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Because I intend to eventually kick my tumblr addiction (taking it one day at a time here) I wanted to explain why I spent so much time back in 2015/16 ranting about how Solas doesn't love Lavellan.

People made the mistake of thinking I was this heartbroken fan in love with a fictional character. The hilarious reality is that my character would have totally killed Solas for his crimes if she was given the option. My character is in love with Solas. I'm not.

But anyway . . .

The reason why I was so upset, and the reason why I tried to so hard to convince other gamers that the Solas romance is not love, is because it is incredibly stupid and irresponsible that Bioware/Weekes would write an emotionally abusive relationship and then sit in an interview and state that it was “love.”

Weekes was just trying to comfort young fans who were upset, but in the end, he did something really wrong without meaning to. I recognize that.

I thought of this because the other day I stumbled across this heartbreaking article about a woman who discovered -- six years into her marriage -- that her husband was actually a terrible person who did terrible things while smiling in her face all the while. He was manipulative and emotionally abusive to push his own agenda while caring very little that he was harming her. He did not intentionally set out to hurt his wife, but he did. And in the end, when she found out the truth about him, he chose to leave her -- while she was pregnant -- in order to pursue his agenda of being a destructive asshole.

Even after her husband had emotionally abused her, manipulated her, and lied to her, the woman was still baffled. Because all along, he had seemed to really love her. He seemed so "kind and gentle" only for her to discover he really was not. She was in denial for a long time. Imagine what would have happened to her and her child had she attempted to "fix" such an abusive situation instead of doing what was best for her and her baby? This is the kind of guy who might have wound up beating his wife and maybe killing his child, even if just on accident, still killing it.

The story remained me SO MUCH of Solas and Lavellan.

I've already explained over and over why Solas and Lavellan were in a very unhealthy one-sided relationship and why it was most certainly *not* love. The point of my post is to explain why I was so insistent on convincing other Solasmancers of the truth.

It's because I am very concerned about media that teaches young girls that abuse is love. They learn at an early age that they should put up with belittling, manipulative, abusive behavior, and they see it as normal, and they wind up with shitty men who emotionally, physically abuse them and sometimes wind up murdering them.

Love is something that has to be learned. People who never learn what love is are the ones who wind up in these dangerous relationships where they are mistreated.

In other words, I was reaching out in frustration and trying to help people. And yes, I was VERY frustrated by the other Bioware fans who sneered at me and didn't understand what I was doing.

Everything about the Solas romance is emotionally abusive, though. 

Solas sneers on Lavellan's religion and culture and continues to belittle it long after his "apology" at Haven. He just doesn't do it to her face and instead sneers on her people in various banters with characters like Sera and Morrigan. This is emotionally abusive. Making your partner feel inferior because they share a different culture and religion? That is fucked.

And no. Don't quote that line at me about how you can choose to let people make you feel inferior. That does not excuse the person whose shitty behavior is making you feel small in the first place.

Solas is racist throughout the entire game. To him, Lavellan isn't like those other heathens, meaning other mortals -- especially Dalish -- are worthless and inferior. That's like . . . dating a racist who thinks you're the only worthwhile person in your entire race.

When Solas isn't sneering on Lavellan's culture and religion, he is lying to her about who he is and what his motivations are. In the end, he is responsible for a great deal of her physical, mental suffering and pain and doesn't have enough respect for her to tell her the truth.

And why does Solas have no respect for Lavellan? Because he does not see her as an equal. And he does not see her as a person. She can even SAY this to him in Trespasser, "We aren't even people to you, are we?"

Solas never loved Lavellan. He's a pride demon. He can not love. His romance was all about sexual tension and steamy kisses, as much as asexual people hate to hear that, it's the truth.

In the end, Solas chose to keep going with his shitty agenda over protecting the life of someone he supposedly loved. He will kill her and all her friends because "He is not a monster."

Within the context of the story, in a world where people can time travel and the elven religion has been deemed demon worship by racist anti-indigenous writers, it doesn't look like Solas is being emotionally abusive, but he is. You could almost make excuses for his behavior because he's an ancient elf who lost his entire world, but you shouldn't.

Solas is, in fact, a monster. He is a pitiful figure who should not be saved. And everything he did to Lavellan was text book abuse.

It's really upsetting that Bioware would write a romance like this without calling it out for what it is. And Weekes knows the romance is abusive, otherwise he wouldn't have ridiculed and mocked "diehard" Solasmancers who shouted that they wanted to help Solas *before* their character knew the entire truth.

This is also what angers me the most about Twilight and books like it. I hate stories that teach young girls that abuse is love. These stories are targeted at teenagers who don't know any better and don't yet possess critical thinking skills.

In the same way teen paranormal romance novels are irresponsible, video games are irresponsible with the things they teach young boys -- such as how women aren't people but slot machines that give sex when you have the right number of charisma points.

I'm not saying media causes people to be shitty. I'm saying it reinforces those negative aspects already existent in our culture and helps them to thrive.

So long as stories keep teaching boys to abuse women and young girls to lay down and take the abuse, this shit will just go on.

And if you're about to reblog this and tell me that media has zero effect on people and their behavior, head over to Google and type in "szechuan sauce, Rick and Morty."

Crumbles’ Big Dump of Upcoming Fics

Happy New Year, everybody! I certainly hope that so far things are going well for you all. I had been meaning to make this post a while back but things got kinda… delayed. Between a lot of really painful personal tragedies – including the death of my dad – and a stressful schedule with work and school, I’ve been a little all over the place. 2017 has been, by far, the cruelest and loneliest year of my life. My dad’s death has shattered me in a lot of different ways, but it had a huge impact on my ability to write, which crippled my usual coping mechanism. He was always really invested in the original stories that I work on as well and was also so supportive of my works. It made writing – something that I have always relied on as a stress relief and outlet for my negative emotions – painful and challenging and it, in turn, made me bitter and resentful at myself and at him. I’ll make another post about where I’ve been in my own mind fully just to get it all out eventually, but for now I just want to offer up an abridged version.

Most days I didn’t – and, honestly, there are still days where I don’t – feel like myself at all. But I feel that, at this point, not writing would be a disservice to his memory.

In the last few weeks I’ve felt a bit more clarity and I’ve been able to find my voice again. I don’t want to stop writing and I have no intention of doing it. In fact, my imagination has kinda jump-started back to near-normal capacity and I have a lot of ideas I’m really excited to share. This post is about the ideas I have in mind and when I intend to upload what. I want to put myself on a schedule because I feel like setting goals for myself will be a good way to get me back in the swing of things.

In preparation for this, I’ve actually gone ahead and made myself an AO3 account – which can be found [here] - because the ideas under the “Read More” are all going to be multi-chapter projects. I’ll still make posts here on tumblr when any updates go live (and should have schedules for when each fic will be updated), I just don’t want to post full chapters here, since I tend to write long chapters. I am also adding the disclaimer here that one-shots (with some exceptions)/ requests/ and other things of that ilk will not be listed here because those have no real schedule in mind.

Ships to Expect: SasuSaku (Naruto), SoMa (Soul Eater), Hance (Voltron), and a whole mess of Kidge (Voltron) because I have no control.

The Shrink Treatment 3: Voltron (Kidge): I am almost done with this one and, surprise to no one, there’ll be one more part after that to just wrap it all up. Regardless, though, I should be able to finish this short series up before the end of the month! Release Date: January 11th/12th, 2018 Update Schedule: Once (Part 4 will hopefully be done within two weeks from whichever day I upload Part 3)

Request 5: Voltron (Kidge): Leaving this vague, because I still want it to be a surprise, but the final of a list of requests I received a few months ago! This, much like The Shrink Treatment, ended up getting away from me. I relaly loved the idea and it’s taking me a while to get it finished. Release Date: February 14th, 2018 Update Schedule: Once (Valentine’s Special)

Like Treading Water: Voltron (Kidge): Love isn’t exactly an emotion that is easy to explain or acknowledge if you aren’t actively looking for it. Little nuances will stick out as something irregular and strange, but can be easily shrugged off when a mind applies logic or sound reasoning to it. You can blind yourself to something that is so obvious to those around you simply by virtue of coming up with other explanations. This is a chronology of how each Paladin realized that Keith Kogane and Pidge Gunderson were falling for each other; including the two Paladins themselves. Note: I started working on this back in October of 2015, shortly after I watched the first season and became Voltron trash. As such, I’m currently having to re-read what I’ve written so far to assure that it falls in line with the canon of the series thus far. Release Date: February 14th, 2018 Update Schedule: Once (Valentine’s Special)

Keidge Month: Not a multi-chapter story, but I just want to say I have every intention of participating in Keidge Month in March; in fact, I’ve already started to work on some of my prompt fills. I’ll post all my prompt fills to both here and AO3, just so that people can choose to read it on whichever outlet is more comfortable for them. It’s my number one ship and it happens to take place during my birthday month, so what kind of smuck would I be to not participate? ;3c Release Date: March 1st, 2018 Update Schedule: Daily (Month Long Event)

Cherry Bomb: Naruto (SasuSaku) – After an accident in the facility that she is interning at, Sakura Haruno gains super strength and an accelerated healing element. With the help of her role model, Dr. Tsunade Senju, she learns how to control and harness this power to help protect the denizens of the city. She is thrust into stopping a plot by other humans with genetic mutations to take control of the city using intimidation and force while also trying to keep her secret identity hidden from her photo-journalist boyfriend, Sasuke Uchiha. Note: I’ve been planning this project for roughly three – Hell, almost four – years now. This is going to be my final Naruto project – excluding any requests I get – and I want it to be something really special and significant to not just anyone who reads it, but also to my own growth as a writer. Naruto has been one of the longest fandoms I’ve been in and SasuSaku was one of my first really big ships; I want this to be a final love letter worth my time to write and worth everyone’s time to read. Release Date: March 2nd, 2018 Update Schedule: Bi-Weekly

Kidge Week: Again, not a multi-chapter thing but I really needed to say I have every intention of participating in this as well! My goal is to finish as many of my prompt fills for Keidge month before the prompts for Kidge Week drop in February as possible so that I can start working on that ASAP. Release Date: April 15th, 2018 Update Schedule: Daily (Week Long Event)

Hance Month: What do you know, I had way more things to list as non-multi-chapter fics for the first half of the year than I thought! Another extended event I have every intention of participating in because I really want to produce more content for Hance. It’s really such an great, under-rated ship that deserves more love! Release Date: May 1st, 2018 Update Schedule: Daily (Month Long Event)

Lance McClain vs. The World: After getting involved with a charming young engineering student named Hunk Garrett after meeting at a bar, Lance McClain finds himself getting dragged into a series of events that seem to be ripped right out of a comic book. He is given a warning from the leader of something called “Team Voltron”; a group of Hunk’s ex-lovers and close personal friends, dedicated to determining the worthiness of Hunk’s suitors through various competitive means. Never one to back down from a challenge, Lance agrees to the terms and is forced to learn various new skills and talents in order to compete with the roster of powerful opponents he faces. Note: The fact that there aren’t more Scott Pilgrim AUs in any of the fandoms I like is really disappointing, so I decided that I’d fix that problem myself. While I’ll be following the basic formula set up by the source material, I intend to take a very different approach and keep it fresh with some ideas of my own. So if you’ve actually seen Scott Pilgrim? This’ll be of a different flavor, so don’t assume you know what I have up my sleeve. ;3 Release Date: May 10th, 2018 Update Schedule: Weekly or Bi-Weekly.

Bodyguard AU (Title TBD): Voltron (Kidge): After publically calling out the shady business practices of Galra Tech, acclaimed actor Keith Kogane finds himself the subject of both an attempted assassination and threat of blackmail. Undeterred, he feels no fear at the prospect of making an enemy of the powerful conglomerate. Worried about his safety, both physically and his privacy being violated, his agent, Allura LeAltea, calls upon the help of an old charm school friend of hers. Enter Katie Holt; renowned tech prodigy and secret hacker known as Pidge Gunderson, hired on to be Keith’s personal bodyguard. The only catch? The two must pretend to be dating to assure that Katie can tag along with him wherever he goes without cueing Galra Tech into knowing their threats have had an effect. Note: I love Bodyguard AUs. I love Fake Dating AUs. I love deviating from the expectation. On top of that, an amazing Bodyguard AU one-shot has already been written by the talented Camphalfgalra on AO3, in which Keith is the bodyguard and Pidge is his client, so I decided to flip the roles for my own version of the trope. Release Date: June 15th, 2018 Update Schedule: Weekly or Bi-Weekly

Twilight: Voltron (Kidge): One night, Matthew Holt disappeared from his room without a trace. In the time that he’d been gone, his younger sister, Katie Holt, has been frantically pushing for more action to be taken in bringing her brother home; believing he has been whisked away to the deadly mystery of the forest around their small village of Kerberos. With her brother missing, her mother’s health rocky in her grief, and her father away to help a neighboring village with a fast-spreading illness, she is struggling to maintain not only all effort to bring her brother home alive, but also keep the family farm up to its normal functionality. The Head of the Village Guard, Thace Kogane, insists that she accept the help of his two children, Keith and Allura, to assist her with the farm. Initially cold and distant, Katie slowly warms up to the duo and finds that they may be able to offer her more help in finding her brother, as well as unraveling the mysteries of the dark forest just outside the fences of their small village. Note: I basically just threw the Voltron cast into the universe of one of my own stories – The Tragedy of Helena and Jeremiah – and went with it. Pidge is a pseudo-replacement for Helena and Keith is a pseudo-replacement for Jeremiah, though they have drastically different personalities from my own characters, and as such the story goes in a much different direction. I also borrowed some elements from another project of mine - Sweet Tooth - which The Tragedy of Helena and Jeremiah is a prequel to. Release Date: August 17th, 2018 Update Schedule: Bi-Weekly or Monthly

SingleParent!AU (Title TBD): Soul Eater (SoMa): Soul Evans has been struggling with life as a single father for roughly three years now; working two jobs and odd hours to support himself and his precious daughter, Harmony. Upon the announcement of his older brother, Wes, getting married, he is begged to return home to help with preparing for the ceremony and to be his brother’s Best Man. Feeling that he’ll have better opportunities with his family’s support and more time to spend with Harmony, Soul agrees to moving back to Death City. Through fate and circumstance, Soul meets Maka Albarn, the writer of his daughter’s favorite series of children’s books and intended Maid of Honor to Liz Thompson, Wes’ fiancée, and the two get along pretty well. And, perhaps from there, more will develop between them. Note: Bodyguard, Fake Dating, and Single Parent AUs are my fucking weakness. On top of that, I really want to write something that kinda messes with the typical tropes of Single Parent AUs that I’ve read. Hopefully it’ll be a fun ride for everyone! Release Date: September 28st, 2018 Update Schedule: Bi-Weekly