im feeling so very conflicted rn

Actually you know what I need to rant about this: while literati is technically a good girl x bad boy dynamic it is written so incredibly well and avoids so many pitfalls and stereotypes that it makes a good girl x bad boy hater like myself (I’m only half joking — I don’t think any trope is inherently good or bad but I tend to dislike most pairings with this dynamic) fall head over heels for their story and relationship.

So much of what makes the two of them work is the contrast between how others perceive them and how they truly are. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people who understand who Rory is as a person (Lorelai, Lane, Paris, Richard and Emily to a certain degree for starters), but she's constantly met with the expectation that she just does good and is supposed to make everyone proud 24/7. Stars Hollow as a group especially are big on this, as seen f. ex. through how Taylor takes Rory's one comment about an inappropriate DVD and twists the whole thing into a censorship crusade and makes Rory its poster-child even though she wants nothing to do with it and tells him so repeatedly. But instead of hearing Rory disagree with him (like he would Lorelai and Luke) he assumes that she actually agrees with him - and why shouldn't she when she's the perfect sunshine paragon of good who would never disagree with her elders? Also her grandparents treat her as incredibly fragile and childlike, like she must be too innocent to ever do anything wrong and so whenever she does something it has to be somebody else's fault (usually Lorelai, but occasionally Jess or whoever else was present). Time and time again Rory is treated like something innocent and naive and weak — but not by Jess. He sees her as a person.

And it obviously goes the other way too. Jess is treated like shit by pretty much everyone else. Either people hate him unprovoked or very much provoked (he did do a lot of pranks in his first few weeks and while I'm a Dean-hater I'm not blind to how much Jess picked fights with him), or they’ve simply given up on him. He tells Rory himself that every authority figure he had back in New York gave up on him too, from teachers to principals to his very own mother. But Rory doesn’t treat him like a lost cause, she treats him like the smart, brilliant and asshole-ish teen that he is. By having faith in him she also often holds him more accountable than others. Where f. ex. Lorelai or the other adults just roll their eyes, Rory physically drags Jess into doing his shifts at the diner. While others write him off, Rory chews Jess’ ear out for not helping Luke more and for willfully making enemies out of the Stars Hollow adults.

They don't put each other on pedestals or below each other. Jess doesn’t try to make a sinner out of Rory and she doesn’t try to make a saint out of him. There’s genuine respect between them. They expect each other to have integrity and treat others with kindness and honesty, and the rest is good old chemistry and common interests.

I particularly love how in so many of their scenes (especially pre-relationship) when they spend time alone they just get to be these goofy nerdy kids. They argue about controversial authors and dig through records shops and eat hot dogs and make fun of each other and try to make each other laugh. It’s not just sexual chemistry as it too often is in a dynamic like this (and often uncomfortably sexual when writing teenagers - looking at you Gossip Girl), and not just well written intellectual chemistry — they have platonic chemistry too. A hell of a lot of it actually.

While I don’t think ASP wrote them through a purely deconstructionist lens on the good girl x bad boy dynamic (if she did plan on writing the dynamic at all), there is something to be said about how where many around them treat them like stereotypes they treat each other like people. To so many people, Rory is a perfect small town princess, a little miss sunshine with booksmarts for days but too delicate and sweet for anything with grit and weight. To a lot of the same people and many more Jess is a pathetic brutish and maniacal lost cause, hell personified in a chainsmoking leather-wearing teenager. But to each other they are actual human beings. Kind and mean and flirtatious and scared and reckless and smart. Rory really thinks that with the right motivation and mindset Jess can be the kind who does (and at the end wrote) incredible things. Jess really believes that with a little more practice and support to step out of her comfort zone she can be the amazing journalist she wishes to be.

They don’t have this stupid «we’re so bad for each other but we can’t stay away» thing that too many trope users rely on and don’t even justify in the plot. Everyone else might think they’re not fit for each other, but they knew they were each other’s person from the very first day.

hiiii haha. hello. exceptionally awkward introduction bc idrk how to start something like this so let's just jump right in. im taking a break from this account for a bit. i know i said i wanted taob out before halloween and currently im fine sticking with that deadline, but if i decide i need longer away then i will take longer away. every time ive reassured people that id never abandon a fic and updates will always come eventually i never once considered that my writing and ability to feel safe and comfortable on this site would be actively taken from me, so im not even going to apologise. i dont want this either and more importantly i dont fucking deserve it. i dont know what it is in the past year, if ive hit a certain amount of followers or 'popularity' that's made it so the natural ratio of positive to negative interactions must in turn go up, but there's been a serious uptick in weird asks for me. the annoying part is that a very small amount of them are actually objectively mean and hateful, the rest are just weird and invasive from people who seemingly dont realise that's what they're being. ive reached a point where i dont care if the intentions are good. it's not my job as a 20 year old tumblr user of all things to defend the morality of someone who couldnt even bother to come off anon. unfortunately, after blocking only one or two anons, the weird asks have decreased substantially, which says all you need to know about the fascinating and exhilarating lives led by these people, but ive also gone on to turn anon asks off entirely. this is something i actively fought against doing and had to be pushed into by my mutuals (who have been the coolest people on planet earth during this entire thing). turning off anon was a big deal to me even if it sounds silly. i felt betrayed and like id been backed into a corner because it was so vehmently something i DIDNT WANT that to feel like i had to do it anyway for my own mental health??? that sucks. so even though ive 'fixed' the problem, im still kind of reeling and uncomfortable every time i come on tumblr. i hope it's just something i need time to ease because i'll truly be devastated if this becomes 'ruined' for me. tumblr exists as the only place in the world where i am honestly every facet of myself without shame or hesitation; losing that would be insanely harmful to me. and to the people who cant appeal to the actual human behind the post, let me put that in words you can understand: we wouldn't get any more writing 😦😦😦 riots and fires and sirens, i know. so yeah. to anyone who has sent me an anon ask and you're now wondering if you were part of the problem, im firmly of the belief that you'll know if you are. when i say 'weird asks' i dont mean 'you sent me a para about your personal life just to vent or ask for advice' or 'you sent me a really deep emotional compliment about the impact me and/or my writing has had on you' - i love asks like that, so much that i put off taking a break and turning off anon solely for the joy they bring me. im sorry that it might feel like you're being punished too bc of the actions of what in reality is a HANDFUL of weird people, but this is what i feel like i have to do to feel safe and not go insane every time i log in. love you guys, hopefully ill see you soon x

I know several people who like LOVE seasons 5-7 (11th doctors run) and think the storylines and moffats writing are brilliant and I don't get it!!! what am I missing??? why does literally every single episode have the exact same stakes: Rory/Amy/the doctor is dead. forever. so dead. but wait!!! what if they aren't!!! why do so many of the explanations for why they're not actually dead feel so rushed like they were added at the last minute!! why does every single queer character act kind of weird and awkward about being queer!! why does the doctor casually say that women are inferior when no one's around!!! what the fuck!! hello!!!

Hi! Long time no yap but I've been really bothered by this thing and I know you're just the person I can go to with this (even if we don't always end up agreeing at times).

I got into a tiff with someone in a comments section of a post that was about Amy (Which character do you think deserved to become a villain? or something similar). They brought up Amy's abuse of her boyfriend. I may have tried to defend Amy (key word is tried. I am officially rubbish at debating) but then I may have said something? Because they said that I (and apparently a lot of other fans) was excusing Amy's abuse because of her trauma. It got me stumped because isn't young Amy's treatment of Rory rooted in her trauma? Did I miss the memo where we separate trauma and abuse? Am I missing something?

That statement bothered me a lot because if there's one thing I never want to do it's defend an abuser. So here I am, humbly asking and hoping to clear the muddy waters.

Your really confused and disturbed moot, Tia 💌

TIA!!!!! Thanks for the ask 💌 , and I send you all the hugs.

Discussion of abuse, trauma, ableism, infidelity, and unhealthy relationship dynamics beneath the cut.

(First off… while I really appreciate your faith in my explaining skills <3 <3 <3 my passion for traumatized characters and mentally ill+neurodivergent rights doesn't make me especially qualified to fully clear muddy waters especially not knowing the full context, but I feel you, and what follows is my informed perspective!)

Speaking generally first, harm done in media is best examined by the impact on the audience, with a different lens than harm done to real people. While relatable experiences in media can be useful and validating and incredibly important, you can’t be “defending an abuser” when the abuse is fictional. It's actually normal for traumatized/ND/mentally ill people to project onto mentally ill villains, when villains are the only significant representation for those stigmatized symptoms in a media landscape that excludes and demonizes us simply for existing. RTD can't stop people who hallucinate from reclaiming the Master's Drums and projecting onto the Master, for example — 90% of the best Doctor Who psychosis fic by psychotic authors is about the Master, whether RTD likes it or not. It's not true crime.

(This is speaking generally. Amy Pond is very much not the Master.)

Abuse is a behavior, and there can be many reasons for it, but reasons based in trauma don’t make it not abuse (some forms of generational trauma can propagate abusive parenting styles, when the parent thinks abusive parenting is normal, or lives entirely vicariously through their child). This absolutely should not be taken to mean trauma correlates with abusive behavior; rather that abusive behaviors from traumatized people are more likely to present in specific ways.

Abuse is also a targeted behavior, based in control — not consistently displayed C-PTSD symptoms as seen in Season 5 Amy Pond through many aspects of her life. Mental health symptoms don't become abuse just because they hinder one partner from meeting the other partner's needs. Any life event can do that.

Without knowing the context of the arguments, this is the aspect of their relationship I've seen you talk about before (which I also feel strongly about), and what I assume is what you were debating? So, here I will talk specifically in regard to Season 5.

We all know Amy — she's never attached to Leadworth because she never wanted to leave Scotland, no steady therapist because none of them stick up for her, can't stick with one job yet her first choice is a job that simulates intimacy because her avoidant behavior (a known trauma response) isn't sustainable to her wellbeing. Rory knows her fears of commitment stem from her repeated abandonments, it’s why he’ll always wait for her, and it's why he blames the Doctor “You make it so they don't want to let you down.”, who apart from having caused a lot of her trauma, has actively taken advantage of her being the “Scottish girl in the English village” who's “still got that accent,” because he wants to feel important, so yeah, I think interpreting Amy's issues (and how Amy and Rory transverse them) as Amy abusing Rory indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of their relationship, as well as a misunderstanding of the (raggedy) Doctor’s role in Amy’s formative self-image (which of course she works through in Season 6, but I am sticking to Season 5).

Abuse is always based in control. That just doesn’t fit here. While Amy's detachment from her real life includes things like calling Rory her “kind of boyfriend” (which she is upfront about to his face; differing commitment levels isn't abuse, though it can be a relationship red flag for both parties IRL) — her Season 5 disregard of Rory’s feelings occurs only in response to the fairytale embodiment of her trauma. It's never a response to Rory; it's a response to the Doctor, who stole her childhood and led her by the hand to her death. She cheats on Rory with the Doctor in her bedroom full of Doctor toys, drawings, models, she made from childhood to early adulthood.

(And yes, like many repeatedly-traumatized people, Amy is prone to being sensitive and reactive. Take her “Well, shut up then!” line in The Big Bang; but given Rory responds to this by hugging her, clearly he doesn’t take it as her actually dismissing him. He knows her better than that.)

And by no means do I meant to imply this is fair to young Rory, poor Rory, who's left struggling with the feeling that his role in her life is in competition with the role of her trauma (aka the Doctor). But not every unhealthy relationship dynamic is unhealthy because of abuse. Labelling Amy's treatment of Rory in Season 5 more accurately isn't the same as excusing her harmful choices — but making mistakes is part of being human, Amy's mistakes are certainly understandable, and she works through them out of love for Rory.

If there's one thing to say about Moffat women, it's that Moffat allows his female characters the same grace that the male characters *coughTENcough* have always had, to hurt and struggle and make realistic mistakes and overcome those mistakes and to heal without being demonized.

Amy isn't perfect, but she is a fully realized character, and her story gives us a resonant depiction of childhood trauma.

okay but. rory has the "hates being wet" werewolf temperament. which means she gets furious from contact with water

she also has dirt on her hands. always no matter what. cause it comes from the "tattoos" category. sure, she spends a lot of time outside. she might be digging a lot of holes. constantly

but i firmly believe. rory does NOT wash her hands

or anything. not with water at least. she just grooms herself like the animal she is. which leads me to some other stuff i would like to point out

rory would NOT put on fucking make up. she would NOT fucking shave. her creators are cowards. let her be masc without stupid additions "just so people still can tell its a woman!!"

okay back to funny stuff. rory i know youre the biggest metalhead here. yess lets go to a metal concert together. but girl why are you wearing bovver boots in your sports outfit . are you insane

anyways heres a screenshot of rory holding an obviously oversized rabbit<3

so nice you get to look at it twice

to be clear they introduced amyrory divorce plot because there was literally nothing else to do with them. there is only a modicum of interest when their relationship is unsteady

I am the number one mike gets vecna'd truther. I have damn near 100% confidence that mike gets vecna'd. there is no version of s5 that I can imagine where mike doesn't get vecna'd. he will be shown horrendous visions and he will scream and cry and veccy boy will get his homophobic dog moment and mike is gonna be shaken up and refusing to tell anyone what he saw and it will be the most important, impactful, and jaw dropping vecna scene of the season, and I will be pulling up the cristiano ronaldo gif

anyway im too sweaty and annoyed to sleep so im lying here thinking about art i havent finished and trying not to scream a bit

i have to say, i kind of think ayitl is a darkly genius means of resolving a not-quite-love-triangle -- a highly discoursed-upon love situation, if you will -- because i think both rory/logan and rory/jess shippers look at the revival like “this shows exactly why [pairing i don’t like] doesn’t work, and exactly why [pairing i do like] does work”

and i think it works equally well in either direction, hahahahaha

someone explain to me how rory got out of that car accident with a hairline fracture but jess, who was driving and was no doubt receiving the brunt of the damage, was completely fine?

grrr forgive me moshi i accidentally sent that ask on anon but im here to feed u now😼

i always thought jing yuan was a tit guy so do u think he like slaps ur tits during sex🤕 my friend says the same thing but with gepard.. >_< eeeee idkk maybe im hallucinating moshi *sobs*

OMG. BRO OK LISTEN I THINK UR RIGHT LIKE. it starts with a little teasing slap like a sweet one yk? then he sees ur reaction n hes like ^_^ hehehe THEN IT TURNS INTO A THING FR 👹

No literally, your tags are so right. Rory’s love for Jess is on such a different level in my opinion and I don’t mean this in a condescending way towards the other two (as much as I might dislike them, it’s not the point I’m trying to make) but their entire course and journey sets them apart for me. Like there are so many aspects of them that aren’t like Rogan or Rory and Dean that makes Literati stand out all the more, if that makes sense. Such as the fact that Rory never outright said ‘I love you’ to Jess, unlike when she blurted it out to Dean or told Logan she loved him or just the simple fact that Dean and Logan got multiple chances while Jess didn’t. There’s something so quietly significant about that to me, for some reason that I can’t put into words. Like I’m not seeing it as Rory loving him less than the others but in a way I can’t quite explain yet, it almost makes me feel like she possibly loved him the most. And it scared her. Especially taking into account s4 (peak literati angst ofc), she could care and love him all she wanted but the fact was that he wasn’t reliable, unpredictable, full of constant “changes” which was no longer something Rory wanted. But something always lingered there for her with him, no matter how many years passed. And well, ofc I don’t find this good that she did but I almost forgot to acknowledge that Jess was also the ONLY boyfriend she never cheated on. It’s just another interesting little detail to add to whatever rambling this is, I dunno what this even is but it’s been in my head for days. And I still don’t think I organized it or worded it correctly but just thought I’d leave it here b/c why not? I love hearing your thoughts anyway!

NO YEAH YOU'RE SO RIGHT!!! I've been trying to put this idea into words for awhile now. Rory and Jess's love was just different. Like you said, he was the only one she never cheated on (also the only one she cheated with in the original series), and he was the only one she didn't give a second chance. My thoughts are like yours, like it scared her to risk getting hurt like that again. Because Jess leaving seemed to hurt worse than any breakup with Dean or Logan. She could take getting hurt by Dean or Logan again, but getting hurt by Jess would destroy her. And she needed a stability that season 4 Jess couldn't provide, and by the time he was stable and secure enough for them to be able to work things out, she was with Logan. So despite her obviously still caring about him (because hey, she went to Philadelphia, she read The Subject, she kissed him back!) she couldn't do anything with the feelings she had for him in that moment. Then in AYITL, she relies on Jess for help and he gives her encouragement and despite it being years later, they still have a relationship that's unique to them and different than the relationships she has with Dean or Logan or even Paul at that point.

Rory's love for Jess was just... totally unlike the love she had for anyone else, and I think that's why they always come back to each other.

i respect the hell out of lorelai gilmore for the way she treated paris and lane

Who are the 3 British riders you respect 👀

1 Mr "my chin disappears when I smile"

2 Mr likes dessert and Taylor Swift

3 Mr summer break skinny

leaving the apartment where i lived with my ex turned out to be more painful than her leaving the apartment where we lived together