m still not sure I would want to read a book that is dedicated to this topic of accepting blindness, but who knows?

I also might feel more open to this narrative from a writer who experienced becoming disabled in some other way and was open about it. While they would still need to research blindness, some of the issues I named here could be avoided through having prior personal experience that non-disabled people simply don’t have.

If, however, you find yourself upset or feeling excluded by this post, consider what I wrote again. Consider why you think you are the best person to tell such a story with this particular arc.

I am also not saying that non-disabled writers could never write this topic well. I just question, again, what they can add to the topic of accepting blindness that blind people can’t already add. This is also assuming they were able to avoid some of the issues I listed above that might come up. Which would be difficult on top of doing all the other research they need to do in order to write a book. Why make it harder for themselves?

Now that I’m done with the disclaimers, accepting blindness should be something mostly left up to blind writers. This narrative is so closely tied to the trauma-based / incident-based blindness that it can be hard to separate them, but I feel like the readers of the blog have thought hard to suggest ways to improve or subvert that trope and the problems that go with it. Maybe they can do the same here. Maybe not.

Anyway, the reason I think it should be left to blind writers is because of the personal experience I mentioned previously. Acceptance will come from a more authentic place. Anything that comes before the acceptance will also come from an authentic place and blind writers will know how to deal these issues a little better.

Blind writers will know how to write this topic well. They can center blind readers in a way that many arcs like this don’t.

As a side note, blind writers also need more recognition and attention. This arc is specifically about or mostly about accepting blindness, which blind writers are intimately familiar with. Their stories should be prioritized in this area, at the very least.

If a non-disabled writer decided to do this topic, I think it would help to read and public ally promote books and other works by blind people.

Thank you for asking this question.

This was a really great question and I want to thank the anon for asking. I really appreciate the chance to discuss this topic. If anyone wants to expand on this question or figure out ways to subvert this arc, feel free to ask. Also, remember that I am not authority on stories about blind people, but I feel this opinion in shared by many of us and it should be known so writers can be aware.

Suggestions for alternatives.

1. Include only brief instances of acceptance and / or make it only related to blindness instead of accepting blindness as a character arc.

It will depend on how you do it, but brief, less direct instances of acceptance could be done well. One thing I’m thinking of is Toph challenging her father in The Blind Bandit. This could be seen as a form of self-acceptance for Toph, one which is related to her blindness without being the entirety of her need to accept part of herself, which gives her the courage to disrupt the view her parents have of her. Toph doesn’t struggle with being blind. She struggles with something related to being blind, which her parents being over-protective, limiting her freedom and expression, and putting her a gender role box.

The rest of Toph’s story wasn’t completely about being blind either. The writers, who weren’t blind as far as I can gather, handled this part well, and so I wanted to include it as an example.

Obviously, this can also be done badly, but that’s what beta readers are for. I personally would prefer the acceptance arc only be tangentially related to blindness, especially when combined with the trope about going blind through trauma / incidents / accidents.

2. Start in a different place.

You could start the story or character arc in a different place, rather than starting directly after going blind. This could be years later. After they already adjusted to the bigger parts of being blind. This saves you the need to figure out how to get around it.

Some parts of this ask might help.

3. Focus mostly on the practical stuff rather than the emotional side.

Focus on things like cane skills, adjusting to using screen-readers or needing to increase font sizes to read. Focus on learning to cook. Make the arc less about emotional stuff and more achieving goals. While I can understand how this might bother some blind people, I think it can work if blind readers are consulted, especially readers who went blind later in life. I wanted to include this as an option just in case people are determined to include going blind in the story. I think, if the author is careful, it could go well. A few narrative justifications for not writing the typical acceptance arc include:

-the character was already blind in some way first

-the character has a blind sibling, parent, or friend they grew up with

-the character got counseling or the story mentions they are getting counseling

Alternatively, you could also focus emotional difficulties on the traumatic incident, if there is one, and not the resulting blindness.

4. Write different stories - expand what stories about blind characters look like.

Writers have so many opportunities! I don’t see why they would feel the need to write a story primarily about going blind and learning you aren’t useless now after all, when they could be writing about a blind mermaid challenging the Mer Queen and falling in love with her instead. When they could be writing about blind space pirates creating new technology for other blind people. When they could be writing about a blind witch reclaiming their sexuality and also learning to dance to make their coven less worried about their social life after going blind.

See this post for more ideas about expanding the typical stories.

If you are creative enough, none of my claims that certain topics being best left to blind writers should stop you. If you feel limited, you might be trapped in the idea that blind people only have one narrative: trauma, sadness, helplessness, and just maybe, acceptance. If you don’t feel limited, you are in a good place.

Blind readers want other types of stories, too.

I hope this helps some of my followers. Thanks for the interesting question, anon. If anyone has any questions or would like me to clarify something, feel free to ask. I wrote this at night when I was tired. I have missed some things.

-BlindBeta

P.S. The ideas I pitched at the end are free to use if you feel inspired by any of them.

[amphibious-thing]

#not to be that personTM#but didn’t hhbomber just make a video about how citing things like this is improper#and if you do it it’s misleading your audience at best and plagiarism at its worst?#I can take a quote from any historical figure/celebrity and manipulate it to push a certain narrative#but if I cite where the quote was from then people can check that source and see how much I’ve removed it from its context#or as op said - I can just say that d’Eon hated being referred to as a woman when there’s mountains of evidence to the contrary using a#quote that’s been removed from its wider context at best. or just by simply saying ‘she wrote in her letters’ without referring to which#letter at worst.#im not saying this YouTuber is as bad as Somerton (for example) but this is what the whole hhbomber fiasco was about!!!#you have to properly cite your shit. otherwise it looks like you’re either intentionally misleading people (at best)#and plagiarizing (at worst) and both make you a shitty YouTube essayist#ESPECIALLY for queer history which already has enough misinformation floating around as is

I don't think what Kaz Rowe is doing really qualifies as plagiarism. They're not reading Kates book almost word-for-word the way hbomberguy shows iilluminaughtii, Internet Historian and Somerton doing in their videos. Certainly some things Rowe says are similar to what Kates wrote in Monsieur d'Eon Is a Woman for example (emphasise mine):

Although d’Eon wanted to be known as a woman, he was having trouble defining the kind of woman he might become. Patriarchal France was intent on forcing him to accept a narrow gender role that meant giving up his military and political career.

~ Gary Kates, Monsieur d'Eon Is a Woman p28

This wasn't really just a result of the royal decree. d'Eon really and truly wanted people to believe that they were a woman, and on a spiritual and internal level, they really and truly felt that they wanted to be a woman. But what kind of woman they wanted to be was a much more difficult issue to overcome. The flavor of womanhood that d'Eon craved was not something that would be won in the 18th century, even less so as a noblewoman. They wanted something more... Amazonian.

~ Kaz Rowe, The Chevalier d'Eon: the Trans 18th Century Spy, (17:02)

But when it comes to history the facts are the facts. There are only so many ways of wording things and misgendering aside I think both Kates and Rowe's descriptions here are pretty accurate. I'm reluctant to call this plagiarism. The only thing I think is arguably plagiarism is using translations without properly crediting the translators.

The real issue is the lack of proper citation. As you said I could say anything in a video and then vaguely claim that so-and-so said it in a letter. Sure Kaz Rowe has a source list but unless I painstakingly work my way though the entire list its hard to really verify the claim and even then I might not be sure what they're referring to like with "prisoner of war". I don't even think Rowe is necessarily lying about d'Eon describing her "situation as being forced to take on womanhood" because that fits d'Eon's fictional narrative of her life. I suspect Rowe is taking something d'Eon said out of context but I can't say that with any certainty because they didn't cite their source!

Whether intentionally or not Kaz Rowe presents things in a misleading way. For example this is a quote as presented in their video (17:35):

This is the full quote as it appears in Kates book:

“I would prefer to keep my male clothes,” he told Douglas, “because they open all the doors to fortune, glory, and courage. Dresses close all those doors for me. Dresses only give me room to cry about the misery and servitude of women, and you know that I am crazy about liberty. But nature has come to oppose me, and to make me feel the need for women’s clothes, so that I can sleep, eat, and study in peace. I am constantly in fear of some sickness or accident that will, despite myself, allow my sex to be discovered. ... Nature makes a good friend but a bad enemy. If you chase it through the door, it just blows back in through the window. “On the one hand,” d’Eon continued to Douglas, “my goal is to succeed in a diplomatic career so that I can help my mother and sister by paying off debts that my father incurred before his death. Without male clothes, how can I perform such a noble project? But on the other hand, my love for studying, my desire to finish books that I have started and many other projects push me to take dresses for working, living, and sleeping peacefully. Here are the two passions of my heart. The one moves me to the right, the other to the left. I do not know how to escape from this Cretan labyrinth.”

~ Gary Kates, Monsieur d'Eon Is a Woman p71

Rowe just cuts out two parts in the middle of this quote with no indication that they've altered the quote at all. Most notably the following section is missing:

But nature has come to oppose me, and to make me feel the need for women’s clothes, so that I can sleep, eat, and study in peace. I am constantly in fear of some sickness or accident that will, despite myself, allow my sex to be discovered. ... Nature makes a good friend but a bad enemy. If you chase it through the door, it just blows back in through the window.

Now in this section you'll notice that Kates has also left something out (indicated by the ellipsis) however he at least is clear that he has done this and cites his source (Papers of d'Eon, Brotherton Collection, University of Leeds Library, Box 6, p.66-68). Rowe on the other hand leaves no indication that they cut anything out and then vaguely cites it "Le Chevalier d'Eon to le Chevalier Douglas". The only indication they give as to the source of this quote is saying that d'Eon said this to Douglas "While spying in Russia". They do not include the fact that this is from d'Eon's autobiography even tho Rowe just said that d'Eon's autobiography is "only moderately useful today" because "much of the details are entirely fictitious". In fact d'Eon likely never said this to the Chevalier Douglas in Russia but instead probably wrote it later in life. The quote is still interesting and worth including in the video but the lack of clarity in regards to the origin of the quote is a problem. I only know the context of this quote because I've read Kates book!

This might seem harsh considering Kaz Rowe's video is pretty standard for pop history content and I do think they have some interesting and worth while points but those points are really undercut by the misleading information and blatant misgendering. If you're going to present yourself as an authority on a topic I think you need to do your due diligence and comprehensive citations are a really important part of this.

While I don't think this qualifies as plagiarism per se I do think the hbomberguy comparison is really interesting because I do think its all symptomatic of a bigger issue with video essays in general. hbomberguy gets to the heart of the issue in his video Iilluminaughtii and the perils of lazy video essays. In one part of the video hbomberguy explains how in her video How Power and Control Changes People Iilluminaughtii repeated long debunked information about the Stanford Prison Experiment that she got from a New Yorker article. He sums up the issue nicely:

this is a massive problem with media platforms right now YouTubers who know nothing about anything can misunderstand a bunch of Articles and spread lies to millions of people

~ hbomberguy, Iilluminaughtii and the perils of lazy video essays (7:45)

Kaz Rowe's isn't on the same level as Iilluminaughtii, they make about 1-2 videos a month compared to Iilluminaughtii who at one point was apparently making 3 videos a week. But whether you're making 1 video a month or 3 videos a week making a lot of videos on different topics in a relatively short amount of time means that the research is, more often than not, going to be lazy. I don't know how long Kaz Rowe spent researching d'Eon but I've been researching d'Eon since 2019 and I don't think I know enough to make good 30min video on her. Sadly its often the people who know the least who are the most confident in their knowledge.

One thing Kaz Rowe does, which is not unique amongst youtubers, but still annoys me, is that they will tell you who said a quote but not where they got the quote from. For example this quote is simply cited "Le Chevalier d'Eon".

Misgendering aside this doesn't tell us where or when d'Eon said this. Or whether this is a direct quote or a translation of something she wrote in French. You might think this information would be in the description but no there is just a list of sources not specifying where any quote or particular piece of information is from.

Now in spite of Kaz Rowe's lack of proper citation I can tell you that this quote is actually a translation from Gary Kates book Monsieur d'Eon Is a Woman. Kates citation for this quote is "Préface général de l'éditeur de Paris, qui en 1798 ...," Papers of d'Eon, Brotherton Collection, University of Leeds Library, Box 7, p. 59.

There isn't anything wrong with Rowe using Kates rather than tracking down the original source from the University of Leeds but I do think they should have cited where they got this quote from. There is no mention that this is a translation by Gary Kates. And this isn't just about crediting Kates for his work but also about historical accuracy. Understanding that this is a translation is important. Knowing when and where d'Eon said this is important.

When it comes to a quote I can easily write out that quote and paste it into google and voilà its from Kates book!

But when it comes to claims made in Rowe's own words I have no idea which of their sources they got that information from. In a section of Rowe's video where they explain their choice to use they/them pronouns for d'Eon (in spite of the fact that d'Eon used she/her pronouns) Rowe states:

They also disliked wearing women's clothes in general, as well as the narrow social restrictions that came with being a woman. In one letter, they described themself as a prisoner of war. And in another letter, they described their situation as being forced to take on womanhood.

These are some pretty significant claims so I'd be incredibly interested in what Rowe's sources are. I know d'Eon talked about disliking women's formal dress and preferring women's informal dress, she wrote; "The informal dress suited me very well, but when I had to wear the formal dress with accessories and jewels, it was a great torment for me". (translated in Dressing d'Eon by Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell) But to say she "disliked wearing women's clothes in general" seems to me a bit of an overstatement.

While I'm lost as to which letter in particular d'Eon talked about being "forced to take on womanhood" the words "prisoner of war" certainly rang a bell for me. My initial assumption was that the "letter" that Rowe was referring to was probably not a letter at all but d'Eon's autobiography in which she writes:

It was then that a new theater of confusion and glory opened before me and swallowed me alive in my skirts at Versailles, where I was kept as an honorable prisoner of war in the household of Madame and Mesdemoiselles Genet, ladies-in-waiting to the Queen, who endeavoured to have me emulate their dress, their work, their conduct, and their virtues. They had to please both their mistress, who was a sovereign, and their husbands, who dominated them. For I who have neither husband, nor master, nor mistress, I would like to enjoy the privilege of obeying only myself and good sense.

~ The Chevalière d’Eon, The Maiden of Tonnerre p16

However considering that Rowe doesn't cite The Maiden of Tonnerre as a source its probably actually from Kates who writes:

A few weeks later, d’Eon’s mood had grown even worse. “Don't remind me, Madame,” he wrote to his closest new friend, the Duchesse de Montmorency-Bouteville, “about the errors of my youth, nor the happy follies of my military career, for the problems found in the midst of a war were more pleasing to me than the tranquillity of being in the midst of the Court during peacetime. In actuality, I live here in the respectable home of Mme Genet as an honorable prisoner of war.” Although d’Eon wanted to be known as a woman, he was having trouble defining the kind of woman he might become. Patriarchal France was intent on forcing him to accept a narrow gender role that meant giving up his military and political career.

~ Gary Kates, Monsieur d'Eon Is a Woman p28

Or maybe Rowe is thinking of the following conversation between d'Eon and Marie Antoinette that Kates includes in his book:

“Madame,” d’Eon responded, “today I realize that the death of my past condition gives life and glory to my present state and to the future for eternity. Allow me to swear that I will remain a prisoner of war in skirts, in faith and in homage to the law. For faith is the first theological virtue; without it we are but a drum echo in the air.”

~ Gary Kates, Monsieur d'Eon Is a Woman p31

Or perhaps Rowe is thinking of something else entirely there really isn't any way for me to know because they don't clearly cite a source.

None of this is unique to Kaz Rowe. This criticism could be made about numerous video essayists. Its a symptom of pop history content in general where people who do not have the expertise in a topic attempt to summarise it for people who will likely never do any further research into it. Rowe doesn't have to cite their sources in a comprehensive way because their fans are never going to do in-depth research on d'Eon in the first place. So they can say that d'Eon "described their situation as being forced to take on womanhood" in a "letter" without ever saying which letter they're referring to.

[leam1983]

Forspoken (2023) - Thoughts

I think the hate train needs to die down somewhat. There are great games, games that elicit something personal and emotional out of you, there also are okay games where your investment is minimal but something about the tone or mechanics sustains enjoyment - and then there's a descending slope of mediocrity.

At the highest point on that slope, I'd probably slap anything that's conceptually or thematically broken, or anything that sort of expects its design to smooth deep gouges on the technical front. Past that, you've got what's incontrovertibly mediocre - like anything out of Gilson B. Pontes, for Jimquisition fans - and you hit the abyssal bottom of that slope with shit like Zog's Revenge or whatever other forms of unpublished Antisemitic, sexist or racist crap that exist online.

Is Forspoken about as good as a title that celebrates ethnic cleansing as a concept? Fuck no, it's inarguably better - by miles. It has a clear sense of identity, it's very sedately focused on being a fun time as opposed to a drag, and most of everything that's got the Web frothing at the mouth has to do with conveyance and with Fray's concept as a character.

Let's start with an admission, in that Fray very clearly has a chronic case of Joss Whedon Mouth Disease. She's confrontational, cynical, self-referential and off-putting in that really specific way that reminds me of the worst stretches of Buffy the Vampire Slayer's dialogue scenes. Considering how her tale is an isekai by design, you sort of have to excuse a certain modicum of "HOLY SHIT I MOVED THIS STONE WITH MY MIND!" because the fact is, if we all sprouted superpowers tomorrow morning, none of us would have the necessary self-consciousness to keep our bafflement in check.

Where that's a problem is that Fray is written in a way that freezes her in that moment, in that instant of acquired superiority and of suddenly increased self-confidence, without letting her internalize what's happened to her or letting her adapt to Athia's needs and expectations. Everyone you meet across Athia has the solemnity and dourness you'd expect out of someone plucked out of Ye Olde Fantasy Paperback, and Fray's dropping F-bombs and contractions like the locals wouldn't just ask her to repeat herself constantly.

When in Rome, as the saying goes. Fray ignores it entirely, and her being the protagonist seemingly absolves her of any etiquette or propriety breaches that would arise out of two wildly opposed dialects smashing together.

Literally everything else I've played is fine. As in, I won't bother remembering Forspoken's combat loop, not when Sony's own Housemarque released Returnal and not when PC players have access to several other different and more polished combat loops. It's a race-a-thon and a collect-a-thon and a case of narrative delivery being delayed for as long as possible in order to mask a lack of confidence - but it really isn't offensively bad. It's one of those games I'll actually pick up for myself (thank you, Day One game rentals at my local place) once the price comes down, but it really isn't worth all the bile I see in YouTube comments.

It's a decent 6/10 from me. A great pick for when your backlog's empty, you have twenty bucks burning a hole in your pocket a few years from now and don't mind mentally checking out from the characterization or lore. Not a must-play but a could-play, ideally on some muggy spring afternoon a few months from now.

[firelxdykatara]

Katara x Aang :3c

are you trying to get me in trouble

-cough-

no but in all honesty, my genuine feelings about kataang boil down to three major points: 1. it's boring, and does not jive thematically with either of their character arcs, to the point of, 2. actively hampering character development on both sides, and 3. katara deserved better.

points expanded under the cut. (please, if you're a kataang shipper and you see this, just keep scrolling. i've tagged it appropriately and put the bulk under a cut and at this point that's literally all i can do lmfao.)

send me a ship and get my (brutally) honest opinion!

1. It's Boring: This is the most subjective point on the list (I mean, in fairness, it's all subjective, but I have evidence from the show and post-canonical materials to support my other points; this one is just preference), but there's just... nothing to kataang. It's cute (when it's not actively aggravating), and... that's about it. It's not even that I dislike friends-to-lovers as a shipping trope (though it's not my overall preference), because there are a lot of friends-to-lovers couples that I do ship (kanej comes to mind, also will/elizabeth from potc, karolsen from supergirl, romione and hinny from hp, among others), but one thing that I think all of those couples have that kataang doesn't is that both sides of the pairing are teens or adults when they get together, with teen/adult dynamics and issues and stories to deal with, rather than one half being a teenager and the other being literally prepubescent.

And don't get me wrong, I have no problem with age gap ships in general. And as far as atla goes, Katara, at 14, has the same age difference from Zuko (16) as Aang has from her, and it's never stopped me--because both Katara and Zuko are well into puberty when they meet and I have no problem picturing them being into one another and growing together as they enter adulthood. Aang, on the other hand, is a child. And he acts like it. Which wouldn't be a problem, if the show weren't expecting me to believe he is a) ready for a romantic relationship, and b) ready for one specifically with Katara, who is not only older and far more mature but is specifically cast as his caretaker in a very maternal role for the entire show's run.

This show asks me to believe that a teenage girl well into adolescence is going to be attracted to and develop romantic feelings for a pre-adolescent child--and it asks me to believe this while showing us otherwise that Katara's type is actually older boys with fabulous hair and angsty pasts in all of her other potential romantic dalliances--and then enter into a relationship with him, all while ignoring the elephant in the room that is the fact that she was basically acting like his mother for the entire series to that point. (Something that is heavily lampshaded earlier in the very same season.) That just stretches the bounds of credulity way too far for me, especially when there's no evidence that Katara herself would get anything out of their romantic relationship.

There's nothing there for me to sink my teeth into. No delicious development, no parallels where they help each other grow, no internal conflicts that they have to work through together, nothing. Certainly no reason for me to actually believe Katara feels (or would grow to feel) anything for him other than the platonic affection of a caretaker. I can easily believe she loves him dearly, as a friend and quasi-little-brother, but I just can't see that developing naturally into romantic love--not the way it's presented in the show.

And even if they did manage to at least make the development of Katara's feelings believable, unless they changed something fundamental about the nature of their relationship, it'd still be boring, so.

2. It Actively Hampers Their Character Development--On Both Sides: I've written before (extensively lol im so sorry) about how kataang is actively detrimental to Katara and to Aang. In short (because ye gods this post is already getting long enough), Katara is narratively harmed by being shoved into a relationship that completely ignores her stated feelings--a relationship that had been presented as a one-sided puppylove crush for the vast majority of the series--and it inhibits her growth as a character in ways that become far more obvious in the comics and lok, where the very same creative forces that lead to her beginning a relationship with Aang in the first place reduce her to 'the Avatar's girl' and very little else, all the way through to the end of LoK (where she is a Healer and the Avatar's wife and, again, very little else).

As for Aang:

As to how this relationship is detrimental to Aang (other than the comics and LoK nonsense)? Just take a look at book 2, when he’s trying to learn Earthbending from Toph. Katara constantly coddles him. Much of the time, she’s afraid to be anything other than gentle and understanding with Aang--partly because of her fear that if she pushes him too far, he’ll run away. (Which he does, several times.) But sometimes, what Aang needs to grow is a sharp kick in the slats, which Toph was more than willing to provide--and which worked. Katara was great for teaching Aang to waterbend, but he needed more than that to grow as a person. And he can’t get that while he’s in a relationship with someone who will apologize for getting upset when he was very explicitly neglecting her.

In addition, it is pointed out by Guru Pathik at the end of Book 2 that one of Aang's chakras is blocked by his attachment to Katara. Aang takes this to mean (incorrectly) that he has to stop loving her in order to become fully realized as an Avatar, but this is actually part of the problem--because the issue isn't that he is in love with Katara, it's that he's possessively attached to her. He believes himself entitled to her love in return, rather than selflessly loving someone regardless of whether or not they return that affection. (This is obvious come the EIP episode, where Aang demands to know why he and Katara aren't in a relationship already--because he kissed her without asking [or even checking to see if she'd be ok with kissing him], which he phrases as mutual even though it very much was not, and he gets angry and violates her boundaries when she says that she is confused and doesn't want to think about it right then.)

It is his attachment to Katara--the need for her to return his love, the belief that she will and it is only a matter of time before he gets what he wants--that he was supposed to let go of, not his feelings for her in general. Unfortunately, while he pays lipservice to doing this (far too late for it to be useful--if he'd stayed with the Guru for five more minutes and unlocked his chakra there, that battle would've gone very differently), he almost immediately backtracks on that development come book 3, and there isn't another single whisper of Aang maybe growing up and moving past his one-sided and possessive crush and realizing that even if Katara doesn't feel the same way, it doesn't mean she loves him less or that their friendship is less important.

What really needed to happen, for Aang to grow as a person and become fully realized as an Avatar, was for him to grow up. To realize that his feelings were not of paramount importance, and that even if he was in love with Katara, he was not entitled to her love in return. He should have been able to move past his need for her to love him back, in order to get past that stumbling block, unlock his chakras, and regain the Avatar State in time to face the Firelord. But he didn't. As a result, they had to find some other way to just give him the Avatar State (a well-placed rock) and the means to defeat Ozai without killing him (the deus ex lionturtle) and his entire character arc just fell apart in the third act rather than reaching a satisfying conclusion.

3. Katara Deserved Better: This really ties into how her romantic relationship with Aang hampered her own development, but I'm still bitter enough about it that it gets its own bullet-point. And the biggest single reason I could never ship kataang--the thing that would've turned me off even if there were substance and a halfway decent storyline for them--is the fact that Aang kisses her without her consent (for the second time) in Ember Island Players, Katara gets angry at him and storms off, and then..... she walks out onto the balcony to make out with him.

With nothing to bridge that gap.

It's bad enough that a show aimed at children had a scene where the child protagonist kissed the object of his affections without her consent when she didn't want him to (made explicit by her angry reaction)--and this is absolutely an issue when the show is aimed at children and it may well be the first experience they've had with consent issues portrayed in media--but this moment is never addressed again. Katara just decides--completely off-screen--that she does love him Really and walks out to make out with him in the epilogue. There's no conversation, no apology for violating her boundaries, no discussion of why that was wrong or any indication that Aang understands what he did and why it upset her. They don't have a single one-on-one interaction between that kiss and the epilogue, and the only other time they are on screen together, Aang yells at her and storms off.

So, even leaving the comics and lok aside, Katara deserved much better from her own romantic plotline. In fact, she deserved to have one, rather than simply being the oblivious object of Aang's affections, given a couple moments where she blushes but otherwise remains completely ignorant of his feelings (she looks shocked and upset when he kisses her prior to the invasion, and then she completely forgets that even happened because she's confused as to what Aang is even talking about during EIP until he brings it up; that's not the behavior of a fourteen-year-old girl who was kissed by someone she was developing romantic feelings for), before the epilogue where it becomes clear that she figured all of that out off-screen and had feelings for him after all.

She's a main character, not a side-character written in solely to give one of the mains a love interest. She deserved a romantic plotline of her own. (She could have had one with someone else, with very few changes made to what was actually on-screen prior to the epilogue, but that's another conversation entirely.) She deserved to have her feelings considered at all important by the person she was going to be paired with in the end, rather than having him just assume she felt the same way and then get mad at her for never giving any indication of it when he'd never asked about her feelings to begin with. She deseserved agency in her own romantic narrative, and she just didn't get that with Aang.

So yeah, at the end of the day, my biggest issue with kataang is that it involved doing Katara dirty, and she's my favorite character and she deserved so much better damnit.

[fermented-writers-block]

Lus and the Human Portal Clone Theory

Even before Keeping Up A-fear-ances aired, I have been working for almost a year now on running through all the possible various suspects with wonderful folks like @sepublic​ , @anistarrose​ , and @elementalist-kdj​ . Like the post title indicates, from sheer process of elimination, the only conclusion that made sense to me was a clone made of Luz by the portal door, and I’ve been working on refining and reworking said conclusion up to the version I will lay out here.

Now, as @safetayy​ , @theowlhouseheadcanons , and @50shades-of-blue have heard from me before, the portal I've long suspected was not made to go from the Demon Realm to the Human Realm, but rather to go from the Human Realm to the Demon Realm by humans, for humans. This is because it then could tie into the hypothetical existence of a Luz clone without having the issue of asking where Eda, Lilith, and King's clones are, as the clone in this case is the result of a function of the door to create a basic level duplicate of any human that passes through it rather than it happening for just anyone that passes through.

With this, it's because the suitcase form of the portal looks as thought it indicates it was used for temporary trips to the Demon Realm, much like how suitcases were used when railways and international boats made travel more accessible for the middle and lower classes. For example:

Going by the way the door “faces” and the way it swings open, the ergonomics of the portal makes it look an awful lot like a right handed out swing door, with the Human Realm on the “inside” and the Demon Realm on the “outside.” And the arrow in the diagram depicts the general direction of traffic that such right handed, out swing doors are typically design with in mind - ergo, showing what way the portal appears to facilitate travel in.

Now, before you ask, the reason why I think the portal could have been created in the human realm in the first place is that it might require an extra component/bit of help or two from the Owl Deity which I’ve discussed before in the past as hinted by these connected designs:

I’ll explore how I feel the revelation that such a twist about the portal’s origins could play into the themes and narrative of the show under the cut, but overall, I feel these are potential significant details to keep in mind for the rest of this arc of building a new door and handling the idea of Lus having initially been made as a temporary-duration clone, hence how "Luz" comes off so uncannily in the letters as she wasn't meant for long term impersonations.

That, and why I named this the Human Portal Clone theory, for those wondering about the name.

Alongside this, my thought has been that walking back through the portal to the Human Realm basically makes the portal send a recall signal to tell the clone to return to it, where the clone would be reabsorbed into the portal and its memories are given to the original. However, with Luz going back into the Demon Realm for a brief time in YBOS, I am of the mind that it doesn’t just make another clone, but rather that doing so merely made the door turn off the recall signal and allowed "Lus" to resume the impersonation.

And as for the clone itself and why they’re writing letters to Camila, well, imagine it from Lus' perspective. To her at the time of creation, the last thing she probably knew was that she had been chasing the cute little owl that took her Azura book into the woods, and right when the bus to Reality Check Camp was about to arrive.

Also, if you think about it, Lus being the work of someone we/don’t know yet raises way more plot threads/questions than answers compared to being the work of the portal, as outlined below:

TLDR at end of post for those wondering

Belos? How and why before YBOS where he actually started paying attention to Luz for the first time and actually got his hands on a portal? 

Eda? Why would she do all this and not tell Luz she can goof around without needing to worry about her mom or the camp/in time to fool the camp, especially when it took a good amount of time for Eda to even start feeling that close to Luz? 

Hooty got ruled out from the getgo since he can’t hold pencils, King just isn’t that subtle, and everyone else that Luz knows has the major issues of just straight up not knowing about the camp in the first place. Well, that and a lack of another known method of getting to the Human Realm in the first place.

The camp? Why would they worry about a missing camper whose disappearance is all HER fault and thus would more logically result in a call to her parent than some convoluted clone conspiracy? 

And finally, some currently completely unknown third party?

If we’re talking a Changeling, A) it’d be easy for Luz to dismiss them and B) that just makes all the ominous portrayal of Lus super straightforward instead of a subversion like is the show’s shtick.

If we’re talking dimensional counterparts, A) they have to REALLY have led a very similar life to Luz’s in order for there to be enough common ground for Luz to listen, and B) dimensional counterparts aren’t even a confirmed or likely thing that people cooked up from Episode 1 side characters influenced by Amity’s concept art.

And if we’re talking some complete surprise third party group or another, it doesn’t make sense to introduce a third party and their motives and plans to the show this late in when Belos is already taking up the bulk of it all.

Hell, if anything, the continued existence of the duplicate in of itself would indicate that the target of the conspiracy is none other than Camila Noceda than anything to do with Luz or Eda, especially with the complete lack of anyone taking advantage of Luz and or Eda. 

From the getgo, Witches Before Wizards already hard-baked into the show the idea that Luz is NOT inherently special or anything into the foundations of the show from the getgo - ergo, Camila likely just is an absolutely regular human being, someone who has no justification for such a convoluted conspiracy to surround them.

That said, I believe that the idea of the portal having originated from the Human Realm could potentially play into some interesting stories to be had with Camila and Lus here, especially as the conspiracy board shot from the promo was confirmed by Dana to apparently be from S2A, not from the episodes past Yesterday’s Lie:

After all, with Luz searching the library for a way home this coming episodes, perhaps she might figure out something the next couple of episodes that allows her texts to send through, which would logically lead to the above picture. That, and Camila and Lus being confused by and trying to figure out what’s going on there.

I mean, the cabin in the woods likely has a very close connection to the portal and it’s origins given how closely tied the two structures seem to be, and as far as we can tell, Luz never mentioned the cabin in her videos to Camila, but if Lus tries to retrace her steps, that would be a natural vector to lead Camila to the cabin and thus allow us a chance to actually investigate it.

That said, all following the trail would do is lead her and Lus to a dead end at the abandoned cabin, where they would have nothing else to do except discuss their complicated relationship concerning Luz and twiddle their thumbs while waiting for Luz to finish things on her end - which while something I think would be interesting to see, I just don’t see how much of a way to keep them in the greater picture of the show without some kind of project or activity that the two of them could work together on on screen. 

And that’s what leads me to a particular train of thought here, starting with the question of what if Luz FAILS to make a working portal over the course of S2A and such?

With the possible in-universe mystery over what the heck is going on with Lus, perhaps the cabin might hold some notes from the original last human owner - if not potentially the creator - of Eda’s portal as well as potentially some of the same materials and such from previous trips.

Cue CAMILA building a working portal, following in the footsteps of the original creator and such and thus finding a reason to stay on screen, all the while potentially demonstrating both why Belos wanted the portal instead of making his own, as well as diving into the Owl Deity’s connection with the original portal. Heck, maybe the Owl Deity is only accessible in the Human Realm and that plays a part in Belos wanting to get to the Human Realm, which would bring Camila directly into contact with the magic her daughter has been interacting with.

Also, just imagine the internal conflict going on here with Lus. After all, helping Camila build a portal to get the original Luz -and hoo boy would that be a tough thing to grapple with- would most definitely do that and make both Lus AND Camila question how much the latter likes Lus vs Luz.

Like, just imagine it. There would be major chances for Lus and Camila to discuss what would happen if and when they’re finished with the portal, and what will happen to Lus’ relationship with Camila if and when Luz gets back.

Does Camila really prefer her daughter to be all more “normal” like Lus, or does she prefer the old, “weird” daughter from before the summer with Luz?

Perhaps she might be able to figure out how to strike a nuanced balance between the two, and all on a metaphorical journey to truly build a better connection between her and her daughter(s?). 

TLDR: Or in short, I can’t help but feel it would be fitting to see Camila building a bridge WITH Lus TO Luz. 

Particularly, by being the one to craft an actual working portal in the Human Realm instead of Luz in the Demon Realm, showing a parent putting in an active effort to get down to their child’s level rather than waiting for said child to try to get up to their parent’s level even if they can’t or find it incredibly hard to do so.