#if the text is about a time or culture other than the authors' own how did the values of the time/society the author is from
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sometimes i think im terrible at english lit bc i literally didnt go further than GCSE and dont really give two shits about symbolism or deeper meaning like it's just not my bag really. i simply never found literary analysis interesting. i always preferred language and linguistics. the mechanics, more than the art.
then i come here and see everyone completely fail to do the utmost basic thing of "taking into consideration the time/society/culture in which this was written, and (if different) the time/society/culture it is portraying" like
ah. i am perhaps not awful at reading.
#when was it written? where? what values does that society hold?#how have those values impacted the text?#was the text criticising those values or subverting them in some way and thus progressive but just in a way you do not now recognise?#if the text is about a time or culture other than the authors' own how did the values of the time/society the author is from#and the opinions they broadly held about the subject matter#mesh with the actual values of the time/place the text is about#should you be surprised at all even remotely that books written 125 years ago have themes and values now considered regressive#not unless you're a fucking idiot#but was it regressive *for its time*#was it perfectly standard for its time and endorsing/agreeing with society at large#or was the author writing critically and Amping Up The Values to demonstrate that the author considered them wrong
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Why You Shouldn't Care About Theme (as a writer)
"Theme" is another word like "worldbuilding" and "plot hole" that writers put way too much stock into without clear definition. It's often thought to be one of the most important things in your story, one of the defining traits of creative writing, but it can be hard to pin down, and some pervasive definitions are actively harmful to the writing process. Let's talk about that.
A common misconception about theme is that it's the story's "message." Under this definition, a theme of The Great Gatsby would be that generation wealth is a hollow substitute for genuine human enrichment, love, etc. A theme of Hamlet would be to not kill yourself. But this idea of a book's message misses the point of why we read at all. Reading is a relationship between the author and the reader; to interpret text, the author puts their experiences in writing, and you bring your experiences to its reading. In other words, you as the reader create meaning from a story. You give the story its messages. The author's only purpose is to transcribe their worldview and experiences, and the best authors can sway the empathy of the reader towards those experiences. Anything greater than this, any book that moralizes, preaches, dictates, is gaudy, emotional propaganda. Imagine a novel where throughout the book, the author is telling you about the toxic environmental effects of unwalkable cities. While true, narrative fiction is a realm of characters and story, not essays. Readers pull meaning from a novel because they think and feel about a character's struggle and relate it to their own. So a message about The Great Gatsby is that generation wealth is hollow because we as readers live in an age of unprecedented wealth disparity; a message about Hamlet is to not kill yourself because we as readers have felt pretty down in the dumps sometimes and have maybe thought about suicide. But our experiences could be different: if we're generationally wealthy, we might read Gatsby as a celebration; if we have an awful stepfather, we might read Hamlet first as a story of revenge than of introspection. Strong authors make you sympathize with the experiences they've gone through--Fitzgerald himself was a wealthy, popular man and saw firsthand the effects of wealth, and Shakespeare probably felt rough around the emotional edges at times--but ultimately, deciding a text's "messages" is up to the reader.
So if we can't control the messages of our writing, what is theme? I like to think of it as "whatever a text is about," and that about word carries some ambiguity. Is Gatsby about money? Yes, but there's more to that. You can think right now about a plot element your WIP is about, but as authors, we want to find that greater depth. That's what we call theme.
Common writing advice tells you to plot out your theme, that greater depth, before drafting the novel. Figure out that Gatsby is a story about generational wealth being a hollow substitute for romance before anything else. But when you think about it, this is crazy advice. Themes like this can only come from our characters and how they interact with the world, and how our characters act is always going to stray in some way away from our plans for them. Writing that deeper theme, then, is impossible to plan (unless you're the most extreme plotter and have found success like that, then keep doing what you're doing. But you reading this almost certainly are not in that camp, let's be honest). So how do we get there?
Before you start drafting, think about the surface-level "abouts." Don't go deep yet. Just think about what's pressing on your mind. If you want to take a very slight moralistic bent here, do so, but be sure not to go into specifics (that's for the characters to do). For my first novel, I wanted to write about friendship responsibilities, family responsibilities, and friendship; for my second novel, church camp, romance, and evangelical culture; for my current novel, the role of story in culture, honor, familial trauma, and cultural perceptions of gender. Some of these took on moral detail--evangelical culture is bad--but most didn't. As you're writing, your characters will discover that deeper meaning. Again, your characters have to and will by nature of being part of the narrative. Your readers interact with the story, not with you.
In my first novel, I came to the thematic conclusion that too many responsibilities degrade individual identity, but too few leave someone empty; in the second novel, I concluded that evangelical culture places restrictive boxes on what romance looks like, and on how to interact with and resolve traumatic events. But I didn't come up with these--my characters did, and I learned from them in the exact same way any reader would. Similarly, a reader might interact with my characters and come to completely different conclusions. This is normal, okay, and encouraged.
You may also find other themes popping up as you write. In my second novel, popularity and social capital became a huge cog in the machine. Let these fresh themes surprise you, and run with them.
Ultimately, you can't control what your readers take away from your story. Your goal as a writer is to create characters so rich and deep and intimate (not in the romantic sense, unless you're into that) that the reader can bring their experiences to the text and find meaning. We cannot worry about this before starting a writing project, because we can't control it, and thinking too much about it will muddy the waters of what actually matters, what we can affect. And when you start to sense those deeper meanings emerging in your story, run with them, flesh them out, and embody them in the struggles of characters.
#writeblr#writing#writing advice#writing questions#fanfic#creative writing#writers on tumblr#writerscommunity#writer#bookblr#booklr#reading
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ok ok slightly feral post as promised.
first, some context setting: I think it's really interesting to analyse texts in terms of both what the author was trying to do (and whether they succeeded) and what they ended up doing (intentionally or not) and I think their cultural/historical context is vital if you want to do this. I'm not interested in whether Robert Jordan or the Wheel of Time are, like, morally correct in their politics or whatever. I'm interested in what the art is trying to do.
and the thing about Jordan, see, is that he projected this image during his lifetime of a Genial Older Man (see: beard and pipe) but he...wasn't actually that old! He was 42 when EoTW was published. He died at 58. He was a Baby Boomer publishing books at a time when Baby Boomers were the hip young generation taking over from stodgy WWII veterans (Gen Z: It Will Happen To You Too).
What this means is that he was a child and adolescent during the Civil Rights movement, in a then-majority Black city in the Jim Crow South*. He would have gone to segregated schools. The tertiary institutions he attended had only started to desegregate a year or two before he attended each of them. I think his war trauma in Vietnam gets a lot of attention because he did talk about it and also because that's a narrative we understand for white men, but I think we...skim over the impact on white men of growing up at this time because? Civil Rights only happened to Black Americans I guess? but it's his context too. Similarly, he was an adolescent and young man at the time the (white) feminist movement was really kicking off in the US. he was in his mid-20s when banks were first legally *required* to allow women to open accounts and have credit cards in their own names. he went on to marry a woman a decade older than him, who had left her husband to raise her son as a single mother while continuing a professional career in the early 70s; these were issues that must have been incredibly relevant for her.
and what we see in his writing is attempts to grapple with gender and race that are self-evidently of mixed success, but I think have to be contextualised in light of this period of immense change he grew up in. Think about the predominance of women as merchants and bankers in WoT, in the context of how recent their rights to even control their own money were in the US. The...everything...he was trying to do with the Seanchan, making them extra-canonically Southern American-coded. The Whitecloaks as the KKK (among other things, of course).
As an example, I think there's also something probably unintentional but fascinating in the way he presents the pre-Breaking Aiel: bluntly, they are a distinct ethnic group in hereditary servitude (always thinking about how that ancestor of Rand's in the Rhuidean sequence had to get permission from Mierin Sedai to switch to someone else's service so he could marry his girlfriend, this is...uh...super cognate to issues enslaved Black people faced). They're associated with agriculture through the Song sequence. And they're pretty much the ideal of what slave-owning Southern American culture WANTED enslaved Black people to be: completely happy to serve. Then, as the post-breaking Aiel, they become feared as a source of violence, which resonates with the way that enslaved people were feared by their slavers.
I don't think for a second that the intention here was to depict the AoL as a Secret Slavery Dystopia, I think we're meant to take the Rhuidean flashback sections pretty much as they read on the page. But I also think putting Jordan in his historical and cultural context does pose the comparison. Similarly, I find it really interesting that he positions Seanchan as riven by constant revolts and uprisings (because it's a fascist slaver regime) but he never ever goes so far as to link enslaved people in Seanchan (damane and da'covale) to those revolts and uprisings, even though that is fundamentally the deep fear *for real and obvious reasons* of all slavery-based societies.
Or then there's the changes to the Two Rivers in the books - like, both then and now I think it's actually pretty radical to present an influx of Muslim-coded refugees of colour as a thing that enriches the Two Rivers both socially and economically. Various characters are wistful that it's changed, but they don't think it's bad. The text here is really clear that welcoming the Domani and Almoth Plain refugees is both morally right and beneficial. And this is in a book being written and published shortly after the first Gulf War.
There's so many more things like this where I just have no real idea what he was trying to do on purpose and what was accidental and what was fun for him in fiction but did not necessarily link at all to his real-world political beliefs. but gosh it's interesting to turn over and poke at.
#wheel of time#wot book spoilers#robert jordan#and then there's things like...IIRC some stuff about Gareth Bryne is referencing General Lee#and I know a lot of you are Bryne haters but the point here is not#that that means Bryne is bad#it's: how hard was RJ thinking about that and why did he do it at all?
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The Gish Gallop was a term coined I think on the 2000s internet for a rhetorical maneuver where to buttress an argument you provide a ton of low-quality evidence; that the evidence is bad means it should be easy to refute, but the very large volume means it will take much longer to explain why it's all wrong than it did to copy-paste a bunch of links, and to a certain kind of very naive onlooker, it looks like the galloper is winning--after all, the one interlocutor has presented a ton of evidence! The second interlocutor has to spend so much time bending over backwards to refute it! Surely the first guy is more knowledgeable and authoritative. You aren't going to look at all that evidence yourself, of course--who has the time?
But listening to Dan McClellan talk about the Gospel of John this morning, it occurs to me that I don't think this is disingenuous. Not entirely. I think this is just the style of argumentation a lot of Christians (of a particular religious flavor) are used to. And I'm not just talking about in non- or para-religious matters like evolution. This is how Christianity understands the Bible.
This week's Data over Dogma is about the theology of John, and why it is non-trinitarian (because the Trinity is a much later doctrine developed as a kind of political compromise, maintained only because it had state backing) and does not actually identify Jesus with God (the theological developments are more complicated here; but suffice it to say it was not at all a given that "authorized bearer of the divine name" and "actually God" were the same being in 1st century Hellenistic Judaism, and indeed the distinction between the two had developed in Jewish thought precisely to avoid the awkwardness of anthropomorphic figures proclaiming themselves God in some of the older sections of the Hebrew Bible).
The funny thing is, there are a ton of passages in John that get trotted out as proof texts that Jesus is God. There are very good reasons in the case of each one to doubt that that is actually the correct reading; but of course, if you don't know anything about Greek, all you have are modern translations produced under the assumption of the dogma of the Trinity--mostly for devotional readers of the Bible who would be outraged if the Trinity wasn't in the New Testament--and you have been raised in a cultural and/or educational milieu where it is simply a default assumption about the way the world works that the Trinity is a timeless concept that has been in the Bible from the beginning, it sure looks like one side is spinning up tendentious arguments based on silly semantics that have nothing to do with the religion you learned as a kid.
But this exegetical approach (really, eisegetical) is common to many topics in traditional Christian theology. There are a ton of passages from the Septuagint that the Gospels warp to be about Jesus, even though, in their original context, this doesn't make any sense; sometimes even they're based on obvious mistranslations, like having Jesus ride into Jerusalem on the back of two animals simultaneously because you don't understand appositives. And you can poke holes in any individual bit of this exegesis, but psychologically having a ton of low-quality evidence for a thing is a pretty effective bulwark against thinking critically about that evidence; for every individual argument you knock down, the person you are arguing against is probably thinking, "yeah, but what about all that other stuff," even if they can't actually name all that other stuff in the moment.
And it's not mendacious! This is the stuff of true belief; this is how you get breathless Christian commentators saying the Bible couldn't possibly be written by human hands, because it so perfectly predicted Jesus even in the Old Testament--and the evidence they point to is, to anyone not steeped in traditional Christian exegesis, and especially to Jews who have their own exegetical traditions, absolutely barmy. Like really pants-on-head crazy stuff. But of course even now it is still being processed, in many parts of the world, through a two thousand year old tradition trying to reconcile it all and to normalize it all, and--to bring it back to discussions of evolution on the internet in the 2000s--I can't help but think of all those people who talk about the experience of thinking evolution was so obviously nonsense, because all they were exposed to was the fundamentalist strawman of it. When they finally sat down and began to read about it on their own, from unbiased sources--often with the intent of criticizing it--they realized how distorted their understanding was, and how limited their supposed outside view.
(If there are general lessons to be wrung from this situation, I think it's simply "beware of echo chambers." Social consensus in a bubble can make bad arguments feel much stronger than they really are, especially if you are not exposed to the actual opposing view. Be on guard against mistaking "quantity of evidence" for "quality of argument," especially if you're not gonna evaluate that evidence yourself. Also all religious traditions are fundamentally eisegetical, because in order to keep holy writ relevant to the community its meaning has to be constantly renegotiated. So, uh. If you want high-quality exegesis, ask an academic, not a theologian.)
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But by the end of my five years [as a copy editor], I felt intellectually and psychologically worn down by the labor I logged on my biweekly timesheets. Whatever roller-rink of neurons helped me spot aberrations from convention had grown practiced and strong, and it was difficult to read any unconventional sentence without reflexively rearranging it into a more conventional form.
Something had shrunken and withered in me, for having directed so much of my attention away from the substance of the stories I read and into their surface. Few people in our office, let alone outside its walls, would notice the variation in line spacing, the fact that Jesus’ was lacking its last, hard “s,” or whatever other reason we were sending the proofs to be printed again—and if they did, who the fuck cared? [....]
I can’t help wondering, though, whether there wasn’t something insidious in the way we worked—some poison in our many rounds of minute changes, in our strained and often tense conversations about ligatures and line breaks, in our exertions of supposedly benign, even benevolent, power; if those polite conversations constituted a covert, foot-dragging protest against change, an insistence on the quiet conservatism of the liberal old guard, and if they were a distraction from the conversations that might have brought meaningful literary or linguistic change about. In fact, I sense myself enacting the same foot-dragging here.
It’s fun—it’s dangerously pleasing—to linger in the minutiae of my bygone copyediting days, even if, by the time I left that job to teach college writing full-time, I was convinced that “correcting” “errors” of convention most readers would never notice was the least meaningful work a person could possibly do. I’m writing this, however, to ask whether copyediting as it’s been practiced is worse than meaningless: if, in fact, it does harm.
*
Do we really need copyediting? I don’t mean the basic clean-up that reverses typos, reinstates skipped words, and otherwise ensures that spelling and punctuation marks are as an author intends. Such copyediting makes an unintentionally “messy” manuscript easier to read, sure.
But the argument that texts ought to read “easily” slips too readily into justification for insisting a text working outside dominant Englishes better reflect the English of a dominant-culture reader—the kind of reader who might mirror the majority of those at the helm of the publishing industry, but not the kind of reader who reflects a potential readership (or writership) at large.
A few years before leaving copyediting, I began teaching a scholarly article I still read with students today, Lee A. Tonouchi’s “Da State of Pidgin Address.” Written in Hawai’ian Creole English, or Pidgin, it asks whether what “dey say” is true: “dat da perception is dat da standard english talker is going automatically be perceive fo’ be mo’ intelligent than da Pidgin talker regardless wot dey talking, jus from HOW dey talking.” The article leaves many students questioning the assumptions they began reading it with: its effect is immediate, personal, and profound.
In another article I pair it with, “Should Writers Use They Own English,” Vershawn Ashanti Young answers Tonouchi’s implicit question, writing, “don’t nobody’s language, dialect, or style make them ‘vulnerable to prejudice.’ It’s ATTITUDES.” Racial difference and linguistic difference, Young reminds us, are intertwined, and “Black English dont make it own-self oppressed.”
It’s clear that copyediting as it’s typically practiced is a white supremacist project, that is, not only for the particular linguistic forms it favors and upholds, which belong to the cultures of whiteness and power, but for how it excludes or erases the voices and styles of those who don’t or won’t perform this culture. Beginning with an elementary school teacher’s red pen, and continuing with agents, publishers, and university faculty who on principle turn away work that arrives on their desk in unconventionally grammatical or imperfectly punctuated form, voices that don’t mimic dominance are muffled when they get to the page and also before they get there—as schools, publishers, and their henchmen entrench the idea that those writing outside convention are not writing “well,” and therefore ought not set their voices to paper at all. [...]
Like other emissaries of the powerful (see, e.g., the actual police), copy editors often wield what power they do have unpredictably, teetering between generous attention and brute, insistent force. You saw this in the way our tiny department got worked up over the stubbornness of an editor or author who had dug in their heels: their resistance was a threat, sometimes to our suspiciously moral-feeling attachment to “correctness,” sometimes to our aesthetics, and sometimes to our sense of ourselves. [...]
There’s a flip side, if it’s not already obvious, to the peculiar “respect” I received in that dusty closet office at twenty-two. A 2020 article in the Columbia Journalism Review refers casually to “fusspot grammarians and addled copy editors”; I’m not the only one who imagines the classic copy editor as uncreative, neurotic, and cold.
I want to say they’re the publishing professionals most likely, in the cultural imagination, to be female, but that doesn’t feel quite right: agents and full-on editors are female in busty, sexy ways, while copy editors are brittle, unsexed. Their labor nevertheless shares with other typically female labors a concern with the small and the surface, those aspects of experience many of us are conditioned to dismiss.
I’m willing to bet, too, that self-professed “grammar snobs” rarely come from power themselves—that there is a note of aspirational literariness in claiming the identity as such. [...]
It makes me wonder if, in renouncing my job when I left it—in calling copyediting the world’s least meaningful work—I might have been reenacting some of the literary scene’s most entrenched big-dick values: its insistence on story over surface (what John Gardner called the “fictional dream”), on anti-intellectualism but also the elitist cloak of it-can-never-be-taught. The grammar snob’s aspiration and my professor’s condescension bring to mind the same truism: that real power never needs to follow its own rules. [...]
Copyediting shares with poetry a romantic attention to detail, to the punctuation mark and the ordering of words. To treat someone else’s language with that fine a degree of attention can be an act of love. Could there be another way to practice copyediting—less attached to precedent, less perseverating, and more eagerly transgressive; a practice that, to distinguish itself from the quietly violent tradition from which it arises, might not be called “copyediting” at all; a practice that would not only “permit” but amplify the potential for linguistic invention and preservation in any written work?
--- Against Copyediting: Is It Time to Abolish the Department of Corrections? Helen Betya Rubinstein on Having Power Over More Than Just Commas
#linguistics#literature#copyediting#copyeditor#prescriptivism#grammar snobbery#editing#writing#publishing
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JOHN WICK x READER - The Courier
part 3!
[part 1] [part 2]
summary: John’s being a little slut and finds out you’re more dangerous than you let on. More background details of Y/N. You invite him to your base for a few drinks, and John seems to be asking too many questions. In response, you use an unconventional method to make sure he’s not a snitch. John desperately needs to relieve some tension after you finish, so he takes matters into his own hands. Female reader, John x Crime Boss Reader, slow burn, 5500 words.
author’s note: thx for the love! i love writing these, and i really like making the reader (you!) an anti hero. (you’ll see). i would highly recommend reading the first and second part if you’re new here! linked above! lmk what you think! tysm! 💕
warnings: nsfw, organized crime, implied death, violence, alcohol, cursing, sex work, significant age gap, male mast3rbatįön.
A few days have passed since your encounter with John in the Continental, ending with that steamy and tense kiss in the hallway. You had even given him your number. John hadn’t actually texted you yet. His mind was racing with the possibilities between the two of you.
Well, there was you. A young, powerful, self-made crime boss. Or as your employees would say ironically, a girly-pop criminal.
Right.
Of course, there was John, a middle-aged hitman with a dark reputation, even for the criminal underworld. Retroactively feared throughout the industry, there was a general unspoken rule to not fuck with John Wick. That was just common sense at this point.
And here he was, fidgeting with this metal-engraved business card you gave him during that makeout session, so he could keep in touch.
He’s anxious about the feelings he was developing for you. John had kept up with his playboy culture ever since his wife passed, and in his mind, he wasn’t sure if he was ready to give that up.
“Mm, mister Wick, you look awfully distracted.” the escort he had called over to his hotel room to help him relieve some tension he had after his encounter with you.
Her name was Bethany, or Brandi, or something. He didn’t really pay attention. What he did know was that she had excellent hand and blow job skills.
This Brandi chick was right. He was distracted. She’d been trying to get John hard for 15 minutes, and he couldn’t manage. How fucking embarrassing.
John took a peek at your name that's engraved onto the thin piece of metal. Ah, that seemed to do the trick. Blood swam to his shaft, growing his erection, and Brandi smirked a bit.
John’s pride wouldn’t allow him to admit that the sight of your printed name could do such a thing to him.
If anyone were to find out, he would simply die.
It didn’t take long for Brandi to take John into her mouth, stroking what she couldn’t fit with her hands. John closed his eyes, not wanting to establish any emotional connection with the woman to give her the wrong idea. He would simply sit back, and enjoy the pleasure he paid for. Even if the passion wasn’t there, it would have to do.
-
Meanwhile, you and three other women had a man wrapped in tarp and duct tape in their grasp, shuffling down a long pier towards the body’s destination. The Hudson River. The sheer pollution would eventually eat away at its flesh. A sure fire solution to you and your little problem at the moment.
The four of you grunt, count to 4, and swing the corpse out of your grasp, a splash following the collision to the water.
You sighed, snapping off your latex gloves, feeling your phone vibrate a few times in your pocket. God dammit, what now? You attempted to get rid of the fresh corpse body stench from your nose when you pulled your device out, and seeing a text from an unknown number. It was directed for your personal line, and not your business line. Interesting. That’s when it hit you, in your drunken stupor, you shared a personal business card with the one and only, John Wick.
Of course you did, you moron.
You huff out and click on the bright notification on your screen, opening the app up.
Unknown #: Hey, hope you still remember me. It’s that smoking hot guy from the bar a few days ago. You doin' okay?
You rolled your eyes at what John called himself. The smell of swamp water and bird shit entered your sinuses. Thank god that it successfully replaced the cold, damp, dead body smell. You can hear seagulls caw above your small group of women, heading back to your SUV as if nothing had happened.
Now, you're typing away at your screen to reply to this middle-aged man who had taken two days to even utilize your number.
You pause, raise your eyebrows, and slowly read the message over again. Interesting.
The feeling of his hands around you, squeezing your hips and biting your lower lip. The sensation is teasing your mind, so much so that you block everything else out.
You’ve touched yourself about 5 times since then, and you can’t seem to get this stupid man off of your mind. You craved him. Everything from the glares he shot at you with those dark eyes of his, to the sting of his scruff on your soft cheeks.
“Hey,” one of your employees interrupts your midday fantasy. You jolt slightly, blinking at the taller and muscular woman, she’s been working for you for about a year, her name is Jenny. “You ready, boss?”
You take in another deep breath, more lake smell entering your nose, and you can feel the moisture in the air. Somehow you managed to find a time when no one was even outside. Even if they were, no one asked questions. Mind your own business in this city, and you’ll go a long way.
You nod and climb into the back seat of the truck, get situated, and let your employees handle the rest. The truck starts driving, and here you are again, focused on that damn phone screen.
You grunt.
God dammit.
Y/N: yeah, I remember you, old man.
As if you haven’t been thinking about him since you escaped to your hotel room the other day.
Look at you. Crime lord. Criminal mastermind (sort of). You're a big-time player.
All of that, just to act like a schoolgirl when any guy you’re remotely attracted to gives you some sort of romantic interest.
Classic.
Of course you still knew how to talk to them, charm them, get them wrapped around your finger. That was a piece of cake. But what if one wanted a kiss?
Well, time to skedaddle.
-
John had just finished onto Brandi’s face, handing her one of the hotel room towels so she can clean herself off. It was a lot, thick and stringy ropes of cum had landed on her cheeks and lips. He was still recovering and catching his breath.
Then he hears his phone vibrate. It’s you.
He smiled. You texted back quicker than he anticipated.
Great, she’s calling me old again. John sighed to himself.
Sometimes he forgets he’s damn near old enough to be her father. Was that.. weird? Maybe he just shouldn’t think about it.
John: alright, girl boss, whatever you say.
John set down his phone and waited patiently for Brandi to finally leave for the night. He slipped her a wad of cash, and she was gone faster than she came.
John can’t get his fucking mind off of you. The number of times he has had his way with you in his head was too many to count on two hands. Does he feel bad about it?
Yeah.
Did he want to stop? No.
He oh so desperately wanted to see what was lurking underneath your clothing. He hasn’t felt this way in a long time.
John was a total slut, don’t get me wrong. A few times a week he’d have different women over. Some were regular hookups, and some were random girls he picked up at the bar or club. If he wasn’t doing a contract, he was definitely balls-deep in some random chick on his couch.
That was just life though. At least for John.
He used to be a romantic, date nights, flowers, gentleman type acts. But now, well, you know already.
John sighed and decided to double-text.
Of course a man his age wouldn’t understand the almost taboo nature of the double text. A rookie mistake some would call it, others would think it’s stupid to look into it that much.
John: u wanna have some drinks with me tonight?
-
You’re still shocked that John called you a girl boss over text. You’re still staring at your screen, bewildered at the thought.
A girl boss?
No way. Absolutely not, those chicks were always pyramid scheme fanatics that would reach out to you over Facebook to convince you to join their cult company.
That wasn’t you! You were a hard ass. You ran your crew well and knew what you were doing at all times.
But you were a woman.
And a boss.
Oh fuck.
You and the few employees in the truck hop on out. You had driven from that pier back to your warehouse headquarters. This is where the magic happened.
Right on the outskirts of Brooklyn, your enterprise came out of this warehouse. Filled with fast and reliable motorcycles and other expensive toys. There were a few women who were scurrying around to get some deliveries finished before the end of the night. You notice that one of your assistants decided to change the music on the stereo system.
The same assistant, Marissa, hurried over to you, took your bag, and handed you a coconut Redbull. You mumbled the lyrics to an Ice Spice song that was blaring in the warehouse.
The realization hits.
You look up, looking Marissa dead in the face.
“Please. Be real with me.” you speak to her, and she awaits your question. You take a deep breath. It’s the moment of truth. “Am I a girl boss?”
Silence breaks out in the warehouse. Everyone dropped what they were doing to wait to see what your personal assistant would have to say to that. The only thing being heard now is that Ice Spice song.
Oh god. That wasn’t a good sign.
Marissa pressed her lips together, her green eyes shifting around the warehouse.
“I mean, technically speaking, I suppose someone could call you that, you’re not cringe though!” Marissa assured you. Your breath hitched, and your heart felt like it stopped.
How embarrassing.
You swallow your pride in, nod, and shove your hands into your big overall pockets.
“Alright. Alright. Cool.” You nod, pulling your phone out and walking away from the main action, everyone went back to work as if they didn't just eavesdrop on that conversation.
What a fucking question that was.
You look at the last text John sent you and are surprised to see that he asked to have drinks.
You pause, staring at the text message. You know John doesn’t understand the concept of double texting, he was like, 45, or something. Poor guy didn't know any better. You sigh.
“Is Wickathan bothering you again?” your assistant Marissa asked, chuckling over the nickname you made for John.
“He wants to have drinks tonight, but look at me. I would rather smash my head into some bricks than go out tonight, I’m exhausted.” You groan, the feeling of disappointing John hits you right in the chest.
Why are you so worked up about him, bitch?! You ask yourself. You’re too hot to stress yourself out about this.
Marissa gives you a grin.
“Well then invite him here.” Marissa provides an idea for you. You raise your eyebrows, and nod affirmatively.
“I don’t know what I’d do without you.” You tell her, flashing her a grin and quickly texting John back.
Y/N: you wanna just have drinks at HQ?
You liked calling your work headquarters, or HQ to shorten it up. Really made you sound like a secret spy with a base.
Well, you weren’t a spy but it was a base.
Sometimes you forget that you’re running an entire criminal enterprise, the Ice Spice blasting at your self proclaimed headquarters wasn’t helping.
-
John can only imagine what this headquarters looks like, and is quite intrigued by the idea of having drinks with you there. Now that he’s planning on seeing you tonight, there’s a bad feeling in his stomach.
Does he feel bad about seeing an escort right before meeting up with you? That can’t be it. Can it?
Dammit, John. You’re a bachelor, you can’t be falling for some girl because she’s pretty and powerful. He cursed at himself internally.
His eyes glaze over his reflection in the mirror as he ices his shoulder, which was hit pretty bad by some asshole with a golf club during a job yesterday. It left a very purple bruise and was sore as hell.
He wondered if there was an appeal to his battle scars all over his body. There probably was, right? Whenever he was shirtless in front of a lady, her attention would immediately focus on all of his tattoos and marks on his flesh. Of course, they were stories from a younger and less experienced John.
Sometimes it would even scare them off entirely. But if they got past the tatted-up back and several scars, you could get a glimpse at his toned body. John's not a bodybuilder material by any means, he was lean and in shape, the ideal size for a professional killer.
He was perfect for the job.
John’s mind is racing, he knows you’re dangerous. You built an entire empire in a mere three years, people would kill for your skill and position on the food chain.
It kind of turned him on.
Especially ever since he found your business page, where all of the information for clients was readily available.
John noticed an "As Seen on Tv!" tab on the professional-looking website, he clicked on it out of pure curiosity. He didn’t know what to expect.
It was a YouTube video of a compilation of CCTV footage, showing various car and motorcycle chases. They were cut and spliced into a well edited video that had Industry Baby by Lil Nas X playing in the background.
That couldn’t be you, could it?
Oh, it was. You and various people in your crew who also did deliveries for your company.
John could tell from your figure whenever it was you on screen, and he was particularly shocked from seeing GoPro footage of you.
He sees you jumping out of the window from one moving car to the hood of another, shooting at the driver through the windshield, killing him instantly. Of course, as soon as the bullet was fired from the barrel of your gun, whoever edited the video censored it. John could still see the blurred-out figure slump to the side but was obvious that he was dead. You had even climbed through the shattered glass and took over the driving, shoving the corpse off of the seat as if it were a regular work day.
You and your crew obviously knew what you were doing, that was a fact. Ruthless, violent, and skilled, a dangerous combination for anyone. John noticed that you seemed to be more precise, the difference between you and your other employees was noticeably significant. They were still very impressive nonetheless.
As skilled as you were, you were still an amateur compared to John. He figured you most likely excelled at combat on the road but in a regular circumstance? You probably weren’t as efficient or deadly.
He was right.
“Fucking hell,” John mumbled to himself, it wasn’t anything new to him, but seeing this as an advertisement for their business of a website was… something. That’s for sure.
It was like watching a bunch of kids goofing around and getting it all on tape. Well, that was exactly what it was. A bunch of young women on the screen, and swap out the word goofing with maybe, rampaging?
His eyes were glued to his screen as he watched the video boasting their skill set, even showing a worker and you drifting your expensive bikes down the highway.
And now John's in his car watching the video once again in the parking lot of the warehouse that Y/N had invited him to.
John was pleasantly surprised that this young crime lord had invited him to her home base after only meeting him once.
Well, technically twice.
John hadn’t bothered with his work attire, he had thrown on a pair of nice jeans and a long sleeve black shirt. He even went the extra mile to put on cologne and touched up his beard.
John sighed and exited his car, locking up and sauntering towards the large industrial looking warehouse.
He could hear a plethora of noises from the building, the big garage door was open, and he raised his eyebrows at the image of dozens of women doing advanced mechanical work on modified bikes, or even riding off on said bikes.
John wasn’t sure what to expect but it sure as hell wasn’t this.
Especially with the Latin girl pop that was blaring from the very impressive stereo set up.
Your chop shop was clean, organized, and busy. Extremely busy. John had been squeezed past by about 7 women already who were hard at work.
It was clear that John was a fish out of water, he was quite literally the only man in this warehouse. He wasn’t sure if he liked that or not.
What’s the opposite of a sausage fest? John asked himself.
But where were you? John narrowed his eyes and did his best to find you, which happened to be squatting near a motorcycle that was suffering from some serious curb rash, which you were attempting to fix.
It was a sight that was a complete 180 from the other day at the cocktail party. Compared to the long and elegant black dress, you were now in a crop top and some denim overalls, that looked like it had seen better days.
John had to admit, it was pretty cute. He was used to only flirting and going out with women who were refined, and classy. That's what you displayed the other night.
But after seeing those clips of you online, and seeing you here, he knew that was all a front.
You were feminine for sure, however, you obviously had a masculine energy to your personality. John wasn’t used to that, it was really refreshing.
Before John could, one of your workers had hurried over to you.
“You think I should go hybrid or classic?” One of your modification technicians asked, her name was Marie, and she had worked for you for the past 2 years. You looked up, checking out the pictures on her phone she showed you.
This was a difficult decision. Lashes make or break a woman. The choice of a lifetime really.
“Hybrid, you’ll serve cunt with hybrid for sure.” You answer, and the two of you laugh at the ridiculous statement you just said.
Your attention turned to John, who was about 20 feet behind Marie, who was also trying not to laugh.
“Serving cunt? Do I even want to know?”
That was the first thing John had said to you today. You bursted out laughing, trying your best to contain it. It didn’t work. Marie turned around, and her blue eyes widened at the mere sight of John.
He was intimidating by nature, tall, dark, and mysterious. Now add in his deadly reputation, he could make anyone’s skin crawl with just a glance.
“Holy fuck, you didn’t tell me that Wickathan was coming.” Marie blurted, immediately covering her mouth afterward. Your eyes bulged at her, that name was meant to be an inside joke between everyone in your crew.
Dammit, Marie.
“Oh my god, bitch!” You stage whispered, smacking Marie on her shoulder in disappointment.
Did John hear that right?
“Wickathan?” John repeated, stepping up towards you and your current project. The man was a force to be reckoned with, he towered over you, especially now that you weren’t wearing heels. “Did you come up with that yourself?” He asked. It suddenly became hot in the room, caused by his husky voice that was directed towards you.
You forgot that you had just been staring at him for the past ten seconds, with awkward silence swirling between the two of you. Oof.
“Oh, uh, yeah. I thought it was funny,” you admitted. “I bet the Boogeyman gets fucking old, huh?” you asked, using a mocking tone on the nickname.
John respected your bold attitude.
You could see the way John was looking at you, despite you being a mess from working on bikes all day. His brown eyes trailed up your body and he smiled at seeing you without anything fancy on. He could get used to this.
A woman of many talents? Sign him up.
I might not be a bachelor for long, I better be careful. John thought to himself, smiling down at you.
“Come on, squirt. Let’s have that drink.” John teased, and your face starts to pinken.
Squirt?! What the fuck? You think, stepping from behind the bike, arms crossed while glaring at the menace of a hitman.
“Hey hey, I’m no squirt. What the-"
John interjects by grabbing you by the waist, physically picking you up, and holding you up in the air. You shout at him, and he’s chuckling devilishly at the sight.
Jesus Christ, in front of everyone? I’m their boss! This looks terrible! You’re internally panicking.
“Hey!” You exclaim, attempting to wiggle out of his death grip.
“Oh yeah, you’re a total squirt.” John teased, setting you back down and ruffling your already disheveled head of hair. Your cheeks are beet red, and you grab his forearm and tug him behind you to your private office.
You were a crime boss for fucks sake, is John out of his mind?
John’s laughing at the sight of your much smaller frame guiding him by hand to your office, in fact, he was getting a little excited over it.
Excited would be the understatement of a lifetime.
The sight of your smaller feminine frame compared to his towering large body made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. John shut the door to her office behind him, listening to you sigh and grab two beers out of her fridge.
Interesting. Beer fridge in the office. Respect. John notes.
You handed him a beer but your eyes went straight to his face, on further inspection you noticed a healing black eye and a few new scrapes. Those weren’t there a few days ago. You furrow your eyebrows at him.
There was no way he finished a contract that quickly between seeing you then and now, right?
“Hey, what the hell happened to you?” You ask him, walking closer to him and grazing your dainty fingers over his new wounds. John felt a lump form in his throat.
Oh sweet baby Jesus, she’s so close to me again. Shit! Shit! He’s thinking to himself. John chuckled in an attempt to cover his flustered nature.
“Oh you know, just work. Typical Wednesday for me,” he tells you, he can barely think straight since you’re standing so close to him. You’re wearing that same perfume that you wore when you saw him last, however, it’s overcast by the smell of exhaust and rubber, probably from working in this warehouse all day. “Nothing crazy.”
You rolled your eyes at him and went to go sit on your couch.
“Uh-huh. Who was it this time?” you asked John as he sits fairly close to you on the sofa. Just close enough for his leg to graze your thigh.
John knew exactly what he was doing. A classic playboy tactic, but why did he get this feeling he didn’t want to just hit it and quit it?
John cracked the beer open and read the label. PBR? Unexpected, alright. He couldn’t be mad at that. He took a long sip. Fantastic.
“Ah, some guy that pissed some Cartel member off. The usual.” John sighed, playing back into the couch, stretching his left arm out and laying it on the sofa, coincidentally right behind where you were sitting.
Coincidentally.
This is when John noticed that your couch was purple and velvet. That was some taste you had there. He scanned the room, it was obvious that whoever had this office was a woman in her 20s.
So, you, clearly.
John was shocked that this incredibly feminine office belonged to a crime boss, but he has seen weirder things. But he did have to admit, the office was quite eclectic. Bohemian? What was the word for it? Well, it was something.
“So, how’s work for you? You guys seem awfully busy out there.” John commented as you opened your own beer, his eyes trailing down your body again.
Oh boy. You notice his chest puffing out ever so slightly, god, he was the real deal.
Don’t show weakness, he’s expecting you to fold! Absolutely fucking not! you reaffirm to yourself.
“Pretty good actually. We’re gonna have to do a plate swap on all of the bikes soon though.” You explained, your eyes never leaving his chiseled face.
Shit.
He’s fine as hell.
You stop yourself, you were talking about work. Details about work. Well, not the nitty gritty but, wait a minute.
“Oh? How do you go about that?” John asked, flashing one of those mischievous smirks that he was giving you the other night.
The worst part about it? It fucking worked. His stupid attractive face, those dumb strong hands, his fucking hair that was perfectly styled backward.
He knew it too.
The question he gave you threw you off though. He wants more details on how work is. You raise your eyebrows as your brain goes into panic mode, almost like it’s wired to sense danger or threats.
John can sense that your whole demeanor has changed, long gone was the spunky girl from a minute ago. You were a whole other creature now as you analyzed him, what did he want? Why was he asking questions about your work?
You set your beer down on a side table and sigh.
God dammit.
Whatever, hopefully this would work. Your legs stretch over him until suddenly you’re straddling his lap. John has to cover his mouth to prevent beer from spitting out of his lips, just from pure shock.
“H-hey!” John exclaimed, the feeling of your bottom on his lap and thighs was almost heavenly. Was this seriously happening right now?
You take your hands and wiggle them up his black long-sleeve shirt, in a frantic search for any sort of wires, recording devices, anything really.
But to John, he’s only seeing the attractive young woman feeling him up, her small hands grazing over his lean and muscular torso. They travel to his sides, and then up and down his back, unknowingly tracing over skin that’s covered in tattoos.
Your fingers are making John melt, plus, here you were, only inches from his face. He can’t stop looking at your lips as you’re determined to find anything that would be used to record a conversation.
You’ve lasted this long and built your empire because you were clever, ruthless, but more importantly, cautious.
And here you were, feeling up John fucking Wick to see if he was bugged or not. The most lethal man in the world is centimeters away from you, his hot exhales sticking to your face and neck like sweat.
John can feel his cock grow to the sensation of you straddling him and searching around his body.
John’s heart is pounding, you sigh and take your hands out from underneath his shirt.
Alright, hair it is.
So now, like the little shithead you are, you sit up slightly to dig your fingers through his head of long black locks. Of course, your chest is at eye level with his face, even almost touching it.
“Y/N, w-what are you doing?” John laughed nervously, he wasn’t sure why he was nervous, and his hands were already advancing to your thighs and hips.
What if I just fucked her right here and now on this couch? What I would do to make her scream my name, shit, I want her to ride my cock so bad that she aches for me the next day. John’s mind is screaming with this and other absolutely filthy images.
“Looking for a bug! You keep asking me questions about my job! That is such a federal ass thing to do…” you explain hastily. John’s heart drops. You don’t even notice his hands gripping hard on your hips until he slams you down onto his lap again, snapping you out of your persistent state.
All you can feel pressing up against you is his rock-hard dick.
Oh shit. I’m an idiot.
“You sure do know how to get a man worked up, you know that?” John hisses out. His hand latched onto your small neck, giving it a stern squeeze, you’re too in the moment to even try to move it. He flips you off of his lap, and stands up from the couch, readjusting his clothing and his long hair.
“I’m, uh, going to use the bathroom. Alright?” John asked, you nod, not even putting two and two together since you were so stunned by that move.
Fuck, he sure knows how to manhandle a girl, huh? You silently ask yourself as he quickly leaves the office.
John had to take a few deep breaths once he left the room and shut the door.
“Fuck,” he whispered, all of his instincts are going wild right now. John finds the nearest bathroom in this large warehouse, and locks the door behind him.
If he stayed in that room for another second, he would have absolutely ruined you. John knows damn well you’re no innocent angel, that doesn’t stop him from viewing you as one. As ruthless and dangerous of a woman as you are, he has made up this false sense of purity surrounding your very aura.
John wastes no time in unbuckling his belt and pants, grabbing his thick shaft out of his boxer briefs, and begins to tug. One of the hands that has brought wrath upon so many, now gripping his cock and attempting to relieve himself in a timely manner so he doesn’t raise Y/N's suspicions.
God, she’s way too young for you dude. You shouldn’t be doing this. I bet she’s so tight and wet, oh fuck. John’s mind is racing to the possibilities of what could happen in this bathroom if Y/N was in here with him.
He’s imagining grabbing you by your tiny throat and slamming you against this wall, ripping those overalls off, and throwing them on the floor. He’s so strong that he could lift her up by her thighs against the wall, spread her legs, and thrust right into her tight little cunt.
John’s breath is staggering as he tries to make his grunts and moans as subtle as possible while he pictures himself plowing into you. He’d be torn between being a generous lover or a selfish one.
On one hand, he’s starting to develop feelings for you, his heart flutters when he thinks of your laugh. The way your nose crunches whenever you smile, or the weird slang you use whenever you talk to him.
With all of his hookups after his wife, he never cared too much about making the other women feel good, but he would always succeed.
John was just that good in bed.
You were the exception.
In the very short time he’s had to get to know you, he was starting to catch feelings, and he’s scared of it.
So instead, he's thinking of devouring your pussy and making you cum over, and over again before using you as a hole.
The mere thought of it is enough for John’s knees to tremble as he climaxes, gripping the sink for dear life. He ejaculates into his own hand, his chest rising and falling at a rapid rate, and he met his own reflection in the bathroom mirror.
The mirror shows a half nude John, breathing rapidly, cock in hand, with beads of salty sweat trickling down his damp skin.
Post-nut clarity is hitting in 3, 2, ah. There it is.
John’s mortified at who he sees in front of him, and he cleans up as fast as he possibly can.
What the actual fuck is wrong with me? Am I this much of a perv? Holy shit! John’s internally screaming, zipping up his pants and clearing his throat.
The thought of doing any of those acts with a woman as young as you is, tempting, to say the least.
John closed his eyes and took a deep breath and opened the bathroom door.
He had a drink to finish with you, and he’s praying you didn’t notice how long he was gone.
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The Sonic Crew, 40 Years Later-
Just one of many possibilities, of course, but I challenged myself to imagine what Sonic's crew and Team Dark might look like when they're older. Long post beneath the cut:
Sonic
The one who changed the least
Still an absolute daredevil with a heart of gold
All that running and frequent injuries did a number on his knees and he started using knee braces and a cane/crutches in his late 20s
(it took him a while to be okay with this, but he's over that now)
(He can still run if needed, but he'll be hurting for a few days after.)
Gets his need for speed by racing cars, motorcycles, the Tornado, and by skydiving
Still LOVES helping people and spends a lot of time volunteering
Yes, he's still signing autographs
He's got a permanent home now, mostly to store the Tornado and his other vehicles. He took over Tails' workshop when the fox left for greener pastures and likes keeping the place fixed up.
He's been reading a lot more. Now that he's got a permanent place, his library collection is massive
He's just taking it one day at a time, man. Always has, always will
Tails
The one who changed the most
He owns a garage in the city now, with a sign on the door that says "Prower's inventions and tinker shop"
He always knew that he wanted to sell the things he made, but he had absolutely zero interest in the business side of things outside of running social media accounts
So he's gone indie! He's almost more of an artist and influencer than a world-class inventor, but don't let that fool you
He's still selling his patents to top companies and making a crapton of money
(he's the second most well-off of the friend group aside from Rouge.)
So how's he changed?
He's lost a lot of his childlike innocence, become increasingly more focused on people's perception of him and making online content
and ultimately, he chose technology over the outdoors
Sonic kinda knew that sort of thing was inevitable, but it still hurt when Tails decided to move to the big city and stop exercising as much
But he's very happy where he is and how he's living, and he and Sonic still catch up with each other frequently
Knuckles
Still guarding the Master Emerald!
But he's really learned how to do more with his life despite staying on one island for most of his time
Tails finally convinced him to install enough technology to keep him connected to the world below
Since then, Knuckles has become the number one expert on Echidna anthropology/archaeology in the world
He's written several books using speech-to-text technology
(it's been difficult work- he's not the best reader or writer, but he put the effort in and now he's a published author!)
When he's not writing or giving talks on Echidna culture over video call, he's still taking care of Angel Island, growing his own food, and making more discoveries about ancient Echidna culture. That much hasn't changed
Ever since the defeat of Eggman, he's more willing to take vacations off of Angel Island, but it's still a rare occurence
He usually notifies the friend group via group chat whenever he plans on coming down for a visit, often resulting in reunions
Amy
Amy absolutely "settled down" and opened the bakery she's always wanted to open
Unlike Tails, she LOVES the business side of things along with the actual baking
Her bakery is one of the most famous in the city she lives in now
She loves the thrill of commanding the kitchen staff and managing all the tasks that go into producing good pastries!
She also developed a love for children, and spoils any child in her vicinity rotten
And she has kids of her own, duh
She helps organize and moderate the group chat for the old friend group
And she loves coordinating visits/reunions
Her house is always open to anybody and everybody. She loves entertaining guests, especially if they're old friends
Her house is SO cute and homey it's almost overbearing
When her kids have kids she is going to be the sweetest grandma ever
Rouge
Already detailed in this post here!
Shadow
He's matured a lot, finally having enough wisdom to act as "the wise immortal"
He's become a nomad, sort of like how Sonic used to be, except he takes things at a much slower pace
(he retired from GUN and absolutely had a midlife crisis. this is the result)
He keeps diligent journals of every place he visits, food he tries, people he meets, and so on
He's picked up on Sonic's hobby of learning languages due to his travels
He's gotten much better at socializing with strangers but still prefers solitude
. . . but he still carries a phone on him and participates (albeit rarely) in the old friend group chat
(Rouge and Omega have him on speed dial, of course. He'll drop everything at their beck and call, even if it's a simple "I miss you")
He's gotten more interested in some more esoteric stuff that would've made his younger self cringe, like poetry and spirituality
The world knows him as a bit of cryptid, lol
Omega
Unlike Shadow, he's not retired!
He left GUN and became a freelance operator. Kind of a mercenary, except he has just a touch more discretion than that
(His version of a midlife crisis happened when he finally killed Eggman circa 30 or so years ago. Those were some messy, messy times, but since then he's made peace with his continued existence)
He is still Angry, of course, but he's a lot more chill than he used to be. Sometimes this throws Shadow for a loop.
His ego, though ever-present, has been tempered by age
Mostly because he kinda thinks his younger self was a bit cringe??
Mention the word "Meatbag" and he'll get stoically embarrassed about it
Anyways, he's also a nomad, traveling the world to do jobs and stopping by Tails' garage for repairs
He stops by Rouge's house often, and meets up with Shadow at least once a month
("YOU ARE THE FOOLISH ORGANICS THAT CONVINCED ME OF THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP. YOU ARE NOT GETTING RID OF ME SO EASILY.")
#sonic the hedgehog#miles tails prower#knuckles the echidna#amy rose#shadow the hedgehog#e-123 omega#weird post! but it wouldn't leave my mind#I've been tinkering with this post since I answered that original ask with Rouge#idk man. as an adult fan it's kind of nice to imagine where they all end up
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Okay nobody asked for this but I have some thoughts about Anna Karenina. I read that book in highschool and it was a pain in the ass but still a rewarding experience. I remember liking it, but at the end feeling like "okay, an adulterous unstable woman, at the time when it was written I suppose it was really ground-breaking, it doesn't seem that relevant anymore, who would condemn Anna today for wanting to leave her miserable cucumber of a husband for a hot blond horse rider with BDE, relatable, no one would stone her alive for that today, that was then".
Wrong. So Wrong.
It was obvious to me that Anna was unfairly punished by society for being human and the author intended to present it that way. Apparently, it is not so obvious to a big part of the readers. The discourse I saw online is extremely disturbing:
"I felt like she chose her lover over her son? To me she just seemed extremely selfish. She has a loving and rich husband".
"yes, she did ultimately choose her lover over her son. It's terrible that she lived in a culture that forced her to make that choice, but that's the choice she made. Her own happiness was more important to her than her child's. That's not a choice most parents would make".
"She is not even a good mother she hated her daughter when her daughter Anya was sick only thing that was important to her was that Vronsky didn't came home at the time so she started using opium".
"I don’t like her. She made a poor decision that left a child without a mother and a husband without a wife. Any woman who puts their own selfish desires over their family is not to be liked".
"I can not abide women who let themselves be pushed around so much by society and the moralists of the day; I keep wanting to give them a good shaking and say "Stand up for yourself, girl!"
"One of the reason that Anna is so hard to like is that she only defines herself in relation to other people. Wife to a husband. Mother to a son. Lover to Vronsky. Who was Anna? What did she like? What were her passions (besides men)"?
"Vronsky said that while Anna seemed only to have him to care for, he had many friends and many interests and responsibilities. Adults usually do. Anna was an eternal child, wanting gratification, indulgence, entertainment".
The first observation is of course, how completely off the mark these takes are considering the particular female experience in 19th century Russia. Especially the comments about her not acting like an adult or her being boy-crazy are laughable, as if a woman in that time period could just "stand up for herself" or even define her life and choose her course of action indepentently of men in any fundamental way. As if she would have ever comitted suicide if she could do any of those things. If she could still keep the boyfriend and her son, if she could decide to have a divorce whenever she wanted to, if she could be allowed to simply exist on her own, she wouldn't have committed suicide. A person who commits suicide is a person who doesn't have a way out. She didn't. And it is pretty obviously stated in the text.
The second remark is that in this story we have a (female) character that is so appallingly victimized and crushed, entirely at the mercy of other men, circumstances or even pure chance, while at the same time keeping her personality, desires, and agency intact. This is why this story is so great and this is why these people do not get it. Tolstoy, consciously or not (probably consciously) really outdid himself precisely because he told the story of a victimized woman who was also kind of a bitch, to put it bluntly. She was both. You can't talk about Anna just by focusing on gender inequality. Being a victim of patriarchy is not all Anna was. Anna was selfish yes, she was irrational and obsessive and ruthless and she wanted it all and she wanted it now. It wasn't enough for her just to have an extramarital relationship, tolerated by social norms, allowing her to keep her son and her lover. No, that was not enough, she wanted to live with her lover freely, she wanted to make the rules and she didn't understand why she just couldn't. She felt terribly guilty for abandoning her son, yet she didn't give a single fuck about the kid she had after, the one kid she could actually take care of. Horrendous. Her husband offers divorce, she doesn't want it. He later refuses the divorce, now she wants it. She is not ready to travel and wants to wait, and when her lover tells her they have to wait one day because he wants to see his mother, she suddently wants to leave now. She is strongly advised not to go to the opera because that would bring herself and everyone around her misery, she goes to the opera. She does exactly the opposite of what she was supposed to do at any given circumstance. What she wanted was bigger than what life could give her, and she killed herself.
Now that may be Tolstoy just showcasing what happens to lusty restless adulterous women. Tolstoy, after all, had the misogynistic factory settings of his time. He was also a genius. I don't believe there is anything about this thrilling, vibrant, catastrophic portrait of a woman that came by chance. The inequality, the unfairness of it all is so palpable everywhere in the book, her absolute lack of freedom constrasting with the freedom of her husband lover and brother. All of these men can do whatever they want, they can fuck, cheat, dominate, determine their life and other's without any criticism or consequences whatsoever, and she can't even leave the house without it being a major scandal. She doesn't control anything in her life, she is completely ostracized. She is considered an actual criminal, a pariah, for having human desires.
And yet, despite all that, she has the audacity to want for herself. In her ultimate victimhood, seemingly at the loss of all agency she still does not let others define her inner world one bit. She absolutely defines her life, she makes autonomous decisions, she even defines her own demise by suicide. She chose this, she could have chosen differently, but she didn't want to. The social setting was horrible for women, but if she was slightly more reasonable she could have had a better outcome. She didn't want that. Crazy right?
And that's why modern readers cannot get this book. We are used to media that convey a "message", ready to consume on a plate with a pink ribbon. We are used to passively watching women reacting to horrors imposed on them, and feeling sorry for them. We are used to a Handmaid's tale type of social discourse. We are used to dystopias. We are used to good guy - bad guy dichotomies. We empathize with female characters getting killed, tortured, physically and sexually abused, because they are the victims. But a woman who dares to leave her kid and go away with her lover? Abhorrent. Inconceivable. It is so extremely difficult to empathize with a female character that is just palpably human, it is confusing, she is not victimized enough to deserve empathy from the modern audience. A victim is a symbol, it is an abstraction. Give a victim a mind of her own and human desires, and she is suddenly a whore.
Tolstoy in all his moralizing puritanical 19th century glory, gave us an actually "complex" (as much as I have come to hate the word) female character, and by "complex female character" I mean a fictional woman that maintains her spiritual autonomy while seemingly being entirely determined by other people or circumstances. I cannot say the same for the vast majority of "strong female character" models of contemporary media.
#anna karenina#aspa rambles#the parallels of this to asoiaf/fire and blood crack discourse about certain female characters are interesting#leo tolstoy#tw suicide#patriarchy#misogyny#russian literature
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Heya, Celibacy Question Anon again
I fully know the blog is centered around an AU, I was merely asking because the ethics of making an AU for something that isn't a show and is an actual religion is pretty shaky since actual religious text is pretty different from a form of entertainment media
I'll be honest, I mainly asked because I have seen and heard multiple accounts of Buddhists saying that personifying JTTW in such a way, especially in erasing/tweaking Wukong's celibacy, is extremely disrespectful
So I wanted to be sure that you were aware of the fact that many Buddhists do say that treating JTTW like it's some sort of fandom media (where you would make AUs rather than interpretations of said text) is very disrespectful (and even in interpretations, outright ignoring his celibacy is still considered wrong. Even if it may has been done before, my concern here is that a lot of worshipers of Wukong has said it's disrespectful)
Hello! First I want to say that what I will say in this text is not directly towards you, anon! I say this in general!
What I understood is that this blog and AU are inspired by Journey To The West which is not a religion. It is a great Chinese work of fiction written presumably by Wu Chengen in the XVI century. I would argue it's one of the best Chinese novels of all time that I think everyone should read. Yes, it has a real religion that is Buddhism, but the main focus is the novel derives its material from folk tales and myths. That's how I at least take it when I read it.
The author of the novel deliberately uses mutually interpretative terms which allow different experts, scholars, and religious practitioners to interpret the novel as an allegory of Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Christianity etc. So Buddhism is not the main religion if we want to go very deeply into it.
I personally think Journey To The West tells a story of spiritual transformation that happens to Wukong for example. While the meaning of religious symbolism can be understood in different ways depending on your own religion and background I think most people agree it's about seeking the truth and salvation for the soul.
That's what I want to add to my AU and how I see JTTW in general.
So for your point, I will answer as best as I can bc English is not my native language and I don't want to cause any drama or hate. When it comes to pop culture and media, I understand that there must be people who don't like JTTW AU's bc the creators, like myself, want to explore the possibilities and make our own stories for fun and entertainment.
I personally think if the people in Buddhism and people who worship Wukong want to have their voice heard they should focus on companies that make a profit. Shouldn't this logic also include Lego Monkey Kid which was based on Journey To the West? Their version of Wukong is not exactly the same as in the novel in my honest opinion and the story could easily be someone's AU (and technically it is!) but it has become full-on animation series that makes money. I'm not trying to be disrespectful to anyone! I'm just trying to open the other door in here.
I don't get any money from making this blog. I do this for fun bc JTTW is a novel that I love. Do some Buddhists and people who worship Wukong hate it and find it disrespectful? Maybe yes, but again JTTW is a novel and that's how I view it. It's like saying Christian people hate any movies where they make fun of Jesus Christ like Family Guy. That's not even the worst yet! I'm saying this as someone who used to be a Christian.
What I am saying is that you can't please everyone. I am aware that people might not like what I do, but I know that legally I am not doing anything wrong. I can't please people who are religious. I don't think I have tried to be disrespectful at least not intentionally. If I would I think people would have said it a long time ago.
I hope this gave you some satisfaction or a better idea of why I love JTTW.
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Ahkmenrah x fem! reader "Heimat"
I'm incredibly bored and watched some Night at the museum. Than it just happened that I thought a little bit (is indeed a rare process) and well I thought I could write a little oneshot for the pretty pharao. I couldn't help myself soo yeah. Btw the reader is in this oneshot from the time of the 20th century and to be more specific (is it written that way? idk well if not I am counting on all of you that you're going to tell me if it's right or not) the reader is from the time of the second world war and well there may be some topics that can trigger people. So I will put a trigger warning at the beginning. But well maybe not I'm not sure what I will include and so on and I also don't know how I make the reader so yeah... I will just go with the flow and write for my hearts content (not sure if I can put it that way). So before the beginning I write a quick definition for the word "Heimat". Ouhh and my little to long author notes are those little mini textes.
Heimat (german): "a place, where someone was born and grew up or is there long enough to have a feeling of being at home (is mostly a word for a place (and sometimes someone) that (or who) someone has a very special connection to)
translated out of the "Duden" can't say it's the right translation to the definition but well if someone of you has a better definition that's in english I'll gladly swap that with this one if you don't mind.
Well let's go then! ahh... btw I write about a female reader so yeah... if you want another one with gender neutral or a male reader ask right away and then I'll write it as soon as I can! I am not a native speaker so well it certainly has some errors and I'll correct them if you tell me where some are. Thanks and let's go!
TW: mentions of the holocaust, death, national socialists and some of the other stuff about the 2nd ww and also swearing but only lightly and once if I'm not mistaken
You have been warned. Reading on your own... I forgot the word. Eh... something like concequences ig but I'm not sure. It's way to late for writing tbh. And if you don't want to read the stuff with the 2nd ww then just skip the background. I will mark it for you guys.
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Everyday I remember my cruel death. I am nothing but a little wax figurine that just resembles my once very much alive self but I still have her memorys. Even though I am only made out of wax and don't even have a real brain. She was a hero for a lot of people even though she was only a little artist that wasn't much known. She lived in nazi germany so she knew what was going on in germany. Even more because one of her friends worked for the terrifying camps. He told her a lot of things proudly and most of them weren't allowed to be told to zivilian people like herself. She took advantage of the knowledge and used it for her art. She showed the terrors of the war of the holocaust of everything.
She also started to try to change the world for the better and so she came into the view of the regime and their corrupted forces. She was able to trick them but well her luck ran out after she helped a spy of the united states. The spy learned a lot of things from her that were cultural differences between the two countries. With her help he was able to keep hidden. To his luck he looked also like a "typical german" probably had ancestors that were german people. However that was a reason why spys of the allies were basically searching for her so that she can also help them. She was bad at denying the need for help of other people. The spys that resided in her humble home also found out that she hid two jewish families in her house.
Europe and germany were her so called "Heimat" she looked up to Stefan Zweig who also saw europe as his "Heimat" or his home. But well his works were forbidden in germany thanks to the national socialists. She was enraged to find out that her favourite author isn't allowed in her home. But she couldn't give a single shit. She still had the books of him that she once bought. She hid them well. They always tried to find something so that they could arrest and torture her. Well she wasn't allowed to draw anymore and that was a problem but she never stopped with helping others out.
Then someday one of her neighbours told her off to the ss. They came into her home and found everything the spy who resided with the young woman and also the jewish families, the forbidden books and her forbidden art studio. Also the books of different languages such as english, french, japanese, italian, spanish and much more. She learned them all and can speak some of them fluently while the others were a little rusty but good enough to communicate decently. They caught her and they also punished her. And their punishment was the reason for her death. She was a strong woman who helped as much people as she could by sending them off to other countries or hiding them and teaching them. The spy was also tortured and died right next her when a bomb of the english army fell onto the building they were in. He apologized to her but she told him that it wasn't his fault and that she decided for herself to walk on this path that was hidden in the darkness without any sight of light. She wanted to bring light into her home, her "Heimat". But she lost it and she pobably never gets it back. Well that's what her dying self thought but that wasn't exactly true.
~End of backstory~
She came back to life and well she is now my humble self who is a good friend of hystorical people like Sacagawea, Theodore Roosevelt and others. My personal favourite of them all is Ahkmenrah. He is a pharao of egypt who is dead like most of us. Makes sense right? And well he kind of is more to me. I certainly don't know what I am for him but he is more than a friend. I think it's enough to say that I have kind of a crush on the handsome egyptian man. Well okay it's a big crush to be honest.
Everytime when I have those nightmares about my death he's there to help me. I'm very thankful to have him. Even though I'm quite sad that I don't know about his feelings for me.
Well my little thoughts about my past and current situation were interrupted by hand that waved in front of my face. I blinked twice and mumbled a little "Wa?", that made him chuckle. "You were very deep into your thoughts today. Is something troubling you?", he asked me somewhat amused but also concerned. I just stared into his eyes and shook my head indicating a "no". He just sighs and asked if I could tell him about some stories that I read. He asked for some fairy tales. So I told him some. Mostly the famous ones like "Snow white", "Rapunzel", "The beauty and the beast" and also "Sleeping Beauty".
At some point he laid down and rested his head on my lap. I stopped reading and stared down on him with wide eyes. He eyed me from his position and asked what's wrong. He wasn't like this before. Never. And this shocked me. "Nothing's wrong. But tell me why are you laying your head on my lap?", I asked with a blush that told the world how embarassed and overworked I was from the whole situation. "I'm simply resting. I was feeling tired." Well he is dead so it was kind of a miracle for me to think that he can feel tired. I just shrugged and returned still a little flustered to reading the current story.
After I finished with the story I glanced down to Ahk who still rested his head on my lap. Surprisingly he kind of fell asleep. I watched his peaceful face and felt the heat returning into my face. I may be out of wax but well I kind of can blush at least at night. Though everyone can kind of. It's cute when I see Teddy blush because of Sacagawea or the other way around. I kind of still wonder how it's possible. But well we talk about a relict that can bring basically everything to life so questioning that kind of stuff can bring a headache to someone and by someone I mean myself.
As I was thinking and staring down on the handsome pharao on my lap the mentioned man was waking up and saw to me. Catching me red-handed as I was watching him sleep. I then registered that he had opened his beautiful brown eyes and well you can guess it. I became something similar to a living tomato. He smiled widely seeing me this flustered and laughed out loud.
"Thank you for guarding my sleep! But I'm sure that the sun will rise very soon." Indeed the sky was getting lighter every minute and it's just a matter of time that we need to be on our places. He sat up but put me to a halt when I wanted to stand up. "Could you answer me one little question about a german word?", he asked looking at the young woman with great interest. "Sure. What is your question?"
"What does "Heimat" mean?" Heimat. I haven't heard that word for long only thought about it. "Well "Heimat" is similar to the english word "home" but some people might say that it has a higher meaning. It's more connected with feelings and it doesn't need to be a place. Sometimes it's a person or a thing." "Hmm can you tell me if my usage of the word is correct?", he asked kind of nervous id I'm putting it right. I just nodded and he took a deep breath. That kind of makes it suspicious. Like if he's going to confess or something. He wouldn't right?
Then he grabbed for my hand and said "(Y/N) my beautiful little desert flower. You are everything to me and my "Heimat" is wherever you are. Eh.. could you tell me how I say in german that you're my "Heimat"?" "Du bist meine Heimat", I answered in a trance like state. "(Y/N). Du bist meine Heimat*" I teared up after he said that. "Du bist auch meine Heimat, Ahk.**" He caressed my cheek and kissed me slowly. It was a cute kiss that showed all his emotions for me and of course I reciprocated it as soon as I was out of my trance.
"I love you", he mumbled lowly while connecting his forehead with mine. "I love you too." He is my "Heimat" and I'm pretty sure he'll always be. Well as long as the tablet and the time are on our side.
What the two lovebirds haven't noticed was that the tablet had little corrosions over it. And that their next adventure is waiting for them.
Well that's it my friend's! It's really late and I'm kind of tired as idk. Especially since it's 3 a.m. And I need to go to school tomorrow like ahhhh! Am I dumb kinda. Do I have to write a class test in math tomorrow? Yes. Yes, I have to. Well that's the reason why I'm going to sleep now. So yeah. Ouh and if I got anything wrong tell me friendly if it's unfriendly I will simply ignore it. I'll make soon a masterlist and link it to this post and the other two as well. And yeah... See ya guys later!
Edited: Here is the masterlist!
Masterlist
Translation:
"(Y/N). Du bist meine Heimat." -> "(Y/N). You're my home." *
"Du bist auch meine Heimat, Ahk." -> "You're my home as well, Ahk." **
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Hi! I’m trying to get my bearings on the post about bimisogyny, and I want to know more on why/how it’s appropriating (copying?) the theoretical underpinnings of transmisogyny. Can you explain it more, or direct me to where I can learn about it? Feel free to say no, I just wanted to ask directly 👍🏼
(feel free to answer publicly or privately, either is fine)
So part of what's upsetting to me about the whole situation is that there's a significant corpus of *theory* surrounding transmisogyny, a great deal of analysis, and these attempts to equate things like "transandrophobia" and "bimisogyny" to it completely elide frameworks in what is very blatantly a game of equalization or minimization. Transandrophobia is a bit more blatant at this - attempting to set up an intersection of transphobia (real) and misandry (not, tragically), and with its proponents essentially openly using it as a point-scoring method against trans women (a fairly prominent proponent was outed as a serial abuser today, another recently instigated a fairly large outcry by feeling the need to draw over stats on violence against transgender people to suggest that it was undercounted against trans men but overcointed against trans women). I think most transfemimists rightly recognize that people who uphold "transandrophobia" as a legitimate axis of oppression are largely just reactionaries - it's true that trans men and trans women experience transphobia differently, but the idea that trans men have it worse is... unsubstantiated is a generous term. The sole function of the word seems to be as a method for transmascs to signal to each other their own transmisogyny.
"Bimisogyny" as a term I think is coming from a better place - bisexual women do, in fact, experience particularly heightened level of misogynistic violence. But... at the same time it's fairly clear that the coining of the word comes from a desire for equalization rather than the emergence of a real framework of understanding. The only substantive writing on the subject essentially gathers a bunch of statistics on the misogynistic violence bisexual women face, lists a couple patterns of fetishization and control from men, and throws its hands up. No motives or mechanisms are considered. This, combined with the author having a history of questionable analysis of politics surrounding sexual orientation in the past, kind of give the game away to me. If an actual understanding of bimisogyny had been set up or was being worked towards, the piece (and the general discourse surrounding it) would be centered on developing an understanding of why conditions are so dismal for bisexual women - who benefits from it, who enacts it, and how. This isn't to say that such a framework isn't needed, it's just to say that... as people use the word right now, it kind of explains nothing while trying to carry the same gravitas as transmisogyny. This is part of why people responding to me with "oh so bi women aren't allowed to talk about their oppression?" is grating because that's obviously not the function of using the term as things are now. I must also admit that the originating piece lingering overlong on anti-bisexual sentiment among lesbians and referring to "bi-exclusionary lesbians"... does not give much confidence either.
And one thing that's been glazed over is that understandings of transmisogyny aren't just "shit sucks for trans women, ergo we get a word", and even if I frankly have a lot of disagreements with the originating text, there is a great deal of insight on the cultural factors informing transmisogyny. Serano theorizes transmisogyny as the intersection of oppositional sexism (the belief that there are essentially two types of human being, split by reproductive capacity into two non-overlapping and distinct categories) and misogyny (the assertion of men's power through the negation of women). I don't even really agree with this reading - I tend to follow Wittig's stance that the establishment of sex categorization is itself necessary to facilitate misogyny and that sex is not in fact prior to misogyny but is constructed. I think Serano is a bit of a liberal, and naturalizes some things which are socially constructed as innate or predetermined. But the understanding that transmisogyny is rooted in the maintenance of sex as a system does hold water, and contemporary materialist feminists do consistently have apt analyses of transmisogyny through this lens (often centered around the positionality of transgender women as degendered women - women who are subjected to misogyny and misogynistic violence without the already flimsy defenses afforded to others through gender recognition). The narrative that transgender women are sexually threatening or gain benefits from supposed intrinsic maleness is itself used as justification to abuse us in a traditionally misogynistic manner. One thing that has been of particular interest to me is the tendency of non-female transgender people (generally trans men and trans-mascs) to leverage a female self-gendering willingly and temporarily for the sole purpose of gendering transgender women as male as a justification for dismissal, violence, or resentment. I think that this necessarily points to transmisogyny being useful as a tool not only for the construction of hegemonic male and female identity but also multiple transgender identities, but I don't want to get any further into the weeds right now.
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Found a really good post I agreed with on my dash but someone left an annoying addition to it that I don't agree with so I just can't reblog the post now but it was a good post about like, 'depiction isn't endorsement inherently, but you absolutely need to learn when it IS endorsing something and let people have meaningful conversations and critique when it is the case."
And i feel like I wish we were at a time when we didn't need to say depiction isn't endorsement because some people are still having discourse that we already had in 2012 about how just because a bad thing is featured and it isn't said in the text that it's a bad thing doesn't mean it's an endorsement of that thing because people generally are expected to come into a piece of media with their own moral compass already intact and KNOW that the thing is bad instead of having their hand held and told basic life facts.
Because I do think sometimes some one will do something, like, racist, and then try and shut down the conversation with "Depiction isn't endorsement" and stuff and we need to be free to have conversations when something is ACTUALLY harmful as opposed to having to like....baby step people through basic "fiction doesn't exist to teach you good morals. kink doesn't mean what you want in reality and taboo kinks are more likely a symptom of rape culture, not a perpetrator of it. depicting something in fiction doesn't mean you endorse the thing in real life even when it isn't explicitly stated as bad in the content itself." and like very basic level shit.
It's like when you are on the level and you know these basic things, you're now free to have actual conversations about social justice and media and the way fandom often sidelines certain demographics of characters in favor of white male leads and all these other important conversations that need to be had but it's not gonna happen if we keep having to hold people's hands and say "No, rebecca, just because this character did this bad thing and the text isn't saying the thing was bad explicitly doesn't mean that the author likes the bad thing happening irl or is a dangerous predator or something. They probably just expect you to already know and to be able to use your good good brain because you are a big strong grown up now and you can do that!"
I dunno this thing became longer than i intended it's just frustrating and I wish we could like...explore nuance on the internet lol. Depiction isn't endorsement inherently, but sometimes it is and we need to have conversations about that but as long as we have to keep informing people 'depiction isn't endorsement' we can't move on from it and HAVE those conversations about what to do when it IS endorsement and how to identify when it is. People would rather it always is or always isn't endorsement because that's much much easier to handle and doesn't require you to have to use your brain to analyze context and do research on the creator themself and stuff like that.
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Anyway general breakdown of my thoughts on Scott Pilgrim:
Perfectly solid romantic drama. I'm actually kind of impressed that the story does not feel dated (except in, like, having flip phones) despite it having by now been copied to death. I'd even dare to say it was ahead of its time. A lot of that is purely through the lack of apprehension with which it portrays gay people, particularly gay men, which like, no one was doing in the early 2000s. That isn't exactly praise, and it comes with a lot of caveats, but it's worth saying. The art was Fine. There was some truly repulsive comic art coming out in the early 2000s and while I'm not a fan of the art style, it's not terrible.
Neither Scott nor Ramona are particularly interesting characters on their own, and their relationship is (deliberately) plain and stereotyped. This is somewhat lampshaded in the story, but still a bit dissonant when compared to the cultural impact of * their * relationship on the general Heterosexual Culture. Ultimately, their romance was the least interesting part of the story, which I think Bryan Lee O'Malley knew.
Knives is kind of the obvious emotional core of Scott Pilgrim, and (by Bryan Lee O'Malley's admission) has the most true and complete character arc. She's, in my opinion, the articulation of a lot of the greater thoughts and anxieties held by the author as opposed to Scott, who is a general representation of a (white) everyman. There's a lot I could say about Knives specifically, but it really comes down to Knives being too big a character for her story. Despite all of her development and screentime, her arc feels starkly incomplete. This isn't really * inappropriate * -- the central idea of her character is that she is a child, ergo still developing -- but it does make the conclusion feel more empty than it should.
The way this is most obvious, I think, is the discomfort with which Scott Pilgrim (series) handles The Existence Of Gay Women. Bryan Lee O'Malley is obviously pretty damn comfortable with the existence of gay men, but seems to have difficulty in processing intimate, sexual relationships between women. Knives is (subtly) written as gay from the get-go, but this aspect of her character (despite, arguably, being a core motivational factor to every other aspect of her character) ultimately produces a lot of momentum to have nothing much done with it. By the beginning of volume 4 it's evident that the author has noticed this dissonance and attempted to address it, but ultimately did so ineffectively. What resulted was a strange, forced kiss between an adult woman and an underaged girl that had essentially no lasting narrative impact, and also Ramona Is Gay, Btw, Not That This Will Ever Be Acknowledged Again. (I kind of have nothing to say about the bizarre pedobait in that volume that was subsequently backtracked.)
The last point I'll allocate to this post is how taken aback I was by the pervasiveness of race as a source of conflict in Scott Pilgrim given that I'd literally never seen someone acknowledge race as a source of conflict in Scott Pilgrim. Knives, aside from her conflicts as a gay girl, is also an articulation of the author's anxieties when it comes to race, particularly the perceived inadequacy of Asian men and the vulnerability of Asian women. This, while fairly understated, is very deliberate and very heavily saturated within the text of the story. Just as Scott has a fetish for gay women, he's implied to have a fetish for (young) Asian girls, and while his repeated and specific assertion of physical dominance of Asian boys/men is never brought up in those terms, it's pretty obviously A Thing.
I think this is probably the most interesting aspect of Scott Pilgrim from a "what's this author's fucking Problem" perspective given that Bryan Lee O'Malley has a Korean mother, though I don't particularly want to go into too much depth. I will say the one way in which Scott Pilgrim felt especially dated was in its particular slew of Orientalist stereotypes, which were in themselves pretty telling: Japanese people have scary cyberpunk shit, Chinese people do martial arts, and Korean people are entirely beneath mention. As I was finishing the story I had to wonder how the story might be different if it were made today, specifically in that Korean people are now at the forefront of North American pop cultural consciousness in a way they were not in the early 2000s. I had to wonder the author's relationship to his own identity informed his decision to not include any prominent characters of his own ethnicity.
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The Komi Report - Communications
446 & 447
This week, in Komi Can't Communicate:
Kawai throws a party...
...and the class takes a vote.
Read It:
Mangareader
Mangakakalot
Viz Media (North America Exclusive)
Mangadex (English updates are dead, but there’s the backlog; and Spanish + Portuguese language updates)
Fun chapters! Kawai is very intense as always, but I've established before how fond I am of her. I think she's fun.
The big news!!!
Congratulations Komi!!! I'm so proud of her (❁´◡`❁)
Kawai texts like she's 90 years old
These connections will aid her in staging a series of political assassinations that result in her seizing state authority.
First of all, I'm fascinated by the arm below Kometani's floating head. It's not positioned in relation to human anatomy. A floating arm for a floating boy.
Second of all, I like that little moment of Komi asserting her boundaries. "Um, No. Thank you". Clear and firm. Good work, girl
Put a pin in Tadano's conspicuous absence for later. Also, that authoritarian dictator looking poster of Kawai asjdnaklsjdnasd
No wonder that cake looks exactly like a wedding cake.
Kawai turning her culture festival into a celebration for Komi is ridiculously excessive, but I bet if you told her that she'd look totally confused asdnaosndkoasdasd. I want to go to Komi Fest.......
it's the Hindenburg of our time.......
She needed a good time :3 so did I......
I like 446! Imo it would have been nice to get some moments of Kawai interacting with her class (other than giving them orders during the balloon crisis), learn about her school, or see something else more personal about her. But this is fun.
Some exciting news, some quality goofs, and I like how witnessing Kawai's decisive leadership informs Komi's resolve in the following chapter. Whether her resolve is simply to make their final culture fest a good one, or whether she has other some other goal in mind, we shall see.
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I don't have many comments to make about 447, except that Najimi is funny
and Komi's confidence is so beautiful.
Now take the pin out of Tadano's conspicuous absence. It wouldn't be notable, except that they draw particular attention to it. He "couldn't come" and Kawai doesn't want to put "undue pressure" on him; a statement that confuses Komi.
This is certainly referring to the surprise Komi Fest, like Kawai thinks Tadano would feel pressured by her demonstration of love for Komi. But at the end of 447 there's this moment
Seems to be leading to something? Like Tadano has something to tell her. Him being notably absent from the chapter where Komi finds out she's been accepted into university, and then having that curious moment at the end of 447, leads me to think that perhaps he has some dramatic news regarding his own university application.
Or maybe he's just stunned by Komi's confidence and personal growth. Whatever it may be, I think it's definitely leading into something
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Hopes for the culture festival!!! Tadano going girlmode again is a must. I'd love to see Perro Rabioso (the YamaNaka band) and get some heavy yuri moments from them. Emoyama and Sukida should go on a date and kiss. Benujit Spopo needs to show up of course. And we need Hitomi and Shosuke to get a major appearance; maybe a chapter or two about their culture fest. It's been so long since we saw them (-_-)
Nice chapters. Feels good ^w^
I'll see you next week! Until then, stay safe 💞
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Bless you for compiling what’s going on with that ex-bird app. It’s been genuinely insightful for me to understand the thoughts of the kinds of people behind those accounts.
That person trying to cancel creators for associating with Forever (and probably advocating for his lore to be excised from the server) saying “but I can’t possibly give up guapoduo, it’s My Hyperfixation” is very telling. Hypocrisy specifically in the context of “separating the art from the artist” isn’t something I’ve seen before, shockingly, so I guess I get to add that to my Social Media Discourse Bingo. (I had an online friend in 2016 who I was terrified to talk about my interests with because I didn’t know what angry punk teenagers on tumblr had deemed “evil and disgusting”, and even SHE stopped listening to some of her favorite metal bands when she learned they were homophobic, and had absolute turmoil when she learned that David Bowie might have allegedly slept with an underage groupie in the 70s. Her constant, unpredictable rage at seemingly random pieces of media was awful for my mental health, but at least she wasn’t a genuine hypocrite.)
Also that tone of “I’ve had good memories here… but I just can’t handle it anymore.” It sounds like someone whose meaningful but soul-crushing work has finally broken them, almost sounding like someone I knew at the frontline worker job I had mid-pandemic who missed her own birthday three years in a row, got repetitive stress injuries, and then got passed over for a promotion that was given to someone who did a fraction of the work. But the “God willing, I’ll never come back” was followed by “I’m 13” …damn, I got whiplash so hard that I astral projected into a universe where things made sense for a second. Because of course kids don’t have a complex view of other countries’ political systems or cultural pressures. Or the nuances of personal change and redemption. Or that sometimes people are just not online for a few days. And of course a 13-year-old doesn’t understand how dumb and petty they look by trying to ruin other peoples’ careers in the name of Activism (tm) while having a fandom portmanteau username.
“I didn’t want it to come to this but… I’m going to delete twitter!” I hope so, but more for their own sake, honestly. I actually have less anger towards most of them now. Many are kids with a false sense of grandiosity that makes them believe they are the ultimate moral authority, but have very little understanding of how messy people or societies can be. I just hope they can learn one day, and look back on who they are now and cringe. (And then many years after that, have the grace to forgive themselves.)
Oof, sorry for the wall of text.
I’m still not over the whole situation with Forever. I miss his energy, and his accent, and his silly bits with Richas that always dragged on too long, and N.I.N.H.O. (and everything it represented), and how different he and Cellbit are but how they understood each other WAY too well, and how he tried to make people who didn’t log onto the server as often still feel welcome and wanted, and how happy he got when anyone non-Brazilian even tried to speak a little bit of Portuguese. (I was learning, but I’ve barely touched it since.) I won’t lie, it’s affected me far more than I thought it would.
I miss Forever. Thank you for your blog being a little space where that’s okay.
I'm honestly a little worried for the kid (s), not in a "oh I just want the best for" fake bs way just a little concerned tbh. I still don't like them but I don't hate them either, they're a kid.
But at the same time I'm worried for their well being, they have like 5,000 follower on their main Twitter and 28 on curious cat (which is apprantly high for that app )
That's 5000 people (teens or not) waiting for you to tell them how to feel that can't be good for their mental state, not for a 13 yr old kid.
Most of their life was spent learning about the world and their still learning, these are the ages where you're worried about the sun blowing up.
You haven't seen how awful the world can be yet, You haven't seen how much worst it could get you haven't learned calculus yet!
To you the world is only these 13 years and you think if you don't act now everything will be over.
I get it, I had that fear too, most people grown into it and realize just how shitty it can get an settle in choosing their own battles and not letting It consume them, because no one had time for that anymore.
You want to experience the most out of live while you can and the older you get the easier it is to balance.
To me it looks like one of those situation where you'll look back and think "I wish I enojyed my childhood."
Because 5000 people waiting for you to tell them who to bash, 28 people prasing your while admitting they use to hate you.
It can't be good. And if they were to read this they'd probably say "oh you don't actually care you just want to shit on me."
And like, yeah I don't care, but am I saying all this because I want to shit on them? no I'm just pointing out concerns.
Apart from that I fully agree with anon.
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how would a westerosi noble lady be treated if she wanted to be a bit more intellectual such as reading scholarly books as well patronizing the arts and sciences as much as the setting allows
Depends on the lady, depends on the situation, I would guess.
(All of this is assuming we’re talking about a married lady running her own household; there might be entirely different considerations for, say, an unmarried daughter or sister, or a woman married to a landless aristocrat, or a widowed woman.)
Where does she live? If she is the lady of somewhere like, say, Bear Island, she might find herself the object of confusion, derision, and/or scorn for prioritizing (what might be see as) impractical artistic pursuits instead of the practical management of the family seat. (Compare Dacey and Maege Mormont’s mockery of Lynesse, negatively comparing her to the warrior-woman depicted on the Mormont hall’s carving.) By contrast, if she is the lady of a seat like Lannisport or Oldtown, then such a lady might be admired or praised for taking an interest in a naturally more learned and cosmopolitan environment or patronizing the sorts of artists and artisans that might flourish in a rich and diverse city environment.
What kind of man is this woman married to? If she were married to someone like Randyll Tarly, I can imagine that the husband would firmly reject and forbid the perhaps “useless” endeavor of a woman pursuing learning. (Compare, say, the apocryphal and probably untrue story that James VI of Scotland thought that Latin had the unfortunate side effect of making women more cunning.) By contrast, a woman married to someone more interested in scholarly texts himself might find herself encouraged to pursue such an interest herself.
How successful, for lack of a better term, is this woman at the rest of what might be termed her job (again, purely in Westerosi eyes)? Has she borne sons (specifically sons, in largely patriarchal Westeros) enough to secure whatever dynasty she has been sent to propagate via marriage? Has she capably run the household, or even improved that running (compare, say, Florence Fossoway, who as the shrewd Lady of Highgarden increased the Tyrell incomes by a third)? Has she shown proper devotion to whatever faith is the dominant religion of her family and society (or is she at least given a pass by her marital family if she does not)? Or is her unorthodox interest in learning and/or artistic patronage going to be used against her, to highlight what might be seen as her other failures?
What is the climate of learning in which this woman is living? (I remind everyone with deep regret and more than a little resentment that Westeros has exactly three known female authors, one of whom exclusively wrote about her sexual escapades and another of whom is only cited for her supposed knowledge of sexual escapades.) Is this a time and place like, say, the era of the Three Sage Kings in the Reach, when Andal culture (including, presumably, Andal learning) was finding more acceptance with the Gardener court and the greater Reach nobility? If so, such a lady might find her interest in scholarship praised as reflecting the shifting socio-political norms of her society. By contrast, if this woman were living in, say, a post-Quellon Greyjoy Iron Islands, she might find her interest in scholarship scorned as dangerously foreign and anti-Old Way.
These are not even scratching the surface of all the considerations to be taken into account, or all the scenarios that might arise. These are just some points to ponder when thinking about a woman interested in scholarship and patronage of the arts in Westeros.
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