So if you follow me (and aren't just stopping by because you saw one of my funney viralposts), you probably know that I've been writing a bunch of fanfiction for Stranger Things, which is set in rural Indiana in the early- to mid-eighties. I've been working on an AU where (among other things) Robin, a character confirmed queer in canon, gets integrated into a friend group made up of a number of main characters. And I got a comment that has been following me around in the back of my mind for a while. Amidst fairly usual talk about the show and the AU and what happens next, the commenter asked, apparently in genuine confusion, "why wouldn't Robin just come out to the rest of the group yet? They would be okay with it."

I did kind of assume, for a second or two, that this was a classic case of somebody confusing what the character knows with what the author/audience knows. But the more I think about it, the more I feel like it embodies a real generational shift in thinking that I hadn't even managed to fully comprehend until this comment threw it into sharp perspective.

Because, my knee-jerk reaction was to reply to the comment, "She hasn't come out to these people she's only sort-of known for less than a year because it's rural Indiana. In the nineteen-eighties." and let that speak for itself. Because for me and my peers, that would speak for itself. That would be an easy and obvious leap of logic. Because I grew up in a world where you assumed, until proven otherwise, that the general society and everyone around you was homophobic. That it was unsafe to be known to be queer, and to deliberately out yourself required intention and forethought and courage, because you would get negative reactions and you had to be prepared for the fallout. Not from everybody! There were always exceptions! But they were exceptions. And this wasn't something you consciously decided, it wasn't an individual choice, it wasn't an individual response to trauma, it wasn't individual. It was everybody. It was baked in, and you didn't question it because it was so inherently, demonstrably obvious. It was Just The Way The World Is. Everybody can safely be assumed to be homophobic until proven otherwise.

And what this comment really clarified for me, but I've seen in a million tiny clashing assumptions and disconnects and confusions I've run into with The Kids These Days, is that a lot of them have grown up into a world that is...the opposite. There are a lot of queer kids out there who are assuming, by default, that everybody is not homophobic, until proven otherwise. And by and large, the world is not punishing them harshly for making that assumption, the way it once would have.

The whole entire world I knew changed, somehow, very slowly and then all at once. And yes, it does make me feel like a complete space alien just arrived to Earth some days. But also, it makes me feel very hopeful. This is what we wanted for ourselves when we were young and raw and angrily shoving ourselves in everyone's faces to dare them to prove themselves the exception, and this is what I want for The Kids These Days.

(But also please, please, Kids These Days, do try to remember that it has only been this way since extremely recently, and no it is not crazy or pathetic or irrational or whatever to still want to protect yourself and be choosy about who you share important parts of yourself with.)

…something about how the lonely witch once up in her tower, shunned by all, is now accompanied by almost everyone in her home

c!Pearl finally got what she would’ve wanted back in Double Life

read a post about there being next to no record abt the historic edward little again (we dont even know what he looked like!!!) and now im thinking a lot about how he died in uniform again.

hes far from the only character to die in uniform (the marines die in uniform! franklin dies in uniform!) and he isn't even the only lieutenant to do so (gore, under his slops, was in uniform; fairholme, too presumably; irving famously wore his coat that hickey steals later; george wore something that used to be his uniform when he got eaten but imo atp he did not wear it as A Uniform anymore that were just the clothes that he had on if that makes sense) but at the end, he is the only one where i still felt that it was an active choice to wear it.

almost everyone else sheds their layers along the way or turns into something else, but ned starts in uniform and he stays in uniform and that's it.

fitzjames famously sheds his vanity and dies in his shirtsleeves, without any of the pomp and pizzazz of his uniform.

jopson, another character who is to me really connected with a certain mindset of holding up appearances, dies in his shirtsleeves, believing himself abandoned by the very person that was his reason to even wear a uniform at all.

goodsir as a doctor/assistant surgeon doesn't really have a uniform in quite the same sense as many others but when he dresses himself before his suicide it is not as an affirmation of his role, or at least not a positive one. he has sworn to do no harm, but he was forced to do it anyway and now he will add a final evil to his toll of sins in the hopes to balance the scales at least somewhat and for that to work, he must wear his outfit as always. he ends up with all pretenses stripped bare anyway.

tozer, a man so proud of his uniform in the beginning, again, dies in his shirtsleeves, no rank left, betrayed by someone who had convinced him to give up everything and yet! reduced to nothing but an ordinary man, he tries again where before he had given up. he cooperates, he coordinates, he even calls crozier captain again, he tries very hard to do the right thing in what looks like a no win scenario from the get go!! and he fails, of course, but he tried.

almost everyone else also ends up either dressed down (bridgens, armitage, dundy, des voeux etc) or somehow transformed (blanky, to some extend silna with her patched and bloody furs) or in hickeys case, both (iconic underwear & greatcoat combo). little never changes. he sometimes has a little scarf, theres the bandage for his headwound for a bit, he sometimes wears the full parade uniform with epaulettes and sometimes just the regular one, there are at least two different uniform hats and ofc you can tell that he loses weight by the way his shape chages under all that wool but he is always. in. uniform.

and maybe this is just my mind making up dots to connect but i think he might even be the last character that crozier ever gives an order to in his official function as a captain (in the tuunbaq seduction/boss fight scene he has been stripped of his rank, at least according to e.c.).

before his final scene, all we get is little arguing over the orders they are given, and how to interpret them. and he is still wearing his uniform!!! wait hold on im not gonna check but maybe he might only wear a jumper in the tent where dundy lauches his soft mutiny actually, so maybe this whole post is crumbling like a domino line but!!! ignoring this. moving on. (even if it is a jumper i remember him wearing sth dark blue aka Uniform Colour so im claiming it doesnt even matter bc spiritually that hypothetical jumper still is a uniform. im not going to let anything like "accuracy" and "real details" fuck up my post smh 🙄. im joking. however! Moving On as i said)

he doesnt even dress up for carnivale! the only other characters that are not in costume are jopson and crozier and they were literally too busy keeping crozier from dying to even begin thinking about joining the communal arts and crafts session! little is atp the acting no2 of the expedition so u might say he was busy but fitzjames has the overall command and still finds time to have a little gender moment in private and the imperialism-approved version of it for the Big Crowd!! (u could ofc argue that fitzy Always has time for a gender moment and who would i be to argue but my point is: i have no doubt that man was fucking busy preparing carnivale & beginning to prepare the walkout and there still was time to Express Some Character!! so how come ned didn't do anything?)

the one other scene we get where we can catch a small glimpse of characters out of their element before it all unravels (pre tuunbaq attack on the camp) is the scene at night when morfin gets shot. it shows lots of characters in various states of undress (silna big blanket burrito i love you) that allows us to see them differently, like their costumes at carnivale did, but in an entirely opposite direction. while carnivale was about putting on masks, this scene is about taking them off. and it drives me insane because i know that little must be there. he is somewhere in the crowd when morfin gets shot but so far i havent been able to make him out and i need to know what he is wearing so bad. it is actually for science (my own curiosity) ! i really need to know. and i cant help but feel that maybe it is intentional that he is just ~somewhere~ instead of In Front of the Fucking Camera because, well. that would be just ned little, wouldnt it? and we dont even know who that is.

On this New Year's Eve, are you too thinkin' bout season 8's: "I did everything I could to get you out! Everything... I did not leave you!" "Nothing you could have done would have saved me, because I didn't want to be saved... After the things I did... I didn't deserve to be out." and season 15's: "I left, but you didn't stop me."?? Because let's be real - Cas would *not* have stayed if Dean had stopped him as he didn't think he deserved to have Dean's acceptance/love. (can't believe that 3yrs later on I am doing 180 on this - i.e. initially thinking that Cas not staying was a result of Dean not asking)

anyways, I guess this is your usual reminder that Dean saving Cas from the Empty & saying "you don't think you deserved to be saved/loved?" is the only series conclusion that would've made perfect sense. See you with the same message, just rephrased differently, next year!

making big strides now that I'm not crippled by pain and wanting to shout it from the rooftops but somehow feeling awful about it because I'm not doing it fast enough. #livelaughlove

autistic coded men who have orange cats my beloved

And the results have just come in, folks. Ally Beardsly has rolled a *checks notes* Hat 20

crawling my way out of my ms word, covered in blood, my only coherent goals are to finally take an advil and sleep

I wish I could say i'm taking the rejection of my application to that zine well, but alas </3

star wars is insane they really did just drop the absolute best set of 4 episodes of anything in history in 2011, then never topped it. wild

I am. So normal about odin bifrostincident

girl in the fireplace is so funny to me. just seeing different people's reactions (and mine) to it. like, here's how I break it down:

if you love rose tyler and timepetals but maybe not as crazy for the doctor himself, this is the worst episode ever EVA!!!!! like hell on EARTH WHYYYY OH MY GOD ROSEEE MY GIRL I'M SO SORRY YOU'RE BEING TREATED LIKE THIS!!!!! DOCTOR go save ur girl goddamn don't just leave her so uncertain and feeling betrayed like that!!!! and don't PROUDLY KISS OTHER WOMEN 😰😰😰!!!!!

if you're a bigger doctor lover but still enjoy rose and maybe timepetals but eh it's whatever, this episode is very interesting and a fun exploration of the doctor, if a bit sad to see rose almost sidelined like that. ultimately one you quite enjoy

if you just care about the doctor and not rose or timepetals, this episode is the SHIT OH it's so good it's SO good oh my god yes please dive more into the doctor's fucked up psyche and life grahhHH!!!! ough. this man is FUCKED UP!! YEAHHHH!!!

spacing out during finals, and imagined a scenario where childhood s/o and aki are in elementary school- a kid trips little s/o in the mud and little aki gets them back by sticking gum in their hair (╥﹏╥) cause bro really be doing that fr 💀

anon... don't get me started... my heart has been yearning so much for childhood friends with aki these days.......

and he would totally do that too, young aki would pick a fight with anyone who bullies you or makes you cry. when he gets a little older, he's actually quite intimidating to the rest of the students, so just sticking with him is enough to ensure no-one tries to mess with you. he'll always make an effort to include you even when everyone else isn't; you're practically stuck together like glue, and even though any rumors about the two of you barely ever reach your ears, you're sure they've noticed how you and aki are rarely seen apart from one another.

smile for the camera (and keep your fingers crossed) Chapter 2: Interrogations, Interviews, and Impromptu Not-A-Dates

So instead of the food trucks, he’d bought a sandwich and a soda from the convenience store (and maybe a magazine too, shut up, he needs the physical proof that yes, he had in fact kissed Klavier Gavin). He’d also bought a pair of nondescript sunglasses and a baseball hat, in the hopes that he’d have a good enough disguise to head back to the office without being recognized. What Apollo Justice had failed to account for, however, was the fact that unlike in the movies, paparazzi aren’t stupid.

Well. Whoops! Didn't mean to take so long to post this chapter, but...here we are, more than a whole year later. Hopefully the chapter's interesting enough to make up for it?

In all seriousness, thank you so much to everyone who's read, commented, and reminded me that there are people out there waiting for the continuation of the story. Somehow I thought I'd already posted the start of this chapter?? Maybe I just thought about doing it so much that I thought it had happened already.

But anyway...I'm going to make sure the gap between this chapter and the next is significantly shorter--you guys deserve to not have to wait for annual fic updates, lmao

As ever, huge thanks to @cubedmango for providing some incredible spot art! And for understanding the "oops, what do you mean i didn't post that?" moment I went through like two weeks ago.

i set byan in your lap, all hissing and spitting and clawing and stabbing like the feral creature they are. "they're just a silly little guy," i tell you as i pat their head and they whip around to bite my hand. there are tears in my eyes as i insist, "they're a lot nicer than they look, i swear."