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hoeforhao · 9 months

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🏷 Kidult ▪︎ Choi Seungcheol Fic ▪︎ pt.2

↷ pairing: dad!seungcheol × fem!reader (feat!jeonghan)

↷ genre: heavy angst, fluff towards the end, mentions of childhood trauma, sort of arranged marriage? cheol and reader have a daughter together, lots of dad seungcheol content!!!

↷ summary: can trying to relive the childhood you never got to experience, through your daughter be the reason of your husband's irk?

↷ part: 2/4 pt.1, pt.3, pt.4

↷ w.c: 2.4k+

↷ author's note: part 2 is here at last!! this time I told myself that no matter what I'll keep my promise and post on cheol's birthday 💌 + also part 3 would be like a bonus with quite a lot of smut😏 and comfort at the end obviously duh!

If you want to be added to this fic's taglist, drop a comment under this post ; my ask box is open too♡

"You didn't have to go along with Hannie's proposal you know. He's just naturally manipulative" shifting on the satin sheets beneath that were definitely fine enough to soothe your tired body, but nothing your aching soul, you lightly chuckled in order to make it seem like you were completely fine with cheol's demeanor towards you today, or rather everyday!

"I agreed because I wanted to y/n,not because I was influenced into" seungcheol's firm hands hesitantly creep up along your waist, sending sudden jolts of warmth throughout.

Isn't this all you've ever wanted, to be wrapped up in his embrace, take in his vanilla scent, while he purred like a small child on your neck...but you knew better....you knew these were the delusions that would only peel your heart apart into flakes, everytime you hoped of them coming true.

"But you can feel uncomfortable staying with me in a resort alone, that too without Hana accompanying us"

"You're my wife y/n"

The man behind you spoke while keeping you in his embrace, hope still flaming in his orbs waiting for you to at least take his hand into yours...

But alas! He very well knew that the hurt he has caused you can even take up ages for him to fix.....well he wasn't in any sort of hurry, rather now completely ready to build an eternity with you, his beloved lady.

While cheol slipped into deep slumber, his arms still wrapped around you and his wet curls slightly brushing the skin of your back, that one line from him kept ringing in your head like a goddamn alarm clock.

"'You're my wife y/n' , did he just say that as a token or did he actually accept me as his wife, did he really melt, will i now finally get to live his love and be treated like how other men treat their lovely wives?"

Dang y/n stop expecting again you idiot. Do you wanna get yourself shattered into shards again!!!!

Amidst all these thoughts racing throughout your head, you didn't realize when you yourself welcomed sleep, wrapped up into cheol's nuzzle.

*********************************************

"Oh seungcheol i completely forgot to tell you two about this!" jeonghan's arms tug onto cheol's back, pulling the parade of you six to a halt, resulting into the older cocking up his head towards him.

"There's this staycation sort of my office is paying for only their best employees" han continues while flipping his long curly locks in the middle "at a resort call Diamond's Retreat where like couples with children can enjoy some leisure. They've a two day camp for the kids, while their parents treat themselves to some alone time with each other, away from the city and life's chaos, in each other's arms" him finishing the last part of the so called news with a teasing smirk on his face.

Seungcheol waited for Han to address as to what his office's trip had to do anything with him and his family.

"Since our other best employee Mingyu tskkk, is already out in Paris with his girlfriend, i was thinking if you three wanted to join us! The girls can have their fun while we enjoy our partners company" the petite looking man finally draws the concluding statement to his evil plan, hands tied tightly around his wife's waist.

"Seungcheol doesn't really do trips Han. We would rather like to pa-"

"Book us three in, we'll go" you were stopped in your tracks even before being able to keep your argument to the duo infront, as your husband made his decision while his arms snaked right around your torso, pulling your head slightly onto his form.

While you were shocked to see cheol showing you physical affection in public, the man beside you was rather concerned and hurt about his own wife not being comfortable in his embrace, trying to squirm her way out somehow.

**********************************************

The day of the trip was finally here and you were literally sweating through your white shirt at the thought of dropping off your daughter at the camp for TWO WHOLE DAYS! not that you were too sad about not having her running by your side all the time,but more cause you were strained about being left alone with her dad.

It has been over ages that you spend your time only with seungcheol by you side, you didn't know what to do, what to say...or more appropriately what to say that won't trigger his irk towards you. YOON JEONGHAN YOU DEVIL CHILD I'LL COME BACK AT YOU FOR THIS TRIP TO YOUR DAD'S ABODE.

"MOM!" a tweak from Hana's small fingers brings you back to this earthly void "I'm leaving with Byul now! Where's my goodbye kiss hmph!!! Daddy already gave me his" a pout paints hers plumply lips - no dna test would be needed to prove that she's the choi seungcheol's daughter....seeing how all her postures are literal copies of her dad, starting from those supple cherry lips to those glistening bambi eyes.

"Momma is so sorry bun,how about a bonus kiss as a punishment!" you peck your daughter's cheeks twice, slowly bringing her down from her father's arms, his hands brushing with your warm ones in the process.

Seeing Hana slowly melt with the horizon, hand in hand with her bestfriend Byul, while both of them excitedly made their way to the adventure camp, made you drop your heart into the pit of your stomach. Realization finally hits you - you're now completely alone with cheol!

"Get all nestled in quick, we've planned for a small sunset date by the rooftop deck. Be sure to be present by 5pm sharp, okay you Ms McTwisp" jeonghan places a playful slap along your back, earning an unnoticed glare from the other man.

Striding towards your room in as small steps as possible for a human to be taking, you unwillingly made your way to the room alloted for the two of you.

"What can be even worse than this already was right?" That was you before you pushed open the gloomy wooden doors to reveal a room decked up in white peonies and silk all around, making it look no less than the mating abode of two doves.

"I..I'll ask room service to clear all...all of this out" you tried to clear out the air before any offensive remark from him would ruin your flutter again, but...

To your surprise, seungcheol looked way to calm and maybe even a little happy at thr sight, the slight curl of his lips giving it out for him.

"It's okay y/n. It's just some decorations! Besides-" cheol takes a little halt, debating whether to say his thoughts out aloud or not.

"Besides they look really pretty, like you" the last two words were only for his ears to perceive, as you were already taken aback by his sudden gentle approach towards you.

After having a hard time trying to make it through the date with that annoying ass bestfriend of yours, for almost half an hour, it was finally time for dessert which in turn meant that he'll get to enjoy your company alone, away from any outside interference.

Although seungcheol would be lying if he said that the entirety of this thirty minutes meal was a torture for him - not when you were laced up in the prettiest sundress he has ever seen anyone flaunt ever. Was it that the dress was too finely woven? No! It was you, that soft smile of yours, those satin black locks half tied up into a white ribbon,that constantly kept distracting you from concentrating on your plate, those glittery siren eyes of yours is what made you look like a moon goddess in such a simple attire.

Oh how he wishes to be seated by your side, tucking away those stubborn strands behind your ears, with his own forefinger, to be feeding you that soufflé himself and to be gatekeeping those cheek pouches only for him to view.....he could never get enough of how godly yet cute you looked while devouring down each and every food bit on those porcelain plates.

"Thanks for the arrangement guys! Now if you would excuse use, I would like to take y/n on a walk by the beach" seungcheol pushes up from his chair, quite frustrated that the reason why he even agreed for this vacation, to spend time with his wife and try to make things right one page at a time, was not being attended to.

An approving nod and a victorious smile flashes onto jeonghan's face, knowing he has now been able to push forward the maneuver for what he actually tricked off poor Mingyu away to Paris, only so that he can somewhat try to mend his bestfriend's family.

"But we need to spen- " for the second time this week cheol banishes you from your right go finish your sentences, as he wraps your hands into his big ones, pulling you two into the beach encircling the property.

The warm sands beneath your feet, the sea breeze running through your hair while your dress flowed along the wind's patterns, made your heart swell up with utter joy. Even though the past few days have taken a big bite out of your heart, there's nothing that a walk along the beach at sunset can't fix right? That too if your husband is now following you like a puppy from behind, without your notice.

"Y/n?" a coo as gentle as a mourning dove graces you ears, while the cool waters traces finds their way onto your feet. You turn around to seungcheol now standing few inches away from you, his head drooped down like a flamingo, hands fidgeting with one another.

"Yes, Seungcheol?"

"Can you....can you call me cheol again pls? Like the old times?" your breath hitches at this sudden approach from him, unsure of what was about to come next.

"I know I messed up...no not even messed up i completely fucked up our relation...i treated you as nothing more than just my child's mother, but" you could now hear soft sobs coming from his direction, as seungcheol's voice starts to become unstable.

"That's not how i feel for you y/n. I don't know what took over me these two years...I won't try to justify myself by saying oh it was work stress or oh i was just not used to being a rookie father and all that....instead i really want to just mend our bond and be a happy pride. Pls?" Seungcheol's eyes finally travel up from the yellow ground beneath to the dark of your eyes, tear drops quite visible around their corners.

Oh how you just wanted to run into his arms, pull him into the warmest hug ever, pat his head and tell him that it's okay....everyone makes mistakes. What matters is them realizing it and trying to put things back into their place again. But your hope was played with way too many times to trust him this fast. What if he yanks you away, what if he gets disgusted by your touch, what if he's just saying all this for the sake of his daughter....

So, to protect yourself from further hurt, all you did was nod at him, flashing him a soft assuring smile, while walking away to sit on the moist sand beneath, ready to take in the grandeur of the sun pour its all into the sea.

Even tho all seungcheol wanted at that moment was to be wrapped into your bosom, he knew it would take a hefty amount of time for you to forgive all his conducts. A small sigh parted his lips as he waddled down the beach himself, leaving his pawprints as a proof of his new beginning, while sitting down by you to enjoy the sunset, hand in hand with his wife.

This newfound feeling of closeness with cheol was confusing yet fulfilling for your craving soul, cuz who could've imagined that you would be sitting on the beach by his side, fingers intertwined while the sun disappeared amongst the tangerine marshmallows before you.

"You know y/n, that day i didn't mean what i said. I love to see you play with Hana like a kid, reliving the childhood you never had, giggling and jumping like a little kiddo. My heart swells up with joy everytime, to see my wife and my daughter like that. To see my family all happy. I'm so sorry for being a jerk. I really don't know what gets into me sometimes, but all I know is I just want to build an eternity with you, have a small content family with my loved one" seungcheol literally blurts out everything in a breath. Did jeonghan possess him or what.

You didn't know whether it was doubt or hurt or the urge to not melt away so easily speaking, but instead of accepting his apology all you said was-

"We should get going now. It's getting dark." Dusting off the loose sand from the back of your white dress, you gently released yourself from seungcheol's grasp.

An immediate frown replaced his content face, from both the feeling of your warmth leaving his body as well as your indifference towards him. He rightfully deserves it tho. "Y-yeah let's go". Seungcheol and stuttering are two things you have never thought could go hand in hand. Like ever. At least not infront of you.

Overwhelmed with all these fresh senses, you quietly follow cheol on his stride towards your room ; the moonlight hitting on his orbs, radiating off a glint even diamonds can't be compared to, the moist breeze from the waters slightly wetting his locks making them stick to his glistening skin, those rosy plumps sticking out into a small pout....oh how dreamy can this man even look huh...even the moon god would be struck by how his light carves out the features of this fallen archangel.

"You know staring at anyone like that for this long, is considered rude" your trance his broken off by his deep voice, laid with a tint of allurement, as he twisted the knob of your room's door, "but you're my wife, I'm all yours to look at"

"I'm so so...sorry. I didn't mean to" you shy away from his glare, trying to quickly walk towards the couch, but seungcheol was way faster than you knew. Even before you could take a step towards your goal, cheol already has you trapped in his arms, your back hitting the cold surface of the door, while his knee rested between your legs.

"W-what are you doing, cheol" a warm wet pair of lips lands on yours as soon as the much longed for nickname makes its involuntary way out of your crevices.

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aoxizu · 1 month

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i have another 2.1 character dynamic post in the recesses of my brain but i need to get this out first

star rail's 2.1 update main plotline leans a lot more into existentialism and absurdism than i thought it would which is a really nice surprise

like i thought before 2.0 that at most it was just going to be some "oh no capitalism bad ipc bad cults also bad" thing but honestly what we got is so much more interesting. the spoilers start now

also massive disclaimer i am not a philosophist and actually i really don't like philosophy because it makes my brain hurt and i would much rather just look at logical nice things like math and plants so. if i get anything wrong please correct me

acheron's past and how she became an emanator of nihility reminds me somewhat of the absurdist theme of how people always look for meaning when there isn't any, until they finally realize that the universe is meaningless

and the entire path of nihility basically is a road towards that realization that people tread on, and the difference between the real world and star rail is that in the real world here we have people who will see that and then go write a book about a guy not crying at his mother's funeral, whereas in star rail it seems that just accepting that the universe is meaningless turns you into a pathstrider or even emanator of the nihility (not sure if i remember the details, correct me if i'm wrong)

and then aventurine's whole motivation is trying to understand why the universe is so cruel to him, and to find meaning when you have everything except freedom, both of which are absurdist themes

the leap of faith argument often attributed to søren kierkegaard claims that even though there is no rational logic for believing in god, you should do it anyway because the alternatives are madness, suicide, and ignorance. this was one solution to the problem of confronting the universe's meaninglessness: choosing to believe in a higher being regardless

later world wars i and ii both contributed heavily to the rise of absurdism as people returned from the war, having seen so many others die around them, and then just going back to a normal society with none of what they as individual soldiers had contributed seemingly doing anything. and then it happened again, but on a much greater scale with even more deaths. both wars and the destruction they brought led many people to start questioning why a supposedly moral god could allow this suffering, and this is where camus comes in and says that actually religion and nationalism both aren't good solutions, and instead we should just accept meaninglessness and keep living despite the absurdity

and i think dr ratio's scroll thing kind of relates to that

he tells aventurine to open it when he's about to die, or when he's completely out of answers for the question of how to confront absurdity

and dr ratio's answer for aventurine is to just tell him to keep living, good luck

which is. yeah

it's the argument that there are more answers to nihilism than just 1) going insane, 2) pretending like it doesn't exist, and 3) dying

it's the bold claim that despite everything, you can still choose to live

sure nothing makes sense but that does not detract from your life. it doesn't need to make sense at all

and with the understanding that things do not need to fit our human definition of meaning, we can continue on knowing our true place in the universe

and with that aventurine walks into the very big black hole like look at that thing you cannot tell me there is no symbolism there

let's go back to acheron.

in the part where you get a snippet of acheron's conversation with some guy just before this cutscene, the other party states that "[IX] leave[s] woven strands of fate for humans to walk, and together THEY weave a great shadow...And this shadow silently envelops them."

which to me sounds like a statement on how people across time and space have again and again come to the same question, what is the meaning of life?

and acheron's whole color thing seems to mean that she is one of the few who, after walking so far on the path of nihility, somehow have not died yet, be it from madness or something else

like it seems implied that many many more have seen the meaninglessness of the universe and have not reacted as well as acheron has

ok i have more to say about the elation and how it in turn relates to the nihility but that will have to come later but there is. a lot of interesting things there to explore

once again disclaimer: I Am Not A Philosophist And Do Not Know What The Correct Definitions Of These Words I'm Throwing Around Are. thank you for coming to my ted talk that was more of a longwinded ramble

#hsr #honkai star rail #2.1 spoilers #hsr aventurine #dr ratio #(briefly but i think i might have more to say about him later once my brain gets working)#acheron #hsr analysis #i should make a tag for that because this is probably not the last time i'm going on a wild tangent about star rail #but bad #bad hsr analysis #someone save me and take me back to the luofu i don't want to be doing english homework while playing a supposedly relaxing upbeat game #or whatever it was that shaoji promised in the 2.0 livestream #i just want to go back and see dan heng and jing yuan and qingque and bailu and you get the point #get me out of this dreamscape.

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mayasaura · 13 days

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re: your alecto post

so true! i haven’t been actively thinking about any of that but you’re so right. i do want to point one thing out though, you say that the body has never been anything but gentle with harrow, and you’re not wrong per se but at the same time i’m fairly sure that the body as we see it in htn is harrow hallucinating. which absolutely does not mean that the body has no bearing on the larger character of alecto, she Absolutely does. but i don’t think it’s at all inconsistent that the alecto we see when the tomb opens acts very differently from the body as we see her in htn.

I agree that the Body in Harrow the Ninth is sometimes Harrow hallucinating, but that "sometimes" is important. It seems odd to me that she would be conveniently hanging around just in time to nip into Harrow's body and become Nona if she weren't also sometimes really there.

It would also be odd from a narrative standpoint to spend so much time on Harrow's conversations with the Body, if that relationship was only ever really with herself and her idea of the Body. I'm thinking specifically of those rare occasions when the Body has something to say.

The first example that comes to mind is this little interaction, when the Body has interpreted Harrow's fear of death to her as being because she sees death as a mistake. Harrow asks what else it could be, and:

This statement is nonsense to Harrow, and does nothing to answer her question. It's barely more than nonsense to us, until we learn Alecto's story. Now we know it's literally true. It's true, and it's something about Alecto that Harrow did not know. I feel confident in interpreting Alecto as having been in some way present in this scene. (Though her confusion implies to me that her memory loss did not start with Nona! That's fun!)

Then there's this exchange, right after Harrow has tried and failed to physically seduce the Body, and the Body has told her she has to leave:

So fun fact: This is one of the ways I figured out Nona was Alecto. Nona has exactly the same casually dismissive attitude about sexual advances. "Oh, they wanted to see me naked. It was a sex thing. I don't really mind." This one is less certain than the other. If you want to believe the Body in that scene was a hallucination, there are other ways to explain it. But the continuity of personality there is pretty damn convincing to me.

Like, really tho, if the Body wasn't at least sometimes Alecto, then what was the point of all that? Isn't it way more interesting as an inconsistency between aspects, just as Nona and Alecto are inconsistent?

#the locked tomb #tlt asks #alecto the first #the corse of the locked tomb #the body

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tojiluv · 2 months

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EYES DON’T LIE — choso kamo [chapter four]

description: in which a girl unwittingly becomes involved with a handsome stranger in a club, oblivious to his true identity of being in a famous boyband… OR in which you and Choso must conceal your secret meetings from your friends and his bandmates, especially from his younger brother and your best friend, Yuji.

warnings: minor sexual content. mdi 16+. swearing.

notes: posted a day early since i’m studying for exams.

In the depths of Tokyo's vibrant nightlife, Choso's eyes widened in astonishment, the air thick with anticipation. Standing before him were two individuals: his brother, Yuji, and an enigmatic woman from an unforgettable night at a club. The realization dawned upon him, and a palpable tension filled the room, leaving one oblivious to the awkward pause that hung in the air.

Caught in a surreal moment of recognition, you couldn't help but feel a sense of disbelief as you grasped the truth – the alluring stranger who had captivated you at the club was none other than Yuji's brother.

His older brother.

Finally, Choso cleared his throat, extending his clammy hands to yours, his gaze shifting from the side then to you.

"It's nice to meet you, Yuji always talked about you during the tour."

I'm going to faint, you thought.

You didn't know how to process any of this; everything was moving so quickly for your liking that you didn't even realize that you shook his hand back automatically, familiar cold hands enveloping your warmed ones, just like that night.

His hand gripped the straps of your dress, the flimsy material falling down your shoulders sensually as you let out a small moan, his lips grazing your pulsing neck. You slid one hand into his untied hair, gripping the long strands tightly as you heard him grunt against the pleasurable pain.

You held a tight-lipped smile, returning the gesture by introducing yourself to the older man. Your thoughts scattered about the situation and the memories that kept forming from that specific night.

"I heard a lot about yourself, your band is pretty great," you spoke out, not even knowing if your voice was steady enough to control your breathing. Choso rubbed a hand behind his neck, shyly glancing away from your form as he mumbled a thank you for your compliment.

Am I even sure this is the same man from that night? You were overthinking so much that your brain was going to explode any minute. His confidence right now was majorly different from the one on that night.

I swear he said his name was Kai... was that a fake name?! you exclaimed inwardly.

He placed his arms around your waist, pulling you closer as you kissed each other deeply. He sat down on your bed, your legs wrapped around his waist with your dress continuing to slip down past your exposed chest, goosebumps rising against your warmed skin.

Yuji beamed from the side, witnessing the whole interaction without noticing anything wrong, "Isn't this great? Two of the most important people in my life are finally meeting!"

You and Choso held crooked smiles, eyes not even meeting at all, as this wasn't exactly the first time you'd met; hell, you wouldn't even count your first interaction as acquaintances.

It was way past that.

"Honestly, I didn't know how this would go, but I think you guys match each other pretty well," your best friend stated, chuckling a bit. You both forcefully joined in as well to keep the conversation going. Little did he know how that statement was more than the truth.

"I don't think you'll be able to handle me," you teased, giggling as you slid your hands down his naked upper half. The alcohol was making you more confident than you already were, just tipsy enough to have a good time.

He then grabbed your jaw, squishing your cheeks together as your mouth parted. Staring into your eyes, he slid his hand down to wrap it around your neck tightly, but not enough to hurt you, while the other gripped your waist to hoist you higher against his chest.

"Wanna bet on that, pretty girl? Cause I don't think you've realized the many ways I can..."

You shuddered from the memories, already feeling your cheeks become warmer than before as you glanced at your mysterious man. How do you even move forward from this? The main thing that you were concerned about was making sure that nobody, especially Yuji, would ever find out about that night.

Fuck, why me?

Luckily Nobara and Maki didn't see Choso fully in the light that night but if they did, they would have informed you of who he was immediately before anything could've had. But nope, the world was against you and placed you in one of the most awkward moments of your life.

"Are you feeling alright?" your best friend asks, eyes holding concern as he looks over your well-being. You were sweating a bit, cheeks flared as the room suddenly felt too hot for you to even breathe properly.

Fanning yourself, you held an uneasy smile. "I'm good, just needs some air. Uh, where's the restroom?" You asked, trying to avoid any contact with the so-called Kai or whatever he wanted to call himself, in front of you.

Yuji pointed towards the directions leading to the second floor of the home, "Maybe it's the alcohol, I'll grab you some water! Just try to relax up there, okay?"

Your best friend, so sweet and kind-hearted, unaware of what has happened between you and his brother.

Not even sparing a glance at him, you pushed your way through the crowd to rush up the grand staircase by following Yuji's direction. The first door you rushed in was a big mistake as a couple was making out in a bedroom and yelled at the interruption.

"Uh, continue, sorry!" you squeaked, shielding your eyes of the scene.

Closing the door quickly, you pushed your feet to the end of the hall, the blasting music sounding less vibrant as you knocked on the door before entering as nobody had answered. You found yourself probably in another guest bedroom (how many rooms are there?), which did have a connected washroom. You took advantage of it and began to pat down your face from all the prompting sweating.

"What the hell do I do... the one time I decide to be bold, of course, the consequences come right back to bite me in the ass!" you grumbled lowly, drying your hands on a towel. The situation was messed up for you and your friendship with Yuji, not knowing what solution to make.

You couldn't believe it, that handsome stranger who had you wrapped around his finger that night was Yuji's older brother. How ironic is this? If only you knew how he truly looked like and maybe got to know him more to slip about any family-related stuff, you probably would've had the chance to recognize the man.

But nope, the world was out to get you. Yuji made it clear that if anyone thought about his brother like that, let alone hooking up with the guy, would betray him. You practically did all the above with the man, god, how stupid were you?

Sighing, you kept looking into the mirror as you thought over your options on what to do with this, but it seemed like pretending it never happened was the only way out. Suddenly, you heard the bedroom door open as the music became more prominent, and then it was closed, meaning someone probably entered the room.

"Uh, someone's already here!" You shouted from the opened bathroom door, truly just wanting to be alone for the time being. There was no response, causing you to roll your eyes as you moved to leave the bathroom to confront the person.

"Sorry, but I'm using —"

You stopped your words, feet halting as you stood in front of him once again during the night, but now alone.

"Yeah, sorry, I knew you were here, but I just wanted to check if you were good," Choso mumbled, barely making eye contact with you as he fiddled with the ends of his jacket nervously.

"I'm good... thanks for checking," you mumbled, crossing your arms to comfort yourself. He nodded, glancing around the room before laying his eyes back on your figure.

"Well, that's good. I'll, uh, let Yuji know then.”

Is he seriously ignoring this?!

You were annoyed, more importantly at him, abruptly stopping him from leaving. "Are we seriously not going to talk about it?" you huffed, glaring.

Choso hesitated, his eyes avoiding yours as he shifted uncomfortably in the room. The air hung heavy with unspoken tension, and you could sense his internal struggle. Finally, he let out a deep sigh, meeting your gaze with a conflicted expression.

"I... I don't know what to say," he admitted, running a hand through his disheveled hair. "This is just as unexpected for me as it is for you."

You rolled your eyes, frustration bubbling beneath the surface. "Well, it happened, and we can't just pretend it didn't. What do we do now?"

Choso sighed again, this time more resigned. "Look, I didn't expect to see you again after that night, especially not like this."

"Neither did I," you muttered, crossing your arms tighter.

He took a step closer, his eyes searching yours for some sign of understanding. "It's not that I didn't want to see you again. It's just... complicated. Yuji and I have our differences, and I didn't want to bring you into our family drama."

You scoffed, "Family drama? Is that what you call it? You seduce someone at a club, and it's just a family drama for you?"

Choso winced at your words, frustration flashing across his face. "It's not that simple. Look, I know what we did that night, but I never expected to run into you like this."

"Did you know?"

He tilted his head, not understanding your question.

"Did you know that it was ... me? His best friend?" you asked, eyes vulnerable. You analyzed his face to see if he would admit truthfully that he recognized you at the club.

Choso's eyes widened, shaking his head. "No, no. I wouldn't have if I knew, though your name did sound familiar, but I was a bit buzzed and didn't think much of it. Well, little did I know that it was more than familiar –"

"Then how come you gave me a fake name? Remember, Kai?" You seethed out, interrupting.

"Listen, I usually use a fake name when I'm in public with friends so people don't recognize us. I didn't think much of it at the moment," He defended, shrugging his shoulders but holding a regrettable look on his face. You scoffed, though you did understand his reasoning in a way, you were still annoyed by it.

You felt his eyes gaze up and down your figure, his stare was causing heat to rise in your face. You could see his eyes hold a certain emotion you were familiar with.

"You're wearing the dress," Choso stated, shifting his stance as he took another look before glancing into your eyes. You looked down at your outfit, suddenly realizing why you wore it and specifically, how it led up to wearing it.

"Yeah, um, thought it would give me some luck tonight..." You mumbled.

"Luck?" He questioned until registering what you meant, "Oh... oh," Choso let out a choked cough, not noticing the tinge of red covering his ears.

You kissed your teeth, "Yeah... kinda the opposite right now," you murmured the last part.

A heavy silence settled between you two, the gravity of the situation sinking in. You were torn between anger, confusion, and a lingering attraction that you wished you could shake off.

"So, what now?" you finally asked, breaking the silence.

Choso sighed once more, his gaze dropping to the floor. "I, uh, don't know. We can't change the past, but maybe we can find a way to navigate the present."

You nodded, skeptical but willing to see where this would lead. "I guess we just move on from it, pretend it never happened for the sake of Yuji, right?"

You expected him to agree immediately, yet you didn't receive a response, rather hesitation. His brows furrowed as he glared at the floor, contemplating the decision.

Eyeing him, you repeated, "Do you agree?"

Choso snapped out of his daze before nodding, "I guess we should... for Yuji."

Even though this may be the best decision, deep down, it doesn't feel like it's the right one, you thought. A feeling rushed through you as you both agreed on this choice, but the feeling wasn't pleasant, rather dejected.

That night with Choso was the most passionate and sensual night you ever had from a one-night stand. You had some boyfriends and hook-ups a couple of times during the past few years, yet none of them came close to how Choso made you feel at that moment. He made you feel special, wanted, and very sexy from the way he spoke those dirty words into your ear to the movements of his hips against yours in a rough, but vigorous way, that you became addicted to.

"Well then, I guess I'll... see you around," you mumbled, fidgeting awkwardly on your heels as tension hung in the air.

He cleared his throat, nodding. "Uh, yeah, enjoy the party."

You watched him take a step to leave, but he halted suddenly. Tilting your head, confusion washed over you as he seemed conflicted as if grappling with whether to say something more. After a brief internal struggle, he turned back to face you, a newfound confidence replacing the earlier shy and closed-off demeanor. It caught you off guard, considering his reserved composure throughout the night.

"Even if we're pretending it never happened for Yuji, I don't believe it was a mistake," His unexpected confession had you stunned.

"I didn't regret that night at all and still don't."

With that, Choso left the room, leaving you alone with your thoughts. As the door closed behind him, you released a breath you hadn't realized you were holding, feeling your heart racing. His admission had changed everything, casting a shadow over your decision to move on.

You, too, didn't regret that night. If given the chance, you would have relived those moments in this bedroom. However, you held back; after all, he was Yuji's older brother. You couldn't betray your best friend in such a way, well, not again at least. Now, you wondered if the two of you could carry on as if nothing happened, concealing the truth, especially after Choso's unexpected declaration and your silent agreement.

The night had taken an unforeseen turn, and the consequences were unraveling right in front of your eyes.

⇽ chapter three | chapter five ⇾

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sage-nebula · 8 days

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WatcherTV Debrief

I said I was going to write down all of my thoughts yesterday, but I was simply too tired after work. So I'm going to do so now, in a post that is likely going to be very long, but hopefully will still be worth the read for some of you anyway.

TL;DR: I believe this is a very poor decision on Watcher Entertainment's part and it is at the very least going to cost them a huge swath of their fanbase, if not their entire company in the long run. And at this point in time, I myself will not be subscribing.

With that said though, I don't want this post to merely be a rant about how much I dislike the decision, so I'm going to start off by looking at things from their perspective and explaining why, although some people in the fanbase might feel betrayed, none of the three (yes, three, because Steven, Ryan, and Shane were all equal parts of this decision) personally betrayed anyone in the fandom. If you're still angry, I understand that seeing what might seem like a "defense" might be upsetting, but again, I hope you'll find some value in it regardless.

All of that said, that plus my extensive criticism of this decision is going to be long, so let's go beneath a cut.

First, let us state the obvious: Watcher Entertainment is a media company -- a business -- and Shane Madej, Ryan Bergara, and Steven Lim are not your friends. They are business owners first, and media producers + actors second.

I italicized actors to draw attention to it, because this is something that I think gets . . . not forgotten, per se, but pushed aside in people's minds when they consume video content online, particularly when that video content is on YouTube, which originally began as a point and shoot video upload website that was meant to give anyone and everyone the ability to upload their vlogs or silly little videos. The term "parasocial relationships" is one that has proliferated across the internet, but I think the issue here -- with Shane and Ryan in particular -- is not only that people are thinking of them as "friends," but also that they are thinking, "These are their authentic selves, this is who they really are, I know them." And the fact of the matter is, that isn't true. Shane and Ryan are actors. What we see in their videos isn't their authentic selves. We don't know them.

Now, that isn't to say that it's all a lie. It isn't quite the same as, say, Ryan Gosling or Leo DiCaprio playing a role in a film. But every internet celebrity (and that is what they are at this point) presents themselves in a particular way to their audience. Even in the Pod Watcher podcast, where ostensibly they're having Just Friendly Conversations About Whatever's On Their Minds, they're mindful of the fact that their audience is listening, their audience is judging, their audience is making gifs and fanart of moments they like. They're acting. They're playing up personas to keep fans engaged, to keep fans coming back for more.

So Shane and Ryan (and Steven, when he can be) are actors. You don't know their true authentic selves, and you never have. Anything they say has to be taken with a grain of salt, because they are saying what they want you to hear. Even their live shows are rehearsed. And what this means -- that they only show you what they want to show you -- is that they did not betray you, because they couldn't betray you. They don't know you, just like you don't know them. Betrayal is not possible here.

To that end, Watcher Entertainment is a media company -- in other words, a business. And businesses must generate not only revenue, but profit in order to stay afloat. Now, I don't know what Watcher's financial books look like right now. I have seen people throwing around a lot of numbers about what they have to make from Patreon, from ticket and merchandise sales, et cetera, but without looking at the expense reports, the bank statements, and the budget sheets, it's difficult for any of us to say just what state Watcher is in financially. We can guess, but that's the best we can do.

That said though, we don't have to guess to know the very basic principle of running a business. A business has to, at the bare minimum, break even. Ideally, the business would profit, so that they can not only do things like pay their employees fairly, but also so that they can expand and grow. Any business requires money in order to make product, whether that product is food, an item that you can purchase, or entertainment media that you consume as a viewer. As nice as it would be if Watcher could make their content without needing money to do so, they can't. Even independent YouTubers, including video essayists and Let's Players, require money to make their content. The equipment, in both purchasing and upkeep, requires money. The games (for Let's Players) require money. Internet and electricity bills, food, books needed for research, props, et cetera -- all of that requires money. No matter how simple a video may look, it still requires money to make. There is a reason that most people aren't able to make YouTube a full time job, and it isn't because they aren't talented; it's because it is a deceptively expensive venture to get into.

So with that said, even without knowing Watcher's current financial situation, it does make sense that they need money to run their business, purely from a "businesses need money" standpoint. This is common sense. This is why things like Watcher selling merchandise, having sponsored ads, having a Patreon, et cetera always made sense. And it is possible, too, that even if their present financial situation is okay, that they are thinking about the future, and costs they are likely to be incurring within the next year.

I don't know how many people within the fanbase listen to their podcast, Pod Watcher, but I do. A few episodes ago, Steven revealed that he wants to open a Malaysian restaurant within the next year. This is his dream, to bring Malaysian culture to the United States with food. This is an amazing dream for him, it's wonderful for him, I wish him success in this venture.

However, running a restaurant -- and not only running one, but building one from the ground up and running it -- takes an astronomical amount of time and energy. This is time and energy that Steven is currently expending keeping Watcher Entertainment afloat as the sole person in charge of managing their financials. (He has the official title of CEO, with Shane and Ryan having stepped away from that title In Name Only to focus on production, but the job that Steven is actually doing is CFO -- Chief Financial Officer.) So when Steven announced that he was going to be opening a restaurant within the next year, what I heard was, "Oh, Steven is leaving Watcher within the next year." This is supported, in my opinion, by Steven saying things like how Shane and Ryan will get free drinks whenever they visit, and then hastily tacking on fans can have it, too. He was trying not to show that he was leaving just yet to the fanbase, but the writing is on the wall and they all know it.

What this means is that when Steven leaves, they will need to find someone to replace him. Either Shane and/or Ryan will need to step away from producing and acting in their shows to take over CFO duties (which the reason why they stepped away is because they handled CFO duties poorly while Steven was better equipped for it, so I doubt either of them would like to do this), or they will need to hire someone to do that for them. The lowest CFO salary in LA I can find is $140k/year, and that isn't including benefits. Since Steven helped found the company, it's doubtful he's making that much, but his replacement won't be a founder and will likely want competitive compensation. There is a good chance that, considering this, Shane, Ryan, and Steven feel pressured to bring in a lot more money than they're currently doing right now.

And I understand all of that. I have supported them where I can; yesterday I literally wore my $80+ Mystery Files jacket to work, which felt a bit bitter after the news broke and I realized I wouldn't be able to watch future seasons of said show. I overpaid for a denim jacket because I wanted to support them. It's not as if I don't understand.

However . . . here is where the criticism begins.

To begin with, there is an old saying: you have to spend money to make money. To go back to my previous statements about how even smaller scale YouTubers spend money to keep producing videos to keep their channels afloat, what this saying means is that if you aren't going to put any money into your business or product, you aren't going to have a business or product to generate any revenue. However, some young business owners take this to the extreme, and figure that if they pump tons and tons and tons of cash into their business at the start, it will start to generate revenue more quickly. What ends up happening is that they overspend, sometimes even despite their best efforts not to, and end up not being able to claw their way back out of the red in the end.

Unfortunately, that is what I think that Watcher is doing with their new streamer.

Let's be clear: There have been valid criticisms about how they seemingly over-budget on shows that don't need to have such high production values or budget. Someone mentioned that their Let's Play show (I don't watch that one because horror games are uninteresting to me, so I don't remember the name) credits something akin to 26 people, which is silly when you consider the fact that there are independent Let's Players who are able to produce content themselves. Of course, you have to remember that the LPers on YouTube are editing their own videos, which Ryan and Shane probably aren't able to do -- but even then, that would be one or perhaps two additional editors. The number of people they have working on that particular venture does seem excessive.

With that said though, those 26 people were already employed and being paid, so having them work on the Let's Play show was likely not a new business expense. The streamer, however, is a completely different story.

First, they had to have paid likely multiple people to build the WatcherTV streaming website for them. Granted, I could be wrong since I have never used Squarespace, but I find it difficult to believe this is something Squarespace would be capable of handling. So unless they already had experienced programmers on their staff, they would have had to hire programmers to build the streaming website. They would also need to pay for hosting the streaming website, which includes not only the domain, but server space for all of their videos, and videos take up a lot of space. Previously, YouTube hosted all of their videos. Now? That needs to be on Watcher, and server space and maintenance is not cheap.

So they are paying for programmers, domain name, server space, server maintenance. They are also going to need to pay for security. Not only do they need to be concerned about any potential DDoS attempts, but more importantly they need security to ensure that they can't suffer a data breach and lose the credit card information of their subscribers, something which happens all the time to other companies. Now you may say, if it happens all the time and those companies are fine, Watcher will be too, right? Well, does Watcher have lawyers on retainer? Because litigation can be raised against companies with insufficient website security that puts customers' financial information at risk, which means Watcher could find themselves facing a lawsuit if their streamer is hacked and credit card information is stolen.

So they will need to pay for systems administrators to not only build security for the streamer, but also maintain security for the streamer, because cyber attacks evolve each day and it is a constant battle against them. It is possible that whatever third party they partnered with to build the streamer for them bundled all this together (if that is the route they went), but either way, services like that do not come cheap -- and if they do, you are not getting a service of value.

So what this comes down to is that Watcher Entertainment has likely spent a ton of money they allegedly do not have to build this streamer, taking the "you have to spend money to make money" adage to the extreme. Their hope, near as I can tell, is that they will generate enough revenue from the streamer so that they will be able to recoup the cost of building and maintaining the streamer and generate profit. However, judging by the reaction from the fandom, I think that is unlikely.

As everyone knows, the reaction to this news has been abysmal. While some of the responses toward Steven and Ryan in particular have been racist vomit, I do think there are valid reasons for why this news has been received so poorly. These reasons include:

Watcher built hype for a week, with a countdown timer and everything, teasing an announcement as if it were a new show or similar "gift" to the fandom, when in reality it was the news that the fandom would now have to pay for content that was previously free.

Patreon subscribers are expected to continue paying the same amount, but for far less content than before. Access to the streamer is not included in the basic tier; they'll need to double their cash output.

Many fans are international fans who can't access the streamer at all without a VPN to switch their location to the United States. Even if they want to pay, they are barred from doing so, meaning that Watcher Entertainment is shutting a large portion of its fanbase out for the foreseeable future.

Watcher took a very patronizing tone with their audience in both the announcement video and their Patreon letter. In the announcement video, which was fourteen minutes long when the actual pertinent information took half that time to deliver (if that), they began with a long diatribe about their careers and how much YouTube meant to them, and how sad they were to leave it -- as if they had guns held to their head, and weren't making this decision of their own volition. This is condescending; it implies they believe their audience is stupid enough to believe they were backed into a corner and have no choice. In the Patreon letter, they had a line that read, "And part of that change includes a bit of news that will surely be met with some fits of sobs- we're bringing Watcher Weekly+ to a close. We know. We know." Again, this is patronizing language. They are talking down to their fans, and assuming their fans will be heartbroken by losing a behind scenes the video, or whatever Watcher Weekly+ is. This arrogant, condescending tone does not help soften the blow of being told they are going to pay the same amount of money for less content.

As you can see, the way that Watcher Entertainment executed the announcement that they would be moving future content behind a paywall was abysmal, and the fanbase reacted accordingly. Provided that the anger isn't empty and that the current fanbase sticks true to their word about not subscribing (either out of principle, location, or because they can't afford it), Watcher Entertainment has lost a huge chunk of expected revenue directly out of the gate. And it's possible that they expected this; they had to know they would be shutting out international fans (at least for a time, presumably) and that there would be fans who couldn't afford it. But it's possible that they felt that there would be enough fans to support and subscribe anyway (hence the arrogant tone about people sobbing over losing Watcher Weekly+; that attitude screams of "you're so devoted to us you will do whatever we ask no matter the cost"), and also that they would be able to pick up enough new fans that it would cushion the blow of losing old fans.

Here is where the next problem lies.

Watcher's current subscription model is $5.99/month or $60/year. If you go monthly, you end up paying $72 for the year, so the annual plan is the better deal by $12. When you compare pricing to other streaming services, this may not seem so bad at first; it's on par with DropoutTV, and it's cheaper than Netflix, Disney+, and other big names such as those.

The difference, though, is that all of those other streamers -- DropoutTV included -- have far more content than Watcher does, meaning that the customer (and keep in mind that we are customers, we are not friends, and truly we are not fans when we are paying them money for product from their business) gets more bang for their buck.

I have seen the argument from defenders of the streamer in fandom that say, "So you care about quantity over quality?" And this argument is flawed for several reasons:

There are plenty of quality TV shows on other streaming platforms. DropoutTV has Game Changer. Hulu has Schitt's Creek and Abbot Elementary. Peacock has The Office and Parks & Recreation, so on and so forth. Watcher Entertainment has good shows, but they are not the only good shows in the whole of the media industry. Dare I say, they aren't even the only good shows on YouTube.

While Watcher does produce shows of high quality, their shows have tiny seasons of only six episodes each, and their seasons are spaced out months apart. They also cancel their shows without warning or announcement, meaning fans can wait (and wait, and wait) for a new season of a show they like that will never come, because Watcher dropped the show and didn't bother making official word on it. If you go through Watcher's entire content library (which is easy to do even if you like all their shows, and even easier if you only have a handful of shows you enjoy), then you will be paying for a streamer that you do not use for months on end while you wait for the next batch of six episodes that you maybe want to see if, again, you don't like all of their shows. (I myself only follow five: Puppet History, Mystery Files, Too Many Spirits, Top 5 Beatdown, and Ghost Files.) That is money you have spent on a service you rarely use. In other words: money wasted.

That last point is particularly important when you consider that Watcher Entertainment hopes to draw new customers in to subscribe to their streamer.

Pretend, for a moment, that you have never heard of Ryan, Shane, or Watcher before. You are browsing YouTube, and you come across the season premier of season three of Ghost Files. You enjoy it, so you think, oh, I would like to view the rest of the season. You learn that the rest of the season is on a streaming service called WatcherTV, which only hosts series that Watcher themselves have produced. Their library is very small right now. New episodes for ongoing seasons are weekly, they only have one season airing at a time, new seasons have month long gaps between them. This service costs $60 a year annually, or $6 a month ($72 annually). You've never seen any of their other shows before, and while you could technically afford it, it's not as if money is no object to you. You'd likely have to give up a streamer that has a much, much larger selection of shows and movies you already know you like to give this one a shot. (This one that, mind you, doesn't work outside of your internet browser, so you can't watch it on your television either.)

Would you do it? Really put yourselves in the shoes of someone who has no familiarity at all with Shane, Ryan, Steven, or their shows before that moment. Would you choose to pay $60 for a streamer with low accessibility, and a tiny, infrequently updated library? Especially if it meant losing access to so much more?

It isn't just that numerical value of the price that makes it a bad move. It's the price relative to the product being offered. Watcher's own fans, who love their content, are fiercely divided over whether to subscribe, with many saying they won't. In what universe does someone who has never heard of Watcher sign up to pay them that much for so little offerings? Particularly when they'll only be advertising via YouTube, and infrequently at that given that they'll only be posting season premiers?

(And this is not getting into how they were originally going to pull all of their content before the backlash. Yes, they walked it back -- but not only did they say in the video that the content would only be live until May 31st, but the Variety article says that the company originally told Variety that they would be pulling content, only for Ryan to issue a statement saying they wouldn't do that after. Meaning, they walked that part back because that's the part they could walk back. They have undoubtedly sank far too much money into the streamer to back out of that now. It's way too late.)

Businesses need to make money. Steven, Ryan, and Shane are business owners who are trying to make their business profitable. But I believe that this was one of the worst ways to go about it. I'm not saying that I know exactly what they should have done instead. I don't have all the answers. But I do know that from the terrible execution of getting everyone excited only to tell them (in the most patronizing way possible) that they would now have to pay for a previously free service, to deciding to sink a bunch of money into a streamer that they seem to have done no market research on beforehand and that they don't have the content library to support, this absolutely seems like the wrong way. Moving their content to an existing streamer like Nebula would have been a better move, in my opinion. (And it would have prompted me to actually sign up for Nebula, since there are several video essayists I haven't followed there . . . but I would have followed Watcher, since it would give me access to Watcher content and the content of those video essayists I've been missing.)

But what's done is done. As I said, I think at this point Watcher Entertainment has jumped off the cliff and they didn't do so with a bungee cable. I don't think they can walk this back. I'll be interested in seeing if they succeed, but I have very strong doubts they will.

#watcher #watcher entertainment #shane madej #ryan bergara #steven lim

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total-drama-brainrot · 2 months

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Thinking about the fake dating AU again. 🤯

What if, during his segment on the Aftermath, Noah plays off his 'cheating' as something so emotionally detached it makes him look almost psychopathic, in an attempt to make himself as unlikable as possible?

The 'cheating' was simply strategic, is all. It wasn't his fault the two of them had to go and catch real feelings; Noah was just playing the game. Nothing more.

What? You thought he had feelings for them? Don't be ridiculous, Noah felt nothing for either of them- they were just there to carry him through the competition.

(He doesn't anticipate the ache that twists through his chest after that statement. It isn't true in the slightest, yet even just pretending to not care about his partners is physically painful.)

At first, both Geoff and Blaineley commend him for enacting some long overdue karma/vengeance on the antagonistic duo, but the more Noah intentionally digs himself into a hole- the more hateable he makes himself- the more people actually begin to pity both Heather and Alejandro. Which was the plan from the beginning, so Noah fully commits to it, playing off every interaction as just another cog in his manipulation machine; he's the 'High IQ', after all, of course he planned it all.

And he hides the nausea writhing in his gut from the blatant lies he's sprouting under a carefully blank, uncaring mask of indifference. Every claim he makes is said in the most casual tone- as if he's commenting on the weather instead of admitting to masterminding the heartbreak of two strong competitors- and that's somehow worse than if he would at least seem smug about his achievement. Because at least then he'd (appear to) care.

So, when the Aftermath finally ends, Noah becomes persona non grata. No one wants to even look at him- who knew the little snark could be so ruthless? So uncaring?

And Noah, knowing that he can't confide in Owen (who can't keep a secret to save his life) or Izzy (who's too unpredictable to trust- and who also 'leaked' fake information about him to Sierra during her time on Celebrity Manhunt, so who knows what else she's leak?) turns to his friend Eva, who promptly decks him in the face.

"I'm not friends with cheaters."

And when he tries to explain himself, clutching at his quickly bruising face and hoping that she'll see reason or at the very least afford him some decency, she throws his actions back in his face (actions have always spoken louder than words with Eva). Claiming that, if he's willing to lead on two people romantically, who's to say he isn't also faking their friendship? How can she trust anything that comes out of his slimy mouth?

It hurts. Every accusation is like a wave of searing heat against his already blistered heart, and yet Eva's eyes are so cold as she looks at Noah like he's the scum beneath her shoes.

So he flees to his hotel room.

And, for the first time in years, he weeps.

Given the informative finale of World Tour, the Aftermath crew were given the go-ahead to host one last hurrah, to properly question their finalists about their scheme, and to clear Noah's name.

Their audience was practically frothing at the mouth for an update.

During their interview segment, Blaineley (in an attempt to stir up some drama- she's always endeavouring to stay on brand after all) plays clips of Noah's callous 'confessions' on his Aftermath segment post-elimination, hoping to cause some trouble in paradise for the lovely throuple by sewing the seeds of doubt in their minds.

To her surprise, both Heather and Alejandro start laughing at the clips as if they're the funniest thing they've ever seen, huddling closer to Noah as they poke and tease him. Noah, in turn, sinks in unto himself, red-faced and mortified.

"What? How can you be alright with him saying that?" Cries Blaineley, scandalised that her attempt at brewing tension somehow didn't work.

"Because he does not mean it." Alejandro explains. To his side, Heather nods in agreement.

"How can you be so sure?"

Heather points to the screen, where past Noah is lying his ass off for the world to see, stoic save for the barely noticable twitching of his fingers and the occasional jump of his leg.

"He's lying through his teeth! It's so obvious- you weren't even trying to hide your tells, and after all the practice we did!"

"I didn't need to. Neither of you were there to call me out on the bluff."

#so many brainworms my mind is mulch at this point #total drama #td alejandro #td heather #td noah #alenoaheather #fake dating au #ophe rambling

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asheepinthenight · 17 days

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Remedy (Talon's End Extra April 2024)

Some short fluff for this month's extra! MC comes down with a bad cold, and Hawk doesn't know what to do about it. Contains mild spoilers for post-game Hawk/MC relationship. Mostly written for the romantic version of their relationship but could also be queerplatonic (maybe even platonic, depending on how you feel about cuddling and forehead kisses) if you ignore a couple lines near the end.

You sneeze for what feels like the hundredth time in the last hour, and Hawk's head immediately snaps up to look at you. They put their book aside and lean over to put their hand to your forehead. The difference in temperature between their cold skin and your feverish body makes you shiver. They tuck the covers around you more tightly and look down at you as if, should they blink, you will come untethered from this mortal coil.

"It's just a bad cold, Hawk."

They narrow their eyes at you. "Many animals feign wellbeing in their final days. Self-preservation instinct to avoid predators' attention."

"I don't think I'm feigning 'wellbeing' very well."

Hawk gives you a rueful smile. "No. You're not."

You reach over to pat Hawk's hand where they're unthinkingly pulling a loose thread from the edge of the blanket. "I'll be well in a few days."

"That's what you said yesterday."

"And it's still true—it's only been one day so far."

Hawk scowls at the accuracy of your statement, and your laugh initiates another round of coughing. Once it passes, you look up to see the same look of deep alarm that you've seen in Hawk's golden eyes too many times since yous tarted falling ill. "You're sure this is normal?" they ask

"Very sure."

Hawk manages to sustain a few seconds of anxious silence before resuming their questioning. "And you don't need a healer...?"

You shake your head. "Just rest. You don't have to stay if you don't want to."

"I want to. If you want me to."

You nod, and they reach out to take your hand in theirs. Though Hawk's body isn't warm, it's not unlike a blanket: once it takes on enough of your own body heat, it holds it there, insulating you from the cold outside the bed. As you close your eyes and try to relax, you can feel the anxious static of Hawk's energy fade toward their usual calm.

You drift in and out of sleep, the fever and cough keeping you from resting deeply. After some time, you wake up sweating and kick all the blankets off, only to later wake again shivering. You sit up to hazily claw the blankets back over yourself, but you feel yourself being pulled into Hawk's arms as they lie down next to you, sweeping the blankets up over you both.

"Ridiculous," Hawk says as you bury your face against their chest. "Just rest."

"I'm trying," you say through chattering teeth.

Hawk sighs. "I don't know anything about... any of this. I don't think I'm helping."

"You are." You hold onto Hawk tightly as they rub your back, the warmth slowly returning to you.

"There are times I've wished I were born mortal, but I don't want this part."

You laugh—carefully, so you don't start coughing again—and pull away just enough to look at Hawk. "You'll have to leave the bed when I get too warm again."

"The human body makes no sense."

"Did you just realize that?"

Hawk scoffs and kisses your forehead. "Hardly, but I'll endure the whims of your fever and leave when you ask."

"You'll stay nearby, though?"

"Of course. As long as you want me to."

"Forever, then?"

Hawk chuckles. "You don't need to waste energy courting me; I'm already yours. So yes." They press their lips to the top of your head. "Forever."

#talon's end #te: extras #te: snippets #hawk

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ca-suffit · 2 months

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This antiblack campaign the fandom just tried to kick up again (to avoid talking about the real issue with Nalyra) reveals how powerless they're starting to truly feel now.

They don't have many users left to vilify so they're putting people on blocklists who are brand new (I was here 3 days lol) or not even really in the fandom. That looks goofy and desperate but then it keeps going. DMing strangers to say "the truth" isn't about racism and "talk to me if you really want to know about anything." Everyone's reblogging those blocklist posts now and adding large commentary suddenly, when before they often fully sat it out. They're doing this in a group to look like they have larger numbers and are "revealing" there's a "big secret bullying problem"....except nobody believes them. Because there's plenty of accounts who are out here saying this shit straight to their faces and they pretend we all don't exist. All of this group has to manufacture drama solely because they just don't want to talk about harmful shit they actually do.

Neil has to make an antiblack statement she made suddenly be about antisemitism towards her, Nalyra's antiblackness is "actually" fans upset about shipping and "what's REALLY coming" in S2, showmey0urfangs is always happy to show up with her dumb screencaps and villain monologue nobody asked for so she can make her everlasting outrage about popular black fics and "feminized" Louis sound deeper than it is, Virginia suddenly cries about IRL issues and wants to leave the fandom because she wants to distract from the Nalyra receipts, Keybearer accused another black fan of trolling people and getting accounts suspended on twitter in 2023 when a Marius fan eventually confessed to it and his eternal shame for that means now every black fan except him is a bully (despite nobody talking about this ever anymore except him), chicalepidopterare mocks a black fan for blocking her "because I thought we were supposed to talk about racism" and then poorly tries to frame any retaliation against her to look like bullying ("see, they're misogynistic, they're bullying my art, they're mean for disliking these ships!").

To quote Claudia here, "You must think me an idiot." And the big cherry on top is also how none of these losers can stand to hear any mention of race....in the fandom of the show that nonstop talks about race. They're using very basic (and meant in a gentle, loving way) teasing of Jacob as proof that black fans are racist against Jacob too, black fans hate Jacob's white wife. People hate Lestat for being white too (what?). They can write crap meta all day about Lestat letting Louis "rape" him and only white victims (Lestat) being real victims to the evil black and brown "true" manipulators (Claudia, Louis, Armand) but gentle teasing from black fans about Jacob's haircut is the real racism. Okay lol. Care to tell us again why you think Delainey's Claudia looks "less innocent" now then? This 3D chess you think you're playing isn't playing how you think for anyone else.

I also notice that afaik there's not a single black American in this group. Idek if there's many Americans of any kind in the group. It's been a lot of shaming to black Americans specifically though, again from the show that's focused on black Americans....by people who aren't black Americans.

"There's people pretending to be black so it's okay to keep hating this whole group." It's not enough you already nonstop shit on black fans as it is, now you have to try to angle it as if none of this could be authentic in the first place. Vile behavior. For what? Tumblr isn't even a platform that pays you for whatever clout you have, so really what is the point here. In a small ass fandom on top of it. Some of you have pretty grown kids too, this is extra sad. It makes all the jumping through hoops to coddle Lestat's behavior make sense though, if you're the same kind of person yourself. Anyway, maybe you don't actually know everything because race exists in the real world beyond how Anne Rice wrote about it in her useless books! You make books written by a racist white woman your whole personality and guess what your outlook on life is going to be.

It's been really pathetic to especially watch any fans of color move more to this extreme bullying side as time has gone on. It will never pay off to promote white fandom ideals. These accounts you're trying to cuddle up to aren't even that big. The fandom outside of the tags actually has much more popular posts, supporters, and fics...although that's also half of what this all is actually about, fic numbers. Again, these are grown adults obsessing over this. We could have a whole different fandom if this group didn't exist and keep wanting to gatekeep everything and be the only people who get praise about anything.

It's no surprise that people who worship Anne Rice have major ego problems themselves. It's been fucked up to deal with but the good thing now is that big egos have big collapses eventually and that's what we're starting to see happening now. People are sick of you and able to see through your basic ass manipulation techniques. People just want to have a fandom, they're not here to worship fans who want to be dictators. Nobody is here for your fragility, losers.

#fandom racism #iwtv fandom #amc iwtv #iwtv #interview with the vampire

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deepdreamnights · 2 months

Text

The Age Old Debate: Fire Good, or Fire Bad?

This was originally going to be part of this thread, but the points were distinct enough and my thoughts rambly enough that I split it into two posts.

From the recent PalWorld thread:

We gotta handle that last tag in two parts.

Part 1 "the devs admitted to using AI art to make the pals"

First off, that isn't true near as I can tell. I can't find anything of the PalWorld Devs admitting they used AI for PalWorld designs. Palworld had demo footage with Pals in it 2 years ago on June 6 with their announcement trailer, which means they would have had to have started dev much earlier than that.

This is what AI art from June of 2022 looked like:

On the left, Hieronymus Bosch's Pokemon, on the right, Charmander on Gumby.

I did a much deeper breakdown of the "used AI" accusation here. It does not hold water.

Now, I could change my mind on this point if there were linked evidence to the creators of Palworld saying this. But there isn't.

Because the accusation is repeated in a tag, there's no way to include supporting information, or even to easily directly ask the accuser for it. Many people are going to see it, internalize it, and then repeat it uncritically, and that's how rumors and witchhunts start.

Because I've seen a lot of accusations about PalWorld stealing fakemon, and I'm yet to see a smoking gun. There's barely smoke.

Gonna hit the second point in that tag, but while we're on the theme of spreading misinfo:

Part 2 of the Tag: Using AI to Brainstorm is "Bad"

This is also an assertion that would require support, and I believe it to be wholly incorrect.

Plagiarism happens at publication. Not at inception, not inspiration, not even at the production level. The only measure of whether something is or is not "stolen art" is whether what comes out at the end replicates, with insufficient transformation, an existing, fixed expression. Art theft is about what comes out, not about what goes in.

For more about how this works with AI art, I suggest checking out the Electronic Frontier Foundation's statement on the issue. They're the ones looking out for your online civil rights, and I agree with their position on this.

The argument that AI art is theft because it is trained on public-facing material on the internet just doesn't fly. Those are all fixed published works subject to inspiration, study, and transformative recreation under fair use. The utilization of mechanical apparatus does not change that principle.

And fair use that requires permission isn't fair use. That's a license.

Moreover, altering the process to put infringement at inspiration/input or allowing the copyrighting of styles would be the end of art as we know it.

There's no coincidence that the main legal push against AI art on copyright grounds is backed by Adobe and Disney. Adobe is already using AI art as a pretext to lobby congress to let them copyright styles, and Disney owns enough material on its own to produce a dataset that would let them do all the AI they'd ever need to, entirely with material they "own." And they're DOING THAT.

The genie is out of the bottle, they (Disney, Adobe, Warner Bros, Universal) have it, and it can't be taken away from them. They just don't want anyone else using AI to compete with them.

Palworld didn't use AI to conceive of its critters. If it had, they'd have probably been less derivative.

(three random AI fakemon I prompted up as examples of just that)

Both traditional and AI-assisted art can plagerize or be original, its entirely based upon how the techniques are used.

Moreover, you can infringe entirely accidentally without realizing, but you can also fail at copying enough that it becomes a new protected work.

We're well into moral panic territory with AI in general, and there's more than a touch of it around Palworld, largely because people aren't suspicious enough of information that confirms their worldview.

I used the quoted set of tags as the prompt for the top of the post, all the AI images in this post are unmodified and were not extensively guided, and thus do not meet the minimal expression threshold and should be considered in the public domain.

#palworld #palworld discourse #AI discourse #AI art #fair use #public domain #creativity #copyright #plagiarism #what is art?#midjourney #bing image creator

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itsclydebitches · 1 month

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Okay, so I saw this RWBY meme made by a fan and I can't remember it completely but it was about Emerald switching sides. What stood out to me was the language used and how Ruby's group was specifically referred to as "The Good Guys side" and if that doesn't show how broken this show's morality is then I don't know what does. Emerald switched to the side of good, not just Ruby's side. The side that is specifically good because it's Ruby side. You're either with Ruby or against her with no in-between. Compare this to Aang's group in ATLA, affectionately called The Gaang by fans. A term that collectively refers to the group without proclaiming them as THE good guys. We know they're good because their actions show they are good. It isn't just a title grafted on because they're the stars of the show. And while they have an official grouping in the form of Team Avatar. It still isn't used in the same manner as RWBY fans calling all who agree with Ruby "The Good Guys".

Decided to start answering backlog asks! We've officially entered the post-RT discussion era. Fun! 😬

You know, RWBY is compared (unfavorably) to Avatar a lot, but this comparison is particularly interesting to me because Avatar is, well... Avatar. That's a title. And it's a title built into the fictional world, one that's so significant it's worthy of being the name of the show. The Avatar is a combined destiny/job description that, in the words of the wiki, is the "human embodiment of light and peace." Obviously free will still comes into play - I'd never ignore the significance behind Aang's personal choice of how to bring balance to the world - but there's an element of fate here, of self-fulfilling prophecy, and fourth wall-breaking knowledge. In-world, benders are (presumably) not chosen if they're unsuited to be this embodiment of peace. Once someone knows they're the avatar, they can more easily find the courage/determination to meet such high standards because this is how it's "supposed" to be (regardless of whether anything cosmic is actually ensuring their success). And the audience knows, by virtue of that title and our opening, how we're meant to view Aang: as the Good Guy of the story. All that already exists outside of the actions he takes within the show, helping to soften anything potentially suspect with a "Well, he's just a kid" or "Well, everyone makes mistakes," or whatever explanation that's technically true in any harrowing story featuring a young protagonist... but continually falls flat with Team RWBY.

Because RWBY didn't do that same work. RWBY doesn't have a handle on its own identity the way Avatar does. It laid some of the groundwork early on but then never capitalized on it, which is why I'm endlessly groaning over the failure of not doing anything with Ruby's status as a SEW/simple soul. Those could have easily been titles the way "Avatar" is a title, something that the people of Ruby's world see as cosmic evidence of her purity and inherent ability to lead them in this war. Instead, it's just a one-off, ambiguous statement and a very badly used skill.

So yeah, Emerald joins The Good Guys, which wouldn't be bad if, as said, the show had shown the group unambiguously being Good people in a war with black and white solutions. Or, if we had some reason to believe that Ruby is The One True Leader, destined/worthy of bearing this burden no matter the number of mistakes she's made. But RWBY even undermines the title aspect by making Ruby herself fairly inconsequential in later volumes. Yeah, the show is also named after this team/our protagonist... and yet that began to feel incidental as the cast grew AND many of the characters brought new - arguably better - perspectives + powers into the fray. Avatar made the simple but VERY important decision to say, "This is the ONLY GUY who can do this job. Sure, he's going to need a lot of help and saving the world is absolutely a team effort, but that team revolves around him because he is, again, the ONE PERSON who can accomplish this." RWBY failed to set that up and (arguably) failed to show the group being The Good Guys, at least to the extent that the whole world would understandably put their faith in a teenager who, frankly, just keeps making things worse. Like, that's a big consideration imo. Ruby's intentions have always been good and most fans are fully on her side regarding justifications for her choices, so in that sense she is absolutely The Good Guy, but beyond that she's just really bad at saving the world. So if she's not somehow ordained to do it and continually shows a severe lack of skill in this regard... why are the characters/the viewer rooting for her again?

#rwde #rwby #mymetas

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lloydfrontera · 5 months

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wait lmao what I didn't know there was such a skip. I'm sorry this is comedy to me. so you're telling me they have this crazy ass dimension-jumping shenanigans with Javier tearing up as he finally finds Lloyd, his best friend, the most important person in his life, while it's a mutual statement for the both of them, and then we get no dialogue. and skip to Lloyd getting shoved into a hetero romance with no build up. sorry I can't believe this is real. this sounds like a joke and I choose to treat is as such. this is the most hilarious ending and the marriage now feels even more out of place hdufiskaoa9o

OH MY FUCKING GOD RIGHT?!?!?!! it is weird isn't it???? i'm not being crazy for feeling like it's a weird ass choice??? i felt like i was going insane!! i swear to god i felt like i was being gaslighted when i read it!!! there was no way that was the ending!! there was no way that ch 401 ended with one of the most romantic and heartfelt scenes i have ever read and then the next chapter just????? did a time skip where none of that was acknowledged and lloyd was just fucking married off to alicia??? completely off-screen if i may add!

i made a post about it before but i simply need to rant all over again oh my god

general warning for spoilers because i'm about to dissect the entire novel through a llojavi lens

AGAIN. SPOILERS WARNING FOR THE ENDING OF TGED.

i literally cannot express how much of a mid fuck it is when you realize that lloyd and javier's relationship is very much Thee Slowburn of tged. like. this is an indisputable fact. even if you don't think there's anything romantic between them, which, holy fuck that's such a fucking reach one must be really be in denial to not see it but whatever, even then you simply cannot argue that their relationship isn't the most important one in the entire story.

javier is the very first person lloyd talks to in the first chapter. he's the first person that welcomes him into his new life. he's the one he has to work the hardest to endear himself to. he's the one he spends the most time with. he's the one that follows him around literally everywhere he goes.

from the very beginning their relationship is given a special attention that few other things get in the plot.

through the entire story we get constant moments of them getting to know each other as people and getting closer as a result. they're constantly in each other's thoughts, which is very natural as they're in each other's company almost 24/7. it is actually hard to find a chapter where they not talking to each other or at the very least together. i cannot emphasize enough how,,, enmeshed and entangled they are with one another as characters. i mean it when i say they are a set do not separate them.

it takes lloyd 222 chapters to even admit to himself that javier is his friend and that he wants to keep him safe not because he's the protagonist of the story or useful to him or anything like that but simply because he cares for him and doesn't want him to die. because, and i quote, 'he thought he'd always be with javier for the rest of his life. just like now, he thought they'd spend all their time together moving forward. and like they always did, they'd be by each other's side during hard times. happy moments. relaxed days. they'd share all these moments as they exchanged insults and corny jokes, growing old as a lazy lord of a fiefdom and his knight. lloyd always thought so. the thought just came naturally, without much effort from him, much like breathing. lloyd believed that javier would always remain by his side as that was how it had been until now.' (ch222) <- actual textual quote. btw. if you even care.

and then. it takes javier 320 chapters, a hundred chapters more, to realize that he cares about lloyd much more than a knight cares about his lord's son. because he, and once again i quote, 'is [his] true master in [his] heart. lloyd was his friend. and now, javier wanted to protect lloyd. he would sincerely protect him with everything he had.' <- this is, if i may add some context, said as javier is fighting against a goddamn angel, literally heaven's will, to protect lloyd. after figuring out lloyd is a fake. that he's been lying to javier for several years about almost everything including who he is. and yet. this is what javier feels for him.

they are the definition of a slowburn. it takes them this long to even admit they are friends. and this is with us getting to see them together almost every chapter of the way. we get to see every step of the way. we see their relationship develop with all manner of detail.

and then. when you think you cannot get even more dramatic about them. guess what the major conflict of the plot is. guess fucking what the last obstacle for the story to get a happy ending is.

let me set the scene for you:

lloyd has just finished the jewel of truth, the artifact that will get him the answer he seeks on how to stop the restoration of fate, how he can stop destiny from making the original events of the novel come true and destroy everything he has worked and kill everyone he loves. he has javier at his side, who rushed to join him underwater to make sure he was safe and sound while using it, and he can't help but fondly think how lucky he is to have javier, who is loyal and true and has never abandoned him.

a quote of lloyd's thoughts in this scene:

That’s why, you bastard. I’m going to take care of you until the very end. Once I, your wise and older friend, solve the restoration of destiny problem, you’re going to enjoy the rest of your life by my side in peace. [...] He smiled at Javier and thought to himself. You’re my only friend, Javier. I couldn’t have overcome all the obstacles in front of me without your help. So, my trustworthy and reliable comrade, stick with me until I become a lazy lord and you become my personal guard. I hope we will be able to grow old together… -ch 327

as you can see. he's once again planning on spending the rest of his life with javier. canonically. not even an interpretation this is straight up textual i cannot emphasize enough

and then. the jewel of truth gives him the answer. how to stop the restoration of fate. it's very easy. very simple solution in fact.

either lloyd or javier have to die or otherwise vanish from existence.

that's it. there can only be one protagonist in the world and because of everything lloyd has done he's now being acknowledged by fate as the protagonist of the story along with javier. which cannot stand.

so that's the only thing stopping lloyd from getting his happy ending. he just,,, has to either kill his best friend or kill himself.

let me rephrase this from a narrative perspective: the major conflict of the story is now lloyd facing either the choice of letting everything he's achieved and everyone he loves be destroyed. losing his best friend, the person he cares the most about and has been developing an extremely close relationship through the entire plot. or dying himself.

lloyd of course then spends the rest of the plot trying to find a way to avoid having to die. that's literally what the rest of the novel is about. lloyd trying by all means possible seeking a way to not having to die. because at no point, does he ever consider letting javier die in his place even an option. he doesn't want to die of course, but he never saw javier sacrificing himself as the solution to that problem.

the entire conflict of the last part of the novel is lloyd finding a way for him and javier to be able to remain together without either of them having to sacrifice their lives for the other.

he doesn't succeed.

they end up in a battle down in hell where both of them try to give for one another leading to this absolutely delightful parallel

so fucking tasty oh my god i still go crazy when i see this set of illustrations actually

lloyd wins btw. he gets to sacrifice his life for javier. to javier's absolute heartbreak.

but lloyd doesn't die. he does end up stuck in korea tho, a place he would've rather died than go back to, so he has that going on for him. he's back in his goshiwon, absolutely heartbroken and without knowing what to do.

and then we end up with that scene. javier at his doorstep, having crossed dimensions, tearing up as he sees him and tells him how much he's missed him, looking at him with this face:

now. let's pause here. let's take a moment. take in everything i've just explained. everything that has happened to get to this point.

be honest with me. what would you say is the most natural way the story can progress from here.

take into account all that i have recounted and that i skipped so many other things of the same nature so we wouldn't be here all day.

what do you as a reader would expect to happen next

well, i'll tell you:

cut to black we're now an unspecified amount of time later lloyd has already had all the important conversations we've been waiting to see the entire time off screen and is now preparing himself for his wedding to alicia that we will also not get to see by the way

and you know what the funniest thing is. you know what is the cherry on top.

fucking guess who's the last person we see him talk with.

guess who's the person he ends the novel sharing a smile with.

yeah. Yeah.

i really don't know what else to say. i don't know how else to explain how insane this feels. how incredibly dissonant it comes across. i don't want to use the worse gaslighting like this but it's the closest word i can find to describe what it feels like. i feel like i'm being told something is happening when i can see with my own eyes it is not. or rather that i'm seeing something happen and i'm being told that no it is not and that i'm making it up.

i don't know what bk moon was going for. i really don't. especially when this is what he has to say about chapter 401 aka the chapter with javier coming to find lloyd in korea

clearly he feels very strongly about this scene too. it's the one he's been wanting to show the most, he must have analyzed it from every angle possible, must have put special care to get across what he wanted to convey with it.

so why does it feel like the last true chapter of the novel is meant to,,, undercut the feeling of it?? it almost feels as if the last chapter is telling us 'yeah yeah those two are extremely devoted to each other and would and have given their lives for one another and plan on growing old at each other's sides but don't worry :) it's nothing more than them being pals :) just two guys being really good friends :) see, lloyd is even getting married to a woman that's his real happy ending he's not gay or anything :)'

and this is not me saying that two friends cannot be devoted to each other. absolutely not of course friends can love each other platonically and that be more than enough to justify their devotion to one another.

but. it feels weird when the entire novel is dedicated to building up the relationship between lloyd and javier, taking so much time to make us really feel like their relationship is growing at a realistic pace, take almost 3/4 of the novel to even make them come to terms with how much they care for one another, spend actual years following their development,,, and then make lloyd just marry someone else. someone the novel really didn't spend enough time with to justify him developing feels for her.

this is not a diss against alicia i have nothing against her i just don't... buy that lloyd developed romantic feelings for her. much less that he acted on them that easily.

this is a man who took 222 chapters and several years in-universe to even accept that javier, the person he spent all day with, with whom he spoke almost every single day, who he had risked his life for and had been saved by several times at that point, was even his friend.

and now i'm expected to believe he's in love with someone else who, by comparison, he meets a couple of times and spends a little amount of time with.

well. i don't! it's not in character, it wasn't properly built up in the text and truthfully they don't have enough chemistry to make up for it.

i don't know what happened there. i don't know why bk moon decided to add a romance when the novel didn't need it. i don't know why he chose to make it happen between two characters that didn't have a relationship as deep as the one he spent the entire novel building up and promoting as the most important one. which may i add was between his two protagonists. y'know. the ones the novel is supposed to be centered around.

i don't know. i don't know what happened. i don't know if it was censorship, last minute panic, fear of opposition or rejection or actual obliviousness to what he had written looked like, i simply do not know.

i really hope it wasn't homophobia tho that would absolutely suck lmao

but uh. yeah. i do think the ending is very funny when you put it like that askhdsjkfds

#hey i got an ask #Anonymous #tged #the greatest estate developer #tged spoilers #lloyd frontera #llojavi #javier asrahan #long post #i don't what happened i started typing and suddenly all of this came out of me #i was possessed #most of what i said here i have said before but it's now all in one post #and i have So Much left to say about this topic but i really cannot make this post longer i am so embarrassed already aksjdhk #i feel a little hollow i need to shitpost to get back to normal oh my god #this is. why it takes me so long to answer asks btw. i literally cannot shut up.#i apologize but i cannot promise to change

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captorsicallfriends · 2 months

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why pjo's portrayal of the greek gods is fucked up and how it's affected perceptions surrounding ancient Greece.

*breaks down the door to your inbox with an axe*

start talking now oh my god I want to hear your hot take so bad. I've been interested in religious studies (primarily the Hellenistic and early Roman religious atmosphere (of course acknowledging that the word religion is post-Enlightenment and conceives of supernatural belief as a subjective individual belief, which is inconsistent with how supernatural matters were dealt with in the Ancient world) and how they intersect with early Christianity and proto-Christianity) and I've been fascinated with the Greek gods and I need your hot take on why their portrayal is wrong and leads to incorrect assumptions about Ancient Greece.

oh you bet your bottom dollar i will talk about this. true to the post from which this originated, i will prep no material and all this is off the top of my head so don't quote me!

If you follow my Greek mythology sideblog, you'll know i am unequivocally a Zeus defender. Now I can make a million posts about Zeus alone but I will take a more holistic approach on the gods in general and the perception of Ancient Greece.

The West has been obsessed with Ancient Greece for centuries: the culture, philosophy, history, mythology, mathematical and scientific advancements, and much more. Now it's one thing to take interest in a country's history or a historical era; it is completely another to claim it as your own and make it an ideal state of life to achieve, because if you know literally anything about Ancient Greece, it was anything but. What I'm trying to say here is that Ancient Greek culture has been commodified, glorified, rewritten, and reclaimed by the West when it was never theirs to do so. I've often seen this sentiment expressed by Greeks about their homeland: "The history comes first, the people second." I think a prime modern example of this mindset was when same-sex marriage was legalised in Greece, which was a huge step forward for an Orthodox country with an extensive history of homophobia, but people outside of Greece began making jokes of Greece "returning to their own values" (referring to Ancient Greek practices of pederasty which is hugely problematic and not at all representative of any gay rights if you know what it entails) and people excited to "finally hold lesbian weddings in Lesbos" (signifying the West's perception of Greece as simply a tourist hotspot and not a country with an intricate history and culture). In short, Greece is already unfairly used for the West's agenda of glorification and attempts to build itself a culture that frankly isn't theirs at all.

Now, how does this involve pjo? A lot, my friends, a fucking lot. The publication and popularity of the Percy Jackson series has simply exacerbated all the aforementioned issues in this post. First off, the worldbuilding on which The Lightning Thief relied and the rest of the series ultimately holds is that "Olympus moves with the centre of Western power", which is just. Wow. There are a million things wrong with this concept that would need its own post, so I recommend this article called The Whitening Thief that essentially explains the white supremacy of it all. If you do not want to read the full article, the main premise is that the Percy Jackson series equates Westernism with civilisation and that without it there was "chaos and darkness", which as Paule describes it, is "sipping at a pretty racist cocktail".

note: I have realised how aggressively off-topic this is to the original statement I made, I'm getting there, I promise (although I did warn you it was something I could talk on for hours with little material)

Let's finally delve into the depiction of Greek gods in Percy Jackson. I'll actually start on a bit of a positive note that apart from the weird (for lack of a better term) comparisons of Hades to Adolf Hitler, the original Percy Jackson and the Olympians had some okay characterisation of the gods (I have some reservations about the goddesses on which I will elaborate later). They're prideful and neglectful parents (the myths actually contradict that latter part but I digress) but each with their own complexities and concerns. To use Zeus as an example because he's actually the god who falls short the most in terms of consistent characterisation in my opinion, he lets Percy live in TLT "for the sake of peace in [his] family", indicating a care and sense of duty for Olympus and for his fellow gods, and while he lets his pride and paranoia get the better of him at times, he is shown as a serious authority figure and someone who's trying to keep his realm together, and such characteristics wouldn't be too far off from his mythical counterpart.

But as the series progresses, either Rick got lazy or he attempted to further capitalise his work to make it more palpable, he turns the gods into caricatures by excessively inflating one characteristic they may have into their entire personalities. Returning to Zeus, his paranoia is amplified to an absurd extent that one can simply not fathom why the gods would be the better option than the Titans. As I said initially, he had bouts of paranoia that would be almost normal for someone with such a powerful position, but this is completely derailing any connection with his mythological counterpart, he may as well be an OC with the same name and title as him. To use other gods as an example because I promised a holistic approach and I have seemed to only talk about Zeus (sorry!), the writing of the goddesses Hera, Artemis, Aphrodite, and Athena is simply misogynistic. I'm sorry, there is no other way I can find myself to describe it. Typically feminine goddesses Hera and Aphrodite are extremely demonised and condemned for their flaky and vain attitude; Hera is the evil stepmother archetype and Aphrodite ultimately becomes weak and useless. The "virgin" (quotations referring to Athena) goddesses Artemis and Athena also don't seem to extend past superficial, unoriginal characteristics like being a vehement man-hater who kicked out two sapphics from the Hunt and a goddess who Rick stops at nothing to render her a horrible parent and person (using the Roman myth of Medusa, exaggerating her prideful nature, etc) respectively. And you cannot tell me they're not misogynistic portrayals because just a few minutes on pjo tiktok will show you just how many times Hera is referred to as a bitch (keep my wife's name out of your fucking mouth!!). Then there is TOA and COTG, which makes me want to cry just thinking about Zeus' portrayal there (yes we're going back there). The god who was consistently thought of as a gracious, protective saviour of the people in Ancient Greece (full list of epithets of Zeus, read at your leisure) is an abusive autocratic tyrant?

To go back onto the topic, how do Riordan's works affect the overall perception of Ancient Greece? Well, as I said before, it contributes to the white supremacist view of Ancient Greece as the epitome of civilisation and the glorification of the era, but it also turns Ancient Greece into a fandom to an extreme extent. Now, obviously, I'm not talking about people with a healthy obsession with Ancient Greek history and Mythology (myself included) who like to engage in content about it. I'm talking about people who claim Ancient Greece as an extension of Western, mostly American culture, and ultimately engage in a form of cultural appropriation that strips Greeks of their own history and narrative. This includes writing 'feminist' retellings of Greek myths, taking Riordan's (inaccurate) readings of the mythology as indisputable fact, and removing the myths from their historical and cultural context. People forget that much of these myths were stories written for entertainment and take them as a sort of Hellenic Bible (which delves into the Christianisation of Greek Mythology but that's a whole other post). In short, Westerners think they can do whatever the fuck they want with Greek mythology and Greek gods because they think it's theirs with which to play around, ultimately ignoring the country, history, and the culture from which they actually originate, and it's thanks to Rick Riordan that this attitude has blown up to an insane extent.

*sighs* Thank you for coming to my TedTalk and I seriously admire you if you made it this far.

#diya answers #i wrote all this instead of doing the pile of homework i have so yeah enjoy #sunset-telepath #rr crit

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anti-terf-posts · 8 months

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Hi, this may not be the right place to ask, but I’m just wondering what’s so wrong with radfem ideology? I can’t really find any proper resources detailing why it’s wrong, besides screenshots of either toxic people saying toxic things, or screenshots of tradfem blogs. My own research hasn’t brought up anything either, as I can’t really find radfems saying anything horrible like a lot of anti radfem posts describe them saying. Again, sorry if this is the wrong blog, feel free to ignore this ask if that’s the case!

BEFORE WE BEGIN: I AM NOT AN EXPERT. I USED ARTICLES WITH NUETRAL OPINIONS ON RADICAL FEMINISM, AND BASED MY OWN OPINIONS ON IT. USE THIS AS A SOURCE AT YOUR OWN RISK

This one is actually kind of tricky, because some radfem beliefs are actually very valid and are arguably reasonable.

For example, Wikipedia states, "Radical feminism is a perspective within feminism that calls for a radical re-ordering of society in which male supremacy is eliminated in all social and economic contexts" Which like, totally makes sense! The patriarchy needs to be dismantled entirely in order for women to have true freedom.

However, radical feminism dismisses the idea of legal/class based misogyny, which is ridiculous, considering the fact that women in higher classes often have more power over lower class women, and sometimes even enforce gender roles against lower class women (making them do household chores like taking care of the children or cleaning the house for them, etc.)

And let's not forget the racism rooted in radical feminism. Radfems claim that misogyny is the most basic form of oppression, which completely erases the oppression of people of colour, which has been around since almost forever.

In fact, in the early days of this movement, many black women refused to associate with radical feminists due to their ignorance of oppression against women of colour. It was only after radical feminists began to listen to woc, and start including them in their feminism that they decided to join the ideology.

Moving the discussion over towards prostitution and pornography. Radfems believe that both of those are inherently bad things. It is true that women in lower socioeconomic classes have a higher chance of being prostitutes, but it shouldn't be true. Yes, women who are coerced into sex work in any way should have the freedom to quit, but this should not clash with a woman's freedom to join the industry if she wants to.

So, sometime after the radical feminism movement was started, radical lesbian feminism began.

These women believed that they were helping women fight oppression and misogyny simply by being lesbians, because "heterosexuality inherently oppresses women". This statement is incompatible with the belief that women should have the freedom to do what they want. If lesbians are unable to control who they're attracted to, then why isn't that the same for heterosexual women? And let's not ignore the blatant biphobia that comes with that. A bi woman should have the freedom to choose to be in a male/female relationship without judgement (as long as she isn't being coerced into the relationship) and saying otherwise completely erases bi women's experiences as queer people.

Speaking of queer people, we all know and love the classic TERF, or, FART, as I like to call them. (Also, if you couldn't tell, I was being sarcastic about loving TERFs. No one loves TERFs.)

Trans Exclusive Radical Feminists believe that the trans movement "perpetuates patriarchal gender norms," and "is incompatible with radical feminist ideology."

If you couldn't tell, this is greatly untrue. Radical feminism just believes that we need to get rid of the patriarchy and has nothing to do with how people identify. If you take a look at pretty much any article that discuss radical feminism, you'll see the history of anti-trans rhetoric being spread by the ideology.

Being anti trans is probably what radical feminism is most well known for. Over the course of many decades, the ideology has become less about women's movement, and more about punishing trans people for their existence. Hell, even a quick search of "radical feminism" on this god forsaken site will reveal that their main motive is no longer about women's liberation and has now become all about oppressing trans people.

As my mum put it; "it's the cycle of abuse. These women are so traumatized by the patriarchy and misogyny, that they feel the need to abuse the easiest target."

To recap, the radfem ideology is racist, biphobic, and most notably, transphobic. And if that's not enough to convince you that it's problematic, I don't know what is.

#asks #anon #trans #transgender #anti terf #anti gender critical #anti radfem

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