every time i think about riverdale i get so incredibly fucking mad and i try and make a coherent post about it to get across why its whole concept of existing is So Shit and i can never do it and i delete the post before its even made.
Watch the 2024 American Climate Leadership Awards for High School Students now: https://youtu.be/5C-bb9PoRLc
The recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by student climate leaders! Join Aishah-Nyeta Brown & Jerome Foster II and be inspired by student climate leaders as we recognize the High School Student finalists. Watch now to find out which student received the $25,000 grand prize and top recognition!
thinking about how Humans Are Space Orcs stories always talk about how indestructible humans are, our endurance, our ability to withstand common poisons, etc. and thats all well and good, its really fun to read, but it gets repetitive after a while because we aren't all like that.
And that got me thinking about why this trope is so common in the first place, and the conclusion I came to is actually kind of obvious if you think about it. Not everyone is allowed to go into space. This is true now, with the number of physical restrictions placed on astronauts (including height limits), but I imagine it's just as strict in some imaginary future where humans are first coming into contact with alien species. Because in that case there will definitely be military personnel alongside any possible diplomatic parties.
And I imagine that all interactions aliens have ever had up until this point have been with trained personnel. Even basic military troops conform to this standard, to some degree. So aliens meet us and they're shocked and horrified to discover that we have no obvious weaknesses, we're all either crazy smart or crazy strong (still always a little crazy, academia and war will do that to you), and not only that but we like, literally all the same height so there's no way to tell any of us apart.
And Humans Are Death Worlders stories spread throughout the galaxy. Years or decades or centuries of interspecies suspicion and hostilities preventing any alien from setting foot/claw/limb/appendage/etc. on Earth until slowly more beings are allowed to come through. And not just diplomats who keep to government buildings, but tourists. Exchange students. Temporary visitors granted permission to go wherever they please, so they go out in search of 'real terran culture' and what do they find?
Humans with innate heart defects that prevent them from drinking caffeine. Humans with chronic pain and chronic fatigue who lack the boundless endurance humans are supposedly famous for. Humans too tall or too short or too fat to be allowed into space. Humans who are so scared of the world they need to take pills just to function. Humans with IBS who can't stand spicy foods, capsaicin really is poison to them. Lactose intolerance and celiac disease, my god all the autoimmune disorders out there, humans who struggle to function because their own bodies fight them. Humans who bruise easily and take too long to heal. Humans who sustained one too many concussions and now struggle to talk and read and write. Humans who've had strokes. Humans who were born unable to talk or hear or speak, and humans who through some accident lost that ability later.
Aliens visit Earth, and do you know what they find? Humanity, in all its wholeness.
literally finished drawing this right when he died like what the hell dude 😭 im literally so afraid to start the finale tho dude 13 pt2 alr made me cry 😭
Watch the American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 now: https://youtu.be/bWiW4Rp8vF0?feature=shared
The American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 broadcast recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by active climate leaders. Watch to find out which finalist received the $50,000 grand prize! Hosted by Vanessa Hauc and featuring Bill McKibben and Katharine Hayhoe!
Nico and Percy's dynamic through the series is eternally funny to me, because it's just. like.
Percy's having a constant mental struggle between his fatal flaw of loyalty with a promise he made to Bianca to protect Nico, versus his Big 3 kid desire to maim other Big 3 kids / Poseidon descendant urge to totally maim Nico specifically. He hates Nico so so much. He thinks Nico's annoying and weird at best, and creepy/sketchy when he's older. The only positive thoughts Percy has towards Nico are "He's Bianca's brother and Bianca was my friend and I owe her/He's Hazel's brother and Hazel is my friend and would kill me if I was mean to him," "He's a powerful asset and useful ally (if questionable)," and "He's kinda pathetic and I feel maybe a little bad about it." Percy has multiple occasions throughout the series where he strongly considers - and on one occasionally actually goes through with - throttling Nico.
Meanwhile, Nico is following around Percy like a lost puppy. He explicitly can never bring himself to even dislike anything about Percy no matter how hard he tries. He has a whole bit in BoO where he's mentally going "UGH he's so stupid BUT IT'S ENDEARING HOW DARE HE." He's totally smitten. He's making deals with his dad for Percy. He's making convoluted plans to help Percy stand a chance against Kronos. During the entirety of BoTL it's like he's playing tsundere - "I'm helping NOT PERCY SPECIFICALLY with this quest! Me helping Percy would be SILLY because I DEFINITELY HATE HIM." Then he proceeds to show up to Percy's birthday party to basically ask him on a weird date and spend the entire next book scrambling around trying to help him or protect him or impress him. And Percy could not give less of a shit.
Just. That dynamic is so funny to me. Percy is the founder of the Nico Protection Club in that he's the one they're all protecting Nico from and meanwhile Nico is throwing himself at Percy to the point where the literal god of gay love calls him out on it.
Forever, irrevocably fascinated by Will Graham's love for Hannibal Lecter. You guys don't give him enough attention. I actually think he loves with more intensity than Hannibal. His love is not only sacred, but it's also kaleidoscopic, and visceral, and convoluted, and so fucking much.
I cannot even begin to articulate how beautiful and heartbreaking the Kevin moment was.
The idea that this man who Chimney loved as a brother, who he lost too soon, came back to him in his moment of need and pointed him home? The way Kevin is one of his ghosts, but only in the most loving way.
As tragic as it was, losing Kevin brought with it a realization of unconditional love in the Lees—because not only did they manage to love him through the hurt, but they needed him, too. He wasn't a reminder of their pain—he was the son they had left who they could have lost, too, but didn't. He was love and joy, even through all the hurt. They were a family. A little bit broken, but built on the kind of foundation Chimney had never had until them, at least not since he'd lost his mom.
For Kevin to be the one to point him home? To send him to the two people whose unconditional love had kept him alive, if only in their hearts? To the parents who'd raised them both and didn't deserve to lose another son? To the two people who had never let him down?
Please accept this spiritual successor to #BatBanger Brucie:
Unfortunately, not only has Bruce NOT stopped dressing like a damn tourist, his association with known midwestern-origin Daily Planet Reporter Clark Kent has only made it THREE times worse and TEN time as embarassing 😔🙏
Alicent being ignored as a parent during those first few years. Alicent being expected to take care of aegon, while also allowing Viserys to take him whenever he so pleased, to show off and pass around like a model toy. Alicent being denied her child whenever lords and ladies were around. Alicent only getting him back when she was at her wits end, stressed after being separated from him for so long, watching people hold him wrong, play with him wrong, touch him wrong. Alicent only getting him back when he is fussy and no longer a source of entertainment for Viserys and his guests. Alicent holding her baby close to her chest during outings or events, stiffening when people ask to see him, hesitant to release her grip on him. Alicent biting her tongue when people ask to "give her a break" when she really wants to tell them that it's her baby and she's perfectly capable. Alicent being so exhausted from guests and Aegon being so little and full of energy, and her second pregnancy, causing her to doze with Aegon in her arms, only to nearly lash out when someone tries to slip him from her arms, engulfing him in her arms as if to fend him from hungry wolves. Alicent carrying him around, even as she grows tired, her arms burning and back aching, so she knows he is safe, away from prying hands and acrid whispers, away from his father's attempts to use him for amusement purposes. Alicent feigning a smile, feigning composure and enjoyment, when really, she just wants to be home, in her chambers with her son, where no one can bother them, where they aren't props meant to smile and wave for a man who does not love them.
(inspired by this reblog of my post from earlier. cause yes, @squgs [hope you don't mind me tagging] is right, she would very much go to war for her baby)
i still orbit you, and nothing’s changed,
but if there’s no name to love,
everything has changed.
(cr. namuspromised, lyric translation doolsetbangtan)
poor shiro cannot catch a fucking break can he. first he gets a crippling disease he's got two years to live. then an angsty wattpad breakup with his boyfriend then he gets kidnapped by aliens and pumped full of alien weed then he crashes on earth with so much walking midlife crisis energy that he gains the skinning puppies to make a fur coat hair, and then he immediately gets shot right back into space by his shittass little brother and weirdo friends with the literal matt clone. then this poor man is made the leader of an alien war, becomes a father to four fuckass teenagers through accidental child acquisition, is forced into the kim kardashian lifestyle by a ginger on drugs, gets kidnapped again, gets cloned, fucking dies, somehow comes back (yeah I'm not really clear about this) then this pathetic wet cat of a man, this stressed jean valjean father of four, experiencing his fourth midlife crisis and millionth mental breakdown, gains that senior citizen swag at twenty five. you could colour match his hair with a polar bear. then he witnesses a walking loreal ad (derogatory) get melted alive, watches a castle get blown up, loses three years in a space time jump and then finds out his ex- fiance who broke up with him right before he left has fucking died in a purple thumb invasion before he got to marry him. but oh no no no that's not the end for this poor sad man. poor guy doesn't get a second to grieve before he is visually assaulted by a less cunty sue sylvester ripoff and her gang of bitchy cheerios (this is admiral s*nda), and yet again made a leader against his will, and shot right back off into space again. then he watches the only other responsible adult in this entire franchise (hot badass space princess who like shiro did not catch a break) sacrifice herself and is left a struggling father. ends up marrying some random fucko. all while suffering through his shitass hot topic brother and blueberry disaster's doomed yaoi romance. oh yeah and he's only got one arm. give the guy a BREAK. FREE my man he doesn't deserve this 🔥🔥