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definitelysel · 22 hours

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PICK YOUR DOMESTIC HUSBAND 🛒

WHICH HUSBAND IS ON THE DOMESTICITY MENU TODAY?

featuring: diluc, alhaitham, zhongli, wriothesley, neuvillette.

synopsis: glimpses into married life with the genshin men.

warnings: implied fem!reader, occasional pet names, ooc (I have a sparse idea how diluc works, mention of "activities" (just mention I can't write smut pls), silly goofy ah loser coded men, mild swearing (damn, heck)

a/n: *stretching my back and crunching my neck.* I'm back from the dead. apologies for the choppy writing. thanks for the support on the other posts, if only I could write 50-page essays thanking everyone. <33 :')) not proofread.

DILUC 🍷

PRODUCT NAME: BREAKFAST AND KISSES IN BED. Diluc always hated the Knights of Favonius…

He hated how most of them just stand around like buffoons and do not partake in any actual work that involves saving Mondstadt. He wouldn’t admit that he enjoys playing Batman. He hated them all except for one.

One he was willing to forgive all flaws of. "Knight of Favonius…always so inefficient,” He scoffed at the pathetic sight of the hilichurls trying to dry roast a few knights roped to a wooden stick for their dinner. “Seriously, You’re so right Master Diluc.” Diluc’s head turned so fast at the sound of a new voice. When did you get here? Were you always there and how did he not sense you around?

That’s simply how you always were. A hard worker amidst slackers – he always termed despite Jean trying to explain that others work hard too. Perhaps that’s what caught his attention, honestly, he would never know what did. “G’morning…” He murmured against your skin, head buried in the crook of your neck, your flushed bare back pressed against him. “5 more minutes…” he heard your soft and groggy voice evoking a chuckle from the usually passive man. “Have I ever told you…how beautiful you are?” Diluc muttered against your skin. You smiled and turned around, “You always do. I remember my Dark-Knight Hero crying at the altar.” You pressed a finger against his chest, while he scoffed at the memory. “Don’t remind me about that, Kaeya doesn’t let me live that down…” He sighed, his brother consistently brought up the matter of him crying whenever he was losing an argument. Foul play if you ask anyone. “So…breakfast downstairs or in the bed?” He planted a kiss on your cheek while you hummed out a response, “Bed, you didn’t exactly go easy on me the previous night.” You recalled the events of the passionate night the day before. The honeymoon phase never seemed to end. “I am so sorry–” He panicked,” You're not in pain are you? I promise I’ll be gentle– I knew I should’ve been more considerat–” You stopped him by pressing a kiss against his lips. He groaned at the feeling of your soft lips touching his hands tangling themselves in your hair.

“I’m kidding silly… you should stop taking things so seriously unless you want me to start searching for grey hairs amidst those red locks of yours.” You snickered out seeing him release a breath of relief.

If the Darknight Hero really does exist, he's probably just someone in disguise. When he gets up in the morning to brush his teeth, it's the real him. He was his real him in front of you. People may call him a loser for such vulnerability…he was a loser for you.

ALHAITHAM 🌱

PRODUCT NAME: READING BOOKS OUT LOUD. One would say married to someone like Alhaitham was nothing short of a nightmare. They weren't 100% right. Shrouded beneath the aloof and meticulous personality resided someone who was in complete denial towards being loved. He loves it.

Who was he kidding? Nobody in a million years thought someone could put up with his insufferable personality — said Kaveh, his unpaying tenant. That was until he ran into you during his time as the newly appointed Scribe. You were like a painter, splashing heaps of paint in his 90s black-and-white life. Was eating ice cream always this enjoyable or was it because it was with you? Was the gossip between co-workers always this interesting or was it because it included you?

Why was his heart having an entire Queen’s rock and roll concert talking to you? Was it cardiac arrest or– He almost shuddered at the thought of it being what they called love.

“You’ve got flour on your face, sweetheart.” His teal eyes blinked amusingly into yours, a faint smile curling up his lips. You must have saved a nation in your previous life to land this man as your husband. Beige shirt perfectly sculpting around his abs – contrary to him calling himself “feeble,” hair slightly tousled and slight sleepiness in his eyes. He might not act like it but he was a little child whose needs had to be tended to like the coffee mug in his hands which you made, like usual. You wouldn’t want a cranky Alhaitham now, would you? “Hmpf, not my fault, this cooking book is completely bogus!” You rubbed your cheeks with the back of your hand, wiping away any remaining flour. “This is so boring…if only someone could provide their poor wife with some entertainment.” You always resorted to theatrics to get him to do things for you, albeit begrudgingly. “No, the same tactic is not going to work again.” “Please…” “No…” He groaned, tone almost pleading not to put him through the torture again. “During better or worse!” You resorted to the ace up to your sleeve. WEDDING VOWS! “Stop quoting the wedding vows.” He sighed in defeat. The most intellectually gifted man in the nation couldn't win against his own wife. Ironical. He got up and grabbed a book out of the bookshelf; a small fraction of his much larger library.

“Miss Elizabeth,” Alhaitham lazily flipped through the pages earning a rebuke. “More emotion! You are ruining the scene.” Alhaitham sighed and cleared his throat, “I love you most ardently…” His tone was feathery soft, emotion surging in it. A smile crept up as he stared at you endearingly.

“That’s much better. Though I seriously think Mr Darcy should’ve said– Miss Elizabeth, allow me to kiseth thy lovely lips.” You mimicked the deep voice of the character with the failing British accent. “Please have mercy on Jane Austen’s ghost and let her enjoy the afterlife.” Alhaitham chuckled and continued reading as you continued baking. It was a shame that a man of such talent only paid attention to the truth itself and not to the people around him. If only the searching eyes of the ordinary say the exception to his indifference, you.

This was your biosphere, just you, him, novels and food encapsulated inside your small home.

ZHONGLI 🪨

PRODUCT NAME: ALWAYS ON HIS MIND. What is the best but the most useless flex you have? Being married to the Geo Archon. The inability to just tell the whole world that you are married to the frigging god was painful. You yourself were surprised by your ability to control yourself. Zhongli was a man of carefully curated words. Instead of words, straight-up poetry flew out of his mouth. Everyone knew how much he adored his wife, every vendor, every acquaintance, heck even Venti. Wangsheng Funeral Parlor's mysterious consultant. Handsome, elegant, and surpassingly learned. Excellent memory. A master of courtesy and rules. The amount of poor women who have tried to grab his attention. "Mr.Zhongli, how does this look?" the woman, who he remembered meeting over a history discussion 17 days ago. "Hm?" his amber eyes shifted to gaze at the hairpiece the lady was holding. "Most exquisite.." He remarked, seemingly going into deep thought. Instead of a compliment, he said something that made the woman back away, "Such beautiful craftsmanship...may I ask you to tell me where you found this? I wish to buy one for my wife–" he paused, seeing the lady vanished after pointing at the shop where she got it from. "Zhongli, you should be able to tell why people approach you..." Hutao sighed, standing beside the rather oblivious gentleman. "Let's just continue...we've got customers to find!" Hutao started walking alongside the railing, hoping to find people in need of funeral services. "Maybe we should go and ask peopl– Zhongli??" Hutao looked around for the Consultant, who was caught up chatting with a shopkeeper over some earrings. "Zhongli!" Hutao called out to him, causing his head to turn towards the director. "Oh, apologies...It seems I got too carried away. These earrings caught my eye...I'm sure [Name} would love them.." he mumbled, staring at the jewellery. "I'll take them." "Mister Zhongli? What about the payment..." The shopkeeper meekly asked, causing Zhongli to turn his head fully at Hutao; gazing expectantly. Hutao should've expected this... "Zhongli, we are out here to find customers! Not buying gifts for [Name], her birthday is months away!" "They say the best things should be done first. After all, why must I wait for one specific day to express my love for my beloved?" Zhongli asked curiously and Hutao shaked her head; love was clearly out of her expertise. Zhongli, he is particular about everything. He only attended the best operas and focused on the perfect ratio for the creation of an authentic dish. On a typical day, all you will glean from him is a few pieces of useless trivia, because he particularly enjoys sharing these fun tidbits with you. He was particular about you and your likings. A smile on your face was what he wanted by the end of the day. For being someone alive for 6000 years, he could proudly say that he loved and cherished something– someone.

"Wait here, Director Hu...Perhaps I should get those flowers over there to accompany the hairpin and earrings..."

WRIOTHESLEY 🐺

PRODUCT NAME: BATTLE TO BUY A DOG OR NOT.

"Wriothesley, I want a dog!" You crossed your arms, staring down at the Duke who was glued to the chair in his office. “But why? That’s just unnecessary responsibility…” Wriothesley sighed, rubbing his temples. This was the 3rd time this month you’ve brought up this topic. Was he that incompetent in terms of filling his role as your significant other? Perhaps not with the never-ending paperwork. Oh, how he wished people would just stop committing crimes. “I get lonely in the Fortress…I want a child.” You put forth your point by using the term ’ child’. Child, dog same thing. You hoped to finally convince him this time.

“We have Sigewinne.” Wriothesley pointed at the head nurse prepping tea in the room with the back of his pen. “I am sorry, Your Grace but playing the role of the child is out of my job description.” The Melusine replied indifferently, pouring freshly seeped tea into the three cups. “Fine, we will go get one…I’ll schedule a meeting with the owner of the pet shelter. Happy?” He asked you, chin resting on his palm. Perhaps getting a dog was a good idea as he was guilty of being unable to spend quality time with you… “No way…” “Isn’t that..?” “The Duke of the Meropide–” “He rarely appears in public..” Wriothesley held out the door to the shelter for you, hoping you would go in and it would finally save him from the gaze of curious onlookers. The two of you walked in, only to be pounced upon by a big dog. “Kal! You sly dog! I knew I shouldn’t have let you out!” The caretaker yelled at the big ball of black fur who had tackled Wriothesley to the floor and was aggressively licking his face, tail wagging in delight. “Are you okay?” You asked your fallen husband, who just chuckled in response. “I am good just– Okay stop! I understand your gesture of love.” Wriothesley got up as the dog encircled him. “This one is so adorable…” you gasped at the cuteness radiating from the dog and its big brown eyes. “You’ve got a keen eye! This is Kal, Shiloh Shepard, one of the finest dogs out there.” The caretaker combed her fingers through the thick and groomed black coat of the canine. “He seems to have taken a liking to the Duke.” The caretaker continued as the dog ran back to Wriothesley, peppering his face with licks. “He even looks like you.” You teased as Wriothesley stared at you in disbelief. You did not just compare him to a dog…he even did a double take at the dog to confirm. “We will take this one then…” He chuckled in amusement. Never had he imagined marrying you and on top of that getting a four-legged beast. Needless to say, Wriothesley proudly walked out of the shelter, holding the big dog in his hands like a child. It felt complete ever since getting Kal; like your own little family. Wriothesley wouldn’t admit it but he loved the dog, despite it hogging all of your love and attention. He didn’t expect to be fighting over cuddling rights with a dog!?

He watched you and Kal sleep peacefully on the couch, keeping him company while he finished up his work. He felt a sense of gratitude…people of the Fortress knew little of the crime he once committed. The only one who still remembers it like yesterday is Wriothesley himself. And no matter how much glory or repute he has earned, he still considers himself to be the same old Wriothesley he's always known.Neither a good person nor a complete villain. He's just another soul, still living on in this world. However, your eyes always reassured him in ways he couldn’t describe. Everything was perfect…

[Name]!! YOURDAMN DOG PISSED ON MY COAT!! Maybe not that perfect…whoops.

NEUVILLETTE 🌊

PRODUCT NAME: HELPING THE OTHER DRESS.

Monsieur Neuvillette, The Iudex of Fontaine, always wondered how his life had come to this. 500 years of serving his position as the Beacon of Justice, a lovely, beaming baker somehow broke the monotony. Well, calling you just a baker was now an insult. With your ring finger bejewelled, with one of the rarest gems– an ode to his undying loyalty and representation of his eternal love. “It’s astounding how a covert mission conducted by melusines could’ve landed someone such as myself a lady like her…” He muttered to himself, seeing his full form in the mirror. “Talking to yourself, again?” You leaned against the door frame, lopsidedly smiling at the peculiar antics of Fontaine’s most distinguished man. “Ah, apologies…I didn’t think you would notice me conversing with myself. Now I find myself in a rather awkward predicament.” He chuckled. Dear god, this man was so beautiful that his beauty was almost blinding with the morning sun perfectly hitting his face.

“Say ah,” You requested and he complied. Who better to take constructive criticism from other than your husband? “New filling?” He covered his mouth while chewing on the croissant. “Yup, how is it? I was experimenting with some Rainbow Roses and these Inazuman berries I bought.” You blinked curiously, waiting for some input. “Hmm it is very pleasant, it is fascinating how you manage to maintain the freshness of the fruit…” You smiled at his compliment, before noticing him struggling with the jabot around his neck. “Need help?” You offered and he nodded his head. “This is absurd..it usually isn’t this difficult.” He frustrated replied, it was amusing to see the cool and collected man all worked up about clothing. “I suggest simplifying your outfit.” You attached the jabot and secured it in with the teardrop brooch, fixing the ruffles.

“Thank you. I do prefer my outfit as it conveys the message I wish for it to convey.” He explained before staring at you. You knew that look, he looked at you with his eyebrows slightly creased when he was hesitating from saying something. “What is it?” “Do I get a goodbye kiss before I leave?” “Pfft! I didn’t think you would take that seriously!” Conclusion: this man was wayyy to cute.

Neuvillette is a solitary person. Neuvillette is not known for his personal desires.

He was deemed as someone with unassailable impartiality. If only they knew that perhaps the Iudex was just a wee bit biased.

a/n 2.0: the crust will come off...hopefully. i wonder if it's possible to guess which one of them is my favourite??

don't steal, copy, plagiarise, or translate.

©definitelysel

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minswriting · 2 days

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I have a request!! Spencer/bau!reader where they've been best friends since the early seasons but reader doesn't know that reid's been obsessed with them for YEARS. Like he's stolen underwear, actively works to prevent other guys from asking them out (despite lacking the ability to do so himself), and they always room together when it's needed (he gets himself off while you sleep). And due to Spencer's ongoing campaign to keep any potential romantic interests at bay, reader never managed to lose their virginity. Good thing spence is such a good friend. When you ask him to help you out, ofc he jumps at the opportunity. He'll want to try to get you pregnant, too.

so for this ask i have a series idea for a perverted + corruption kink with spencer. so keep an eye out in the future!!

#🌸 — min’s asks #criminal minds #spencer reid #criminal minds imagine #criminal minds smut #spencer reid smut #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid x you #criminals minds x reader

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mostlysignssomeportents · 2 days

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Ticketmaster jacks us for billions so it can pocket millions

NEXT WEEKEND (June 7–9), I'm in AMHERST, NEW YORK to keynote the 25th Annual Media Ecology Association Convention and accept the Neil Postman Award for Career Achievement in Public Intellectual Activity.

Corruption is a system of concentrated gains and diffused costs: cheaters make a lot of money, and their victims each lose a little. The cheater has a much larger pool of money to spend on keeping the scam going, and the victims need to pay again to fight the cheater.

Actually, it's worse. The victim pays once when they are cheated, then, they pay a second time (in time and/or money) when they fight back against the cheater.

But in order to fight back effectively, the victims need to band together – it doesn't make sense for one victim to pony up to counter the cheater, because the cheater stole from a lot of people and can therefore spend far more than the victim lost and still come out ahead.

This is the third time the victim pays: they pay the "collective action" tax of locating other victims, agreeing to a common strategy for fighting back, and then coordinating with all those co-victims to keep the campaign up.

But actually, it's even worse. Because most corruption isn't just dishonest, it's incredibly wasteful. Corruption involves stealing ten dollars from you to make a dime for the cheater. The polluter who gives you cancer rather than cleaning up their industrial process costs you millions in medical bills – and maybe costs your family the lifelong trauma and expense of living with your death. They pocket an infinitesimal fraction of those costs. The rest is just wasted. They're setting your house on fire to spare themselves the cost of a match to light their cigar.

This is yet another way in which the deck is stacked in favor of corruption. A victim of corruption is placed in a condition of precarity and misery from which is it difficult to marshal a counteroffensive. The cheater, meanwhile, is made stronger and more comfortable by their corrupt activities. Immiserated victims must undertake the hard, ongoing work of acting together to be effective against the cheater. The cheater answers only to themself, avoiding the collective action costs that the victims pay every time they seek to act.

All of this is why we have governments. A government is (said to be) a democratically accountable way to meet the concentrated power of the corrupt with the concentrated power of the victims of corruption. Governments are many things, but they are especially a way of solving the collective action problem of enforcing the rules against cheaters. This is partially in service to justice – no one likes to be cheated, and a society of rampant and routine cheating is unstable and prone to collapse.

But it's also a matter of efficiency. While it makes a certain kind of selfish sense for the cheater to liquidate our dollar to make their penny, from a societal perspective, it's a catastrophe. Letting Wall Street slumlords corner regional markets in single family dwellings makes large amounts of money for their investors, but it costs those cities unimaginable amounts in public services as their housing stock decays, homelessness spikes, and schools and public services crumble for want of local taxes.

The paltry sums that Flint's creditors extracted by insisting on switching to a chlorinated water-supply that leeched lead out of the city's water infrastructure are crumbs compared to the vast, lifelong costs of giving an all the children in a city lead poisoning, to say nothing of the costs to the city as a city nor forever tainted by this unspeakably evil crime.

This is why inequality – and its handmaiden, monopoly – is so dangerous. The more concentrated private wealth becomes, the harder it is for the state to police, and the more likely it is that this private wealth will corrupt our officials. We see this all around us – for example, when Supreme Court justices receive lavish gifts from billionaires whom they later rule in favor of:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/06/clarence-thomas/#harlan-crow

Through the neoliberal era – the past forty years of billionaire-friendly Reaganomics – we've seen increasing concentration in wealth, coupled to increasing collusion between the wealthy and the government to protect the corrupt against the public. Think of the IRS's long decay, in which it turned a blind eye to increasingly blatant tax evasion by the ultra-wealthy, while training its fire on working people who fudge a few bucks on their returns:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/04/13/taxes-are-for-the-little-people/#leona-helmsley-2022

Likewise, think of the governmental obsession with "welfare cheats," no matter what the cost to families who are kicked off food stamps and Medicaid:

https://armandalegshow.com/episode/medicaid-enrollment/

All this in the midst of a corporate crime-wave that is not only unpunished, it's utterly unremarked-upon:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/12/07/solar-panel-for-a-sex-machine/#a-single-proposition

This emphasis on benefits cheating and indifference to corporate crime really highlights the drag that corruption places on a society's efficiency. Even if you believe that there's a lot of welfare fraud (there isn't!), the dollar in "undeserved" food stamps spent by a cheater costs society…a dollar. Meanwhile the dollar that a corporate criminal makes by skimping on workplace safety costs society thousands of dollars to care for the worker who is then maimed on the job.

This is very easy to see in the world of corporate environmental crime. The "social cost of carbon" measures the total cost of pollution: the injuries caused by marinating in fossil fuel extraction, processing and combustion byproducts; as well as the loss of life and property from climate events. These costs are blistering, so high that every MWh of renewable power we bring online saves us $100 in social carbon costs:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/30/posiwid/#social-cost-of-carbon

Governments that sleep on corporate crime are objectively governing badly. That's why the antitrust failures of every US presidential administration from Carter to Trump are so damning: they set the stage for later corruption that would not only be carried out on a larger scale than smaller firms could accomplish, but also for those large firms to corrupt the political process.

This is the Ticketmaster story. The superpredator that is today's Ticketmaster is the end-point of a series of ever-more corrupt mergers, waved through by every-more pliable presidential administrations. It was bad enough when Bush I allowed Ticketmaster to gobble up Ticketron in 1990. After all, the company had already proven itself to be a cesspit of corrupt, bullying activity.

The Ticketron acquisition kicked off a two-decade-long corporate crime-spree that produced a mountain of evidence proving Ticketmaster's nature as an inherently corrupt enterprise that acquired power for the purpose of abusing that power, at the expense of creative workers, the public, and the owners of venues:

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/pearl-jam-taking-on-ticketmaster-67440/

Despite this, the Obama administration waved through an acquisition that was obviously far more dangerous that the Ticketron caper: the 2010 merger between Ticketmaster and the concert promoter Live Nation:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Nation_Entertainment#History

After a decade and a half of vertical monopoly power – Ticketmaster/Live Nation controlling ticketing, promotion and venues – the company has grown from a dangerous octopus with its tentacles twined around the industry into a kraken that is strangling every kind of live event and everyone who earns a living from them. This has produced an ever-more obvious string of scandals, most notably the company's assault on Swifties:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/20/anything-that-cant-go-on-forever-will-eventually-stop/

A combination of mounting public outrage (with Swifties at the vanguard) and the Biden administration's generational enthusiasm for smashing corporate power has led, at last, to a reckoning with the Ticketmaster kraken:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/30/nix-fix-the-tix/#something-must-be-done-there-we-did-something

Ticketmaster is a famously opaque organization. When Rebecca Giblin and I were working on Chokepoint Capitalism, our book on monopoly and creative labor markets, we were able to speak on the record to insiders from every part of the industry, except live performance:

https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

As soon as we raised Ticketmaster/Live Nation with club owners and other events industry insiders, they'd go pale and quiet and tell us that they didn't feel comfortable staying on the record. TM/LN has a well-deserved mafia-style reputation for savage retaliation against snitches.

With the DOJ Antitrust Division chasing Ticketmaster through the courts, we're starting to get a rare, on-the-record glimpse of TM/LN's operations, as its internal documents find their pay into court records. In response Ticketmaster's spokesliars have embarked on an epic spin campaign, to "contextualize" these damning numbers and paint the company as a weak, low-margin business that has been unfairly set-upon by the bullies at the DOJ.

In his BIG newsletter, Matt Stoller offers a spectacular, must-read breakdown of these documents and the ensuing spin:

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/is-ticketmaster-telling-the-truth

Stoller starts with Ticketmaster's insistence that it is barely profitable. Though this is true on paper, the numbers just don't add up. For one thing, anyone who's bought a ticket can see, printed on its face, TM's junk fees: "a 'service fee' without any obvious service [and] a 'convenience fee' that is anything but convenient."

Far more damning is a comparison between the price of a Ticketmaster ticket in the US vs the EU. The EU has legally mandated competitive ticketing, and the tickets there are far cheaper. A US ticket to see Taylor Swift will run you $2,600 – the same ticket costs $340 in the EU. As Stoller writes:

An American could fly to Paris, spend a few nights at a nice hotel, see a Taylor Swift concert, and fly back, for less than it costs to see that same show in the U.S.

How to make sense of this contradiction? How can Ticketmaster show such a low profit margin on its books but somehow end up costing event-goers such an absurd premium?

Start with the fact that Ticketmaster has three businesses, not just one. They sell tickets, but they also promote concerts (that is, front the money for personnel, travel and marketing), and they also own a bunch of the largest and most profitable venues in the country.

This allows them to play a shell-game that's very similar to (and possibly not actually different from) money-laundering, where money is shuffled between entities in order to shield it from creditors, suppliers or tax agents:

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/explosive-new-documents-unearthed

But this presents a problem for Ticketmaster. They're a publicly traded company and their investors demand high returns. And unlike performers or venue owners, investors have power over Ticketmaster management. Keeping "margin per ticket" number as low as possible lets Ticketmaster minimize the revenue it has to share with the people who actually do the work and invest the capital in live performances. But for investors, they need to show another number, one that's as high as possible, to keep the investors happy.

That number is "Adjusted Operating Income" or AOI. While gross margins are the difference between the face value of a ticket and the sum remitted to the venue and the performer, AOI factors in all the other revenue TM/LN books from that ticket, like kickbacks. TM/LN's AOI is very healthy: it's 37% on tickets and 61% on promotions.

Those sums delight TM/LN's investors, and they express their joy through lavish executive compensation packages. CEO Michael Rapino is America's fifth-highest paid CEO, at $139m/year (that's eight times the Fortune 500 average). His sidekick Joe Berchtold is America's highest paid CFO, at $54m. The total AOI for TM/LN is $732m/year – and 19% of that is being paid to two of its execs.

But LN/TM has a third line of business: operating venues. The AOI for these venues is just 1.7%. If this were a normal, cutthroat business, you'd expect those same return-focused investors to insist on their handsomely compensated execs selling off that low-margin turkey. But nevertheless, TM/LN keeps those venues on its books.

When those execs talk to the public, they use the poor profit margins of ticketing and the poor AOI on venues to plead poverty: "how can we be a monopoly when we're barely scraping by?"

But when they talk to the investors who decide whether to pay them 800% of the S&P500 average, they are more forthcoming.

Keeping the margins low on tickets – and making up the money with kickbacks and other corrupt payments – means that potential rival ticketing firms can't afford to get into the business. Without the venue and promotion business, those rivals wouldn't be able to command kickbacks. They'd have to subsist on the rock-bottom margins that are competitive with Ticketmaster.

Likewise those venues: ownership of key venues lets Ticketmaster/Live Nation force out credible rivals in important markets, and keep new ones from emerging, because again, they'd have to make a living on that paltry 1.7% AOI (or the even lower profit margins!).

As Joe Berchtold, the highest-paid CFO in America, told an analyst:

I don't think Concerts AOI per fan is a logical way to look at it. I think if you look at how we've talked about our business, we've talked about our business across the multiple pieces. So you have to look at it, what's the concerts plus sponsorship plus ticketing AOI per fan.

Berchtold is paid roughly $26,000/hour. Those words take roughly 25 seconds to utter, so that's a $7.20 explanation, but it contains a wealth of information – it's basically the DoJ's case in a nutshell.

But Stoller points out a curious fact that isn't captured here. Remember when I told you that TM/LN's NOI is $732m/year? What I didn't mention is the company's gross revenue: $16.7 billion.

When TM/LN talks about how shitty their business is, and therefore they can't be a monopoly, this is the trump card. How could a company creaming off a mere $732 million off $16.7 billion in gross revenue be a monopolist with "pricing power"?

This is where understanding corruption helps clarify our understanding and cut through the bullshit. Corruption is vastly wasteful. In order to extract $732m from $16.7b, TM/LN has to engage in a lot of wasteful and corrupt activities. They have to bribe other key players in the system, spend vast fortunes on lobbying, and generally do a lot of unproductive things with their money.

This is concentrated gains and diffuse losses. In order to command the highest salary of any American CFO, Berchtold has to cook up and maintain this process. In order to earn his $139m/year, Rapino has to play mafia don and keep everyone is his supply chain sufficiently terrorized or sufficiently greased to maintain omerta.

These two men take home a fifth of Ticketmaster's net income because they possess a rare and valuable skill. They are able to obfuscate a corrupt arrangement, enrobing it in layers of performative complexity, until the average musician, concertgoer, or lawmaker, can't understand it. Any attempt to unravel it will induce a deadly, soporific confusion. The investment industry term for his is MEGO (My Eyes Glaze Over), the weaponization of complexity. A skilled MEGO artist can convince you that the pile of shit they're peddling is so large that there must be a pony under it somewhere.

Here's Stoller, de-MEGOfying the TM/LN story:

Live Nation has a giant capital intensive unprofitable division of putting on concerts, from which it skims for its real cash flow. But this leverage among different subsidiaries means that it has an incentive to push up the cost of concerts overall, not just for its own profit. This incentive operates in two different ways. One, since ticket fees are based on the price of a ticket, Live Nation seeks higher prices for tickets so it can move more cash to its Ticketmaster subsidiary. And two, since Live Nation itself gets rebates by overpaying for venues, it has the incentive to push up the cost of shows. No one can undercut Live Nation, as it’s a monopoly.

You might think that this is a lot of mental energy to expend on understanding live performances. If you're not trying to see Taylor Swift, does any of this matter?

It assuredly does. Understanding how Ticketmaster's shell-game works is critical to understanding the similar shell-games played by many other kinds of monopolists, who have wrapped their tentacles around all the other parts of our lives. As David Dayen and Lindsay Owens write for The American Prospect, the companies that avoided monopoly prosecution by ripping off suppliers have bled those suppliers dry, and now they're coming for their customers:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-06-03-age-of-recoupment/

From groceries to plane tickets, rent to cab rides, Amazon to Ticketmaster, we are living through the "Age of Recoupment," when the long con of lowering prices to secure monopolies flips enters it final stage: greedflating the shit out of customers, and using the monopolist's power over regulators to avoid consequences.

Today, everywhere consumers turn, whether they are shopping for groceries at the local Kroger or for plane tickets online, they are being gouged. Landlords are quietly utilizing new software to band together and raise rents. Uber has been accused of raising the price of rides when a customer’s phone battery is drained. Ticketmaster layers on additional fees as you move through the process of securing seats to your favorite artist’s upcoming show. Amazon’s secret pricing algorithm, code-named “Project Nessie,” was designed to identify products where it could raise prices, on the expectation that competitors would follow suit. Companies are forcing you into monthly subscriptions for a tube of toothpaste. Banks have crept up the price of credit, so customers who cannot afford price-gouging in their everyday transactions get a second round of price-gouging when they put purchases on credit. Expedia is using demographic and purchase history data to set hotel pricing for an audience of one: you.

When these companies end up in front of angry attorneys general, DOJ lawyers, or an FTC investigation, they'll use the Ticketmaster/Live Nation playbook to try and wriggle off the hook. They'll point to some barely-profitable (or money-losing) part of their business and say, "How could a monopolist possibly be running a business this shitty?"

If the DOJ makes its case against Ticketmaster, it will set a precedent, both in court and in policy circles, for understanding how a monopolist's corruption works. Monopolists aren't always businesses with gigantic margins. Like other criminals, their corruption can produce spectacular wealth and spectacular waste at the same time.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/03/aoi-aoi-oh/#concentrated-gains-vast-diffused-losses

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little-cereal-draws · 2 days

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@nonbinarylocalcryptid has put this au in my head so here are some headcanons for Odysseus adopting Astyanax instead of killing him

When Odysseus finally gets home, Astyanax is ten and Telemachus is twenty, about to turn twenty one

Astyanax is incredibly furiously jealous of Telemachus. He doesn’t know who this guy is or why Odysseus is so obsessed with him. He isn’t used to having to share his dad’s attention

He tries to come up w ways of getting Odysseus to focus only on him but he’s never successful. Either he gets in trouble for doing smth bad or he tries to start a game and it gets turned into a whole family activity

He gives up after a few weeks and sulks by himself exploring the palace and city. Odysseus eventually finds him and they have some much needed one on one time. Astyanax is ecstatic

Telemachus is incredibly furiously jealous of Astyanax. He doesn’t know who this kid is or why Odysseus is so obsessed with him. He isn’t used to having to share his dad’s attention

Him and Odysseus are trying to make up for lost time and Astyanax keeps bursting in and being super annoying. He’s so glad every time Odysseus shoos him away. He desperately needs this one on one time

Astyanax isn’t sure abt Penelope. She’s very nice, makes an effort to connect to him, and Odysseus hasn’t stopped raving abt her for as long as he can remember. But hearing abt someone in a story is different from actually meeting them. She a total stranger. He warms up to her after a while but for the first month or so, he’s very shy and apprehensive around her

He doesn’t consider her his mom tho, only Odysseus’ wife. He used to think calypso was his mom (she would be the first woman he would be old enough to remember and they lived w her for most of his life) but now he’s content to not have a mom. He only needs his dad anyway

After about a year or so, both Astyanax and Telemachus begrudgingly accept that they’ll have to share Odysseus. They’re both not thrilled abt it but they’re not angry anymore either

Telemachus is a self sufficient adult at this point and spends a lot of time doing his own thing. He’ll go on trips, go hunting, attend his parents’ court, try to woo maidens, debate policy and philosophy w the advisors (which can get pretty complicated when his parents join; his dad especially loves having battles of wits), etc

Astyanax is a preteen and very curious abt what Telemachus is getting up to and what the adult life of a prince is like. He followed him secretly at first but quickly got found out. Telemachus thought it was kinda weird at first but then was a little flattered

He started letting Astyanax accompany him (to an extent. Long trips and wooing maidens are off limits lol). But he’ll take him to court, on quick trips, to his fighting lessons, to intellectual debates, etc.

Penelope isn’t so sure but Odysseus is adamant that learning by experience is just as valuable as structured lessons and they should just be happy that they’re finally getting along lol

The only part he has a problem w is the trips. He’s already anxious when Telemachus leaves on his own but when he takes Astyanax too… The thought of potentially losing both his sons, them taking years to return, or them being harassed by the gods eats him alive. It’s terrible to watch. He doesn’t eat, barely sleeps, doesn’t do any work. The only thing he does is sit by the door to the palace and wait for them to come back. Not even Penelope can soothe him

It’s worse when they go on a boat. Even if they’re only taking a one day trip to the city next over, he’s literally shaking w stress. Instead of sitting by the door, he’ll sit in Poseidon’s temple and do nothing but pray for their safe passage, not stopping at all for food or sleep

Telemachus has offered to leave Astyanax so he feels a bit better but he insists that he’s fine. It’s more important that the two of them bond, form good relations w their neighbors that will benefit them when they’re the king, and become more worldly. He’s fine. He swears it. He’s fine

Telemachus has taught Astyanax how to shoot a bow, how to track animals, how to identify plants, and how to basically do anything that doesn’t involve living on a boat lol

They’ll spar too. Astyanax is much better than Telemachus was at his age and Telemachus is a little jealous abt it. If he didn’t win anyway bc he’s bigger and stronger, he definitely would be angry

It’s weird tho bc he’ll be like “how did you learn that move? It was super advanced." And Astyanax will just casually be like “dad taught me after we fought a harpy.” And Telemachus is reminded that this kid has spent more time w his dad than he has. He never got to have his dad teach him how to fight but this other kid did. It’s not fair. He pushes it deep down and ignores it

Astyanax is aware of what happened to his biological family. Odysseus told him when he was eight. He was a teary mess, barely able to get the story out, but Astyanax wasn’t distraught like Odysseus expected. Astyanax was quiet for a long time, thinking, then went off on his own for a while but by the time it was night, he seemed to have moved pass it

He didn’t remember that family so he wasn’t very upset. He definitely thought it was messed up that he was taken in by the enemy that killed his whole family and destroyed his city but Odysseus was nice and it beat being killed too so he wasn’t complaining

Sometimes he’ll lay awake and wonder what his life would’ve been like if he had grown up in Troy tho. How his biological dad would’ve raised him. How different his life would’ve been if he hadn’t been constantly moving around and fighting for his life. As a kid, he can’t even begin to imagine what that would feel like bc he’s never known it. But by the time he’s grown, it’s different

Telemachus is on the throne now; Odysseus retired and just hangs around now. There are rumors that he's gone mad and even tho it's 100% false, he does nothing to stop the rumors bc he thinks it's funny and likes to mess w ppl

Astyanax is in his mid to late twenties now and he's feeling like he doesn't belong in Ithaca. He looks different from the rest of his family, he's got a much darker and complicated past than most of them, and every time they talk abt war in the court he can't help but get angry and closed off

Tho to Telemachus' credit he's a very fair king and does his best to avoid war and getting involved in other people's wars. That's how he lost his dad for so long and he's not making Ithaca go through smth like that again

Astyanax decides that he needs to see Troy. What's left of it, any new civilizations that replaced it, anything he can find. He's a little worried about the trip across the sea but figures if he did it once before, he can do it again

There's nothing when he gets there. Most of the wood has rotted and the ground is black and charred. He can walk the Greek camp based off the burnt fire pits, the tent peg holes in the earth, and the rotted outlines of the thick wall. The field in between the camp and Troy is littered with swords, spears, arrows, shields, and the occasional chariot wheel. Troy is a ghost town. The only thing left are the great walls. The inside is baren and empty

When he returns, he's furious. His "dad" destroyed his entire civilization. Except for him, no mercy was shown. It was a horrible, monstrous thing to do. (He's forgotten the memory of how much Odysseus cried telling him what he did)

He goes off on Odysseus. Odysseus is partly resigned (he knew this day was coming and he’s in the wrong) but he’s still a stubborn ass who resorts to violence instead of talking things out so the fight gets pretty explosive. It stays an argument but only just barely

They both have swords in their hands when Telemachus comes in. He tries to talk them down and pretends he doesn’t know what the fight is abt even tho the whole palace can hear them yelling

Astyanax asks for Odysseus to be executed, banished, or otherwise punished in someway. Telemachus won’t do it. Astyanax is furious that he’s not taking his side. Telemachus didn’t see what he saw. He didn’t lose his whole family and get kidnapped by the man who murdered them. He has no idea how it feels to have your whole world flipped on its head

Astyanax debates fighting both Odysseus and Telemachus but decides against it. He storms out, gets on a boat, and goes back to Troy. He wanders around there for a while until he finds a civilization to join

Years go by. Odysseus dies, Telemachus has his own kids and grandkids. His hair is starting to go gray. Then one day a messenger runs in announcing the approach of a foreign army

Telemachus runs out to see the threat and a fleet of twelve boats is abt to enter Ithaca’s harbor. At the prow of the biggest one is Astyanax, torch in hand. He’s going to burn Ithaca like they burnt Troy

The prophecy is fulfilled

#sry this started out cute w family fluff then got dark #odysseus #the odyssey #epic the musical #Astyanax #Telemachus #Penelope

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mangora · 3 days

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Me: So yeah the thing about the PI girls for me is how they view themselves and treat other people because like, Sky sees herself as a hero and believes that everyone deserves help or a second chance, which becomes actively harmful whenever she has to battle herself about what’s best for her/her team vs what’s best for the feelings of others, often resulting in failure (ex: her refusing to call out teammates like Leonard as team leader) or her own feelings of anger/guilt (ex: the entire Dave situation); meanwhile Ella is truly kind through and through because she sees herself as an innocent fairy tale princess and the level of kindness is born from the naivety and idealism accompanying that label ended up being her downfall (ex: refused to see the bad in Sugar and insisted on being friends even when Sugar clearly hated her); and of course Sammy is kind and wants to help people (ex: volunteers to go berry picking), but has a massively skewed view of confrontation due to her low self esteem and her image of herself as a helpless or worthless proxy to her sister, to the point that she won’t confront people until she blows up in the most inopportune moments; and then Jasmine wants the best for people but believes that they must make this happen themselves (ex: Sammy) and she also believes that individual healing/kindness is second to working together as a team towards a collective goal (ex: again, in the case of the Sammy/Amy situation) because she sees herself as a leader and a survivor above anything else and expects other people to feel the same, which is why it stung extra hard when Shawn, who she likes, worked against her instead of with her for a collective good, and why it was extra impactful to her when he sacrificed his win to save her when they weren’t working together; and then Sugar sees herself both as a bit of a comedian and as a queen who is above other people, and will make fun of people or manipulate them for her own gain or entertainment, but is still willing to work with others and will still treat them as friends (ex: Sky, Leonard) when a goal is within close reach, with the exception of people she believes are out to hurt her (ex: Ella); and then Scarlett sees herself as a villain but has sought out friends before (ex: Max) and can be incredibly helpful in a team and will only turn to cruelty when people have lost her trust (ex: Topher, Max), or when she feels she’s finally in total power with nothing to lose by hurting others (ex: Scarlett Fever), suggesting she likes some people and would be willing to align with or befriend someone who shares her goals but ultimately sees people as resources, perhaps because the people around her never showed an initiative to work with her as friends past the merge as they did when they worked on a team together (see: Jasmine); and finally Amy is the worst of them as she sees herself as the best of the best in a similar way to Sugar (though Sugar will do the work for this title, while Amy feels entitled to it), and she doesn’t like or respect anyone, and is actively cruel to people for little or no reason even when they can help her, though she still wants their praise and adoration despite this. All of the PI girls are victims of circumstance clearly but they’re also all self-fulfilling prophecies in their own ways. Their adherence to their own self image is both what caused them to clash and what caused them to bond. In the end Jasmine and Sky are the only ones who broke out of their moulds which is why they succeeded (Jasmine got part of Shawn’s reward in his ending and Sky got the full million in her’s). Yuri could’ve saved all of them faster though.

Woman Taking My Order At Unspecified Drive Thru Eatery:

#alex’s td rambles #I haven’t watched PI in like a year or two but the PI girls are ALWAYS on my mind

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moreespressoformydepresso · 3 days

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So I was thinking (shocker I know) about Gaul's theory about humanity. That people, when cornered, lose their humanity and become monsters. More specifically, I've been having thoughts about the moment that "confirmed" this theory in Snow's head for a while now and decided to put them into words. Which might be a terrible idea, but I never claimed to be smart.

According to Gaul, people who are cornered will do anything to survive and lose all sense of humanity to do so. The Games are supposed to be a constant reminder of this, which already raises a few questions that I was going to pose before getting to my actual thoughts here until it evolved into a whole separate train of thoughts. I'll make it a separate post instead but long story short: If it was supposed to be a reminder of this "truth" it was a sloppy, embarrasing failure at best (and also that's not how science works). Regardless of that though, the moment that solidified this delusion is his brutally murdering Bobbin while escaping the arena with Sejanus. There's a problem though. Or rather, there's several problems. Firstly, Snow chose to bash Bobbin's head in until he was unrecognizable. Chose, because he didn't have to do it. If you want my more interesting/unique(?) thoughts skip the next paragraph.

Most people would have knocked Bobbin out at most and then kept running, Snow chose to keep hitting with the wooden plank. He did this not because he lost all his humanity, but because he is a deeply disturbed individual. His formative years were filled with war and propaganda, and his family's proud name being dragged into the mud by his living situation understandably gave him a complex about power and wealth. He needed to feel above other people to cope, and the Capitol provided. Now, that does not in any way excuse his actions (and if anyone's interested I have several essays worth of thoughts on that and all the ways in which it makes me adore Collins and hate extremes in fandom), but it does explain them. Moreover, that complex and stubborn pride in his family's former high status likely fed into his belief in Gaul's theory. If it's true for someone of his status, it must be true for everyone.

Now, the actual reason for this post

Gaul's theory is that people lose their humanity when they're cornered. Emphasis on cornered here. When people are put under pressure, they will act in depraved ways. From Snow's perspective of reality, this is true because when he was cornered he brutally beat a child to death. But was he cornered though? No. Sure, he was in a scary situation, but he was not cornered. There was one child with a knife chasing after him. A starved, dying one. Snow and Sejanus could've easily outran him with some adrenaline boosting them (that shit makes moms lift whole cars to save their kids, come on now), nevermind the millions of other solutions that aren't "beat a child to death with a wooden plank until they're unrecognizable". More importantly though, they're not stuck in the arena. The peacekeepers didn't actively protect them, but they opened the fence for them. Snow could leave the arena. He could've dodged Bobbin and ran, and he'd have been able to leave the arena without murdering a kid. He was pressed, but he was not cornered. Not only does this theory have the most pathetic "proof" of any scientific theory since Andrew Wakefield's vaccine scam, the incident that confirmed it in Snow's mind isn't even a situation where the theory is applicable in the first place. It doesn't prove that people who are cornered lose their humanity. You know what it does prove, though?

People who have power lose their sense of humanity

Snow was not entirely cornered, but he did have power. As mentioned before, Bobbin is a starving child with nothing but a large knife. Snow might not be well-fed by Capitol standards, but he was certainly doing amazing by district standards. He had a wooden plank and a child at his mercy. What did he do? He maimed and murdered the kid. And throughout the entire book, stuff like this happens. Gaul showed him how the snakes work because he's her favorite prodigy. What did he do? He used it to cheat and help Lucy Gray win. When he had that recording of Sejanus admitting to rebellion, he had power over Sejanus' life. What did he do? He got the guy executed. When he had a gun and Mayfair became a possible problem, he shot her. When he became president, he kept the games going and poisoned anyone in his way because he had the power to do so. Mayfair has the power to influence who gets reaped, and uses it to try and get Lucy Gray killed. It happens on a larger scale too. It's the whole point of the series. The Capitol has all the power, and they use it by abusing and murdering the people from the districts, either to keep them in line or just because they want to. For entertainment. Because they can, and there's nothing the districts can do about it. Coin has power, and what does she do with it? She gets Prim killed to break Katniss into her pawn and suggests to put more innocent children through the Hunger Games because she can. Just like the Capitol did, 75 years before that. They can, so they do it. Who's gonna stop them? It's all over the series. And they all try to justify their actions by blaming it on people. Mayfair’s excuse is getting rid of “competition”, the Capitol claims the districts are getting what’s coming to them for the rebellion, Coin claims this new version of the games is what the rebellion wants. Snow has all his mental gymnastics.

It's not desperation that turns people into monsters, it's power.

And those with power will always convince themselves it's not the power, it's the people.

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good-old-gossip · 1 day

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U.S. Government is DOING EVERYTHING to UNDERMINE UNRWA!!!

As the humanitarian situation deteriorates inside Gaza, a non-profit in the US is facing a legal battle that could see it lose the ability to be a major source of donations to the UN agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA).

A coalition of pro-Israel groups in the US and families of the captives being held in Gaza is suing Unrwa USA over accusations that the non-profit is “aiding and abetting terrorism” and giving money to Hamas through its financial support to Unrwa.

They claim Unrwa USA helped to fund the 7 October attacks against Israel. Lawyers representing Unrwa USA filed a motion last week urging the court to dismiss the case on the grounds that the lawsuit does not provide any evidence to support its allegations.

“This case is about UNRWA USA, and the Complaint does not factually allege that a single cent of UNRWA USA’s contributions was allocated for any Hamas-related activities, much less to aid and abet the October 7 attacks,” the motion said.

Unrwa USA’s legal team told MEE that while they believe the lawsuit lacks merit, it serves as both a distraction to the ongoing crisis in Gaza and will drain the charity’s resources.

“A goal of these accusations is to distract and also a goal of these lawsuits, in my view, is to really drain the resources of groups,” said Diala Shamas, a senior staff attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights, one of the organisations working in defence of Unrwa USA.

“While organisations like Unrwa USA are doing really important work trying to direct maximum humanitarian support to Palestinians in Gaza at a time that they need it the most, they’re being distracted by having to defend against these lawsuits,” Shamas told Middle East Eye.

The lawsuit is not alone or unique in its accusations that a Palestinian charity is guilty of supporting terrorism.

Over the past two decades, there have been numerous lawsuits inside the US that have gone after Palestinian charities with such allegations.

“This lawsuit is a sort of small sliver of a much larger story. And that larger story is the use and abuse of US terrorism laws to suppress solidarity with Palestinians and Palestinian advocacy and political expression, as well as Palestinian humanitarian support,” Shamas said.

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generalluxun · 2 days

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So, at what point did you decide to ditch your initial pairings in Dog Daze?

Decide isn't quite the way it went down. It's more that it became increasingly clear Adrienette was misfiring. The post-Risk stress was getting to Ladybug, and her partner taking a more active role in heroing was both helpful and scary for her (a lack of control).

Adrienette actually had a date (Adrien:it's not a date, Sabrina:But it might be!) Alya set it up, the sneaky fox!

Marinette wanted to confess at the end of the movie. She was trying to, bit freezing up. Adrien wanted to comfort her, and used what he had recently learned from his time with Sabrina. He kissed her gently on the forehead. This has the opposite effect intended. Marinette panics and bolts. She's still got everything built up to be Very Important(TM) in her head and his intended gentle reassurance was instead seen as pushing too fast and doing things out of order.

So that didn't help.

When Adrien talks (he's confused) with Sabrina about what happened she figures out that it was probably a confession. Adrien... Doesn't know how to take this. On one hand he's floored, Marinette is amazing! On the other hand, he's worried loving him is causing her stress. *He has a very real example of love causing stress between Cat Noir and Ladybug*

Meanwhile Ladybug confesses... To Cat Noir. Marinette is building up her nerves by clearing the air. She reiterates that they can't *do* anything with their love, because of the masks, but hopes that being honest will help. It does! Ladynoir ends up in this nice place where they clearly love each other, even if it doesn't mean the usual things.

Adrien, not knowing Ladybug was going to do that, had reached out to Marinette to meet up and talk about what happened at the theater(and give her another chance to confess if that was what it really was, though he doesn't say that to her) They meet up on the way to school. She's putting on a brave face but clearly wired. He's trying to help. And finally she does confess! And it is sweet and heartfelt!

And in that moment, Adrien envisions the life Marinette wants, and it's set against everything going on. Monarch, his father, the trials of Ladynoir, all of it. He just can't subject her to that. He tells her she's wonderful, and if *he* were a different person with a different life it would be so easy to say yes. He tells her if life changes, then he'd consider himself lucky if she would date him, but also asks her not to wait. She's too special to be kept waiting in the wings.

Marinette- has a panic attack. She's put so much into this moment. not just her love life but as a sign that she's not a failure(after losing most of the miraculous) and that life is still 'in control'. It takes Adrien, Alya, and Sabrina's help to bring her back out. She ends up being shepherded by Alya while Adrien and Sabrina talk(he nearly had a panic attack in response to Marinette's) and there I think, passed the idea of adrienette working out.

There was just too much going on. It was a bad time, and they had very different needs. Adrien and Sabrina made their way slowly towards admitting they had actually already been dating for a while. It actually might not have happened but others kept poking their relationship and requiring definition.

I expected Marinette to end up with Lukanette. She contacted him soon after her failed confession. She was very open this time though about needing to blow off steam and feel lovable(despite the fact Adrien had said she was, you know how feelings are) They hung out a few times but Luka stayed resolutely in supportive friend territory by his own choice.

In the end (after Dog Daze, during a one shot) Marinette actually ends up with someone who lives life as frenetically as she does. They both spin out of control regularly, but they also both know what it is like to spin out of control and how to help each other through.

#ask #dog daze #my fic #adrien agreste #marinette dupain cheng #sabrina raincomprix #luka couffaine #chloe bourgeois

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graedari · 1 year

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"When you think about it, Clu was really just like a neglected Furby." -@junppga, 2023

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theoldkyokodied · 1 year

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Uploading all my Tomgreg art at once from the past few week before season 4 hits, who knows in what kind of mental state i'm gonna be once it does :')

#tomgreg #succession #dont even talk to me i started watching this show when i had nothing to do at work and now i watch it with averiel my good friend averiel #and we are going to watch s4 together and i feel physically ill from bein so excited #so ya thats what ive been up to... anyway. i love these idiots they desever nothing but the worst (affectionate)#im also a tomshiv lover btw. im the one who yells 'THIS IS HOW TOMSHIV CAN STILL WIN' while they are actively losing on screen #thats the kind of person i am #dont look at me (lying on the floor)#okay i was not going to say stuff in the tags and let the art speak for itself but i NEED to point out details in the wine Painting..#i put a lot of work into that one. thinly veiled metaphors and symbolism yknow..#greg is gripping the stem of the wine glass with his full fist. tom and greg are dressed in the same outfit (sock garters included)#greg look appalled but he is not doing anything about the spill. tom is fondly pouring greg more and more wine. he is doing him a favor #i colored the red wine the same way i would color blood :) oh and tom is not really touching greg #only holding the chair in place. greg is making himself look smaller than he is like usual #oh and @ the person who said that it's the inverse of the tom and nate scene i love the way you think. i did not think of that before #but god. yeah. i actually thought about the scene change from when roman uhh.. christens his office in s1. the one with the coffee machine #i always go insane at that cut. this is not exactly the same since it's more.. about emotions but yknow.. it can be.. the same...

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fighting-these-demons · 25 days

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Divorce Saga Domon - A Haunted Honk Prequel

Hello Internet Stranger looking up G Gundam on Tumblr dot com!

This is an idea for a fic set in an Alternate Universe involving Queer Non-Canon Relationships between the characters of the series.

If you are not looking for this content please scroll on.

If you ARE looking for this content - and you're ok with reading my and other's Headcanons for this Alternate Universe I've haphazardly spun up -

Then go ahead and feel free to:

Check The Tags Of This Post For The Pairings

and click the Read More below!

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Ended up outlining a completely different fic as a Segway for an explanation instead of making progress on the Royal Flush Haunted Honk AU's Clown Motel Fic like I wanted to but uh....

For y'all's review for the AU: A Prequel Outline - Divorce Saga Domon

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Hey real quick - I'm thinking of maybe changing the timeline to 2 years post canon as opposed to 3 years and change post canon.

The reason being: I had a thought that this scene could either be part if the fic or if it's getting to big then it could be a stand alone tie-in prequel fic as part of this AU but - like

Immediately Post Divorce Domon Needs Space and runs off. As one does. And he runs to Earth because he just wants to Get Lost for a while.

He has Argo smuggle him out to avoid detection.

Argo has Andrew help stow Domon in a storage hanger of a Neo Canadian supply ship that's returning to the US - they have trade often enough and share agricultural resources - which leads to Domon ending up in New York when he hits Earthside pavement.

He's privately worked on his English the last couple of months and after being dropped in New York with a different hairstyle, outfit, and accent he's unrecognizable.

He considers making his way west to get some solitude in the wilderness, but something about that initial plan feels off now that he's on the ground.

Chibodee is also Earthside for a special series of prize fights aimed at raising charitable appeal for the US in the eyes of Neo Americans.

Domon decides to hit up Chibodee for a fight on a day between matches hoping it'll clear his head and give him the clarity to decide on a course of action. What ends up happening is an unexpected heart to heart via blows and a breakdown.

Domon is happy for Rain and Kyoji, and he knows it's not true; but he feels like he lost a piece of himself when his relationship with Rain fell apart.

Domon's instinct is to run after that but Chibodee knows this city and Domon doesn't hide out for long before Chibodee drags him back to his place to stay and just "Chill out and breathe. You don't have to be anyone but yourself here. You can take as long as you need to find out what everything changing means for you." Friends and teammates stick together.

So Domon spends a few weeks with Chibodee sparring and hanging out in New York. Chibodee does a frankly awesome job at containing his feelings because he's focusing on Domons feelings and being a good friend first and foremost. Whatever he's feeling can wait until after Domon is done going though it.

There's a bit of a twinge in Domon's heart as he leaves that he can't really place.

After he returns to Neo Japan and gets settled back into life with his family, The Dreams start.

They're mainly set in New York. Small things first like noticing Chibodee's smile and his eyes. Then sparring sessions that begin to turn lurid.

He thought these kinds of dreams would stop after he was married.... he doesn't know what to do about this.

I just figure it gives more clarity and sense of time for the journey from Comphet Marriage Dissolution to Feelings to Confession. Idk.

But I got stuck on a bit and then had this thought and needed to get it down before I lost it and it was so long it made sense to make it its own post as opposed to several replies.

The Maize and Clown Motel will probably still be 3 years and change post canon for clarification.

@thedragonchilde @amplexadversary @youreaclownnow

#Domon Kasshu/Chibodee Crocket #Royal Flush #Chibodee Crocket/Domon Kasshu #Royal Flush Haunted Honk AU #mobile fighter g gundam #I imagine he hasn't had time for a Big Gay Crisis yet but the time is absolutely now #Kyoji absolutely helps him through this crisis because he had a normal environment and university to figure his own shit out.#Kyoji has to figure out WHY Domon is imploding and explosive and avoiding everyone a second time though.#This doesn't seem related to the Divorce but it doesn't seem immediately obvious either. 🤔#Cue Schwarz FINALLY getting a fucking break and immediately coming to stay with Rain and Kyoji at their place.#Domon was aware that they had been living together in Neo Japan briefly before Schwarz was called back to Neo Germany for questioning #Once his rank was stripped of him he was back with Kyoji for a short period before the Divorce as part of Kyoji and Dr. Kasshu's study of #DG Cells. Once they had a breakthrough - Schwarz was sent abroad with a small military group and Doctors Without Borders group to assist #With immediate infection cases on behalf of Neo Japan as part of reparations. So Domon hadn't seen him in quite some time.#Domon certainly wasn't expecting to see him in the garden when he rounded the corner of the Mikamura residence #Leaned over Kyoji who appears to have been working outside on his laptop. Fingers intertwined a hand on Kyojis jaw and locked in a kiss.#Which ends pretty much instantly as they sense Domon and break apart. It occurs to Kyoji and Schwarz that Kyoji never #Got the chance to actually tell Domon much about himself and the man he'd grown into while Domon was training in Hong Kong with Master Asia #This might be a pretty significant shock to him.#I can't decide between Domon running from his Gay Revelation or IMMEDIATELY Losing His Shit at the thought of Rain's SECOND marriage ending #And knowing for sure now the reason why his and Rain's marriage didn't work out. He really does prefer men.#Bu HOW DARE Kyoji do this to her!!! She's been through enough!!!! This will HURT her SO BADLY!!! (Projection of guiiillllttt)#Back to square 1 fir a moment like damn #And once he starts fighting Kyoji about it (Thank God the ressurection gave them the option to make Kyojis new build similar to Schwarz's)#It comes out that Rain cant go through this AGAIN and he won't let him do this to her! Her honor means something to Domon #And it should mean something to Kyoji too as HER HUSBAND #Kyoji and Schwarz catch on the Again bit and Kyoji makes it clear that Rain has known about his situation with Schwarz since they returned #That they're quite literally inseparable and that Rain married him knowing this. She's fully aware and an active participant.#Domon takes a leg sweep and doesn't quite make his recovery as Schwarz steps in #Pinning his arms and one leg in place so he can't run from Kyojis question. Kyoji grabs Domon's hair to turn his head and asks

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