The Amicitia family has long served as the shield protecting the kings of Lucis and their household, and Gladiolus is its eldest son. The bond he shares with Noctis transcends that of a bodyguard and his liege. With his prodigious strength, he stands ever ready to keep his companions from harm.
A lot of guys think “toxic masculinity” is a demonisation of all things masculine, but there’s a reason why it’s called “toxic masculinity” and not just “masculinity”. In Denmark we have two shows that illustrate the difference clearly.
The first pictures are from a show called “Real Men”. It’s basically about men who are so controlled by toxic masculinity it’s killing them. They refuse to eat greens because ew, real men only eat meat. They drink too much alcohol and drive everywhere because god forbid they do any kind of exercise because that’s gay/womanly. They’re so afraid of looking feminine it’s slowly destroying their lives. The show then tries to teach them a healthier way of life so they can be there for their families, especially their children.
The second set of pictures are from a show called “Shoot and Eat”. It’s a hunting and cooking show in one. The older hunter has to shoot an animal with the help of the younger cook who will then prepare the animal with the help of the hunter. In between they do things like build stuff, try new types of beer, have fun with gadgets, goof around and chill in nature. It’s a celebration of the masculine without the toxic part. They don’t ridicule women and the feminine while they have fun with their man stuff. It’s one of the longest running programs here because it’s popular with women too. You see, women don’t mind men being masculine, they just don’t like toxic macho boys who constantly put women down to feel more important.
Occasionally the young cook will worry a bit about looking feminine but the hunter is having non of that. At one point they had to braid rope to build a bigger thing and the cook asked “Isn’t this a bit girly?” and the hunter just responded “I love braiding. It’s so relaxing” There, drink your beer and shut up, boy.
So masculinity? Yeeeeeessssssss.
Toxic masculinity? It’s literally ruining lives.
If a society puts half its children into short skirts and warns them not to move in ways that reveal their panties, while putting the other half into jeans and overalls and encouraging them to climb trees, play ball, and participate in other vigorous outdoor games; if later, during adolescence, the children who have been wearing trousers are urged to “eat like growing boys,” while the children in skirts are warned to watch their weight and not get fat; if the half in jeans runs around in
sneakers or boots, while the half in skirts totters about on spike heels, then these two groups of people will be biologically as well as socially different. Their muscles will be different, as will their reflexes, posture, arms, legs and feet, hand-eye coordination, and so on. (…)
There is no way to sort the biological and social components that produce these differences. We cannot sort nature from nurture when we confront group differences in societies in which people from different races, classes, and sexes do not have equal access to resources and power, and therefore live in different environments.
Ruth Hubbard, The Political Nature of “Human Nature” (via philosophy-lesbian)
The Sunday market was bustling. Victor had lost Yuuri amongst the crowd some ten minutes prior, but he did not bother seeking him out. Markets had become one of Yuuri’s not-so-secret loves whenever they landed in a port and the siren had grown accustomed to navigating them. He had eagerly jumped into a pair of boots as soon as the parrots squawked their calls of land and dressed himself in Victor’s clothes, almost more eager than the crew to get off.
With the turning of the season came typhoons, meaning Victor kept them close to the coast in order to catch protection from the storms. It also meant fewer ships on the water, merchants not wanting to risk their cargo to the temper of the summer sea. Less to pirate meant the days grew longer and rougher, while the supplies on board dwindled.
Victor weaved between stalls and people, picking up some local herbs that he knew Chris would debate on buying with his own coin, supplies and food stores for the crew, medicine powders to restock Emil’s chest. He stopped to look at some beautifully dyed fabrics which he could use to make into robes for Yuuri, but the siren always preferred his own. Not that Victor faulted him, they were as mesmerizing as Yuuri himself.
When the sun hit high noon, Victor found Yuuri kneeling at a stall selling birds. There were fowl in large cages, a few parakeets shuffling around perches, a pen of clucking chickens. Yuuri ignored them all in favor of chirping at a small nest of eggs set out under the warm sun.
“Of course you’d be with the birds. You’re as bad as Minami,” Victor teased, but Yuuri’s attention did not waver even for a millisecond. Chuckling to himself, Victor examined the chickens pecking at feed in the pen before turning to the small elderly lady manning the stall.
A few chickens on board could produce fresh eggs for the crew or serve as a decent meal themselves if food stock ran low. He doubted Yuuri would mind too much, and they would keep the bird nerd happy enough. If Chris complained about the extra work, he could task Yurio with their care. The powder monkey had trained the parrots remarkably well, right under everyone’s noses.
“Yuuri, what do you think about–”
The old merchant lady next to him gasped. Victor would have done the same if he had not grown used to all of Yuuri’s little surprises. Extremely little, this time around.
The nest no longer contained eggs. Only cracked eggs shells scattered around, broken into jagged pieces.
Cupped in Yuuri’s hands were four tiny yellow chicks, peeping excitedly. The smallest wings flapped up at him and they all hopped, beaded black eyes directed at Yuuri in the equivalent of pure adoration.
“Oh dear, I thought those weren’t going to hatch for another day,” the stall keeper said, shuffling toward Yuuri. “Look how healthy they look though. And they’re imprinted on you, it seems, the bitty cheepers.”
Yuuri looked delighted. The chicks continued to peep and he imitated them, peeping back.
“You’d make a good mama bird.”
Laughing at the cuteness before him, Victor scooped one yellow fluff ball up and deposited it atop Yuuri’s head, letting it nest in his hair. Another peep. Yuuri went entirely still to make sure it did not tumble off.
Victor tucked a silver coin too many in the old lady’s hands.
“We’ll take the lot.”
When they got back on board the ship, Yuuri set all four chicks down and shuffled in experiment across the deck. They followed behind him in a single file, peeping all way.
He comes from a very poor family. His father was an alcoholic who beat him and his mother (he once poured hot tea over her and put her in hospital several times), his brother is a drug addict, he literally built an empire out of nothing.
He credits his mother as his biggest inspiration and often has her cooking in his shows.
When he left his first restaurant he pulled a successful Jerry Maguire - the entire kitchen staff went with him. That tells you what he’s like to work with.
He was one of the first to give a restaurant to a female chef.
He went to prison (Gordon Behind Bars) and taught inmates to bake and they opened a bakery (Bad Boys Bakery) that is still running. He hired one of them when he got out.
He did documentaries about the cruelty of shark hunting and cocaine. (when he discovered cocaine was used by his staff he didn’t fire anyone but made sure they are offered treatment)
His kids are a treasure.
He is always ALWAYS kind to servers.
When one of his partners (Marcus Wareing) wanted to leave they got into a fight and settled it in court, they no longer speak to each other but this is what Marcus said about him after the fight:
I feel bad that the first association to him for a lot of people is this shouty TV chef when he’s truly a wonderful person.
When the Nazi concentration camps were liberated by the Allies, it was a time of great jubilation for the tens of thousands of people incarcerated in them. But an often forgotten fact of this time is that prisoners who happened to be wearing the pink triangle (the Nazis’ way of marking and identifying homosexuals) were forced to serve out the rest of their sentence. This was due to a part of German law simply known as “Paragraph 175” which criminalized homosexuality. The law wasn’t repealed until 1969.
these stupid boys finally kiss and it only took (exactly) 200 pages. HAPPY PAGE 200!!! thank you so much for reading the update!! and the whole comic to this point!!! the fans and especially patreon supporters keep me going!! i’m so excited i could finally reach this page, i might do a giveaway on twitter to celebrate later.
but the chapter ain’t over yet!! we still got a fair amount of chaos to go…
next update coming in one or two weeks!
first page | tapastic | art tumblr | twitter
support me on patreon - see comic pages long before theyre posted publicly!