#(obvs don't do it if your mental health can't take it but like. understand that that means you might be missing context)

[goldenpinof]

Not that this is like, a hot new take or anything, but I can imagine that they both might be going through a bit of a crisis. Like their careers have finally died down but like, what do they do. They haven't done much else but be YouTube personalities (which is more than just YouTube, obv) for like, nearly 15 years. They are probably afraid to venture into new territory, because at this point that will likely mean risking either their brand or their bank accounts (like how Dan had to risk money to do the tour / offer to put up his own money for Dinok). Not that that's a good excuse, but I can understand being afraid and Phil just trying to hang on to his usual content for the both of them (as he also figures out work/life balance). Dan only did DD for the tour and it definitely felt kinda forced. Just doing their old stuff but with their older/out-of-closet selves isn't going to be successful in a way it's safe, for now.

As someone with a lot of the same kind of mental health struggles Dan has, I imagine he might be beyond burnt out and doesn't really want the attention anymore because of the work it requires. And even though it's like, okay it's been months since the tour okay what's next... idk what we'll really get out of him for a while (maybe a few years even?) besides random contract work like the channel 4 thing. Like, projection time, but I just got through grad school with extreme ADHD/executive dysfunction/procrastination etc, and was so burnt out by the end idk how I did it. And I'm like, oh well it's been about 6 months I should probably have a job in my field by now (which I'm probably insane for thinking that anyways because the job market is in so wild). But like, I've been kinda burnt out since 2016 (when I was 16 and a junior in high school, at the end of my og dnp phase) and all I can muster the mental energy to do now is the same part-time / retail work I've been doing the past few years. Which like, I'm barely getting by and I do ultimately feel disappointed that I'm not trying harder to put my fancy new degree to work because I'm barely applying for anything. But I just can't get myself together enough to do that right now. I imagine Dan might be going through something similar, like, he could be doing something creative but he probably is just tired and wants to just live life without any expectations and go on vacations and rely on Phil to be the content creator. He's probably aware that it's not ideal. But he also seems done with compromising any creative vision either because he doesn't want to do sponsorships or anything that isn't a deeply personal piece of art. And he probably doesn't have many deep ideas now that WAD is done and Dinok is stalled and there isn't much he seems to want to do commentary on (because if he just sucked it up he would actually be a pretty good commentary YouTuber lol).

I think they also have a lot more stuff to work through mental health wise too before they are ever really able to not be cryptic about their relationship, since when ex-phannies or random people who remember them see their tiktoks or whatever it's what they all ask about. Like to some degree I don't know if they ever wanted to be out and famous but it got to the point where they couldn't keep denying it either. I'm so glad they came out because it's clearly so much healthier, but beyond the trauma of being closeted that they had to overcome they probably now have trauma from years and years of people being weird towards them about their relationship and it's like... now they have get through that in order to take the next step. do they really want to go through all that just to help open themselves up to a new era of content? Idk.

(this turned out to be wayyy longer than I anticipated woops. can't even remember if some of this was in response to what was on your blog or some of the other similar conversations I've seen about this today but yeah).

i'm almost crying. i hate us so much. this is exactly why the phandom needs meet ups irl or "bubbles" where we could have conversations. because trying to answer THAT without forgetting something is hard, and also i can't imagine how hard it is to write these mini-essays and get bullshit in response.

i appreciate it a lot. and i basically agree with your message. i see how it can be true. and i know that in case of burnout, Dan can let himself step back. the problem i have with him disappearing and coming back after 2018 is that he thinks that the audience will wait for him and accept everything he puts out with the same passion, participation, and amount of money as when he and Phil were making content without long pauses. but book sales, merch sales, tour ticket sales, views and god knows what else that we can't see show that we aren't willing to wait. and it started in 2019 i guess, so you would think that by 2022 Dan would understand what went wrong and just book smaller venues (or make a smaller stage for it to not be a problem). i'm using wad just as an example. you said Dan could not want attention anymore. but he repeatedly says that he loves attention. and it's not only words, you can see it irl. ofc after tours there is a period of time to rest. but before that, there was a clusterfuck of something that was barely content while the merch releases were consistent. either because it was pre-made or because Dan was still living in a rose-colored world thinking that we would buy stuff without content. i'm not sure what i'm arguing here anymore riuehdfsidxkl apologies, i guess it's related to Dan wanting to fuck off. and he CAN. i don't care, 2019 taught me a lesson. (doesn't mean i can't bitch about it <3)

anyway. i understand your struggles with work and degree. basically, i was in the same position after graduating, and now it's even more difficult but i get it. choosing to work part-time, in retail and similar "easy" jobs because you can't deal with the weight of expectations that come with a degree, that's... yeah. an adult reality that no one told us about. i wish you the best, and i hope everything works out well. whatever you decide to do, remember you don't have to use your degree if you don't want to or just don't feel like you can at this moment. you know, getting a fancy "serious" job is such a commitment, bruhh. and you can always walk out of retail :)

Dan would be a brilliant commentary youtuber, you're right! he just knows how to talk and make people listen.

their brand is already fucked, nothing to save here. i mean, Dan and Phil brand doesn't exist. Dan's youtube brand is all over the place. AmazingPhil is the only consistent thing. and yes, it feels like Phil is terrified of shifting in any direction. we're stuck with 2016 content, it's like a real-life time machine on youtube. and if it works for him, fine. i'm just sad that there is no "trying new things" anymore and that he can't even get old successful things back.

i'm not commenting on their relationship because it would be too long. fuck tiktok though. i think dnp jumped to this "new popular" platform with no actual regular content to present as a distraction and that bit them in the ass.

#i'm so sorry #this is a disaster #answered #phandom #wad #??

[fairycosmos]

aw bab re: anon msg about england being a shitshow, it wasn't a complaint about ur posting at alllllll 😭😭 of course you can complain on your blog!! omg im sorry that wasn't clear 😭 was just sharing how im privately wishing you the best whenever you're being espec chatty about how depressed you are, and then after finding out the other day thay you live in england, realizing "christ that's bare morbs, i'd still be suicidal if i lived there too." 💀 like you can't be sincere or openly feel like shit in england, it's always ironic or it's seen as repulsive.... and then yes exactly like you said, the tory overlords compound the problem by keeping everyone destitute and miserable. so dw, weren't being down on you, just extending my sympathy for how much harder it is to survive in england. nowhere trying harder to kill the english than england! 🔪🔪 honestly, it's a miracle you've survived this long. anyway you don't have to reply to this public obvs, just a little clarification and reassurance for you personally 💕. love u bab take care xx

OMG honestly it was my bad i think i misread the tone or something but i just wanted to make sure i don't bother you and that i'd understand if i did!! honestly your message was such a relief to read like i feel like ppl do not understand how grim it can be to live in the north of england lmfao. its been on its last legs since thatcher with grey weather n grey people and fuck all saving it. no wonder we've got a drug and alcohol problem bc ppl only express themselves genuinely when they're shitfaced 😭 obligatory second disclaimer that i know im extremely privileged to be born in england and it is by far not the worst country in the world to live in. but i can't exactly say my mental health is thriving on this tiny dumb little island with tory cunts dragging us all further and further into hell with each passing year lmfao. thank you v much angel 💘 you feel like such a mate. also im just now reading the part where you said i don't have to reply to this but ykw let me show you some love in return mwah mwah adore you and pls take care of yourself!! Xx

#anon

[gynoidgearhead]

I feel old.

At the risk of confirming that I have finally shriveled up into a moldy crouton who represents an impediment to progress: It’s absolutely freaking me out to realize I’m going to have to navigate a version of the LGBTQIA community and discourse where there are people involved who are young enough to have completely missed a lot of the things that inform my positions about transgender issues. (Context here if you want it.)

I privately rolled my eyes at Natalie Wynn (of ContraPoints) for saying on Twitter that she sympathized more with “old school transsexuals” than trans women younger than herself, because she felt excluded when people were explicitly asking for pronouns instead of attempting to gender her correctly without asking. That was, I thought, ridiculous - gendering somebody correctly at a glance is a minefield, especially once you start to factor in nonbinary people; and accommodating people who couldn’t fit under that paradigm was, I thought (and still think), worth giving up a little hit of personal gender euphoria and vanity-stroking.

But... fuck. She’s only five years older than me. I am older now than I was when I started this blog by a wider margin. I’m a whole-ass decade older than some of the people dipping their feet into The Discourse on this site.

And today, I finally learned what Wynn meant on a more visceral and complete level, and I’ve felt it. I have stared into the void, and the void has stared back.

And I hate myself for it, because I know that it means I am now a Problem.

There are trans kids alive today whose first exposure to the idea of transgender people wasn’t through crass jokes. This is a good thing.

There are trans kids alive today who didn’t have to watch (or hear about) trans women getting dragged out onto Jerry Springer, to be publicly humiliated and sometimes even embroiled into physical fights. This is a good thing.

There are trans kids alive today who grew up with a more holistic and inclusive version of the internet, who have had access to information about transgender-related topics without having to go to dodgy websites. This is a good thing.

There are trans kids today for whom positive transgender role models have been present on television since they were pre-teens. This is a good thing.

There are trans kids alive today who had immediately supportive parents and who even may have begun transition before puberty. This is a good thing!

I am none of those things. That makes me sad, but I never thought of any of those things as alienating me from younger people. Today I finally found the one that I think does, and I don’t know how to deal:

There are trans kids alive today who have had access to online trans communities since they were old enough to go on the internet, and have thus been subjected to the griping of older trans women and transfem people about the ways public opinion and the media used to vilify trans women and transfem people specifically (before trans men were even on the media’s radar, really), but who missed the entire cultural backdrop from which that griping was born in the first place. This is... I don’t know, just a thing that has happened.

On one hand, the trauma that older trans people have had to live through is absolutely real. Past events are absolutely real, and there are things that younger people can and should learn from history. I know my understanding of queer culture has been deeply enriched by learning about the history of the movement. If I have things to say about my lived experiences, why shouldn’t I?

On the other... how long are communities really obligated to support backwards compatibility? At what point are older queer people like me just making our trauma into the next generation’s problem? I can’t even begin to count the number of times I thought to myself about an older queer person, “please just move on and accept that things are different now, that this is the cost of progress”. I thought that about people as young as Natalie Wynn. I’ve thought that about a lot of people I’ve run into on this site. Was I wrong to think that about them, or are younger people right to think that about me?

This post brought to you by the word “transandrophobia”.

I initially rolled my eyes at hearing that coinage: “‘Transmisogyny’ exists to describe the intersection of misogyny and transphobia,” I thought to myself. “The term ‘transandrophobia’ posits the idea of misandry as a dominant cultural force,” I thought to myself. (”They even missed the opportunity to just call it ‘transmisandry’,” I thought to myself.)

“‘Transmisogyny’ exists because trans women and transfem people have unique problems to deal with, and those problems just aren’t applicable to trans men and transmasc people and don’t even really have counterparts,” I thought to myself, not accounting for the possibility that the situation could have changed, that those problems that were breathtakingly obvious to me might mostly be footnotes today (I’m still not convinced that that’s the case, but I at least owed it to other people to stop and consider the possibility), and that new problems might have developed that need to be talked about, which means sometimes new language is needed.

So I learned something today. I’m not sure if I like what it says about me, and it makes me feel closer than ever to irrelevance and the dustbin of history, but I have to suck that up and deal with it like the adult that I am. I owe humility to future generations. I’ll be damned if I turn into the old coot who spends too much time scolding people who are mercifully young enough not to have felt the same wounds I did, let alone to the point of inflicting them myself.

#do i qualify as a trans elder or something yet #i'm gonna go with ''no and this is pretentious as hell and i probably just like to hear myself speak'' #(also look i am *not* looking for a fight over any of this) #(if your takeaway from this is ''that old person has a Problematic Old Person Opinion! discourse time!'' then you probably missed the point) #(which is ''of fucking course i do. things looked different in my formative years than in yours. please understand that'') #(''and maybe learn something about The Way Things Were while you're at it. i'm grateful if you missed that shit.'') #(obvs don't do it if your mental health can't take it but like. understand that that means you might be missing context) #also i'm pretty sure this counts as vagueblogging. but that's mostly because this is me trying to work stuff out on my own #dropping all this baggage on some random person who has never met me would be 3000% irresponsible and unfair #/ #// #/// #//// #///// #transmisogyny #transphobia #trans stuff #transgender #trans community #lgbtqia intra community stuff #lgbtqia community #horizontal hostility #lateral hostility #aging #getting old #queer history #queer community #trans history #lgbtqia history #contrapoints

[curetapwater]

A very spoilery content warning for School-Live/Gakko Gurashi, but that I wanna talk about because as someone who's sensitive to that kinda stuff it was very distressing and was the first time I laid awake until the sun rose. Again, massive spoiler warning. But if you have some things in fiction that you're really sensitive to then maybe take a look if you're considering watching the show.

If you're sensitive to animal death, puppies in particular, then you may either wanna emotionally prepare yourself or sit this one out. Your call. Like I said, it was very distressing. The scene where the dog dies was the first time in like a decade that I had actual tears rolling down my face over a work of fiction. The death didn't feel exploitative or out of nowhere. It tied into the themes of the show and was written tastefully and didn't come out of left field. I ultimately think the show is excellent, especially in its handling of the subject of mental health and trauma, and I don't regret watching it but I'm also not sure I could watch it again just because the stuff towards the end with the dog was extremely upsetting. Specifically, over the course of the last handful of episodes the dog gets bitten by a zombie, starts getting infected, they find an antidote that briefly turns him back before he passes peacefully in one of the character's arms because it was only designed for human use. It doesn't sound too bad on paper but for me it was gut-wrenching the way they executed it.

A few other things, though it's been over a year so I very likely missed some stuff:

It's a zombie show so obv death and violence are a big part, although the zombies are hardly ever on screen, and when they are they aren't very detailed. Because the show is less about the zombies and more about the situation they have caused, the visuals aren't very graphic, but dark stuff like injuries and character deaths do happen. Also mass death of most of the population is heavily implied, as is the case with the post-apocalyptic genre.

Violence in a school setting specifically

One of the main characters has developed a delusion that the apocalypse never happened to cope with the trauma she's experienced. The other characters are kind and accommodating to her, although I'm not sure they handled it perfectly but they're also teens so it's understandable at least in-universe. Anyway, there are scenes that go back and forth between what the world really looks like and the world that she sees it as. I don't have any condition that leads to delusions, so I can't speak on how well this character was handled. But I just want to make clear that the show deals heavily with unclear perceptions of reality in case that's a distressing subject for you.

Broadly, the show explores the characters' trauma from the situation quite a bit, the above being the most prominent example. There are strong themes of recovery, accepting the person you've become, and moving on, especially in the last episode.

Like I said, it's been a while and I don't intend to rewatch for my own sake, but I thought it'd be helpful to at least try to inform anyone who may want to know. I went in fully aware it was a zombie apocalypse show with psychological themes and it still messed me up for hours after I finished the last episode.

#anime #anime recommendation