#makes her look incapable of handling criticism
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Ok so I have not seen the latest Helluva Boss episode yet but apparently, people are saying that Viv created a character who is meant to be representing some people who criticize the show which...wow, is Viv really that incapable of taking criticism to the point she has to stoop this low? Like sometimes when the criticism is invalid sure, but HB has gotten valid criticism from people and unless you can make valid counter-arguments against the criticism towards your show, doing something like this makes you look incapable of handling criticism.
#hazbin hotel critical#hazbin hotel criticism#vivziepop critical#helluva boss critical#look I don't think that viv is a bad person#not saying that she's an angel or the best person in the world (ya no)#but a some of the controversies surrounding her are a bit dumb imo#That being said...#her show is getting valid critiscm from people and the fact she's doing something like this#makes her look incapable of handling criticism#Just sayin
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A breakdown of an analysis of female portrayal in media
Originally the entire post was going to be a takedown of the post, but to iamafanofcartoon's credit, a lot of the points they make are valid. However, given their bias towards RWBY, some double standards come up ironically as they bring up double standards.
"A lot of people are incapable of viewing female characters as anything other than an innocent saint or a portrait of pure evil.
Arguably the best characters are morally ambiguous ones who live in the gray area between good and evil, but women are much less often afforded that distinction than their male counterparts."
This is the biggest piece of irony ever when you remember how they treat Ironwood, someone who has moral ambiguity (at least in Volume 7) or even how they regard Ruby lying to Ironwood as something that isn't something morally ambiguous, but rather 100% guaranteed the right thing to do.
"I’m been having a huge problem connecting to media.
The only women around are very young or very old and their main defining feature is usually motherhood."
They say as the protagonists of RWBY are women who are very young.
"A lot of the time if there is a military high ranking female character or just female leader that is masculine or butch she will be the villain to be defeated by the traditionally feminine or at least more feminine heroine/love interest of the hero."
Oh, military being evil is just a trope in of itself. You should be familiar with it because you like to bring up a certain someone who fits that trope to a T over and over:
Wonder why he gets shit.
I'm going to pause and heavily commend I Am A Fan for bringing up the overuse of the term Mary Sue and how it's now used as a phrase to shut down any female protagonist who just happens to be just a little too much in the screen time, especially given its ironic origin being that it was to parody the "I get into Starfleet, befriend literally everyone, and then tragically die" trope that cropped up in several Star Trek zines.
There's a lot of debate with Rey and the sequels, but we'll leave that for another day. All I will say though is that holy shit, the defense for Rey here is top notch, especially that part where they compare Rey's handling of weapons to Luke's handling of weapons.
A lot of the post starting from when they criticize the overuse of Mary Sue is actually a really solid read and I recommend you giving it a look, even if you don't agree with what they say.
That said, it comes crashing down over to here:
"You heard of The Bechdel test: Two women have to talk about something other than a man. There is no time window."
Ignoring the fact that the Bachdel test isn't meant to be taken seriously (something that the linked page literally points out), RWBY failed this test numerous times.
Ruby: (putting the pamphlet away) Yeah! Great idea, sis! (holding out her hand as she clears her throat) Hello, Weiss! I'm Ruby! Wanna hang out? We can go shopping for school supplies!
Weiss: (seemingly enthusiastic) Yeah! And we can paint our nails and try on clothes and talk about cute boys, like tall, blond, and scraggly over there!
That's just the straight up example. "But Psyga, she was being sarcastic!". Okay. Well, the condition is that they have to be talking about a man and not specifically someone they're dating, so pick your poison with these two Bumblebee exchanges. One has them talking about two men!!!
Blake: I had someone very dear to me change. [...] you're not him. And you've never done anything like this before. So... I want to trust you. I will trust you. But first, I need you to look me in the eyes and tell me that he attacked you. I need you to promise me that you regret having to do what you did.
Yang: (wipes her eyes of tears, then says as calmly as possible) I saw him attack me, so I attacked back.
Yang: Do you… (loud exhale) Do you think we should've told Ironwood about Salem, before he put so much on the line for Amity?
Blake: Sounds like you do.
Yang: (sighs) I trust Ruby, but I think he deserves to know what he's stepping into. We all did.
But you wanna know the most batshit insane part? Stretch the definition, and you can have RWBY fail this test first try.
Glynda: I hope that you realize that your actions tonight will not be taken lightly, young lady. You put yourself and others in great danger.
Ruby: [Roman and his gang] started it!
Glynda: If it were up to me, you'd be sent home... With a pat on the back... (she notices Ruby's smile) ...And a slap on the wrist. (she demonstrates with her riding crop, which Ruby barely avoids as she gives out an "Eeek!) But... [Ozpin] would like to meet you.
Like, I would bring up that Rick and Morty pointed out how it's not meant to be taken seriously, but then I remembered it's called Rick and Morty and not Rikki and Morticia, so it might not even be in I Am A Fan's radar.
"Go watch RWBY or Legend of Korra. Both involve a deconstruction of tropes. Both involve women standing up against an authority that demands respect based on being authority, not based on respect.
Both shut down the white male savior trope so hard, that men and women who love the patriarchy despise both shows."
What they don't tell you is that the "standing up against authority" bit in RWBY only lasts for two Volumes and it ends up making the main character's deep-rooted depression outright suicidal because their actions in doing so had lasting consequences to their psyche. Not to mention that up until Volume 6, they had been following the instructions of authority.
A straight white male one at that who in Volume 4 went into the body of a person of color and has to possess him in order to continue giving instructions. And that's when the girls start to question his authority and even yell at him. If that's not fucking yikes, I don't know what is.
Korra's standing against authority is more "let the bad guys depose the authority and then we'll clean up the mess" but that's neither here nor there.
Also, I don't think adding a fe in front of male counts as shutting down the white male savior trope.
But of course, anything that Team RWBY or Korra does is immediately held to a double standard and ripped into for anything that they do NOT because they’re flawed or because of writing decisions. Its because they’re LGBT women that they’re held under a microscope.
No, it's because people explored the long-standing consequences of their actions and what it means for upending society as a whole. I haven't been in the Legend of Korra discourse but I definitely know the discourse of RWBY to know that them being LGBT has nothing to do with them getting criticized.
In fact, two of the four girls aren't even LGBT in the first place and the other two are B but you keep denying that and call them L.
Or have you noticed that every fixit fanfic for both series involves defending the Patriarchy while supporting toxic masculinity and trying to revive the White Male Savior trope that both shows have tried so hard to bury six feet under?
Have you noticed that RWBY involves four girls defending the patriarchy while supporting toxic masculinity and trying to revive the White Male Savior trope that it ironically tried to bury six feet under?
Because after Volume 3, the plot is about them going from Kingdom to Kingdom and protecting the Academies, which the last King of Vale had essentially turned into castles to house powerful relics.
When all four of these relics are gathered, they summon two brothers who will pass judgement onto mankind and are seen as, so far, one of the only ways to truly deal with the true threat of Salem, i.e. they are the white male saviors.
Despite being even more trigger happy and axe crazy than Volume 8!Ironwood.
And just to show just how much of a tangent I Am A Fan's post is... That's the very last paragraph. Do you see why I call them FNDM-GPT?
EDIT: This motherfucker reposted this from March! https://iamafanofcartoons.tumblr.com/post/711784852348878848/we-need-to-address-how-media-and-media-critics
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Don't mind me just dropping receipts of JK Rowling engaging in holocaust denial~ Tee hee! :3
https://youtu.be/whJJGqVtkEk?si=aN1HXEfuR7BgxmgY
First of all, I should be financially compensated for having to watch this guy in an Ethel Cain shirt for thirty minutes.
Also, all of the voices used to narrate the posts were so blatantly exaggerated to make people he disagreed with sound cartoonishly villainous which was cringy as fuck. He was incapable of handling this topic with maturity or neutrality at all, and that made it incredibly difficult for me to digest this.
Here's what I learned, unbiased, from the video.
JKR saw a tweet from another user that claimed that nazis burned books related to trans healthcare as an argument point against her. This original tweet had no sources. JKR asked if this was a fever dream and commented that she would need to check her sources because it sounded false. Because it does. Because the original poster didn't provide any proof of this. That isn't Holocaust denial, that is skepticism towards a random Twitter user who made a big claim on a sensitive subject without providing further information. You shouldn't blindly trust what you're told online, especially on Twitter.
The books that the Nazis burned were by a homosexual Jewish man. Someone apart of the LGB alliance who was not JKR got into arguments over whether or not the author of the books was truly a good person, with accusations of him being pro-eugenics and supporting the castration of homosexuals being brought up with a book as a source. JKR posted a link to the thread with this information, but did not make the claim herself nor did she probably read an entire book or look too deeply into the claims happening, which granted she should have done, but she clearly took the elaborate thread and source for granted.
According to mister YouTuber, neither he nor someone else on his source team could find exactly what the LGB alliance claimed was in the book. He admitted things could have just been worded differently than on the thread, but the exact phrases such as "genes" were not in the book. Apparently the author was with a man 40 years younger than him though which I don't know why mister YouTuber brought that up (not even negatively, just randomly dropped) but okay I'll mention it here I guess
Hirschfield (the author of the burned books) was in fact racist and a supporter of eugenics by admission of mister YouTuber. Oops! Mister YouTuber admits that Hirschfeld supported castration for the "feeble-minded", but argued that there wasn't any evidence for homosexuals being considered under that umbrella for Hirschfeld. He also admitted that Hirschfeld, regardless of showing support for some feminist movements, still viewed women as inferior to men.
Hirschfeld's research partner created vaginoplasty, and it's mostly practiced the same way today. He (the research partner, Gohrbandt) also practiced horrific experiments on people for research in hypothermia apparently (and was never punished afterwards), but that's somewhat unrelated. Which leads to:
Mister YouTuber conflates criticism of Hirschfeld's political views and research to the criticism of modern transgender plastic surgeries sterilizing people, which is something JKR has expressed concern over before. This entire discussion isn't even remotely related to the denial of the Holocaust.
Next a user named Alejandra accuses JKR of Holocaust denial with screenshots to various articles that discuss the burning of Hirschfeld's books. JKR replies that the burning of Hirschfeld's books does not mean all healthcare books researching transgenderism were destroyed nor were trans people the very first victims of nazis, which Alejandra didn't claim and argues that she didn't. JKR responds with a screenshot from another user who was making those claims to clarify that despite Alejandra not saying it, others were. That was a bit off topic, but mister YouTuber goes on about people commenting unrelated to JKR even outside of the whole LGB alliance discussing the Hirschfeld mess as well, it's not just JKR going off about unrelated shit during this discussion.
TRAs were trying to twist the narrative of Hirschfeld's books being burned to instead mean that transgender people were the first target by Nazis and that ALL books pertaining to them were destroyed, which was factually not true and, frankly, incredibly insensitive. Mister YouTuber argues that a TIM named Dora who had vaginoplasty surgery at Hirschfeld's institute disappeared during Nazis storming the institute. Dora may have died or been arrested, the actual fate is unknown. I have no comments on this because no one ever said trans people never died to Nazis which he is insinuating and arguing against but I'll mention it here.
Mister YouTuber uses this incident as proof that trans people were targeted by Nazis and they lost all of their research - which was mostly worded with the same mythical usage as when people describe the burning of Alexandria, where people assume we'd be way ahead of what we are right now if the burning didn't happen. I wish I could drive home the fact that transgender people were killed and targeted (and still are today!) because they're seen as homosexuals. A lot of them ARE homosexuals. Man who is feminine = gay = a threat that needs to be dealt with. That is the reality of violent 'transphobia'. Homosexuals were murdered by Nazis. People like Dora were seen as homosexual males. Hirschfeld was a homosexual Jewish man.
The video then pivots to be about whether or not transgender people were killed by Nazis for being trans. JKR criticized TRAs for making the literal Holocaust center around themselves.
Mister YouTuber then goes on about transgenders being targeted by Nazis. We could go in a circle again explaining that transgender people were conflated with homosexuals which is exactly why Nazis would want them dead, or we could go over how NO ONE SAID THEY WERE NEVER KILLED BY NAZIS, but it's useless to keep having this argument. I will bring up that race was a big factor for transgenders when they encountered Nazis according to mister YouTuber's source excerpts though - 'aryan' transgendered people were almost always safe while Jewish and Roma ones were not according to this video's sources. When they (aryan transgenders) were charged, they usually had to pay a fine or go to prison rather than concentration camps. While still bad, it's not even remotely comparable and it happened far less because usually they were deemed not guilty in court since they were "racially superior"
Mister YouTuber brings up JKR's goblins in Harry Potter which is beyond a dead horse at this point.
Here's a direct quote from the fucking video YOU linked me from this man himself: "Joanne may have denied Nazi war crimes, but she isn't a Holocaust denier."
She literally only showed skepticism towards a random Twitter comment that didn't provide sources or any explanation. Should she have researched on her own time before responding with skepticism? Probably! But to stretch skepticism to mean Nazi war crime denial is just that: a stretch.
YouTuber uses anti-Semitic comments from other Twitter users as proof that JKR is bad somehow. Not her fault and there's plenty of TRA idiots who comment dumb shit all the time too. It's irrelevant. She has millions of followers and I see disgusting comments on random Twitter posts literally all the time, it's extremely common to have annoying bigoted trolls on there.
Anyways, here's my takeaway from this:
JKR needs to stop responding to random TRA comments who say dumb shit without sources. That TRA was using the Holocaust, a horrific and traumatizing part of recent history, as an argument point for the trans movement. She probably should have just ignored it or researched what the commenter was talking about so she could be better prepared.
With that being said, I didn't get any notion of Holocaust denial from her whatsoever. I saw nothing but skepticism at a random comment because people love nothing more than to be painfully inaccurate about historical events
I don't think Hirschfeld sounds like a good person at all thanks to his racism/hatred towards black people, his misogyny, his support of eugenics, and his bizarre 40 year age gap relationship, but I don't support Nazis terrorizing him for being a homosexual Jewish man fucking obviously. I would say that Malcom bringing all of this up is sort of irrelevant to what was actually being discussed. It's good to know that Hirschfeld had horrific political views but that wasn't really the point of the discussion going on so it felt really unrelated and out of place in my opinion, but Malcom isn't JKR.
JKR linked to Malcom's thread because he expanded on what these claims were talking about and he provided sources about Hirschfeld and his beliefs. She just didn't read the book that he used. I think she needs to be more careful about source checking and research, because otherwise she's ripped apart even if it's not her saying it.
'Aryan' transgender people were spared the horrific crimes of the Holocaust more often than not according to the very video that you linked to me. I hope white TIMs think about that before they make the Holocaust about themselves, which is exactly what JKR was saying she didn't want them to do. Because she doesn't deny that the Holocaust happened and knows it was a horrific event. It was almost alwaysJewish and Roma homosexuals/transgenders who suffered the brunt of Nazi hatred.
I don't read Harry Potter, and I don't have a deep attachment to JKR. I went into this video wanting to see where exactly the accusations she's receiving were coming from, and I'm left just feeling frustrated and disappointed. It's normal to not trust what a Twitter user claims at face value. It's normal to be skeptical about big claims surrounding the Holocaust. It's normal to not want something as serious as that trivialized.
There were some talking points in the video I didn't cover because I'm on mobile and I didn't have as much to say about it. The link is there for anyone to watch it and take away their own opinion afterwards.
My opinion is that I think JKR handled this poorly, but I do not think she is a Nazi nor do I think she is denying the Holocaust.
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Amber Heard's bootlickers are now whining about how many YouTube videos the trial is getting.
Many people, here and on Twitter, are claiming that Johnny's team had paid off all these accounts that have existed for years, to post the footage of the trial over and over.
Now they're saying it isn't fair and this shouldn't be televised at all because everything's making Amber look bad. BUT when claims were made about the other trial, these same people were going on and on about how you can't trust hearsay and since there was no video proof of how she behaved at trial or how overly favored she was by the judge, everyone should just be on her side.
And now we have video proof of how she behaves. Johnny fought tooth and nail to get it televised so that there are official videos of her listening to her own abusive recordings where she admits to a myriad of abusive behaviors toward him. Those are now public where everyone can watch at any time. No one can claim these are falsified. No one can claim these were fake leaks spread around the internet. The are real and are there. And yes, her admitting to hitting him, following him around, throwing things at him, cursing at him, withholding his medication or trying to force him to take more medication so he can't call out her BS, DO INDEED make her look bad. Cuz they're bad.
This woman has spent years making a mockery of abuse victims. She and her fans have been nothing but terrible about this. They don't like memes and critical posts being made about Amber, but had no problem when they were made in Amber's favor for the past 5 years. It's only wrong, uncivil, and uncouth now.
Now it's suddenly, 'they were mutually abusive'. Now it's suddenly, 'he's an actor too why isn't he being blasted'. Amber Heard is supposedly an A-List Actress and she sucks at it. She's being mocked for being unable to maintain a convincing facial expression for more than a few seconds before she goes back to smirking. She's being mocked for being incapable of pulling up some tears at least to make her ugly faces more believable.
The problem here is that Johnny, in person and in all these damn recordings of him, has remained quiet and level-headed as he speaks. She is always the one raising her voice. She is always the one hurling insults. She is the one who cycles through facial expressions as she struggles to find the right one for the situation and then just gives up and goes back to either smirking or being bored. Overly emotional people reliving trauma get red in the face and nose and their eyes get puffy and red as they cry. Even if she managed to mostly hold in her body's hyperventilation, it'll still be obvious. She's not affected at all. She can't even bother to try looking affected for more than a few seconds before she's smirking again.
Dumb memes from a small percentage of the audience is definitely worth dealing with if we get to have all this proof exposed in court and caught on camera. Y'all could handle improper memes about Johnny's situation for 5 years so you can deal with this.
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Find it very funny how someone with a handle that shows they very clearly can’t stand Aemond as a character replied to tumblr comments made from a YEAR ago claiming that the showrunners can’t do anything in adapting alysmond’s relationship or add any sort of complexity that takes away from the fact that their relationship is not consensual and he is a r*pist. “No amount of pet names or cute moments will change that.” They are so unbelievably incapable of critical thought towards fiction. It’s unbelievable how they attack anyone who sees a FICTIONAL DYNAMIC as compelling and interesting. They had the audacity to accuse someone of “victim-blaming” for thinking Alys genuinely wanted to be with him of her own free will. You can absolutely recognize their circumstances were problematic but that does NOT mean people who enjoy dark pairings in media condone r*pe and to insinuate that is honestly disgusting. They even have “alysmond shipper? go kys” in their bio 💀 Imagine going that far because someone enjoys the possibility of a haunted romance. Just insane.
OMG 💀💀
I haven't seen this blog yet but there's a good possibility that I am already blocked by this individual... since my own blog doesn't shy away from showcasing my explicit biases for certain characters and their ships lol.
That being said, how FUCKING sad?? I totally get not liking a popular character or one of their ships, but to go out and make an entirely new blog dedicated to posting/reblogging 'anti- X' tags is so beyond ridiculous! It's a work of FICTION we're talking about here; how can another person's opinions really affect your own well-being? Asking people to KYS over a ship/character is the epitome of LOSER behaviour. I do consider myself a TG sympathizer, but I CANNOT imagine myself enjoying a fandom without my lovely moots who certainly don't align with my tastes or biases. That's why I try not to use anti- tags in my posts, opting instead for pro- ones which better represent my stance on a topic/discussion.
Anyway, I would just ask y'all to let them be! It's everyone's right to curate a fandom experience to their own liking. While I don't like my own experience to be this isolated, I can't fault anyone else looking to have their own 'exclusive' fandom experience.
That's all! 🤗
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I mean the video with the trans guy in it was filmed before the anti hero (and even if it wasn't it still would have been filmed months before the anti hero video came out)
While her allyship has always sucked etc she didn't directly used the trans actor to deflect from the anti hero criticism. She used him to make herself look good in general
I think often people underestimate how long it takes to create things and how long in advance things are created
No no, I know the video was *filmed* before that, but the timing of the release (VERY soon after the Anti-hero release when usually she spreads it out) combined with the fact that it was specifically the song/video that would give her faux ally points, plus just how much it was made a point that she/her team cast a trans man as the lead all combined is what made it seem suspicious to me.
News about the whole thing came out just a few days after she got called out for AH. Instead of apologizing for making a shitty fatphobic reference in her video, they removed it without comment and dropped a convenient little "hey look Taylor Swift cast a trans man to play her love interest, isn't she SUCH an ally?"
Nothing about it was the correct way to handle the situation. Using the fact that you cast a trans person in your music video to sidestep apologizing for being fatphobic isn't acceptable, and it doesn't make her a good person. It makes her a self serving performative slactivist (bordering on bigot imho) who can't take criticism even when it's warranted, and is incapable of apologizing for her mistakes even if she doesn't believe she's wrong.
How hard would it have been to tweet/post/say in an interview "I didn't think about how seeing something like what I put in the video might effect people who have had a different experience than I have. Looking back, I wish I'd asked the people around me, y'know, "hey, does this seem insensitive? Can we get some other perspectives one this?" I'm really sorry that I wasn't more aware of the impact it would have, and I really want to try and do better in the future. Have some more diversity in my feedback pool and really make a point to listen to voices besides my own".
But she didn't do that. She rushed a release to cover her ass and make herself look good again.
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💥 writeblr intro 💥
hiii folks, this is gonna be my writeblr (hopefully we’ll see how motivated i am) so i want to do a little intro!!
about me
you can call me layne, or if u want to call me icarus, that works too
queer
they/them
disabled with like a million chronic illnesses
21 yrs old
i’m a college dropout with absolutely no plan ahaha
i work as a barista and am looking for music gigs on the side (i still need to get better at the music part oops)
currently reading: Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
about my writing
i write mostly fiction/sci-fi/fantasy
almost all of my characters have powers or magic or aren’t even completely human
i like to write really cool fight scenes, i don’t care if they seem unreasonable, pretend it’s an anime idk. they have superpowers they can do anything
i like to explore the darker elements of these powers and worlds, so a lot of my work is nsfw bc of gore and stuff like that
like incorporating horror into my stories as well as just writing horror too
i write diverse characters and do the best research i can; if someone notices i’ve made a mistake or have accidentally written something insensitive, please let me know! i am always learning!
if i could draw i would make all of my works graphic novels as my choice of media, but alas, i am incapable of doing much more than staring at my tablet and getting angry when the picture doesn’t draw itself
my wips:
Generation Six
sci-fi, superpowers
a woman spends her entire life recruiting people known as Guardians to help protect the world from danger, but the biggest threat she’s ever faced is about to upend it all. not to mention the evil little shadow demon that lives in her head is constantly trying to overtake her and go on a murderous rampage. she’s a bit busy.
large cast, multiple povs
this series is on the back burner for now, i just am not sure where i want to go with it
an untitled pirate story
fantasy, magic gay pirates
the most feared pirates in the world is a crew of six people… and a magic cat? the captain is searching for the greatest treasure known to humankind, and she’d probably have it already, if they didn’t keep hitting all these roadblocks. seablocks? they’re on a boat.
small main cast
Murders of Crow Creek
western setting with supernatural/paranormal elements
a small town sheriff recruits an interesting group of people to help her solve a string of murders: a witch of the Dark Gods, a bounty hunter with a memory problem, a demon killer with a smoking problem, and a bartender with one arm and a hell of a lot of knives tucked in his boots. what’s the worst that could happen? ignore the all out war between gods that they accidentally get themselves into
small main cast
there’s ghosts, demons, angels, vampires, all sorts of supernatural beings just chillin in the wild west
personally love this one bc the main character, the sheriff, is just getting too old for this nonsense; she’s also a big time lesbian yeehaw
Kid Mother
sci-fi, post-apocalyptic
a disease has wiped out nearly the entire human population. if things weren’t already bad, this disease made it so that babies just. couldn’t be born. until one is. with the human population dwindling, and groups trying to speed up that process, our main character has to travel across the country with the first baby that’s been born in two decades so that scientists may be able to find a way to fix this entire thing. no problem.
very small cast
us vs the world trope
other info
i love answering literally any questions about my wips so pleeeeeaaaase ask away!!
i’ll probably also post any fanfics i write bc i have a lot of them, and i really need somewhere to share them oopsies
any advice about other places i can share my writing would be appreciated
please refrain from giving criticism unless it’s 1. constructive and 2. something i asked for :) sometimes i just Can Not Handle It
i do not tolerate any form of bigotry. if i see any clownery on any of my stuff, you will be blocked and reported. just don’t be an ass.
uhhh i think that’s about it? not sure what else to put in a writeblr intro, so if you made it this far, thank you so much! hopefully i will have more detailed posts about those wips up at some point before the year ends! follow if your interested, i’ll probs follow back :)
💥
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part of @cantankerouscanuck's Bionicle/LU AU
The flames wavered, but held on.
A fair fight. All he'd asked for was a fair fight. No mask powers. No elemental ones, either. Just enough to create a wall, so that the duel would not cause casualties, but nothing else.
No tricks, no subterfuges.
Just blade against blade.
And a fair fight he'd gotten.
He gritted his teeth as hard as he could and gripped tight onto the handle of his sword as another blow caused his knee to buckle, sinking into the ground. His arm moved to reply with a strike of equal strength, but his movements felt sluggish, uncoordinated, his limbs suddenly heavy and his armor suffocating.
A blow struck his shoulder; before he could even tilt to the side, a second one slammed into his chest.
In a moment he was flying.
His back hit the dirt hard enough to knock the breath out of him.
He had to stand up.
He had to stand up.
The flames wavered again.
He had to stand up.
"Wars!"
He inhaled sharply. His eyes struggled to look around.
"Warriors! Can you hear me? Answer me!"
The voice was coming from within his mind.
"Artemis," he thought weakly.
A wave of relief swept through him, enabling him to fight through his aches and pull himself up: "Thank Mata Nui," he heard his leader almost sob. "I feared that..."
"With all due respect, madam - you have too little faith in me," he joked. He didn't mean to cut her off, but his opponent was approaching, and he could not let her worry seize his legs in such a critical moment.
Luckily, it made her chuckle.
"What's the situation?" he struggled to think. Where would the next swipe come from? His left or his right?
"Everybody is in accounted for. Impa has already ordered the sails unfurled and the anchors are being lifted as I'm contacting you, we're all set for departure." Artemis replied. Her tone was steady, lacking the vulnerability she'd let through just seconds earlier. "Disengage and reach the spot we mentioned. We'll cover our tracks and be there to pick you up in a couple of hours."
Warriors barely managed to block one of the claws reacching out for him, not parrying it but at least keeping his arm: "Save the detour," he hissed in his mind: "I'll be busy with him a little longer."
"Warriors, I said disengage," the Toa of Psionics insisted: "We're safe."
"For how long?" his mind vibrated with the clanging of metal against metal. "An hour? A day? Two?"
"I told you to forfeit! Right now!"
The flames roared in his stead as a sharp pain burst from his joints: "If I let him go now, like this duel never even happened, you'll have one less brother and a Makuta in hot pursuit."
"We'll have them anyways if you don't stomach to swallow your pride and give up! You can't beat him! We both know it! He knows it!"
Her anger and desperation flared through his swing.
His sword howled through the air; its tip carved a deep scratch into his opponent's mask.
"But for every second I defy him, you gain a minute of advantage."
A wave of emotion began climbing up his spine, rushing through him like a landslide in reverse, clawing into his organic tissue and making it burn with energy slowly shaping into thoughts and phonems and screamed words that filled his body with a restless need to strike as though he had never been hit once during the entire fight, as though he were still as fresh and agile and powerful as the second he'd proposed this suicidal duel -
The weightlessness hit him with a sensation of nausea so potent that he had to shut his eyes before he ended up spilling what little innards he might have had right out of his mask.
Then the ground rose up to plunge him in the dust.
His mind went blank.
His chest hurt.
He had to get up.
He had to get up.
The flames sizzled and waned.
He had to get up.
He couldn't move.
He had to get up.
The space between his audio receptors shrieked with monotone static as Antroz approached slowly, carefully - although there was little doubt about his opponent's incapability to continue on fighting.
"A valiant effort," he commended. His weapon gave a quiet hiss as it cradled the Toa's neck in the curve of its blade. "Foolish, of course - as to be expected by one of your fiery, impatient, overconfident ilk. But valiant nonetheless."
Warriors shut his eyes in resignation.
At least, his duty was done.
The Matoran were safe.
His team was safe.
Ravio...
Ravio was safe.
He breathed.
He breathed.
He breathed.
Why was he still breathing?
He did not even feel the final sting.
Daringly, he opened his eyes and looked.
Antroz was gazing away, around the two of them. The flames that had kept their duel contained, hiding them from the rest of the world as they settled their score one on one, had crumbled away into thin pillars of black smoke after the Toa of Fire had accepted there was no point in fighting further: beyond them now the Makuta could see it - the land, the houses, the streets still covered in footprints.
And not a single being in sight.
He allowed the silence to drape around his shoulders and soothe his defeated opponent's injuries for a few spectral moments.
Then he smirked. And chuckled. Louder. Longer.
Still stuck beneath his foot, Warriors watched the Makuta shake his head lightly as a short laugh erupted from deep within his chest with an earnestly, genuinely impressed sound.
The cold metal of his claws retracted from the Toa's neck; Warriors was surprised by the breath he hadn't known he was holding.
"A ploy to hold me off and keep me in the dark about it, too," Antroz drawled: "So you could shepherd your precious Matoran to safety right in front of me as I, none the wiser, expended my energies against an opponent who knew he couldn't have compared to me, but only needed to keep me busy long enough."
He patted Warriors' shoulder.
"Clever," he conceded. "Very, very clever."
The Toa of Fire remained immoble, perfectly still. He wasn't sure he would have been able to even twitch in his current state.
But the pressure on his body was lifted completely, and he was allowed to lay on the floor aching but alive, not unscathed but at the very least freely breathing.
The Makuta spared him one last glance: "For that, I'll let you live."
The next second, he was gone.
How long did it take afterwards for Warriors to start hearing his own thoughts again?
He breathed slowly against the ground for what felt like an eternity.
He needed to get up.
He was so tired.
"Artemis," he called out weakly.
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
No response.
"Artemis."
Relief coated him all at once like a tree falling right on him: "Warriors!"
Despite his injuries, he smiled.
"Where are you? What happened? What about Antroz? Did you--?"
"Now that's too much faith in me, madam," he interrupted her again, wheezing a chuckle. "He left. Found our plan clever. So I'm alive. Battered. But alright. Just tired."
Her near incredulous laugh reverberated through his chest.
Another presence prodded at his mind suddenly, though it didn't feel different from the way Artemis was doing so - as a matter of fact it was essentially identical, meaning she was likely connecting someone else to him willingly.
What followed was a jumbled mess of feelings and wailing thoughts latching tight onto his chest like a desperate hug.
"Hello, Ravio," Warriors laughed.
The poor Ce-Matoran pelted him with more barely coherent sobs.
"Don't worry, I'm alright."
"Of course you are!" the other shrieked, torn between anger, joy and sarcasm: "Nothing can kill you! You just wanted to make my heartlight shortcircuit again! Like I haven't been through enough!"
"Would saying I'm sorry help?"
"Just you wait-!! We're turning this ship around right now, and when we get there I swear to the Great Spirit I'll--!"
"Keep sailing on then, Artemis," Warriors half joked, "I'd rather stave off my friend's wrath for as long as possible, if you wouldn't mind that. I've been beaten down enough already. I think I deserve some rest for now."
"It might be more comfortable in a ship's bunk, don't you think?" the Psionics Toa offered gently.
"And make you all walk right into Antroz again?" he replied.
A quiet moment of discomfort passed through their empty thoughts.
"I'll be fine," he reassured the both of them. "I'll find my way back to you all at my own pace eventually. I always do. You have nothing to worry about."
"We have everything to worry about, brother," Artemis whispered. Her thoughts were like a caress on the side of his head.
"I know, sister. But I'll make it through the pain, and you'll make it through my absence."
She replied with no words: only a silent understanding.
Mata Nui be with you.
The last thought in his mind was a warm, round feeling, curling around his chest like a blanket and settling against his cheek as though nuzzling it.
He hoped Artemis had allowed Ravio to feel his response too.
He breathed in.
His head was heavy.
He'd just need a moment.
Warriors let his eyes close shut, and fell asleep.
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@ the anon that keeps snarking about how transunity sucks because some trans women are transandrophobic:
We are a DID system. We had not one, but two, headmates* split as a result of DOZENS of transfems being MASSIVELY transandrophobic, ceterophobic, and intersexist towards us and harassing and bullying us and other transmascs. It is a significant part of our overall PTSD related to online bullying (we had PTSD before this, but this is almost its own subcategory of it, if that makes any sense).
Our partner is also a trans woman and despite being shy and conflict-avoidant she has told me the ONLY reason she hasn't stepped in and ripped them a new one is because she knows I both CAN handle it myself and would PREFER to.
The person who took us in when we were homeless and explicitly demanded we NOT pay rent despite only having met my partner before we BOTH moved in with her is a genderfluid trans woman (dating a nonbinary afab person too).
One of my best online system friends, who puts up with all my rants about all kinds of discourse and both messages me daily and is okay with me not always replying (which reminds me that she is thinking about us and cares about us) is a trans woman.
I'm not going to say "if we can recognize that most trans women are not shitty laterally aggressive assholes they can too" because... with sufficiently bad triggers, we've also been incapable of recognizing people as not inherently harmful. That doesn't absolve them of responsibility, though. If they cannot treat other marginalized people with a basic minimum of human decency and respect, they need to stop saying shit like that until they find a way to be minimally decent.
(Other people are making criticisms of transandrophobes within the trans community that are both better and more nuanced - and more true and accurate - than theirs. This is also not saying they can't criticize transandrophobes, but to recognize that the venn diagram between that and transfems is very nearly two separate circles.)
I also would hate to see what they'd say about the fact that we're transneufemmasc "afab" intersex. We've gotten "you're not really transfem" from transfems, do they want to shit on us for BEING transfem and round out the shitcircle?
Thanks a lot for the input again! I really wanted to reassure them that not all trans women are transandrophobes, and that the place we're trying to create is a place of safety where they will not be subject to more lateral aggression, and where they will be able to safely talk about their experiences. But at the same time, it also means that they shouldn't generalize all trans women and treat them with enemity either. And that especially trans women looking forwards for transunity are not the ones going to commit these aggressions.
I get that it's hard, that it can take a long time - overcoming bias is not always an easy process - but I hope that your example will be able to show them that it is possible.
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So there are three things I fundamentally do not understand about M0C and her handling of recent events.
1. What ever made her think that her business would be lucrative for her? Her first doll was a complete flop, she had an etsy for a couple months before that flopped, her patreon has only a couple followers, and her indiegogo reached only 1-2% of its goal. Not to say you can't rise from the ashes, but, it makes me question her judgement when she had flop after flop and STILL decided to throw her savings into a venture without at least trying to get one win under her belt first.
2. She marketed herself as being a engineering whiz kid, brags about her CV, went to every convention to hold panels and seminars on casting, offers complicated services such as resin matching and vitiligo coloring and generally made herself out to be a paragon of knowledge on all things related to BJD creation. But now she's pulling the "I'm just starting out! I'm still learning! People need to have patience, since I'm completely new to this!" card. Like, which one is it? Are you lying about your expertise or are you lying about being inexperienced, because only one can be true. And if you are inexperienced, own up to it and admit your mistakes instead of making it seem like its your clients fault for essentially falling for your marketing and not understanding you aren't OZ the Great and Powerful as you claimed, but rather, a regular person behind a curtain.
3. She regularly (both now and with her first doll) says things like "I wish people came to me with concerns and critique, I want to do better 🥺" but whenever anyone has any kind of concern or criticism, no matter how kindly worded, she deflects and makes excuses without changing anything. A inevitable part of any business, but especially one dealing with something as subjective as art, is having to deal with bumps in the road in terms of customer and community concerns and criticisms. You need to be able to listen and understand when change is needed, and as of right now she seems incapable of doing that.
Honestly, she needs to quit while she's ahead with the "damage control". Its just making her look a million times worse.
~Anonymous
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I wish I could feel a little more optimism about Harry/his career right now, but I just feel like things are looking grim. You mentioned (about his coming out) that people are starting to lose sympathy for him, and I think that's very true, and even inside his fanbase. I absolute hate that it happened and it was so shameful and undeserved, but I think what happened when Anne posted about DWD is really telling. This movie promo has been a shitshow and has really hurt Harry's image (deserved or not), and no one on Harry's team seems to be willing to acknowledge that or have a plan to deal with it other than 'pretend it's not happening'.
And I think Harry does share in the blame for this. People have complaints about the project and the way it's been handled, a lot unfair but some fair. Harry has done nothing to respond to or assuage those concerns, and on the contrary his actions, like at Venice, just fuel the fire. If he acted genuinely enthused about this project, speaking about how much he enjoyed it or appreciated Olivia even just as a director, I think it would help change the tenor of the conversation. But he isn't. Then you have Florence and now Chris Pine avoiding promo for this movie - and maybe they have legitimate, non-drama reasons, but they could be doing things to combat the impression they're giving, but they're not either. And then Olivia keeps bringing the drama back up but doubling down on a perspective of 'I'm right, I asked Shia to leave for Florence's sake, any drama or criticism you hear on the internet is just fake gossip and people are just mad because I'm a woman', and not addressing more substantive critiques. And even if there are aspects to her story that are true (definitely misogyny is playing a role here), framing it the way she is doing makes it hard for her to make those points sympathetically.
All of which leads to exactly what happened to Anne. I don't know exactly how to articulate it, but the way they've ignored and dismissed these issues has just made people angrier and angrier. If people are angry enough to start giving his mom hate, his team have wildly mismanaged this. And now there's another Pleasing drop, because at this point I'm convinced Harry's team are terminally incapable of reading the room.
Yeah, I understand your meaning. I feel like a lot Harry’s fans (both Larries and non-Larries) have been pretty cruel to all of the women he’s dated, including Camille. I just wish fans would have better boundaries and log-off before sending hate. Ultimately, I think that’s on the fans. But setting Florence, Shia, and Don’t Worry Darling aside, Olivia has always been supportive, respectful, and kind towards Harry publicly. And he’s done very little to reciprocate. And it’s noticeable.
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Y'all suck at dissecting Kai's character, so I guess I have to do it.
And I'm not even a Kai stan. He's a bottom tier ninja for me, which I guess means you can trust me, cuz I'm not biased, but also why am I the one doing this? I don't know about y'all, but recently on my dash, the method by which Kai fans try to make him sound good is... saying the writers hate him, ignore him, and that he isn't written well? Which... I mean there is a little bit of truth to, but like yikes guys, is this the best you got? Kai is a wonderful character with plenty of attention from the writers, a meaningful piece of the cast when put in secondary rolls, fairly consistent character writing with actual progression and valuable qualities that help the team without having to be the smart one- despite what some posts might tell you.
Let's get one thing cleared up: Ninjago isn't the best written show. By high level Hollywood standards, most the character arcs are kinda weak or too heavy handed, character consistency can be iffy, and most things serve the plot rather than the characters. There is no character you can point to and say "wow, this character is written so well! No complaints!" Nya and Jay were butchered by their weird love plot, Cole's one season doesn't actually give him an arc, Zane's been nothing but the robot numbers guy for like 10 seasons now, and Lloyd seems to be incapable of doing anything but relive the same one piece of dad angst for depth. Sorry, it's true. All the characters suck when you look at it from a large scale writing perspective. So when I say Kai is well written, I mean by ninjago kids show standards- cuz that's the scale we're working on. No, you couldn't drop Kai into a well written drama, but as far as ninjago goes... he's got a lot going for him, and by no means is he the biggest victim of poor writing.
(fair warning, wall of text below)
The title is a bit disingenuous. There are plenty of good Kai character break downs. What I am presenting here is a more positive perspective. On the whole, I will tend to give the writers the benefit of the doubt, and credit for what they do right writing is hard guys. That's what I'm doing here. I don't see much sense in getting mad the writers on behalf of Kai, or any other character. Ninjago is a simplistic ensemble show that works because of the identifiable simplicity of its main characters with some deeper layers hidden underneath if you keep watching. They've given us a damn good show with some damn enjoyable characters, so here are some criticisms I feel are a little flawed:
First, let's get the 'focus' thing out of the way. Apparently there are people saying Kai doesn't have a season yet? Which... what? I mean, I get that the pilots aren't a full season, the first two seasons, though he is the central protagonist, aren't "Kai seasons" as we've come to define ninja focus seasons, season 7, though he gets majority focus, he shares with his sister. But like... did y'all just forget about season 4? You know, the season where he had the title card, was on the box sets, got the love interest, and the majority of the A-plot? not to mention it's the best season don't @ me Like... if season 4 isn't a Kai season, I can make a damn good argument that season 3 isn't a Zane season, and I doubt anyone wants to go down that rabbit hole. I really can't wrap my head around this one. And I get that the fandom hates season 11 for some reason, but like you can't just pretend it doesn't exist. Kai has a consistent arc across 30 episodes in which he takes his powers for granted, loses them, and learns that, not only does he have value within the team without them, but that his element is intrinsically a part of him that he reclaims, bringing them back more powerful than ever, and with new respect for them. That's one of the most solid arcs in the whole series- the location is even thematically connected to his element. That's some good stuff right there! (Quick plug for season 11 if you haven't watched it in a while. Give it a rewatch, you might be pleasantly surprised)
Not to mention the writers give him fun side stuff all the time. Lots of fears of tech and water to overcome, a deep protective streak with Lloyd, becoming a chancellor, having a true potential actually relevant to the plot as a whole, blacksmith responsibilities, befriending dragons, hanging out with his dad. Not to mention actual focus stuff we haven't talked about yet, like his whole "my dad is evil" phase, and his "I might be evil" phase with him and Skylor. And on top of that, even when he doesn't have an explicit side plot, he's always just a fun and dynamic side character to make jokes or give exposition.
Now, into character stuff. Let's start with Kai's hot headed-ness. Some people say he's been loosing this quality, and I will admit, that's true! But those that claim this makes him inconsistent... I strongly disagree. In early seasons, Kai's temper would lead him to snap at his friends or make stupid decisions that set the team back (see episode 2 Zane freak out)- these are bad things. These are character flaws, yes? Now, in newer seasons, people say that he's inconsistent, cuz sometimes he'll be hot headed, and sometimes he won't. I'd say, this is exactly how being hot headed... works? It flares up without warning, and as an individual gets control of it, it'll pop up less and less often because they're channeling it into productive things - like say directing the anger towards an enemy (see season 11 end freak out). Kai has gained control of a character flaw, and though it still pops up on occasion, the fact that it's a once in a while kind of thing speaks to his growth. I have a little brother who has this exact personality, and watching him grow up, I can tell you, this is how it is. He used to snap all the time, and he still does sometimes, but much less frequently, because he's a more mature person with better control of his emotions. This is a good thing. This is overcoming personal flaws. This is progression we're seeing.
And while you're hyper focused on this one aspect of him, things like his cocky confidence haven't changed a bit. I mean, that season 3 bit between him and Pixal, and his season 11 "fire maker" streak have the exact same energy. You can not convince me otherwise.
Another adjacent quality that hasn't been dampened is Kai's impulsiveness. This can be a good quality of his, he'll get into a fight without thinking, getting the jump on the enemy. Good stuff. But, this has become such a well defined trait of Kai's that it has been used in a comedic capacity. This is what happens when a character is extremely consistent to the extent that both the audience and the characters in universe would be able to predict their actions. Kai's impulsivity used to be a more serious quality that put himself and others at risk, and was a big power move whenever he did something rash, but it's become such a staple of the show that it's now being used for comedy. That isn't Kai's impulsivity going away, that's Kai's impulsivity being recontextualized for the sake of the show. The season 9 "Who's stupid enough to jump on that thing" isn't a joke at the expense of Kai just for being dumb, it's a joke at Kai's being so predictably impulsive that everyone already knows he'll be the one to put himself in an insane amount of danger without thinking twice (you know, something stupid that might get him killed). But because in this instance, the danger is warranted, this is bravery. It's a complement to his character- it's what ends up defeating the colossus. Why are some people so bothered by this joke?
Oh right, cuz for some reason people want to peg Kai as the smart one? Look, Kai isn't stupid, none of the ninja are. All of them have smart moments (all of them have dumb ones too) and Kai can certainly handle himself, but "smart" is definitely not one of his defining characteristics- I think some people are confusing smart for his actual strength. Connected to his impulsivity, Kai has very good simplistic instincts. He sees the big picture and looks at the most surface level solution- which when the situation calls for it, that does indeed make him smart. But the same logic that led him to think "This snake has a glowing target on its head, lets hit it" also led him to think "I'm in a video game, therefore I am immortal." Are you really going to look at me and say he figured out Lloyd was the green ninja through logical deduction and a careful consideration of the facts? No. He had a gut feeling, and he trusted it. Instincts- instincts paired with his impulsive following of said instincts is what leads him to solve problems- and sometimes, that can be extremely effective. This goes for other ninja too. Jay isn't the smartest ninja- I would really only classify Zane and Nya as having intelligence define them (hence their ship name). But Jay is extremely creative and crafty. He also knows his was around mechanics, and as such, this will lead him to come up with creative tech based solutions which are smart. But, idk about you, if I had to point to another ninja as being 'dumb' it would 100% be Jay. Kai is a lot of things. He's passionate and determined and confident and persistent. He's a good improvisor, he's powerful and he's charming! These are all wonderful qualities, he doesn't also have to be the smart one. I am the worlds biggest Pixal stan, and she's a smart, sassy, powerful character, but I'm not gonna sit here and tell you she's also hilarious and adaptable and strong willed. She's a straight man to all the ninja's antics, extremely tied to her samurai x suit, and lets people push her around all the time. That doesn't mean she can't be funny, or self interested, but when she does act these ways, it stems from her other more prominent qualities. That make sense?
And while we're clearing up what Kai isn't, please stop characterizing Kai as an overly protective brother - especially romantically. The only two times he's been romantically protective to Nya are in Wu's Teas which I mean, come on and in the pilots when Jay is literally a stranger. For crying out loud, by the end of the pilot, he's smiling when Jay and Nya hug. That's not overly protective, that's just normal, any reasonable person would react this way, protective. And it's such a great stereotype break for a kids show like ninjago, having an older brother who actually trusts his younger sister to be her own independent person who can make her own decisions. I mean, I guess it's fine if you HC differently but like... idk, I don't buy it.
Now, is there still room to criticize the writers? Yes. Hell yes. But not to an extent greater than any other character. Could he have had more of a defined reaction to events of the most recent season that I won't name for the sake of spoilers? Yes. But could Zane have reacted for more than .5 seconds at being an evil war lord for apparently 60 years? Yeah. Has Kai taken a back seat in the past 4 seasons? Yeah. But so has Lloyd- and he's literally the main character of the show. Not to mention two of those seasons have gone to people who had to wait over ten seasons to get one to themselves, and one of them is a 40 minute special. Kai's doing just fine.
Anyway. Kai is great. He's a fun, stereotype breaking, impulsively driven, ball of energy and confidence who gets a good amount of screen time and some fun side plots.
One last thing to clear up: no hate to anyone. This isn't targeted at anyone specific, this post has been a long time coming, I've just seen some weird overblown claims on various platforms over the past few months and I finally sat down to write about it.
I like the Kai content we have. After all, if the writers were really that bad at writing him, then no one would like him.
Wow this was so much longer than I thought it would be. Um... if you have other long winded rants you'd like to see from me... let me know I guess?
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Do you know when the racism and ableism accusations against Nora started? Because back when I was active in 2016/2017 and don't think they were a thing, or were very low-key. Was it something she said or are people just basing it off the things she wrote in the books?
From what I remember, the first time I heard the blanket statement of “Nora is racist/fetishizes gay men” blanket statement was early fall 2019 (which is so ironic for the fandom to say on so many levels lmao). There wasn’t a catalyst or anything, just she went offline 2016 and no new content was coming out and the aftg fandom is such an echo chamber that… an accidental smear campaign happened.
Before then, I would see occasional “Nora used ableist slur” which… is funny (not that ableism isn’t serious) to me people care more about that than Seth saying the f-slur. IMO this is because with Seth, it clearly shows the character thinking it and not the author who is writing about what will be an end game mlm relationship.
But anyways! Long story short, it's the fact that she’s an ace/aro woman who wrote a mlm book, and based off of the events in canon. There is no “Nora called me/someone else a slur” it’s “Nora wrote a book where slur(s) are used” and “the Moriyama’s are Japanese.”
Below I put my own opinion on these claims and go into more detail:
CW for discussions of: racism, ableism, mlm fetishization
Fetishization: (and mentions of sexism at the end)
To one question in the EC about her inspo for aftg she jokingly responded how she wanted to write about gay athletes. On other parts of your blog you could see she was a hockey fan and an overall sports fan (anime or otherwise) but I've seen this statement taken out of context and framed as “she's one of those BOYXBOY” shippers. Considering how… well-developed both Andrew and Neil’s relationship is, and it takes them until like the 3rd book and there is a whole complex ass plot going on around, you can see how that's just. Not really true. And considering the fandom is like… 85% women (queer women but still women) and I've gotten into a discussion with someone who is a woman and called Nora a fetishizer and was ignoring my opinions as a mlm, and I really just wanted to say “well what does that make you?” it's a very ironic high horse. She didn’t write 3 all 3 books to put Neil in lingerie pwp or crop-top fem-fatal fashion show, fandom did.
Also, I talked to an ace/aro friend about this, and she talked to me about how AFTG spoke to her very much so as an ace/aro story. Neil is demisexual, Nora didn’t know of the word at the time of reading it, but she did get an anon asking if Neil was demi after, and she said “had to look it up, and yep, but he doesn't really think about it” (paraphrased). Obviously it would have been cool if andreil were canonly written as wlw by Nora instead, (which would have increased the amount of wlw rep and demi rep) but tbh I don’t think tumblr would have cared about it nearly as much and everyone would just call Neil a cold bitch–like people do with Nora’s other published book with a main character who's a woman. Plus they're her OC’s, not mine.
The fact is that 50% of all LGBT+ rep in literature is mlm, mostly white mlm, and not written by mlm. I’m not going to hold her to a higher standard than everyone else, she already broke a shit ton of barriers in topics she discusses that otherwise get ignored. I’m grateful to these books for existing even if it's a mlm story written by a woman. I still will prioritize reading mlm written by mlm–and vice versa with wlw– in the way I prioritize reading stories about POC written by POC. But credit where credit is due, this is a very good story, and a very good demi story.
Ableism:
To me, AFTG is a story about ableism and how we perceive some trauma survivors more worthy than others. Neil and the foxes using ableist language shows how people actually talk. Neil thinks shitty things about Andrew, like the others do too, and thinks he's “psycho”. The story ultimately deconstructs this idea and these perceptions of people. Wymack, someone who says the r-slur (which is still not known by the general population as a slur even in 2021 much less the early 2000s when the book was beginning to be written and what the timeline is based off of) is a character who understands Andrew better than most of the others do, and gives him the most sympathy and understanding despite using words like the m-slur and r-slur. Using these words isn't good, but it is how people talk, and this character talks. Wymack is a playful “name caller” especially when he’s mad, the foxes think Andrew is “crazy” and incapable of humanity and love because of it. They call his meds “antipsychotics” as an assumption and insult in a derogatory way, when really antipsychotics are a very helpful drug for some people who need them. Even Neil thinks these things about Andrew until he learns to care about him. All the foxes are hypocritical to am extent, as people in real life tend to be. Nora herself doesn’t use these or tweet them or something, her characters do to show aspects of their personality and opinions and how they change over time.
Racism:
As for the racism, I've seen people talk about how racial minorities being antagonists is inherently bad, which I think lacks nuance but overall isn't a harmful statement or belief. However, Nora herself said she wrote in the yakuza instead of another gang or mob because she was inspired for AFTG by sports anime, (which often queer-bait for a variety of reasons). I haven’t seen a textual analysis acknowledging the racist undertones surrounding the Moriyama’s as the few characters of color who are also major antagonists, but instead just “Nora is racist”. Wymack having shitty flame tribal tattoo’s is just… a huge 90’s thing and a part of his character design. Her having a character with bad taste in tattoo trends doesn’t mean she's racist. There is the whole how Nicky is handled thing, but that's a whole thing on it’s own. The fandom… really will write Nicky being all “ai ai muy spicy, jaja imma hit on my white–not annoying like me–boyfriend in Spanish. With my booty hole out and open for him ofc.” and as a Mexican mlm I’m like … damn alright.
I think there is merit to the fact that she writes white as the default* and unless otherwise stated a POC a character was written with the intent to be white is another valid criticism, as well as the fact that the cast is largely white, but everything Nora is accused of I've seen the fandom do worse. That goes to the debate of, is actively writing stereotypes for POC more harmful than no representation at all? And personally I prefer the lack of established race line that lets me ignore Nora’s canon intent of characters to be white and come up with my own HC’s over the fandoms depictions of “zen monk Renee with dark past” “black best friend Matt who got over drugs but is a puppy dog” “ex stripper black Dan who dates Matt” vague tokenism. I HC many of the upperclassmen as POC and do my best to actively give thought behind it and have their own arcs that also avoids the fandom colorism spectrum of “darkest characters we HC go to the back and fandom favorites are in the front and are the lightest.”
*I however won't criticize her harsher or more than… everyone else who still largely does this in fanfiction regarding AFTG as well as literature in general. This isn't a Nora thing, it's a societal thing, and considering the books came out in like 2014 I'm not gonna hold her to a higher standard than the rest of the world. She's just someone who wrote her personal OC’s and self-published expecting no following. I don’t know her race and I’m not gonna hold her to a higher standard than everyone else just because.
The criticisms I've seen have always been… ironic IMO, and clearly I have a lot of thoughts on it. I think most people say those things about Nora because they heard them, and it's the woke thing to say and do and don’t critically analyze their actions or anything, but just accept them.
#ask#aftg discorse#fandom culture#fandom politics#fandom psychology#mailob#damn cant wait for my words to be twisted lmao#sorry the ableism one is the shortest I wrote that one first actually
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your fave is a rapist, deal with it (part 1).
I wanted to talk about the way mafi handles sensitive topics (sexual assault and violence against women in general) for a very long time. But I had some doubts about it. Do I really need to do this? Is this even be useful or would I just waste my time shouting into the void? Because I tried to start this conversation on twitter about a year ago and… it didn’t go well. So I decided to focus on something more positive, like shitposting and writing fanfiction and creating headcanons and blah-blah-blah. But today all hell broke lose and I saw 20 threads on twitter explaining how sexual assault was actually juliette’s fault. Treads and tweets that were getting 500+ likes each and god knows how many comments under them agreeing with this line of thinking.
And as a cherry on top: the girl who tweeted the original tweet (when she apparently said that it was a sexual assault) got bullied by the fandom so bad, she needed to go private.
So let’s reread THAT scene in shatter me, and parts of destroy me and unravel me that touch this topic, to see who’s right. Maybe this girl was actually wrong and maybe she just misjudged the whole situation and she deserved to be bullied for spreading this awful misinformation about our king AARON aka the man who invented feminism itself WARNER (minor spoilers: she wasn’t and she didn’t).
We need a little bit of context here. The books are old. They were written in 2011. It was the golden time of Gossip girl and Vampire diaries. Chuck Bass and Damon Salvatore were walking around assaulting women left and right and everyone loved them (off the topic, but i’m 99% sure that Chuck was a blueprint for Warner, there’s way too many similarities between them). In 2011 it was NORMAL and even considered sexy (trust me, I was one of those people, those were dark times). So it’s not surprising that there is a sexual assault scene in book, it’s surprising that in 2021, when everyone is a feminist, after the metoo movement, when there’s so much info about all kinds of abuse and red flags and there are stories of survivors, we still blame women for bad thing that happened to them.
There’s gonna be quotes (a shittone of quotes) because that’s who I am, and because you can’t really argue with the source material???? Everything is there, on the surface. All you have to do is READ.
To give you a type of discourse around this:
(it’s a google translate but it’ll do, and i’m not gonna show any un, because that’s what stupid bitches, who bully other people because of the book character, do)
The main point, the main argument, is that Warner has a super power and he feels EVERYTHING JULIETTE FEELS! So he would never hurt her.
Let’s see what she feels:
(btw, it’s chapter 39, shatter me)
Warner drops his hand. His glassy green eyes are so delighted I’m petrified.
Warner backs me into a corner and I realize I’ve never been so defenseless in my life. Never so vulnerable.
“We can really be together,” he says to me, undeterred by my silence. He pulls me close, too close. I’m frozen in five hundred layers of fear. Stunned in grief, in disbelief.
My brain is on fire, ready to explode from the impossibility of this moment. I feel like I’m watching it happen, detached from my own body, incapable of intervening.
Yes, she definitely want to have sex with him! She’s incredibly aroused by him.
“I want you to choose me,” he says. “I want you to choose to be with me. I want you to want this—”
Oh, look, he KNOWS she doesn’t want him. And he doesn’t give a flying fuck about it.
“You’re only afraid of what you’re capable of. Admit it. We’re perfect for each other. You want the power. You love the feel of a weapon in your hand. You’re . . . attracted to me.”
Do I even need to comment this shit?
JULIETTE TELLS HIM NO. WARNER STILL DOESN’T GIVE A FUCK.
So she tries to communicate non-verbal:
I try to swing my fist but he catches my arms. Pins them to my sides. Presses me up against the wall.
Because that what you do when someone want to have sex with you. You force them to stay.
“Don’t lie to yourself, Juliette. You’re going to come back with me whether you like it or not.”
HE DOESN’T GIVE A FLYING FUCK ABOUT HER CONSENT, exhibit number 3.
“But you can choose to want it. You can choose to enjoy it—”
I really don’t know what can scream RAPIST louder than this. You can choose…
Like… he knows. He. Knows.
“I will never,” I breathe, broken. “You’re sick—you’re a sick, twisted monster—”
“That’s not the right answer,” he says, and seems genuinely disappointed.
(I have to confess, I haven’t read this book in a long time, I forget how awful this scene really was. how the fuck someone can see consent HERE???? you need to check your eyes, people. And maybe buy yourself a new brain with working “critical thinking” function)
His nose brushes the nape of my neck and I stifle a horrified shiver that he misunderstands. His lips touch my skin and I actually whimper.
I feel a thrill of hope. A thrill of horror. Brace myself for what I need to do.
SHE DEFINITELY WANTS TO HAVE SEX! CAN’T YOU SEE IT?
I swallow the vomit threatening to give me away.
“I’ll be good to you,” he whispers. “I’ll be so good to you, Juliette. I promise.”
Ew, gross.He’s fucking creppy.
I’m so stunned, so horrified, so cocooned in insanity I forget myself. I stand there frozen, disgusted. My hands slip from his chest. I nearly shove him off of me. But Warner will not be discouraged.
Warner. Feels. Everything. She. Feels.
So there’s three options:
he’s a rapist who doesn’t give a fuck about her consent:
he’s a stupid rapist who thinks that wanting to vomit and being ashamed and terrified is part of a foreplay;
he’s never being with the woman before, so he can’t recognize VERY OBVIOUS signs that she doesn’t want to have sex due to his inexperience, and it still makes him a rapist.
No matter how you put it, the result is always the same: this scene is an attempted rape, and if you say that Juliette is at fault because she had to pretend to like it, you’re a rapist apologist.
(I covered destroy me and unravel me in part two and three because it’s getting way too long)
#tw:sexual assault#shatter me series#eff rants#anti aaron warner#juliette ferrars#deserved better than this#bullying people is not ok#fandom shenanigans#shatter me
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