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#an unfortunately as shitty as it is theres always going to be racists and theres always going to be racist comments because it benefits big
nightwatch-ithaqua · 3 months
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eh, not my preference, and i seriously doubt we share any servers anyways because.. well, we arent really in any because we dont like being social, and we certainly arent in any big official ones. one on one convo like dms or discord tend to not work very well for situations like this because, as i mentioned, socially awkward and from that point on itd fully be on the other person to keep anything going since we dont really like reaching out firsf to people we arent close with.
ill be honest, they kind of did scare me off a tiny bit lmao, i dont like being told to quiet myself down in any way even if its completely true and necessary haha .. but eh, ill try a bit harder nonetheless.
i thought of two new things, the ears on the hood and the mask. personally if you asked me whether the ears were real or not i honestly couldnt really tell you.. i could move and feel them like actual ears but when the hood comes off theres nothing there lol. my mask was also like that for some reason, by all means just .. a normal mask, but it worked more like my actual face when i wore it. eyes moved and blinked, could make expressions and open my mouth etc.. crazy (shrugs)
🪷
Yeah I mean. We have ADHD so we forget about people we aren't close with so fast it's not even funny anyway.
And like if you aren't comfortable then like, you aren't comfortable. That's okay.
As for my mask, the only thing that I moved were my eyes. In headspace me and the others can move the ears to express ourselves but we couldn't like.. actually in our own bodies. Sometimes we can emote with the mask in the headspace too but like again, not in our bodies. Something about life in the headspace has to be extra expressive for us because we don't have an inner voice to hear each other.
So a lot of our communication is via images or emotions or thoughts. Unfortunately this leads to a lot of us also accidentally invading each other's memories but we've worked on controlling that better.
Also I get you. We're always told we talk too much. Marshmallow is.. he's always so stressed coming out from doing headspace stuff he fronts alone on purpose or with some of our more mute or semi verbal alters so he can have company but also sit in silence.
Dyslexia does make it harder to read for sure but I'm just excited to get an ask.
I have less suspicions about you now though so I'll tell you about the emoji and why I held off saying anything.
That emoji you sign off with has been the same emoji sitting in our discord status for quite some time.
I held off on telling you because awhile back a group of bullies tried to accuse us of being racist and supporting slavery despite no proof (what worried us was that people seemed to believe them anyway). All because we used Pluralkit on discord and they didn't like that. Yeah our attitude got a bit hostile and we became extremely on edge and our abusers kept trying to make themselves sound innocent like we shouldn't just assume they were being mean. And I doubted myself really bad, I kept wondering if we were just digging this hole but we also remember that it literally started with them attacking us.
There was even one instance where they tried to bait an alter of ours into flirting with a minor. It failed of course, not only because they were a minor and part of this group, but even if they were an adult we don't like our alters being sexualized and we most certainly aren't interested in our attackers, attacker's supporters or some random strangers we don't even know.
So I was wary that somehow you using this emoji meant that you were one of them. Not to mention you being a minor. Needless to say I'm still on edge since you're not opening up about your discord but those ARE your boundaries. And frankly we insist on always respecting boundaries.
Being a system is shitty and us being so open about it does unfortunately put a target on our back. But we look at it a few different ways. One, we show other potential systems whether or not this is a safe space to engage so they can decide from there. But two, most importantly for our sakes, we can find out who our real friends will be.
It's less exhausting than masking and coming forward about it and then all the "I don't understand why can't you be one person" "who was fronting the most" "okay so who's [username]" etc. or even them secretly starting to make fun of us behind our backs. Though that can happen either way.
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ninetwelves · 7 months
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my mom is bit unsocialized when it comes to some world problems and DEF when it comes to pop culture (the social problems has it pros and cons and all pros to the pop culture stuff) and she unfortunately encountered some strong black conservative viewpoints from a coworker of hers (i say black specific bc shes doing the whole “white people are trying ti make black people gay just pure out of touch bs” which im not fully equipped to go THATTT deep into that topics and only something i can understand just surface level upon being edgucated on it but to explain it theres right wing views in every community and its jusr really sad and hypocritical when minorities are right wingers bc they really do themselves disservices and leave out ppl who intersect in idenity from their acrivism and anyone who leaves out any minority group isnt left wing and minorities who are right wing just range from derranged and selfish if intentional and self aware, to out of touch if not
bc she was venting about this problematic worker at her workplace she has (shes on sick leave and im helping her out bc she physically cant keep up w her life rn) and i was hnnggg god im so sorry u have to listen to that
and i use problematic in a correct way here bc shes really shitty to the patients they help ugh :/
ALSO EXTRA IMPORTANT POINT
theres no need to dive that deep into like black community discourse if ur not black so many nonblack ppl and esp white ppl go so overboard and misunderstand it bc of their lack of experience and really poison the in community discourse by being racist jdbjdndnd just up this is a specific incident my unsocialized mom had to witness and was very confused about and thankfully ppl edgcuated me on it n talked to me about it but in so many cases theres no need to dive deep into it
like for example as a white person saying “BLACK PEOPLE!!!! STOP BEING HOMOPHOBIC!!!!!!!!!” ur genuinely gonna mess up the discourse bc in this world singling out black ppl to be the sole oppressors w out context n shit towards queer people is just cknfkd dangerous as fuck its so fucking dangerous it gives white conservarives an excuse to demonize black people, it makes black conservatives go OH LOOK BEING GAY IS RACIST THE GAYS R RACIST (which white gays this proves part of the big racism problem, u still are white before ur gay in this white supremecist world we live in its context we live in a white supremecist racist anti black world that is the context) but that feeds into some homophobic black conersertive points that HURT QUEER BLACK PEOPLE!!!!!!!!! u are not the sole victim of the within black community discourse, actually ur likely just not the victim at all!!! esp when u do this shit online for these movements to fucking black it’s irresponsible and stupid at best and racist at worst or maybe its all of the above always idk ive seen this happen hear from one white queer person to other white queer people stop fucking doing this its creating so many problems u think ur “fixing”
also similar to why slurs get reclaimed who says it…truely can make a fucking difference that pov is so important idk why yall just…cant think sometimes….
and this goes towards any white person w some minority status but its absolutely huge w white queer people like god….
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on the topic of alastair apologizing... let's talk about the Academy. idk, here's my two cents.
EDIT: thank you to @alastairxcarstairs for pointing out that Alastair's hair was natural at the academy, not bleached. I have made a few edits in red! I don't think it changes the idea of my post too much, but it does raise some complications as something that we know has affected alastair deeply (vs a comment about his father & clive which were things he was already feeling and whose traumas to not lie in a comment made) and I think honestly might be one of the only ways for a reconciliation between the two of them, to recognize that they both used shitty ways that the world works against them to hurt each other deeply, and that wasn't right. (also can the two queer "icons" learn to not be racist please & thank)
this got... ridiculously long. I'm sorry. feel free to disagree with anything I've said, it's just my conclusions from what I've read an my own experiences. theres a lot of discussion of bullying, death, and alcoholism.
alastair really didn't say much to or about kit and thomas (except the rumor, which I'll get to in a second) at all. he called thomas names, but it wasn't something that ever really bothered thomas and I think that's probably because alastair never said them with malicious intent.
he said a lot of shit to and about james and his family, none of which james deserved. that's something he needs to atone for.
most of his bullying (except the rumor) with matthew was reciprocated. they both talked shit to and about each other. it doesn't cancel each other out in a way that means it never happened, but its not really something anyone has to atone for imo, just more of a "we both treated each other like shit and that was stupid, let's move on from it and not do it anymore."
the vetis demon... it was a prank. a cruel, scary, idiotic prank. it wasn't alastair's idea, but he went along with it and he helped. obviously it was something very distressing to james and matthew, but they're both fine. I'm not saying alastair should get a pass for it, but clive literally died. they were 14/15 and as someone who lost a classmate at that age, there's a weird sort of guilt about it, even when you had nothing to do with their death. alastair learned the consequences of his actions the hardest way possible, and I don't think people recognize that enough. we don't know much about clive at all. he acted like an asshole, sure, and he was definitely naive and arrogant (a vetis demon???) but we don't know how he treated alastair. was he kind to him behind closed doors? was he always cruel? did he bully alastair? we don't know. regardless, I'm positive that alastair has a lot of complicated feelings about it, and a fuck ton of guilt. because HE can be a better person. HE can apologize and move forward and travel the world and fall in love and get his heart broken and do all of the things that people do after they finish school, and clive never will. alastair learned his lesson, and james and matthew can be reasonably certain that he'd never try anything like that ever again. while he could certainly still apologize for it, I think thats something they can assume at this point without him saying it.
the second one was deliberate, matthew knew that alastair had already told him it was Clive's idea, but he WANTED to get until alastair's skin. he WANTED to make alastair hurt more. he was a child (they both were), and he was upset, and he wanted to make alastair hurt. and he did. alastair snapped.
and, finally, the rumor. the first thing to recognize is that alastair was in a bad place when he said that. he said that because he was in a bad place. all of those^ complicated feelings had just started (clive had literally just died) and to make matters worse, everyone's fathers had rushed to the Academy in wake of the incident except for Elias (thomas pointed this out). then matthew showed up. he started out by calling alastair names, fine, typical. then he said "Has no kind soul thought to inform you that your hairstyle is, to use the gentlest words available to me, ill-advised?..." strike one "...A friend? Your papa?" strike two. then he said "Though I cannot help but wonder whose idea their nasty little trick was" even though Alastair had already explained that it was Clive's idea and why, strike three.
the first one was just racist. maybe he didn't mean it to be, but we know that alastair was self conscious about his hair because of how dark his features are and how alienated he feels as a non-white boy.
the second one was an unfortunate coincidence imo. matthew had no idea what alastair was going through at home or that he was particularly upset about Elias that day because he'd been forced to watch all of the other boys with their fathers.
in matthew's eyes, what he said there SHOULD have been just another throwaway insult, but he was blinded by his privilege as a white boy with loving parents, and anyone who knows alastair's situation can see that it anything other than just a throwaway comment.
I'm explaining all of this not to excuse what alastair did but show how the rumor scene was atypical from his usual bullying. we haven't SEEN enough on paper to make that observation, but we can infer from all of this that that was not how alastair normally behaved. that was how alastair behaved when he was pushed over the edge, that's it.
while he said awful things about Thomas and his parents and Matthew's parents, he was never trying to hurt them, it likely didn't even cross his mind. he didn't start that rumor, and I doubt he even ever actually spread it. there's no evidence that he would be someone to spread rumors like that (something very speculative and secretive, vs something obvious and well-known like what he said about tessa), especially given the rumors around his own family. he only repeated it to matthew because he was pushed out of his limits. it's most likely that he heard the rumor, ignored it, and the ONLY time he has ever spoken it was to matthew that day.
he said it to hurt matthew. that was his only goal. that was his only motivation. he wanted to make matthew HURT. and he did. he really, really did. I think he could see it as soon as he said it. CC has said that he regretted what he said as soon as he said it. he hurt matthew in ways that can never be undone, and I think he knew that as soon as he said it because he has been hurt that way, too.
so, no, I don't think alastair actually owes thomas or sophie or gideon or charlotte or henry an apology for what he said beyond "I caused this person you love very much irreparable harm" because while he said awful things about them, he never did anything to actually hurt them (beyond hurt matthew).
to say that alastair owes matthew an apology... feels a little cheap to me. I don't think alastair will ever genuinely apologize to matthew solely because he doesn't think that what he's done could ever be forgiven. even if he were to become a fucking saint, even if he became the nicest, kindest, most giving man on earth, there is nothing he can say or do that can undo the pain he's caused.
what happened to charlotte and her baby is NOT alastair's fault, nor is matthew's alcoholism (because we could play the blame game all day then - because if it weren't for Elias would alastair have been pushed past his limits? is it his fault? if his alcoholism is because of his brother's death, was all of this just Yanluo's fault in actuality? but that was all in revenge for Wen Yu exterminating a nest of demons, so maybe it's her fault, then? it would never end, and that's not even TOUCHING mother hawthorn's involvement). matthew MUST be responsible for his own actions and choices.
but alastair caused a harm to matthew's psyche that can NEVER be erased. he will carry until the day he dies. alastair may have not intended to hurt him in such a profound was, but he did, and he knows it. he crossed a line that cannot be uncrossed.
this doesn't mean that alastair can't be redeemed or that he can't be a good brother-in-law to james and a good partner to thomas or a good person in general or even that him and matthew can't move past it and learn to tolerate each other. but in his eyes and matthew's, forgiveness is too weak of a concept for what he has done, and I doubt he will even ask for it.
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dromexa · 3 years
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so i started a fight with one of the racist people i work with today
long story short, there are some romani travellers in the area who were using the building car park for whatever reason about a week ago. they were asked to leave and then today they have apparently broken into the car park (i’m not sure how exactly one breaks into an open air car park but, yknow, thats another debate) and the site manager sent an email to everyone who is based from that building (despite there being less than 100 of the normal 400 people who are actually still working there and not from home, no idea why they sent it to everyone tbh) telling us that they had broken in, the police had been called, etc etc.
so, because a majority of my (very small) department are working from home, we all communicate via a team chat since we can’t actually yknow, see each other anymore. at this point its late in the day, about 5.30 and theres only 5 of us online at this point which includes 2 managers and this one woman (we’ll call her [tiff] since she’s always in one)
for context on this vile woman, when i first started working there, just over 3 years ago, i was deep in the throes of depression. i actually didn’t even get diagnosed until about a month or two after i’d started there even though i’d been seeing a doctor about it for about 6 months (which is a whole other thing). and this woman bullied me incessantly. she constantly made remarks about me, and even on occasion my family, to me and others, made complaints about me for completely unnecessary reasons, a whole plethora of stuff that i honestly cannot be bothered to get into. she made me cry many times, both at work and when i had gone home. when i finally got on medication and started having monthly meetings with my manager i told her about [tiff] bullying me, and she got straight on that shit and it has tapered off since then. of course she still makes the occasional remark or insult, but i don’t take notice of her anymore as i’ve gained bounds more confidence in myself and my ability to do my job. every remark that she makes against me is unwarranted, always an over the top reaction to something i have said. i have never instigated an argument with her. her dislike of me is extremely clear to me and everyone else on the team. it is not a point of contention; in fact it is a hotly discussed topic amongst us whenever she decides to throw any barbs my way. and this is just the shit she does to me. i am not the only person in the team she acts like this towards. it is not an uncommon occurrance. to put it simply, this woman is a bully.
and so, after receiving the email about how the romani travellers from last week have broken into the car park at work, [tiff] puts in the chat “I see the t*nkers are back at it again.”
now, i have been ill for about three days (hopefully its not the Rona but i doubt it since i never go outside anyway) but since i’m working from home i’ve been suffering through it cause my job isn’t actually too hard at the moment. i am exhausted, cranky, upset that i haven’t been able to really eat anything for the last three days and completely  done with the day emotionally, mentally, and physically, and particularly with this woman.
so, i replied.
“no need to be racist [tiff].”
as soon as i sent the message, i felt the storm brewing. i know that racist people do not like to be called racist, because of ignorance of ‘propriety; or whatever the fuck it is, they don’t like it even though its true. i know that [tiff] has an explosive temper, so i’m just waiting for the shit storm she is no doubt furiously typing as fast as she can. and then i get the message
“shut your mouth, its short for itinerant which is an IRISH word”
now, at the time, i admit, i had no idea what that word meant. i had to swiftly google it. it means traveling from place to place, which i guess is an apt description of the romani people as this is something that they do indeed do. however, that isn’t the word she said. in fact, ANY WORD that isn’t ‘roma/romani’ or ‘traveller’ is considered offensive to them (and honestly i’m not so sure on if traveller is considered as offensive to them). so what she said was still racist, and all i can really gather from her response is that she’s trying to use her own culture of being an irish descendent to defend her racism? which makes... no fucking sense? you can’t justify discrimination against a certain group or culture by saying ‘oh its okay, i’m allowed to discriminate against another group/culture because I’M from a discrimanted group/culture’. in regards to the word itself, i’d say its similar to calling someone of japanese descent a j*p. yes, it technically is short for a real word. however, the shortened version of it IS A FUCKING SLUR. It doesn’t matter if the slur itself came from a ‘proper’ word, its STILL A FUCKING SLUR. IT IS OFFENSIVE. IT IS NOT OKAY. and for the icing on the racist cake, she told me to shut my mouth on a GROUP WORK CHAT. talk about the absolute peak of professional work courtesy. such a wonderful human being, really.
so, me being the chill person that i am, did not type all of this into the group work chat because i am not going to argue all of this with a racist on a group work chat. i was tired, i felt like shit, and its a waste of my time anyway. this woman never thinks anything she has done is wrong. her excuse to my manager for bullying me was that i must ‘not get her sense of humour’. there is no reasoning with her, there is no reason in arguing with her.
therefore, my only response was “...it’s still derogatory though.”
which i thought was quite to the point. like i said, i’m confident enough in myself to stand up to her now. i’m not going to let herattempts to defend her pathetic actions deter me from telling her that she is being fucking racist.
unfortunately i never got a reply as one of the managers stepped in (figuratively) and said ‘this is not the place to have this chat ladies’ (don’t think badly of her, she really is a good manager and was the biggest help to me when i was in the deepest of my depression, and has actually been supporting me since i had a small relapse in december). i assume it was because of our long storied history of butting heads, especially in the chat, that she put a stop to it before it could escalate.
now, i know i started this whole rant saying ‘i started a fight’ and there were only three sentences said total. but, like i said, this woman is a bully. i don’t expect this to be over. i know in her twisted little head she’s going to do everything she can to make my life at work difficult. and since her daughter works with us in the same team too (who is honestly just as bad), i imagine she’ll be doing the same thing too in ‘solidarity’. thankfully, i am, and have always been, very careful when speaking with her to be professional (in my own way, after all) so that she has absolutely NOTHING to throw back at me. so that, in moments like these, all she does is impale herself on her own shitty personality. my current estimate for how long this particular grudge for calling her out on her shit in front of the entire team (who might not have been there, but will definitely see it when they log in tomorrow morning) is at about a year.
and i’m certainly looking forward to it.
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izzyliker · 4 years
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i think like.... some of this ‘fanfic isnt above criticism’ discourse fundamentally is built on some weird ideas and understandings of criticism, creative freedom, and variance in ppl reading the exact same thing. 
like: just because you dont like a specific thing about someones writing doesnt mean its objectively, concretely wrong, bad, or inappropriate. nobodys going to kill you or jail you or whatever for leaving a mean or unnecessarily blunt comment on someones fic, but it is kind of sad/funny to see people talk shit about writers for ‘not taking criticism’ as if their opinion is objective truth and not just.....their opinion.
like: i have had people tell me my writing is too abstract, or it doesnt make any sense, or that i use too many metaphors or whatever. thats their opinion! i have also had people say that me writing the way i do is dreamy/mesmerizing/whatever nice, sweet things they had to say about it. as a hobbyist writer and someone who ENJOYS writing that way i am not going to change it because someone didnt like it, and people being mad about that is... kind of funny to me? just dont read my fic then! i write six line long sentences and use five em dashes in a single paragraph because i like doing it. if you dont like reading that you dont have to read it!
there’s... of course room for gently calling people out for writing in -phobic and -ist stuff while obviously having no idea that it was -ist or -phobic (eg. having characters misgender a trans character and not warning in the tags, or referring to a trans character as their deadname and using the wrong pronouns until they transition [’x was a girl blah blah she liked blah blah then she suddenly realized shes a boy wow anyway now im getting to the actual story after misgendering my character for no reason. them being trans never comes up again’], or writing deeply bigoted stuff or otherwise inserting unfortunate tropes in writing) and im not going to say that it’s ~bullying~ someone to let someone know that it seems like their writing reflects their own, genuine bigoted beliefs or misconceptions, and a lot of time people will be mortified and thankful to hear that (and when they aren’t theyre usually either openly bigoted, or theyve had other people tell them otherwise and chosen to believe those people instead, which you can feel however you want about).
like: ive left a strongly worded comment on a fic before because it turned out to be completely untagged for the rape depicted in it (as in: no archive warnings apply - not even chose not to warn), and featured a twoc ‘’’’’’having sex with’’’’’’’ a trans guy, where the author was a white cis person who did not see anything wrong with the lack of tagging OR the damaging tropes used with zero self awareness. i dont think you can NEVER say ‘im trans/gay/bi/ace/a person of color/a person of this ethnicity and you don’t seem to be - did anyone beta read this, because you have depicted the character with my marginalized trait in a very stereotypical way, and idk if thats on purpose or not’ or anything similar. sometimes people who are racist or homophobic or biphobic or transphobic also write fic. sometimes a fic makes your spider senses tingle because of the way something bad is depicted in it. 
but like and especially re darkfic - 
when people say ‘you need to take criticism when people say your fic glorifies bad relationships’ i think... what people fail to take into account is that although sometimes people do in fact write narratives where they do not even realize theyre writing a shitty relationship (this is often made obvious by a complete lack of tagging or a flippant attitude about the actions of the characters rather than anything that happens in the work itself) sometimes when you read a fic and think ‘this obviously says that this relationship is good! and that you should read this and think the relationship is good!’ it’s not actually an objective, true criticism that the author needs to... idk...rectify? reflection is always good for yknow becoming a better writer and looking at possible issues re: how you see relationships or certain people or whatever (this isnt just writers or artists btw, this is also you as the reader or the consumer or the person, existing in the world), but sometimes it’s just a fic that either was triggering for you, or that didn’t fill the specific narrative need you had.
again: i have written unhealthy relationships. i like writing codependence, and relationships with bad boundaries, and relationships where people are in denial about how their relationship makes them feel. i have, ON THE SAME FICS, had people say they thought it was validating; or cathartic; or respectful; or realistic and kind and compassionate portrayal of those relationship AND other people say they were uncomfortable; that they thought the narrative not using the word abuse meant it wasnt meant to be abuse (despite the ‘unhealthy relationships’ tag); that they thought it was disrespectful to write two characters they liked in an unhealthy relationship. and theyre all allowed to have those opinions! sometimes someone’s writing just doesn’t spark joy. but just because you didn’t like a fic doesn’t mean the writer has failed. when a fic writer has multiple people say ‘i liked this; this felt real; it felt compassionate and respectful and i will come back and read it again’ and one person say ‘i think this is bad’ i don’t think its... evil of the writer to say ‘yknow, im sorry you didn’t like this fic, you might want to read x fic where the story has a happier ending instead,’ and not change or delete or otherwise do anything to that fic.
i dont know guys like... again, just because you didn't like something doesnt mean theres something intrinsically wrong with it. and a loooooot of posts here conflate ‘this person wrote a fic that uncritically used a bunch of tropes the author did not tag for and thus was not even aware of having used and i have left a comment saying that the implications of that are kinda fucked’ with ‘this person wrote a fic about an abusive relationship/sexual assault/whatever and it wasn’t written the way i want those topics to be written about, and i have left them a comment saying that they need to kill themselves for it.’ 
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thiamfresh · 6 years
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4, 9, 12, 14, 21, 24, 28, 30 -love rux
4. What villian do you believe is most worthy for a redemption ark?
If we’re talking about ones who’ve had it and i thought deserved it then ZUKO.
If we’re talking those who have yet to have one and i think they should.
Billy Hargrove. And stick with me here because I know he’s a piece of shit but I have a reason for this.
Okay so, Billy he’s really a kid. He’s what 16-17 should he know better than to be a piece of shit? yes. Does he? clearly fucking not but really, not that many people do at that age. 
Young people do shitty things, and i’m not saying it’s okay, or that his abusive bullshit is in anyway normal, but also…I get it. Hurting someone else can feel good when you’re hurting and it’s easy to let your pain overshadow everyone elses and think making yourself feel better takes president to being a decent fucking human being. (it doesn’t, dont be a dick)
Now i’m going to go of kinda fannon here so bare with me. Neil Hargrove is abusive, he used homophobic slurs against his son and is widly suspected of being a racist piece of shit and currently, Billy is his mini me and we shouldn’t like him, he doesn’t deserve to be liked, getting abused doesn’t cancel out the shitty things he does and the (not so subtle)  undertones of racism his character shows.
So why redeem this piece of shit?
Because. Stranger things is an extremely fucking popular show set in a time that, unfortunately, isn’t so different to the current climate of the world. Everything is going to shit, racism and homophobia are prevalent. It’s a show that not only draws the eyes of adults but kids. It’s a show that is setting examples for the youth of today with these characters who match their ages and are open about their emotions.
Kids will be watching it and seeing themselves as ou beautifully nerdy little heros.
And i bet you also have kids watching it who see themselves in Billy. You’ll have those kids who (again we’re going into the fanon of possibilities of season 3 and a Billy redemption) will look at Billy agreeing with his fathers disgusting world views, or at the very least not arguing against them. 
Now, you could have that end two ways. Number one, you could have Billy not question his dad, continue down the path of piece of shit and no doubt end up dying a gruesome death or getting his arse kicked by our heros again and returning home to get the same treatment from Neil.
Or, You could show the story of a kid  following his fathers views for the majority of his childhood turning around and learning and accepting. You could have a character that shows kids in situations similar to his that their is a way through all the anger and pain. that there is friendship to be had if they’re willing to open themselves up enough to see that we’re all the same and that everyone deserves to be treated with respect.
and it’s 6am so this is coming out nowhere near as coherent as i want to explain it. but i just think, characters like Billy, they don’t get redemption arks because they don’t ‘deserve’ them. They’re old enough to know i’s wrong, they’ve done this in the pst and blah blah blah and yeah, it’s true. but, fuck, i don’t care if you’re 17 or 57. Things like Racism and homophobia are learned. It’s ignorance. And to show a story about someone overcoming their ignorance and putting their crap aside for long enough to learn is important. 
A story of someone like Billy being brave enough to tell his father to fuck off and learn tolerance and acceptance is something we need. IT’s a story that may well resonate better with young kids in conservative households listening to their parents using slurs and spreading hate. It’s a story that says it doesn’t matter how you were brought up, you are in control of your own life, you make your choices and you can choose whether to be a piece of shit or a decent human being.
And it teaches those all ready open minded people that someones past, although it does hold weight, it doesn’t define them. That saying and doing shitty things doesnt mean you can never change, just because someone has said or done something ignorant and wrong in the past doesn’t mean they can never learn to be accepting.
In conclusion, is he worthy? No. Should he get it anyway..yeah, honestly, id be up for showing that you can out grow ignorance and that theres a way out of the ideals your family istilled in you other than like death or epic humiliation like most shows do to these types of characters.
9. What were you almost named as a baby?
My Mum really wanted to name me Tyranny. Like..yeah…wow. She says it sounds pretty, me and my brother will forever shame her for it. But my brother was almost called Xaiver only saved because my mum ‘couldn’t pronounce it’ so honestly, I think I had the better end of the almost name stick.
12. Favourite smell
My best friends clothes. I don’t know what he uses but fucking hell it smells so good. He sent me an old top of his last year and i slept with it over my ace or like a week because his clothes always just smell so fucking good. The smell hasn’t changed since we were 12 either. It’s ust iuhgihirh so good. Like spicy pine or something idk, whatever it is it has my soul.
14. How many friends do you have that don’t live in the same country as you?
Close close friends i’d say like 5. Then i have another like 15 that i love and want to meet but we don’t talk quite as much as those like main 5.
21. How many people have you thought “Glad I don’t have to interact with them ever again” about?
Like 348 (my school class minus my best friend). No but seriously, i don’t think i’ve every really thought that? There are loads of people i’m so very glad i won’t have to interact with for long periods of time, but I still wanna keep them facebook friends so if i ever become succesful and pretty i can dangle it in their faces.
oh actually, when i was a kid i had this babysitter who’d padlock me and my brother into the room we were in and i was super happy when i realised i’d never see her again.
24. Whats the strangest website you have bookmarked?
I don’t have many weird things bookmarked tbh?? I have ‘a history of children’’ and 3 taps in a row of 100+ plastic test tubes on ebay but they’re all pretty normal, just fanfic and publishing agencies i’ve submitted too.
28. What is the coolest name that you would never name a real human child?
Duude, i’m up for calling my child Sirius Nagini, so like…i don’t really have many limits.
30.How do you feel about snails?
I fucking love snails. They’re so chill, they’re just wandering around, doing their own thing, eating and lounging in the rain. I once found a snail on my bed and i adopted that little uck or like eight hours, he just sat on my hand while i typed, moved around tracing lil slime circles on my hand. Loved tht little fucked, i was heartbroken when i had to take him outside. Found him a nice patch of leaves to chill on though. Whenever i step on a snail accidentally because it’s dark and i’’m not looking and i hear that crunch a bit of my soul gets chipped away. I’ve cried more than once because I stepped on a snail.
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the-space-case · 6 years
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Hi! First of all I love your art and I love you
Hello and Thank You!!!! I’m not sure if you’re talking about a fan comic or an original, or long or short but I’ll give you some tips. GRANTED I am not a professional and you may find a different way that is easier for you.
1.) Think of a basic storyline or prompt. Like, “Man is dying and is going to a mountain to see it before he dies and meets his DESTINY???” it can be stupid. It can be silly or vague so long as you have something to start with.
2.) Think of the protagonist, as well as a bit of the timeframe or universe. Are they human? Alien? Medieval? Elf? For our example here lets say its a medieval man from a heavily forested area. He is a lumberjack who hates potatoes and his old man told him stories of the mountain in the west that holds a magic temple; only the pure of heart may enter. He is dying, and wants to see this mythical place before he passes. Draw a few examples. You’ll want some basic refs to look back on.
3.)Think of the antagonist. It can be nature, machine, man, elderich horrors, etc....(typical story tropes are something like man vs. machine or man vs. nature). For our case lets say its mainly man and nature. Bandits, bad weather, illness, etc...DRAW SOME OF THOSE REFS. These beginning ones don’t have to be in depth. just basic stuff.
4.)Hash out what you want to happen in the BEGINNING, MIDDLE and END. These are kind of the most important parts. Its definitely important to think of the end ahead of time instead of thinking about it when you’re halfway through; thats a quick way to never end it at all. Our lumberjack begins his journey selling all he owns and getting a horse to set out to the mountains with nothing but a bit of gold, an old axe and a sick ride.  In the middle he encounters various trials that test his “pure of heart”-ness. Probably three, they can be as long as you want so long as they are generally even alongside each other. (3 or 7 are magic numbers WINK). In the end he reaches the temple and is welcomed inside due to his good deeds and it was allllll along a metaphor for the journey to the afterlife.
5.)get some good references. You have a time period set, a scene in mind, and some tools. Gathering from our example, we’re going to want; various forest scenes of pines, plains, dirt roads, medieval towns, mountains, temples, animals, people, cultures, etc. We need refs for our horse, axe, and gold. Remember those quick refs of characters you made in steps one and two? Now is the time to finalize those. They’ll have developed with the level of detail in your story. Add background nonsense no one else will notice but will enliven the story like how our axeman always ties his beard when mad or how he prefers apple cider over beer anyday. Give those fuckers some names. Bandit Bill challenges Axeman Abel for his horse and loses his head (literallly???)
--if you can go to like, museums or lectures or fairs about these things and take notes. USE YOUR RESOURCES!! ASK QUESTIONS!!! (For ilulatte I visited a couple of coffeeshops and roughed out some cafe drawings haha)
7.) Separate events into chapters. Generally theres a prologue, chapters 1-whatever, the end, and an epilogue. Our axeman has a prologue of starting out on the road, chapters 1-3 depicting pure-heart-trials, climax/end of reaching the temple, and an epilogue of someone else starting their journey to the temple based on his influence on the world because this shit is cyclical, baby. 
6.) make a fuckton of thumbnail drafts. You know these characters now; you built em out of your own head. You know how they move and talk, so slap down their journey in tiny pages. add minor details to the sides. (Here’s a shitty example of mine from ilulatte!!!!!)
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7.) finish allllll of them. or at least the first few chapters. Its good for you I promise. You’ll notice the pacing much better this way! You can add a bunch of extra details in the margins like extra panels and bg notes. Don’t be afraid to experiment with the direction of your story, but try to keep the overall plot the same! (sticky notes are great for this!)
8.) start roughing out the actual pages. You’ll change things from the thumbnails (like I always do haha); thats okay!!! They’re more of a helpful guide than solid stone rules.  It’s like making the scaffolding to make the base for the rest of the building.
9.) do the lineart, bgs, text, etc. There’s tons of helpful art programs for this like CLIP studio paint or medibang if you’re doing it digitally. Remember those refs you collected for our horse, axe, and bgs? Now is the time to use em. BE VIGILANT. Keep copies of the originals. Go back frequently to look for mistakes or missing details. Keep a check list. Freckles? check. Scar on nose? check. shading???? UHHHHHH----SHIT.
10.)you should probably number the pages. keep em in a nice sized resolution if you want to print but lower it if you’re posting to the internet to dissuade reposters. keep em all in one organized folder if possible. Slap your signature on em for extra safety.
11.) ????? Sell it on gumroad idk.
GENERAL TIPS:
-start with short stories. Build your own stamina.
-have relatable characters with flaws. Tumblr seems to hate “problematic” characters but thats literally the point of character building and narratives. THEY’RE RELATABLE IF THEY’RE FLAWED. If a story doesn’t have characters that conflict with each other its a boring one. Axeman Abel wants to help everyone; Bandit Bill wants to help himself only. LET THEM HATE EACH OTHER.
-its also good to have characters that are friends but still conflict with each other. The Dragon Age series is phenomenal with this (their characters are good in general, take notes!!)
-theres a lot of shitty people out there. USE THEM. (seriously though examine other peoples interactions and you’ll make better characters. )
-bad things happen to good people. Bad things also happen to bad people. Bad things just sort of happen. Don’t shy away from unfortunate events; your story will fall flat without conflict both planned and random.
-Obviously you don’t have to share the same world views as your characters. (dont let the antis fool you.) Axeman Abel can hate broccoli but you can still enjoy it. Bandit Bill can be a racist piece of shit but that doesn’t mean you are.
-have characters of various personality, body type, race, height, etc….it really livens up the story.
-generally you don’t want the bg to overwhelm the characters, so most people do a sort of painterly bg against the solid outlines of the characters but thats all really up to you and how in-depth you want it to be.
-you should also make a regular schedule, if you can. Say, something like “twenty finished pages a month” or “four pages a week” depending on the level of detail. Simplistic style and palettes of course take less time to make than full color/heavily detailed pages, so plan accordingly to prevent burnout. If you post weekly, having a few pages done ahead of time will be good in case you need an emergency break.
-be open to critique but don’t be a doormat, either. ESPECIALLY if you’re doing it for free. People will try to take advantage of you; don’t let them. Block them and move on.
-above all; BE DEDICATED. Comics take a great deal of time by yourself, but doing them helps you develop important skills in the end like time management and general technical know-how like digital programs and writing. It’s not just art, though that’s a major part of it.
-probably should’ve said this earlier but make what you enjoy??? People can generally tell if you dont enjoy your own work. There’s less effort there. 
THIS WAS REALLY LONG SO I HOPE IT WAS HELPFUL IN SOME WAY ILU HAVE FUN BE SAFE OUT THERE
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