It’s amazing how people went from “Let men wear dresses! Clothes don’t have a gender!” to “If a man wants to wear a dress, clearly a feminine article of clothing, then I know for a fact that man is actually a closeted transwoman.”

Can clothes help people better understand their thoughts on their gender identity? Yes. Should others merrily shove others into boxes based on conservative gender norms? Absolutely not.

Sometimes, a guy wants to wear colorful nail polish and pretty dresses. Sometimes, that person looks in the mirror and realizes that their choice in appearance clarifies some things regarding their gender, and sometimes, those choices in personal appearance are steps along a path. Hell, sometimes a transman wants to wear dresses and nail polish. It doesn’t mean that they’re lying about their gender identity: it just means he wants to wear pretty nail polish and a dress. It’s different for everyone.

Can we please stop going so “woke” that we circle right back to strict conservatism? A person’s choice of appearance should be based on their personal expression. It shouldn’t be used as a tool to shove people into carefully defined, rigid boxes.

This post wouldn't leave my mind.

Error and Ink meeting before they completely become themselves is so....

ლ(ಥ益ಥლ) HHHHHHH

i don't really use tone indicators but if i did my favorite would be one i made up called "/nfa" which translates to "not fucking around"

One mistake I made a lot when I started learning English was writing both the auxiliary and the main verb in past tense—as in, "Did the rain stopped?" My English teacher had to really drill this grammar point into my head, she was like "the point of 'did' here is to indicate past tense, there's no need for another time marker." Me, genuinely baffled: "Why not?" Teacher: "Think of the 'ed' in 'stopped' as having migrated to the beginning of the sentence and become 'did'. So it's no longer in 'stopped'." Well I was sad to see it go. I pointed out that in French you'd say "The rain (itself) has it stopped?" and 'the rain' feels welcome to stay even though the whole point of the pronoun 'it' should be to replace it in a quicker way. But it would be sad if the noun & its pronoun never got to hang out together so we keep both <3

My teacher had a British look on her face that made my middle-school self wonder if maybe she thought my language wasn't optimally designed, and then she said that in English it would feel clunky to give the same piece of grammatical information twice, and "if you use 'did' then the -ed in 'stopped' doesn't add anything." That just sounded offensive, I mean since when do letters need to add something to a sentence? isn't it enough that they adorn the end of words & frolic with the others in friendship. If it bothers you so much just don't pronounce them. Idk, "did the rain stopped" felt so right to me. In the end my teacher said that "The rain has it stopped?" with the redundant pronoun is the more formal French phrasing anyway, and I was like yeah true we'd rather say "is it that it (itself) has stopped to rain?" and I felt like this really proved my point and I think she felt the same way

Why would you—That's not—I just wanted to ask for help, why did you have to go and make it awkward???

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second batch of outfit requests!

pattern collage / showfit / clownfit for @koifsssh & candy cardigan Eddie for @jazzzzzzhands <3

One of the many things I find funny and irritating is the slant of a lot of interpretations of Alecto's name (that it's about feminine rage)--on this here wlw internet in the year of our lord 2024, it's easily made to figure as rage against God, or rage against patriarchy, or religious oppression, and therefore an allusion to the idea that she's going to get her vengeance on John for betraying and oppressing her somehow, but like

John is the one who named her Alecto. He's the one who named her that. So, naming her "Alecto" is alluding to the embodiment of John's rage--their rage, since they are joined inseparably (John even explicitly says that when he first perceives her: "You wouldn't stop screaming. You were so scared. You were so goddamn mad").

He says of Alecto to Harrow, "In a very real way, you are [Alecto's] children". At a very surface level, Alecto is (depending on the text or tradition), one of the Furies--famously, in several surviving Greek tragedies, who punish Orestes for the crime of killing his mother. In fact, in Aeschylus' Oresteia, they declare that they are specifically bound to avenge matricide.

So the name "Alecto" alludes to the nature of John's mission and how he sees it.

It also implies that his divine rage, the rage that gives him power, the power that makes him divine, that he either represents or wants to represent, is feminine rage. He was chosen by Earth (which, Furies are sometimes the daughters of Gaia); he is her champion, however he's managed to fuck that up. Once the truth of that comes out, it becomes clear that all of his power comes from her.

And that's why you get statements from Tamsyn Muir like:

“[T]he God of the Locked Tomb IS a man; he IS the Father and the Teacher; it’s an inherently masc role played by someone who has an uneasy relationship himself to playing a Biblical patriarch. John falls back on hierarchies and roles because they’re familiar even when he’s struggling not to. Even he identifies himself as the God who became man and the man who became God. But the divine in the Locked Tomb is essentially feminine on multiple axes – I think Nona will illuminate that a little bit more."

So yes, he plays the role of Emperor and God and Teacher, with all of the things that implies. And I don't think it should be discounted. But he also is (and partly sees himself as) the chosen champion of a goddess, or what is for all intents & purposes for a human like him a goddess. He is her avenger, and while she sleeps, her avatar.

And I don't think we're meant to read him purely as a parasite who's taking advantage of her to gain power for himself, either. Or an oppressive, Kronos-like figure. Especially if you consider Palamedes' theory of the Grand Lysis, even if he was purely motivated by desire for power before (which I really doubt), there are parts of each in the other, now. What was clear and separate before is uncertain and interpenetrated. Is his rage his own, or hers? Is his mission of revenge his, or hers? If he wants power, is that his own selfishness, or her desire to survive?

And does it matter?

I have very normal feelings about a situation where Toshiro visits Melini after a long while. Laios has established himself as king, although he still has much to improve on. Toshiro carries on the family mantle, but that isn't relevant now; he's on a break, seeing friends he hasn't seen since their last chaotic adventure. Laios waits to greet him at the docks when he arrives. Toshiro feels his heart quicken, though this is very quickly brushed off. Who wouldn't feel excited when meeting a companion after so long? He runs down to the docks—he forgets himself—He runs down the docks, ecstatic.

Laios greets him with a handshake. It's... much too formal. Diplomatic. The attitude befitting a king, not a friend. Toshiro forgets himself. He greets Laios with the handshake he's extended, yes, but he feels weird about it.

As Laios walks ahead of him, he is aided by his trusted advisor, who is bickering with him while telling him what to do. Laios is comfortable, with him. Toshiro is an outsider; he forgets himself.

i’m okay w being alone for the most part but i feel so frantic lately with wanting human connection

family vaca photos and misc

If you’ve ever gone to a Mountain Goats show and waited in line outside for hours or gotten chummy with folks in the crowd, you know how deep the lore runs. It can make you feel small in the blink of an eye. Your undying love for “Cubs In Five” becomes instantly overshadowed by the guy with a tape recorder in his pocket who can recite setlists from 2004 gigs in states the Mountain Goats rarely make it out to anymore. But what’s beautiful about that scariness—even if you feel like your fandom is not enough—is that...there is such an undercurrent of love, affection and hope at every turn. At some point over the last 30 years, these people found Darnielle’s writing—be it via his boombox recordings or via the label-backed, concept-album concertos—and elected to devote a piece of themselves to loving these songs so much that, no matter what mix-and-matched setlist is thrown at them, they are ready to sing along with every note.

hey guys this tMG article is really fucking good and I think everyone should go read it

Death Note as a show is such a 'trying to order a milkshake at home depot' situation to many people - I've seen it claimed over and over that Code Geass or Monster are equivalent to if not better than Death Note because they do human drama so much better.

And it just makes me stare at a wall because Death Note was never meant to be about interpersonal drama or grand nuances of morality. Of course that is part of what we take out of it and focus on as readers, but it was never meant to be the main focus at all.

Death Note isn't failing these aspects, because failing something implies that you were actually trying to accomplish it.

At its core, Death Note is a suspense story designed to entertain people. That's it. That's the goal here. And it's good at that goal.

I think once you realize this, it is easier to make peace with the canon.

no silt verses until next week at the earliest because they're still refining the production and dealing with life getting in the way BUT the episode is going to be over 75 minutes long and future episodes similarly massive in length and story content. i only see this as a win.

"Seven years ago we all went through the flames; and the happiness of some of us since then is, we think, well worth the pain we endured."

Although Dracula was published in 1897, some think that it takes place in 1893 because of the way the days and dates used line up. If that's the case, Jonathan Harker's epilogue, seven years later, would have been added around 1900. A new era bubbling with new change and new conventions. The story ends with Jonathan looking ahead to a new century filled with the unknown and being able to look on the past, despite its darkness, "without despair."

Name twinsies!

(Based on the community consensus about LWJ's grey horse's name)

saw @chez-cinnamon's absolutely BANGER butterfly!Howdy design and couldn't resist! two fluffy flutterbyes <3 solidarity