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waffles-for-brunch · 3 years

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This project began as an indirect response to a few negative tweets in the days following the Valentine's Day Destiel wedding. During such time that “certain sources” chose to speak against the impromptu "wedding" and state that the direction of the show never included sexuality or romance. Since this argument has sparked a bit of discourse as to the validity of Dean Winchester and Castiel's relationship and sexualities, I began this edit as an exploration of observations throughout the entire 15 season run of the series. (That's not to say that Sam does not also have his own impactful romances throughout the show -he does have several notable ones- but in his case they are never debated upon or erased.)

There are three complete edits linked below. The differences are explained in their descriptions. (I also recommend downloading for best quality rather than simply watching in the browser, but it’s your choice)

BiDeanEdit: (Click here to download)

Runtime: 18:04:44

File Size: 10.0 GB (10,741,415,805 bytes)

Series long compilation edit (in sequence) of Dean Winchester and Castiel’s relationships and intended expressions of their sexualities (ie interest in both genders). This edit focuses on their relationship as it develops with one another, their other notable relationships (DeanxBenny, CasxMeg, DeanxLisa, etc), and the framework around their sexualities with small scenes of expression (ie Dean in ‘Playthings’ or ‘Everybody Hates Hitler’, or early seasons Dean & his transgressions with women, or Cas in ‘Caged Heat’)

BiDeanMLMEdit: (Click here to download)

Runtime: 14:40:57

File Size: 8.05 GB (8,649,798,685 bytes)

Series long compilation edit (in sequence) of Dean Winchester and Castiel’s relationships and intended expressions of their sexualities. This one is the same as the last but with only MLM content (Otherwise referred to as ‘only the gay parts’). We focus on this more repressed side of their sexuality and see these clues laid out altogether in one fluid edit (these examples are also available in the previous edit, however are just not aligned beside any heterosexual content). DeanxCrowley, DeanxBenny, DeanxLee, DeanxCas, etc.

DestielOnlyEdit: (Click here to download)

Runtime: 13:08:49

File Size: 7.17 GB (7,709,560,696 bytes)

Series long compilation edit (in sequence) of only Destiel related content. The same as the above edit, just simplified even more to only focus on Dean and Cas’ relationship over the years.

Keep reading below to find my full analysis of the complete edit regarding these guys sexualities, relationships, and the parallels we can draw.

To understand why it is that so many queer fans of Supernatural and other similar shows read queerness in characters and their relationships, we should look at the hays code established in 1930. At this time this certain code was established to monitor what was allowed to be depicted outright on film. Within the margins of what was to be stifled, was homosexuality. As such, filmmakers had to plant “queer-coded” seeds into the writing and subtext so that queer audiences watching could interpret these characters and relationships in this manner without the words and actions stating so outright. (At this time homosexuality could be depicted on film as long as said gay character was either a villain, caricature, or met an untimely end- feeding into the blossoming of the kill-your-gays trope. But that’s another topic for a later time.)

As film changed over the years and times became more accepting of lgbt characters portrayals on screen outside of simple coding, this did not make the code obsolete. Queer-coding and queer-baiting are often used in media in present day as a way to pull in viewership. Networks are able to garner the best of both worlds, in a sense. They can draw in heterosexual audiences that may not want to watch queer media, whilst also drawing in queer audiences by coding some characters and relationships just enough to pull those viewers in. This works simply because there is such a lack of queer representation in most media that we’ll take what we can get.

This is where Supernatural comes in. There is a reason that Supernatural and thus “Destiel” is known by some as “The Great American Queerbait.” This twelve years long gay slow-burn between one overly masculine character and his awkward angel best friend did not begin with the intention of romance or baiting, as many of these things generally don’t. However, once fans realized the chemistry between these two particular actors and characters, it became something blatantly written into the show. Sometimes jokingly, other times as legitimate moments of emotional intimacy between two characters. So to say that the show’s direction never included sexuality or romance is, to put it bluntly, bullshit. Just because something is not written in clear and concise wording right in your face, does not mean that it is nonexistent and that the writers did not know what they were writing into the show. (Not even to mention the actual love confession in 15x18, but I digress).

We know very well that queer content has been written subtextually into media for the better part of seventy years. It is a language in media just as much as lighting is a language, just as much as certain camera angles, color design in costumes or set decor, and music design are languages. All of these, outside of the simple words said on screen, make up our media and these characters and our shows. Tv is a world of color, not black and white.

[[ further readings on the above topics: X X X X X ]]

I decided upon this full edit encompassing both the female and male aspects of Dean Winchester and Castiel’s relationships & sexualities because oftentimes when we’re looking into potentially queer characters we tend to focus on the same sex attraction and neglect the opposite sex attraction. Both are very important to acknowledge and compare, if at the very least to view where they may overcompensate, where toxic masculinity may come into play, compulsory heterosexuality, trauma responses, etc. Sometimes what a character doesn’t do is just as important to interpret as what they do do.

For instance, Dean Winchester. If we are to operate under the assumption that he is bisexual, any repression we witness throughout the series as to his male attraction is likely to be a result of his difficult upbringing, similar to most queer identifying people with childhood trauma. His father is a marine, the picture of manliness in which Dean himself blatantly embodies in an effort to impress and make his father proud in any way he can. Dean is already unlikely to seek out activities in any aspect of life of which might make John look at him in a different light (ie, in an every day setting, even simply watching Finding Dory- this is not something S1 Dean would have admitted to liking, but we see Dean in later seasons standing up for himself and his appreciation for it).

Is it perhaps for this reason that we see Dean as an overly blatant and flirty ladies man in season 1 when John is still alive, while this side of him steadily declines as the series continues? It even becomes established in season 3- in light of Dean’s fears surrounding going to Hell, he enters an attitude for coping that Sam recognizes- hypermasculinity, promiscuity, deflection. Heightening the idea that this caricature of himself that he embodies is a mask that he wears in order to cope with something else. He is donning the image he assumes others think he should fit into. Sam calls him out on this through the years, and eventually this becomes something we see in him less and less as he feels more comfortable simply being himself.

If we take into account the time of which this first season is filmed, this is 2005, a time where gay jokes were still funny and an overcompensating character was a joke attached to it. We see Dean built up in these first couple of seasons through this lens of jokes about a hyper-masculine character being mistaken for gay, however instead of this building up the masculinity to encourage a raging heterosexual characterization, this overcompensation is exactly what inadvertently sows the seeds of queer-coding. To queer watchers this reads as a deeply repressed character with childhood trauma who overcompensates when faced with observations of gayness and uses hypermasculinity to counteract these accusations.

It is through circumstances such as “Bugs” in S1 or “Playthings” in S2 that we first see these ‘jokes.’ The brothers are mistaken as a gay couple. Dean being the more “masculine’ of the two characters has a blatant reaction to these situations (Overcompensating), and Sam’s lack of a reaction is what solidifies his own straightness all the more. Neither brother is homophobic (this becomes established as time goes on) so why would either have a problem with this mistake? Sam wouldn’t care because he’s clearly not gay- in fact, he usually just laughs it off. Dean would care because he wonders what about him looks gay? Do other people see it too? Do they know? What’s wrong with him?

We also see another blatant example of this type of freakout in season 8. “Everybody Hates Hitler.”

(Images: “Playthings” S2xE11)

(Image below: S8 “Everybody Hates Hilter”)

We frame these situations in early seasons around girl of the week scenarios and brief bar flirtations. Have to make it clear that our manly straight character looks as manly and straight as possible. Dean is also in his 20s, he’s more carefree/not as traumatized yet, and he is a sexual man so he does sleep around quite a bit. What is notable, however, is how much this drops off in later seasons. As time goes on Dean seeks out less and less the fleeting encounters of one night stands, in favor of genuine connections- even if he himself frequently doubts his own ability to ever have a settle-down type of relationship or life. Lisa is the only long-term female romantic relationship Dean ever has throughout the series run, and this tentatively begins in season 5 and ends in season 6.

Dean and Lisa’s relationship is founded more in a dream of something that Dean wants to be rather than who he actually is. Although he loves her, their bond is made through trauma and their relationship overall is reminiscent of a soldier who returned home from war with heavy PTSD and begins to burden the family that he will come to realize he doesn’t quite fit within anymore.

Outside of this, his closest relationships from thereon out are between Benny, and Castiel.

Let’s start with Benny. Throughout season 8 Benny is framed as an ex and his relationship with Dean directly parallels Sam and Amelia’s. Both brothers must confront their relationships with their ‘significant others’ and decide whether to cut them off or proceed. Both brothers found these people under circumstances in which they did not get along with them at first but were pushed together. Another person comes in the middle of their relationship (Amelia’s husband for Sam, or Cas/Sam for Benny). The brothers each resent the other’s significant other or the circumstances surrounding the relationship. Sam hates Benny because he is a vampire and Sam does not understand why Dean continually trusts him (which is a circumstance inherently queer-coded in itself for comparability to an unaccepting family). Dean does not care for Amelia simply for the fact that Sam chose her over looking for him in purgatory.

Other instances we see parallels between Sam’s romances and Dean’s:

“Sex and Violence” S4 siren: Nick(Siren)/Dean parallel to Sam/Dr Lady

Season 4: Ruby/Sam and Cas/Dean teamup parallels

S1 Dean pulling Sam from the fire away from Jess vs S12 Sam pulling Dean away from Cas who may die approaching Lucifer to fight

Season 8: Dean/Benny vs Sam/Amelia. Dean and Benny, since they’re essentially going through a breakup, are directly paralleled to Sam and Amelia and their breakup. See “Larp and the Real Girl” for Charlie and Dean’s conversation about Sam’s recent breakup and Charlie picking up on the fact that Dean might also be going through one.

1x05 vs 8x07: Sam seeing Jessica on the sidewalk as they drive down the street vs Dean seeing Cas on the side of the road as he drives down the street

S11: Perhaps this one can be interpreted loosely and not necessarily romantic (esp on Sam’s end), but “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” both brothers are drawn to forces they actively fight against being drawn to. SamxLucifer and DeanxAmara.

S11: “Beyond the Mat” not a relationship but with crushes/infatuations. Dean with Gunner Lawless and Sam with Rio.

S15: Cas telling Dean that “We Are” real. vs Eileen being unsure what’s real and Sam kissing her and saying “I know that was real.”

S15: “The Trap” Dean loses all hope following the death of their friends and primarily Cas. Sam loses hope after Eileen’s death. Directly paralleled in the episode. (We also see Sam lose Eileen in 15x18, where Dean also loses Cas)

Additional parallels between Dean/Cas with anyone else:

Season 9/10: Cain/Colette vs Dean/Cas. “She only asked for one thing. To stop.” vs Cas asking Dean to “Stop”. Both circumstances referring to the Mark of Cain.

S12 “Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets” Lily (human)/Isham (angel) vs Dean (human)/ Cas (angel)

Led Zeppelin: This music means something within John/Mary’s relationship, which Dean directly acknowledges in 12x01 with Mary. We find out Dean has gifted Cas a mixtape of his “Top 13 Zepp Traxx” in 12x19. (the implications of Dean having made a mixtape for Cas, being its own point in a different discussion)

When Lucifer contacts a person to try and get them to open up to him, he uses their dead lover as a ploy. SamxJess, NickxSarah, VincexJen, DeanxCas - 15x19 when Lucifer calls Dean using Cas’ voice.

The parallels of unreciprocated love/infatuation. DeanxCrowley and CasxHannah. Dean likes Crowley but clearly not the way that Crowley likes Dean. Cas likes Hannah like a friend or sister, but she keeps putting the moves on him for awhile and he appears deeply uncomfortable and has to shoot her down more than once.

Parallels between Dean’s own relationships:

Dean in “Let it Bleed” torturing demons to find the location of Lisa and Ben vs Dean in Purgatory torturing monsters to find the location of Cas “The angel”

“The Rapture” opens in Dean’s dream which Cas visits and says he’s in trouble and gives Dean an address to go to immediately. “The Song Remains The Same” opens in Dean’s dream which Anna visits and says she’s in trouble and gives Dean an address to go to immediately.

S6 Dean dodging calls from Lisa vs S12 Dean dodging Cas at the beginning of “Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets” (notable also how Sam treats both circumstances the same)

S11: “Into the Mystic” 11x11 Mildred tells Dean the key to living a long and happy life is to follow your heart. Later in the season “All in the Family” 11x21 When Casifer is still captured by Amara, she puts her hand to Cas’ heart and is able to connect with Dean to contact him. Hinting at the link between Cas and Dean’s “hearts.”

Not necessarily a parallel but an observation. 7x01 when Cas is loaded up on God juice, and Dean has given up but Sam hasn’t and wants to talk to ‘the guy’, Dean says, “He’s not a guy, he’s God.” But in 11x18 Dean refuses to give up on Cas and let him continue to be possessed. Sam keeps speaking about Cas like he’s just a vessel and Dean says, “It? It’s not an it, Sam. It’s Cas.” Mostly this shows the development of their relationship and Dean’s willingness to continue to fight for him.

Dean’s dream world with Pamela in S14, she says to Dean “How come you only want what you can’t have?” and in S15 during Cas’ confession scene he says to Dean, “The one thing I want, is something I know I can’t have.”

Before we delve into Dean and Castiel specifically, let’s explore a few more things regarding Dean.

Let’s start with Cassie. This is Dean’s first romantic relationship we see on the show, and is arguably his first love. What is notable about her is her characterization and Dean in relation to her. We haven’t seen him in a relationship before, and thus this is the baseline to which we can draw how he is in this type of vulnerable state.

We see here that he is drawn to strong individuals. Cassie is a very strong willed character and can hold her own. She has a boldness about her. Dean appreciates that. We see similar in his next framed love interest: Jo Harvelle. Jo is another strong character, and though Dean sees her more as someone he needs to protect because she doesn’t have as much experience under her belt, he respects her intellect and strong will all the same. They connect through a love for hunting and mutual daddy issues. Personally, this is a relationship I view more as a little sister dynamic in a similar vein to Dean and Charlie, however this pairing is still worth noting because as it was written it was intended to potentially flourish into a romantic relationship. This did not pan out, though the seeds are still there.

Next up is Anna. Again daddy issues are a solid connection these two hold, and while this relationship is more of a one-night-stand than anything else, there are still important points to be taken from this encounter. The first is just how much Dean cares. We don’t see very many sex scenes with Dean throughout the series, but of the ones we do see, it is apparent that he is a gentle and tender man. He cares. About even a single night with a woman. (Cassie, Anna, Lydia ’The Slice Girls”) This is a contrast to Dean’s general persona of the masculine straight promiscuous lady’s man. He has all the bravado of a man who ‘loves em and leaves em’, but in reality that is not who he is. This is another example of the faces Dean wears in front of certain people (and what he thinks they expect of him), and the person he is once he lets that mask fall.

It may be important to note as well that Anna, (it is rumored) was originally meant to be more to Dean than this simple one night stand and connection. She was intended to become a romantic interest but, as it turned out, Dean and Cas had more chemistry so the arc that Anna was meant to follow was instead given to Castiel.

It is another year until the apocalypse comes along, Sam dies, and Dean falls back into Lisa’s lap. While Lisa is another strong-willed woman who rolls with the punches, her lifestyle deviates from Dean’s usual romantic interests simply because of her offering of a normal life outside of everything he’s usually known. A life with her is dipping his toe into a life he could have had if he didn’t hold the weight of the world on his shoulders and hunt the things that go bump in the night.

This is Dean’s last “official” relationship of the series. After putting Lisa and Ben in danger by being someone that he cares about, Dean accepts that he’s simply not a guy that can have a normal life or a normal family. He cares about people and they get hurt. This is a weight he holds on his shoulders for the remainder of the show. He loves someone, or more accurately, they love him, and they’ll get hurt. End of story. It doesn’t help that immediately following this, Castiel “dies” too.

Maybe it’s Lisa, maybe it’s Cas. Maybe it’s a combination of the two at this point in time, but Dean is never again the same when it comes to relationships after these events at the end of season 6. He becomes more cautious, tries to keep people an arm’s length away, and we even begin to see less and less promiscuity and flirting with miscellaneous women from this point on.

Let’s talk about Castiel.

Although Dean has had various queer-coded moments throughout the beginning of the series and up to Castiel’s entrance in season 4, his minimal relationships up to this point have all been with women. Simply exploring the evolution of this relationship from Dean’s side of the picture, Dean doesn’t start to truly warm up to Castiel until perhaps the end of season 4. He begins the season unsure of the angel, perhaps even a bit afraid of him, before the two garner a sort of mutual respect as Dean begins to see that there’s more to him than simply an agent of heaven.

They’re friends in season 5. The quirky, strange angel that doesn’t understand social cues, stands too close, stares too much, and says things like “we’re making it up as we go” and “tonight you’re my little bitch.” He’s a far cry from the ethereal entity that showed up in Bobby’s kitchen just a year ago and threatened to toss Dean back into Hell. What really turns the curve, however, is “The End.”

5 years in the future in the midst of an apocalyptic war, Cas is still around. He’s human and he’s stuck by Dean’s side through it all, even though this Dean is just a shadow of his former self. Then again, so is this Cas. But still, they stuck together. Dean isn’t used to that. He has very few people that have stuck by him for this many years. Could probably count them all on one hand at this point. Bobby and Sam at the top of the list. Everyone else either dies or leaves. And in this future, Bobby and Sam are dead, but Cas is still there.

Dean has abandonment issues. His mother died when he was four, his dad was in and out emotionally and physically his entire upbringing, Sam left for Stanford the first chance he got. He’s got strings of dead friends and lost relationships surely in tow for years at this point, and half the time Dean has become accustomed to pushing people away before they have a chance to push him away first. (Ie Cassie, Lisa, often even Sam too at times). Cas won’t make these issues any better during their run together, but up to this point Cas hasn’t let him down. The simple fact that in this one future universe Cas had stuck by him, I’m sure that makes a big difference to Dean and actually may be imperative for their relationship going forward and the trust that forms between them.

Something that becomes a large part of their relationship is Cas and Dean’s ability to have conversations with just their eyes. This is a shorthand that Dean is known to have with Sam on occasion, especially during times of combat. It takes a certain amount of intimacy and knowledge of the other person to be able to have a shorthand like this. The first instance we see this between them is quite possibly “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester,” when Dean convinces Cas that they can save the town. We see it again in the ‘beautiful room’ when Cas slams Dean up against the wall and Dean seems to understand what’s happening. Another instance, “The Song Remains the Same.” In a way, it’s a locking of eyes that just seems to say “trust me,” and they do.

Sam wonders if Anna may be right. If killing him and scattering the pieces will stop this whole Lucifer vessel business. Sam asks Cas, Cas looks to Dean, they share a look, and Cas shuts Sam down. In all likelihood that plan could have worked, but Cas wouldn’t do that Dean. He wouldn’t do it to Sam either but at this point he’ll do anything at all for Dean.

If we take a moment to consider Dean and Cas’ relationship here, it is unlike any of Dean’s previous ones. Dean never has this same kind of shorthand with any of his other relationships, save for possibly Benny to a certain extent. Cas is an odd guy, and Dean frequently describes him as such, but he finds it endearing (if “Free to be You and Me” is any indication this early in their relationship). The previous women in his life all had the same thing in common, that they’re strong willed, brave, and don’t put up with Dean’s shit when he’s being a shit. Cas does fit all this criteria, but he’s also someone that Dean has a hard time reading. Cas is so literal sometimes that Dean can’t tell what’s literal, what’s deadpan, and what’s just Cas’ personality as an angel. But at the end of the day, simply put, he likes him and he trusts him. Getting Dean Winchester’s full trust as quickly as Cas gets it is an anomaly all on its own.

Dean’s female relationships are fairly surface level. They’re easy and fairly uncomplicated. Boy likes girl, girl likes boy. Girl gets mad at boy, relationship ends. Easy. Expected. His relationship with Cas isn’t easy. But the big endgame relationships seldom are. There’s blood, loss of trust, rebuilding, and there’s a pull that at the end of the day always brings them back to one another no matter how incredibly messy things get.

And boy do things get messy. If we touch back into the end of season 6 where things end with Lisa and blow up with Cas, Dean is at an all time low in the relationship department.

Dean takes Cas’ betrayal hard. Breakups are one thing. Leaving Lisa was expected. It was bound to happen eventually. Dean always knew that somewhere inside. He mourns leaving them, but knows it’s for the best. But with Cas’ betrayal at working with Crowley, he’s devastated all over again.

Dean never expects his relationships to last forever, but again there’s a choice few people in his life he lets take up space on the list of those who might stick around. Bobby, Sam, Cas. I don’t think Lisa was ever on this list, as much as Dean wishes he could tell himself she and Ben were. But they weren’t. That relationship was a ticking time bomb. And when they nearly die because of his life and the creatures surrounding him every day, that’s the end of it.

Fast forward, season 7 is a time of mourning. He’s lost Lisa and Ben, he gets Cas back for all of 30 minutes before losing him all over again and never being able to repair that relationship. But he keeps the trenchcoat. Fishes it out of the lake, bundles it up, and keeps it in the back of every single car that he and Sam drive that year.

Dean doesn’t keep mementos. Not of Cassie, not of Jo, Not of Anna, or even Lisa and Ben. No pictures, no items, just memories. You know what he does keep? He keeps his dad’s leather jacket, Bobby’s flask, pictures of he and Sam and his mom. Is keeping the trenchcoat in the back of the car for a year similar to those familial keepsakes? Maybe. But it’s also more than that. It’s covered in blood and lake water, and I’m sure Dean would explain it away that Cas was family and that’s why he kept the coat. Probably even believes that too.

Then we have purgatory.

Dean prays to Cas every night. He could get out of that place just on his own, but he stays there for months in full combat just to look for the angel and get him out with him.

“First we find the angel”

“Cas, we’re gettin’ out of here. We’re going home.”

“Cas, buddy, I need you.”

“Let me bottom line it for you. I’m not leaving here without you. Understand?”

“Cas, we’re gonna shove your ass back through the eye of that needle if it kills all three of us.”

“It’s gonna work. Nobody gets left behind.”

When we meet Benny, Dean’s only other primary male pairing of consequence, he is not trusted. This team-up is one of strategy and a mutual goal only- at least at first. Dean and Benny fight well side by side, but the trust only runs so far. That is, until during one particular fight with leviathans in which Cas nearly bites it, Benny saves the angel’s life. This is the main turning point for Dean’s entire trust in Benny from here on out.

“Benny has never let me down.” Dean says later to Sam. And he never did. He saved Cas, got Dean out of purgatory, and then later on he gets himself sent back to purgatory just so he can help Dean’s brother get out of there.

Dean and Benny’s relationship was “pure” in purgatory. They didn’t have to worry as much about the fact that Benny was a vampire and Dean was a hunter, they were just brothers in arms who earned one another’s trust, respect and love. There’s no way you let a man kill you and send you to purgatory to save his brother if you don’t love him.

Their relationship once they broke out of purgatory is where things began to sour, not because of anything either of them did to the other, but more the space they let grow. Regular Earth was different from purgatory and these men had to go back to their roles and say sayonara. “What happened in purgatory stayed in purgatory” and all that. Benny was a vampire and Dean was a hunter. That kind of thing mattered here despite the fact that they did care for one another.

Dean and Benny’s tumultuous relationship in relation to the people in Dean’s life could be reminiscent of a queer experience in itself. A lack of acceptance from Sam, Bobby, Martin- Dean’s family. Not because of who Benny was, but what he was. Pair this with the already established fact that Amelia and Sam were a direct parallel to Dean and Benny, Season 8 has been one of the most blatantly queer-coded seasons as of yet.

Which brings us to “Goodbye Stranger.” It is established early on this season that Dean feels that there’s something wrong with Cas, something off about him. The fact that they don’t know how he popped out of purgatory is just one part of it. It’s in the way he acts, how spacey he is, the fact that he doesn’t answer Dean’s prayers. “I always come when you call.” Cas once said. And he did. Until now.

This is another aspect of their relationship which is simply there and not spoken about much- similar to their staring and eye communication thing they do. Dean started their relationship unable to read all of Cas’ quirks very well and unsure of the guy. Now, he’s fluent in the language of Cas. He knows by tone of voice, by shiftiness, by his expressions- when something is up. Maybe he started paying more attention after the whole Rafael situation until he could read Cas like the back of his hand, or maybe he just started paying attention just to pay attention.

He’s known something is wrong for months while Cas has been under Naomi’s control. Just the same as years later, he knows something is up when Lucifer is taking a ride in Cas’ body. And he knows in 12x15 just by the way Cas speaks on the phone that something is off with him.

They come upon the angel tablet in the crypt, and Dean does fight back when Cas starts in on him, but he spends even more energy trying to get Cas to come back to him and fight whatever force has him under control. He never once stopped to think that this was just Cas. “This isn’t you! Fight this!” Dean would repeat over and over as Cas beats him nearly to death.

There was a moment he certainly thought that Cas would kill him, and it seemed like he was more bothered by the fact that it was Cas that would do it more so than the thought of dying.

Cas breaks through the mind control, heals Dean. Then he leaves. So, again, Cas leaves. He keeps doing that to Dean. I stated before that Dean’s abandonment issues come into play in this relationship, but unlike at the beginning where Dean saw a future that Cas stays in, this Cas keeps coming and going. This makes it difficult for Dean to trust him fully, to rely on him. But the fact of the matter is that he does still trust him completely, and that’s what bothers Dean.

When Cas does come back again, collapsed and bloody in the middle of the street, Dean puts up a wall. He’s hurt and he’s tired. He doesn’t want to trust him as much as he does and he definitely doesn’t want him to keep coming and going without a thought. (What’s interesting to note here, though, is Dean’s change in character as this occurs through the years. Because while here he may simply give Cas the cold shoulder and not talk much about his hurt in this situation, we see later on in 12x19 after Dean has been fretting for days about where Cas has gone off to, and Cas finally does return, he voices his side of things. “With everything that’s going on, you can’t just go dark like that. We didn’t know what happened to you. We were worried, that’s not okay.”)

Naomi hits the nail on the head when she visits Dean after Castiel disappears and she notices Dean still hasn’t warded the boat against angels. It is moments like these that we realize just how much everyone else around these two also notice their chemistry and their deep devotion to one another, always seeming to fall back to one another.

“I think you have me confused with the other angel. You know, the one in the dirty trenchcoat who’s in love with you.” - Balthazar S6

“The stench of that impala is all over your overcoat, angel.” - Crowley S6

“Castiel? Oh, he’s not here. See, he has this weakness. He likes you.” -Uriel S4

(to Dean) “Go ask him, he was your boyfriend first.” - Meg S7

“I have tiptoed through all your little tulips. Your memories, your little feelings, yes. I know what you hate. I know who you love, what you fear.” - The Empty S13

“And then after a rousing speech, his true weakness is revealed. He’s in love... with humanity.” - Metatron S9

“I’m sorry, did you just say that you lost a Winchester? Because, one, that’s... interesting. And, two, how is it that you lost Dean? I thought the two of you were joined at the... you know, everything.” - Kipling S14

“And for what again? Oh, that’s right, to save Dean Winchester. That was your goal, right? I mean, you drape yourself in the flag of heaven, but ultimately, it was about saving one human, right? Well, guess what? He’s dead, too.” - Metatron S9

“Don’t lose it all over one man.” - Hannah S9

“The very touch of you corrupts. When Castiel first laid a hand on you in Hell he was lost!” - Hester S7

“Oh, sweet. Almost anything. Castiel? He’s dead. All the way dead. Because of you.” - Miriam S13

“And then you’d kill the angel, Castiel. Now that one, that I suspect would hurt something awful.” - Cain S10

“He should know this- Lucifer, his favorite, isn’t doing so well. Say nothing of the vessel, your friend Castiel.” - Amara S11

“I’m gonna cure you of your human weakness, the same way I cured my own. By cutting it out.” - Isham S12

Bonus: Dean to Sam about Garth’s baby Castiel- Dean: “This Cas keeps looking at me weird.” Sam: “So kinda like the real Cas.”

It is time and again that opposing forces recognize the relationship between Dean and Castiel, and it’s commented on and used against them frequently.

As we move forward to the angels falling and human Castiel, this season opens up with dean in the hospital with a very ill Sam. The first thing he does before contacting anyone else is pray to Castiel. There’s a moment in 9x03 where Castiel walks into a church and speaks with a woman there. He expresses his lack of faith and she says, “I guess that’s why we pray. You need something stronger than yourself.” Dean never prayed until he started praying to Cas. He prayed to Cas during the apocalypse, in purgatory, when Sam was sick during the trials, now in this hospital. Dean might not have faith in God, but he does in Cas.

Castiel is human, and while Dean tears apart the grid trying to find him while angels are on Cas’ ass, he still watches him die, then has to kick him from the safety of the bunker the very same day. Up until this point, Cas has been a genuine part of their family regardless of their squabbles over the past months, but kicking him from the bunker damages that. Once the reasoning comes to light, however, Cas is forgiving immediately. He’d forgiven Dean even before that. That’s one thing about Cas that Dean never seems to get over either. Dean can get angry and take things out on him, kick him from the bunker, make stupid decisions and nearly kill himself, holler at him, blame him, but Cas comes back every time. He forgives him every time. It’s already overwhelming when Sam does this, but the ease at which Castiel consistently forgives Dean is a lot.

Dean gets the Mark of Cain. It’s a means to an end, he says. When he becomes a demon as a result, this is when his relationship with Crowley is deepened. This relationship is an interesting one because it’s essentially an unrequited example. Dean likes Crowley, and when he’s a demon he has a good time, but Crowley’s feelings appear to go much deeper- even if he tries not to show it.

It is very possible that Dean and Crowley’s relationship is a formation more as a result of a joke than anything else- where the writers are concerned. But whether that was the intention or not, this is a relationship that continues to affect Crowley’s actions towards Dean for the rest of the series. He doesn’t let Dean kill innocents as he’s a demon, he saves Castiel from certain death as his grace drains, he gives Sam the information to find Dean so he can be cured, and he aids in getting the mark removed from Dean even as Sam attempts to kill him in the process. In return, Dean gives Crowley the benefit of the doubt more often, and they share a sort of mutual respect. What differs here, however, from Dean’s relationships with Benny or Castiel, is Dean’s actions. It is clear that Dean doesn’t feel as deeply as Crowley does, so this is an interesting relationship to compare side by side with the others.

Not only this, but DeanxCrowley in these first few episodes can be seen as a parallel with CasxHannah. Two unreciprocated relationships which do not last long in this particular phase, but do result in a friendship within these pairings as time goes on.

Still with the Mark of Cain, Dean and Cain have a few things in common. Cain had said that his wife, Colette, before she died had asked him to stop. Stop the killing. It’s several months after that that Dean is going off the rails and Cas, behind Dean as he’s walking away, asks Dean to stop. He nearly kills Cas then, almost fulfilling Cain’s words just weeks earlier: “And then you’ll kill the angel, Castiel. And that, I suspect, would hurt something awful.” This is a direct romantic parallel written into the show.

When the darkness is released, Amara and Dean are immediately drawn to one another through some sort of connection as a remnant of the mark. This relationship is another interesting one, because it ties in to true desire and consent. Dean is drawn to her, yes, and she is sold as a sort of potential love interest this season, but Dean himself doesn’t want anything to do with her. He’s hypnotized when he’s around her, but as soon as he’s away this energy dissipates.

So in light of this storyline let’s talk about consent and the sexualization of Dean Winchester for a second, shall we?

Dean is an often highly sexualized individual. He plays along more in his younger days, but the older he gets the more frustrated he becomes with the whole situation. I’m sure there are more but here are some tentative examples (This is also something that happens to Sam a decent amount as well.):

Wendy at the psych ward in “Sam, Interrupted” kisses Dean

Pamela touching Dean’s inner thigh in “Lazarus Rising”

Ezra in “Time After Time” kisses Dean without consent

Gets turned into a vampire because he’s “pretty”

Pamela in “Dark Side of the Moon” kisses Dean

Almost becomes a vessel for Sandy’s mate in “The Thing” because she “enjoys looking at his face”

Amara kisses Dean in “O’ Brother Where Art Thou”

Mildred gropes Dean’s leg in “Into the Mystic” and continually makes advances even tho he’s uncomfortable.

Random girl slaps Dean’s ass in “The Last Call”

Ellie in S8 wants to sleep with Dean and even kisses him randomly

Meg kisses Dean as he’s being held against his will in “Sympathy for the Devil”

Granted, there aren’t a plethora of examples, but it’s still a lot and it is interesting to see how often Dean has been sexualized for someone else’s pleasure. It is bound to work into his characterization as well, and his sense of self-worth. He’s often described as the pretty one of the brothers, and seeing as he is the more promiscuous of the two, it is assumed that he welcomes all of or most of the attention that comes his way.

It is for this reason in particular that the situation with Amara is bothersome to me. Not only is Dean taken advantage of physically, but his mind is essentially hypnotized whenever she is near, not giving him total control over his actions or desires. Amara is in part meant to be sold as a romantic interest, but throughout the season Dean continually expresses his discontent. He’s even ashamed to admit these feelings to Sam and Cas, even though he knows it isn’t his fault he still feels responsible. (Which, if we think about it, this is could be a queer allegory too. The lack of choice, feeling shame, etc.)

What is notable, however, is the day that they attempt to capture Lucifer and speak to Cas to get him to expel Lucifer from his body. Amara makes a surprise appearance and captures Lucifer/Cas herself. Dean yells to Cas. This catches Amara’s attention and appears to confuse her, and even Lucifer, seeing as when Dean is around her he’s meant to have eyes for just her because of their “bond”. His link to Castiel appears to be stronger, however.

Amara uses this connection between Cas and Dean when she wishes to contact Dean, simply by placing her hand over Castiel’s heart. She says to Dean, “If you should cross paths, if (god) should reach out to you, he should know this - Lucifer, his favorite, isn’t doing so well. Say nothing of the vessel, your friend Castiel.”

If we backtrack a moment, Dean finding out that Castiel is possessed in the first place is a very emotional time for Dean. He doesn’t want to accept that Cas would make such a decision, put himself in that kind of danger, and choose to leave once again. Sam, the arguably more rational thinker at this current time, tries to rationalize that Cas may not come back willingly since he chose to let Lucifer in. “Not possible.” Dean says. It’s simply not possible that Cas doesn’t want to come back to them. It’s not something he can accept.

The next several episodes are begun with Dean either losing sleep trying to figure out what to do about Cas, or simply moping about. Sam has to comfort him each time. This is notable behavior as well, because Dean isn’t often one to wear his heart on his sleeve this frequently. Certainly he has his moments, but much of the time when he’s distressed he simply buries it all down and puts up a front. He doesn’t do that here. In fact, once they do begin to put together a plan with Crowley, Sam thinks they should still utilize Lucifer in the fight against Amara but thinks it’s foolish to move him into a new vessel.

((I actually counted up the mopey Dean scenes- between finding out Cas is possessed, to getting Cas back.))

There are four convos with Sam (multiple episodes) where Sam has to comfort Dean and say something along the lines of “we’ll get him back.” (Just as an aside, I don’t think there has ever been a scene in the series where Dean comforted Sam about Cas, it’s always Sam having to comfort a freaking out Dean)

Then, of course, there’s the scene where Dean comforts a victim and she says “I watched the man I love die. There’s no normal after that.”

There’s the “It’s not an ‘it,’ Sam. It’s Cas.” scene.

There’s Dean trying to get through to Cas when they capture Lucifer.

There’s the Dean yelling “Cas?” to Casifer when Amara is in the room.

There’s two more scenes where Sam comforts Dean again.

There’s “The Chitters” episode with the gay hunter couple. (This isn’t a direct relation, but more of an honorable mention because it seems abstractly relevant)

Amara connecting to Dean through Cas’ heart.

Dean freaking out about making it to Cas in time and again talking to Sam about it.

Dean asking “what about Cas?” as they’re planning the attack with God against Amara.

Someone has said once that you can tell that Dean is in love with Cas because Sam isn’t. It’s in moments like this that this becomes readily apparent. Yes, Sam cares about Cas, of course. But it’s just different than the way that Dean cares about Cas. When Dean cares about certain people, this love weaves into the very fabric of his being and he just feels it so completely and overwhelmingly, he can’t simply not fight for it.

“Dean, it’s a strong vessel, it’s held Cas for years, and we know what he’s been through.” Sam says.

“It? It’s not an ‘it,’ Sam. It’s Cas.”

Dean appears almost shocked that these words would pass through Sam’s mouth. He’s confused that Sam wouldn’t fight for Cas just as much as Dean would. The type of love they each have for the angel is just different. Visually, action-wise, reaction-wise. This conversation in “Hell’s Angel” highlights that.

You know what else highlights it? The fact that when they do trap Lucifer, it’s only Dean who gets through to Cas and talks to him to get him to come back and expel Lucifer. It’s Cas only seeking Dean’s forgiveness in S7 when putting the souls back in Purgatory. It’s Dean in S6 being the only one to defend Cas in “The Man Who Would Be King.” It’s Dean later in that same episode being the one to get through to Cas in the circle of holy fire. It’s “I did it, all of it, for you.” It’s Dean carrying around that trenchcoat for a year and mourning when Sam doesn’t. It’s Bobby checking in on Dean mourning Cas, but doesn’t check in with Sam about it. It’s Sam pulling Dean out of the apocalypse world in season 12 as Dean screams for Cas and physically fights against Sam to get to Cas. It’s Sam seeing Cas dead on the ground minutes later, but still able to walk away while Dean is frozen in place, frozen in shock. It’s Dean being the only one to wrap up Cas’ dead body. It’s Sam always having to reassure Dean that Cas is probably fine, whenever he goes missing for a little while. It’s Dean hardly able to function in S13 with this encompassing grief over Cas’ death and yelling “It got him dead! Now you might be able to forget about that, but I can’t.” It’s S15 when Rowena tells Dean and Cas to fix their quarrel before it’s too late, and later Dean in purgatory not sure of it is too late as he’s praying for Cas to be okay and crying against a tree.

Sam’s reactions are important to take into account. Sam cares, yes, but Cas isn’t as wholly encompassing in his life as he is in Dean’s. If anything else is to prove that, it’s the way that Dean grieves (I mean, if you were to put Sam in Dean’s place in 15x09 in Purgatory and their fight, there’s no way that Sam would react this extremely).

There are three different points to highlight Dean’s grief. The first is season 7 with the trenchcoat, which we’ve already talked about. The second is when Cas is possessed by Lucifer, which we have covered as well. The most damning, however, is Dean’s season 13 grief arc following Cas’ death. Dean also loses his mother during this time and a few other friends, but considering how he reacts when Cas comes back, a great amount of this grief has to do with Cas. Dean completely loses hope and faith in anything at all during this time. He hates Jack for giving Cas false hope and getting him killed. He doesn’t believe in their mission anymore. He doesn’t believe anything matters at all. “Right now, I don’t believe in a damn thing.” Dean admits to Sam. When Cas comes back from the dead, however, he pulls a complete 180. He has hope again. He has faith. And all of it begins with Cas.

Lastly, Dean never hooks up with anyone again after Castiel’s final resurrection. We can go through an outline of the steady decline of Dean’s hookups and relations outside of Cas as the decade goes, but during this three year window specifically, Dean’s only pairing is Cas. Sure, he might flirt with someone every now and again, but this never goes anywhere. (Arguably the person he flirts with the most in any episode in these final three seasons is Daphne, but idk if that even counts much considering she is a cartoon.) And as Pamela says once in Rocky’s bar: “Besides, you don’t want me. You just like to flirt. I’m psychic so I kinda know.” And that was just in Dean’s head anyways so it’s probably even more true than had Pamela actually said it herself.

When Jack comes in the picture in season 13, and Castiel comes back from the dead, this makeshift little family is formed. All three men act as father figures to this half-angel kid at different capacities, and amongst this dynamic another is formed a bit further between Dean and Cas. They’ve already been acting a bit as an old married couple in recent years (Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets, anyone?) but this co-parenting scenario they’ve found themselves in has solidified this dynamic all the more as they collaborate on the issues that arise with Jack. In “Lebanon” when John Winchester comes back for a brief period, John even says to Dean that he’d hoped he would get a family someday and get out of hunting and such. Dean replies, “I have a family.” Sam, Cas, and Jack are his family. Cas has been family for a long time, but here and now Dean just isn’t looking for anything else or anything normal. He’s happy with himself and the people he’s surrounded by. He’s not looking for anything else or anyone else.

For a change of perspective, let’s check out Castiel’s relationships over the years.

Unlike Dean, Castiel’s queerness and interest in Dean has been officially canonized. We can speculate all we want on the legitimacy of Dean’s love for Cas, but we can speak in certainties about Castiel. Castiel is in love with Dean Winchester. Speculation can come in when we consider, just how long has this love existed for him? Let’s start from the beginning.

Right off the bat when we meet Castiel, he’s a semi-emotionless soldier of heaven who works under strict orders and doesn’t have much free-will. Dean begins to change this. We can see even in their first couple encounters that Castiel is interested in Dean- in what he has to say, intrigue in the fact that Dean talks back to the angels (despite that these angels are unkillable beings and could smite him on the spot), the fact that he’s snarky and brave and questions everything. Where Uriel finds Dean annoying and blasphemous, Castiel finds the back-talk fascinating. Dean’s words impact Cas, and it’s not long before he starts to have doubts about Heaven. Following these orders blindly and unquestioningly starts to seem foolish when Dean puts things in a different perspective.

Even after Cas undergoes what some have funnily dubbed “conversion therapy” in “The Rapture” (when Cas had finally decided on going against Heaven and to help Dean stop the apocalypse) it’s still not enough to stop him completely. A bit more time with Dean and he’s convinced yet again to help this one human man stop the apocalypse with his brother. He even dies for him and this new mission of his.

Castiel throughout this first season is interesting because we see firsthand his struggle to understand beginning to feel emotions and accept thinking for himself. “For the first time, I feel...” He says to Anna. He wants her to tell him what to do. He wants orders because that’s all he knows, and he doesn’t understand why suddenly he cares. It hurts him to send Dean in to torture Alastair. It hurts him even later when in the beautiful room Dean dismisses him with a “What do you care, you’re already dead. We’re done.”

It’s possible that in these first several months, or even these first couple seasons, that Castiel follows Dean around and does as he asks because he’s allotted Dean as the new being he serves. Because serving is what he knows. But it’s also through this that he begins caring more and more. He learns more how to express certain emotions, he learns more about humanity, he learns more about what is important in life and what is worth fighting for. As Cas will admit himself 12 years later, “Ever since we met, ever since I pulled you out of Hell... Knowing you has changed me. Because you cared, I cared. I cared about you. I cared about Sam. I cared about Jack... I cared about the whole world because of you.”

We start to see sprinkles of this especially throughout season 5 as Cas begins to come to terms with caring and adopting Dean’s mindset to care. Consider Sam for a moment. He and Cas don’t necessarily get along a lot and mostly just tolerate one another in these early days. However, as we see in “Abandon All Hope” when Castiel is captured by Lucifer, Cas gets visually upset at the concept of Lucifer taking Sam as his vessel. “You are not taking Sam Winchester. I won’t let you.”

Sam and Cas don’t have much of a relationship at this point, but Cas cares because Dean does. In “The Song Remains the Same” not long later, he even refers to Sam as his friend.

By the time S6 rolls around Castiel is in the midst of a civil war in heaven entirely because he has adopted the Winchester’s all encompassing mindset on the importance of free-will. Castiel is making his own choices, and he does everything he can to protect the Winchesters from harm as he does so. He decides not to seek out Dean’s help while he’s raking leaves because Dean had already sacrificed too much in Castiel’s eyes. He raises Sam from perdition because he feels it the right thing to do. He re-sinks the Titanic to keep the boys from being killed by Fate.

Personally, I think Castiel has been slowly falling in love with Dean this entire time, he’s just not aware what this feeling is. But this becomes even more plausible to me when we get Castiel’s perspective in “The Man Who Would Be King.” Cas cares what Bobby and Sam think of him, sure, but all he focuses on is Dean. Dean’s happiness and ensuring he not sacrifice more. Dean’s loyalty even as Cas seems to be guilty. Dean’s words when they capture Cas in holy fire.

The problem is, their relationship this season is also rocky. Cas seems to think that he’s merely a tool at the Winchester’s disposal and not much else. But he doesn’t mind because he cares about them so much, so what do his feelings matter? He sees himself as their protector. Their guardian angel. A role he’s fine with filling regardless of how they feel in return.

But when things get bad, Dean says to him “Next to Sam, you and Bobby are the closest things I have to family. You are like a brother to me. So if I’m asking you not to do something... You’ve gotta trust me, man.” and Cas seems genuinely surprised at this admission. Emotional, even.

As time goes on, Castiel’s actions nearly primarily revolve around Dean

After Cas realizes his error and is sending the purgatory souls back to their place, he tells Dean repeatedly that he’ll find some way to redeem himself to him. That’s the most important thing to him then.

When Cas smites the demons outside of the mental hospital in 7x17, all of his flashes of memories coming back were memories of Dean.

Partially to aid Sam and partially to redeem himself to Dean, Cas takes on Sam’s Hell brain in the asylum and goes crazy.

Cas runs in purgatory to keep the leviathans away from Dean.

Cas breaks out of Naomi’s mind control/brainwashing because of his feelings for Dean.

Let’s talk about that final bullet point for a moment. The Naomi chapter is damning in “Goodbye Stranger.” It isn’t copies of both Sam and Dean that Naomi trains Castiel to kill hundreds upon hundreds of times. No, it’s ONLY clones of Dean.

“What broke the connection?” Dean will ask after Castiel heals him in the crypt and takes control back over his mind. “I don’t know.” Cas will say. It wasn’t the angel tablet. That may have unwound the last of Naomi’s control over him, yes, but he’d dropped that angel blade before that. It was Dean that broke that connection. Even if this remains unsaid, it doesn’t make it any less true. Maybe Castiel starts to have an understanding of what his feelings are and what they mean here, but he won’t be truly sure until he soon becomes human.

Before we get there, though, we’ll take a brief pause to explore Cas’ heterosexual explorations and connections.

First is Meg. Cas’ relationship with Meg is born of sexual exploration more than anything else at its conception. He’d just been watching porn in his downtime and when Meg kisses him, he goes with it enthusiastically. Later, he seems to have a certain infatuation with her in his “crazy” state, and seems to trust her perhaps simply because she had been watching over him in the institution.

This is interesting because in his “crazy” state, Cas is a lot more raw and unfiltered and optimistic than he ever has been before. He compliments her, is concerned with her safety, and trusts her. On the contrary, with Dean, Cas is a lot more hesitant and even fearful when talking about certain subjects with him because of his past failings. He tries to keep the peace without directly getting involved because his direct involvement in the past had failed them all so spectacularly.

He and Meg continue to have a sort of connection whenever they cross paths until her demise the next season, and he still holds a respect for her years later, continuing to use her nickname for him “Clarence” as an alias at various times.

When Castiel becomes human in S9, he’s a bit lost and overwhelmed. April takes him in for the night. Although this is a short-lived romance considering she tortures and kills him the next day, for a brief enough time Cas starts to become acquainted with human romance and sexual desire. He loses his virginity to her. It is estimated by some that this is merely sexual experimentation on the part of a very confused newly human Cas, and others have used this to say that Cas is not gay but pan or bi. The conclusion in any regard, in my opinion, is purely up to the viewer.

If I’m to offer my opinion, however, seeing as he has shown interest in both sexes, though remains unlabeled, I consider him simply an unlabeled queer person. Sexual identity and orientation has never seemed to matter much to Castiel, so I don’t see why it should matter to me. He loves who he loves, simple as that.

When we get to Hannah, she provides an interesting foil to Castiel for a time, and an emphasizing expression on just how much he’s changed since his introduction to Earth and the Winchesters. Where Castiel has been open to a plethora of new emotions and experiences through the years which have made him a bit more human than angel at times, Hannah is still new to humanity and the range and movement of emotions that come with it. Just how little she seems to understand proves how much Castiel has grown and does understand by comparison.

As such, he seems to pick up on the fact that Hannah has an attachment to him that appears to be forming into a romantic or sexual interest. He gently turns her down multiple times, not expressing interest in her behavior although he does respect her greatly as a person. Though this relationship isn’t considered romantic from Castiel’s perspective, its unrequited nature again is a good parallel to Dean and Crowley’s relationship at this same time. Angel x Angel and Demon x Demon. Both one sided.

Now, let’s get back to Dean.

Up to the point that Castiel turns human, for however brief a time, he finally gets a look behind the curtain of human emotion. Now, we all know that Cas is in love with Dean already here- and probably has been for some time. Years, even- but it’s my personal belief that during this time turning human is when he actually realizes it and understands where these emotions come from.

Maybe it’s the heartbreak of Dean kicking him from the bunker, maybe it’s seeing Dean again when he shows up in line at the Gas n Sip, or maybe it’s somewhere in between when he sees two people on the street looking at each other and realizes “oh, that’s love. I know what that is. I felt that, too.” And every moment from then on he realizes what that feeling was in his chest when he looked at Dean for a little too long, or why it hurt so much to see the pain in Dean’s eyes at something Cas had done, or why hearing Dean’s prayers to him just felt different than they did with Sam’s. Why everything that he’d done since he rebelled from heaven was in the name of doing the right thing, muddled alongside doing the right thing for Dean. Caring because of Dean. Caring for Dean.

It’s during this time when he realizes what these feelings are, that he also must come to terms with the fact that they’re unreciprocated (or as he believes, anyway). This is for two reasons. The first, he still believes at this time that Dean kicked him from the bunker just because. And the second, if there’s anything that Cas took to heart from Dean’s example as strongly as the concept of free-will, it’s self-loathing. He doesn’t see himself worthy of love. Dean doesn’t see himself worthy of love either. They’re both messy piles of self-loathing that breeds into a blindness to the depth of care they hold for one another.

Now that we’re on the topic of self-loathing, this leads into Castiel and his decision to become Lucifer’s vessel in season 11. Much like Dean, Cas has a consistent issue with seeing his own personal self-worth, so when the opportunity comes along to “be of service to the fight” and become Lucifer’s vessel, he takes it on easily. He considers himself expendable, and he won’t see just how much Dean struggles with this fact while he’s possessed. In fact, Cas never knows just how much Dean struggles with his absence at all, which is just one of the many divides between the two of them that could easily be resolved with communication, if either were ever good at that.

Once Lucifer is shoved from Cas’ body, however, Dean makes a point to let Cas know just how important he is in his life. He’s said Cas was family before, but that was before the falling out at the end of season 6. Dean makes it clear that he and Sam both consider Cas family, once again, during a ride in Baby. “You’re our brother, Cas. I want you to know that.”

Now, here, simultaneous heartbreak and love occur. Because while Cas is likely very much in love with Dean here, and very much aware of it, to hear that Dean simply thinks of him as a brother must ache a bit. However, we’re also talking about Dean Winchester, and for him to call someone a brother is an immense depth of love, probably the most the man is even capable of. Dean never says the words “I love you” to anyone, so this is about the closest anyone could get. Cas knows this, he’s well-versed in the ways of Dean Winchester by now. So, while it aches, his heart is also full.

Comparable to:

“We need you, Cas. I need you.” 8x17

“We’re gonna shove your ass back through the eye of that needle if it kills all three of us.” 8x05

“Don’t make me lose you, too.” 7x23

“Don’t do anything stupid”

The entire purgatory confession/apology prayer in 15x09

Cas returns this love just hours later, offering to go with Dean to die taking out Amara.

If we jump forward to the divorce arc of season 14-15, we can hit upon the next great heartbreak of Castiel’s sad little love life. While the Winchester brothers, Castiel, and Jack have all become a family unit, Castiel never wants to lose that. But two things happen. First, Cas’ deal with The Empty is made, and somewhere along the line, silently, he becomes aware that allowing himself to be happy, and that happiness, somehow involves Dean. The second thing that happens is Jack kills Mary Winchester, and Dean says Castiel is dead to him.

So, The Empty won’t take him, but his family is broken apart. Castiel never gives up on a single family member, though. That’s the thing about Cas. The same way he consistently forgives Dean for all his behaviors over the years, he never loses faith in anyone in this family. And when they come to reunite, he’s happy simply in appreciating any and all time they have together, however brief.

Then, in true Castiel fashion, he sacrifices himself for Dean Winchester in 15x18.

Their relationship has always left things unsaid, but I don’t think there’s ever been a question on whether Dean loves Cas or Cas loves Dean even if they don’t talk about it. You can’t look at Cas and Dean’s faces seeing each other again for the first time in weeks at the end of “The Last Call” and say that there wasn’t love and heartbreak there. On some level I think that Cas knew that Dean loved him back, but Dean was so buried in trauma at that point that it might take him years more to realize what he actually felt and what he needed. But Cas is such a selfless lover that he was absolutely 100% fine with just being around Dean for the rest of his life, even if he never got a chance to tell him how much he genuinely cared for him, and never got that reciprocation back. Castiel’s love for Dean is so pure and selfless it’s overwhelming to even consider, but for someone like Dean it would be a hundred times harder to accept or even fathom someone caring about him as much as Cas does.

So Castiel never pushes Dean further, never suggests, barely even touches him. The only liberties Cas takes are small touches to heal him (even though he doesn’t need to touch a person to heal them), a few small hugs through the years, just sharing comfortable space inside the impala, small moments watching Dean’s favorite movies with him, or sharing a moment over beers in the kitchen. And Cas’ happiness was in telling Dean how much he loved him likely because then maybe Dean would actually see how much he was worth. Cas wanted Dean to know how much he loved him and how he viewed him, because Dean deserved to love himself and was worthy of it.

The five types of love languages are as follows:

Words of affirmation

Physical touch

Gift giving

Acts of Service

Quality Time

One of the reasons Dean and Cas miss the mark with one another so often could simply come down to love languages. A lot of the time, what a person needs in love language is often what they also give. I don’t think this is the case where these two are concerned, though. They’re both so sacrificial that it’s difficult for them to accept this in return, even though this is what they each offer to the other and anyone else around them.

Both Cas and Dean’s giving love language is “acts of service” which translates into sacrificial actions much of the time, though it can also be more domestic than that as well. It’s Dean grabbing an extra beer for Cas or making food, or it’s Cas healing Dean without any prompting, Cas loading up on pie and beer at the Gas n Sip when Dean’s mad at him.

What they each need, however, is different. Dean needs “quality time.” He needs his people close, he needs them to answer calls, and he needs to know where they are. This clearly ties in to his abandonment issues, and it hurts his relationship with Cas significantly when the angel just keeps leaving, or disappears without answering his phone for days at a time. And when he dies, obviously. He always comes back, though. And half the time when he’s gone it’s because he’s trying to get a win for Dean against whatever issue the team is facing at the time.

What Cas needs, best I can tell, is “words of affirmation.” Cas has a consistent problem with thinking that he’s worth less than he is, and is less important to the people around him than he is. Dean obviously has this issue, too, but with Cas it’s somehow infinitely worse, if that’s even possible. Frequently, what he needs to get him going in low points is a few words from Dean or encouragement in general. To name a few:

“Maybe to fix it.” 7x17

“I’d rather have you, cursed or not.” 7x23, Cas then goes with Dean to find and kill Dick Roman

“I’m not leaving here without you.” S8 in purgatory when Cas wanted Dean to leave him behind but Dean was having none of it.

“You’re our brother, Cas.” 11x23, after Cas was possessed by Lucifer and thought he was expendable.

Over time, Dean does get a bit more vocal with Cas about issues he’s having or just with encouraging words as well. Cas, too, sticks around a lot more. They’re not perfect but they do begin to grow and work with one another in these later years to give one another what they need most to see how much the other is loved.

In conclusion, there is a significant amount of romance and sexuality written into this show, and simply interpreted as well. And that’s the thing, when a queer person says that they interpreted a certain piece of media as queer, it’s not up to someone else to say that they can’t, or shouldn’t, or that they’re interpreting something wrong. That’s the thing about media, it can have so many different interpretations and meanings to so many different people.

It’s my personal interpretation to see the queerness embedded in the text here. Maybe it’s not there for another person, and that’s cool too, just don’t tell me how I should see it. The fact is that it was written into the show to be interpreted, and interpret is what we did.

I’d love to hear any feedback that others may have regarding this. Any other theories, different interpretations, things I may have missed. I hope you enjoy the edits, and the endings I put together for them. We all need a little bit of happiness after that ending, so I hope it leaves you with a lighter heart. :)

Much love,

Taylor

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midethefangirl · 3 years

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Captain America: Civil War - My Thoughts

I know this is like 5 years late but for this, I’d like to resurrect a barely dead discourse that succeeded in not just dividing the Avengers but also dividing the fandom. Before we start, content warning for spoilers and let’s dive into this mess.

So, basically, the entire conflict of civil war stemmed from General Thaddeus Ross (who is a hypocritical dick, btw) coming to lecture the Avengers on being destructive despite conducting destructive experiments (ahem, the Abomination and the Hulk) but I digress. Then, Ross presents the Sokovian Accords which is really lengthy and we see Steve reading like a few chapters(?). Now, let us note that the Accords were presented to the Avengers after a mission-gone-wrong killed about 11 people in Lagos (lay-gos, not lah-gos that pronunciation gave me headaches as a Nigerian).

So, the Sokovian Accords were written by 117 countries and vetted by the UN asking for the Avengers to be under oversight (which SHIELD would have done if HYDRA hadn’t infiltrated it in the first place but it is what it is). Somehow, Steve made it about “our right to choose” (how?! Cause I’m not understanding) and decided to not sign*.

*he later got back to sign, then backed out when he learnt that Tony had placed Wanda under house arrest (even though it was for her protection. I do believe Tony should have fully informed Wanda about keeping her in the Avengers’ Tower)

My issues with the plot of Civil War are:

1. The Sokovian Accords were not read out loud or placed on some kind of PowerPoint slide for the audience to understand why Team Cap is against the Accords. No, the fandom wiki is not a source because that one is from Agents of SHIELD and not a lot of MCU fans are familiar with that show (yours sincerely included). Assuming the contents were read out loud or discussed by the Avengers, I’d have understood why Team Cap refused to sign the accords but since none of that was given, I’d remain Team Iron Man for this one.

2. The Sokovian Accords is not the American Constitution. Then again, the MCU fandom tends to be American-centric and most Americans seem to have this belief that the world revolves around them (and it manifests itself in Civil War discourse).

3. Contrary to popular opinion, the Sokovian Accords were about 117 (mostly third-world) countries asserting their sovereignty and boundaries, not taking away rights from the Avengers. If we go by what the MCU wiki claims about the accords, yes, some parts are absurd (like asking for blood samples and using trackers, why are those necessary?). However, when 117 countries state that they want you to respect their boundaries, I think it is best to comply. Unfortunately, respecting boundaries is one thing the USA has a problem complying with and guess who happens to represent America?

4. The Accords affected only their hero lives, not their lives as a civilian. I doubt the UN would limit the Avengers’ movements as civilians

5. Let us not forget how Steve and Clint protect Wanda from accountability and responsibility. Wanda in the MCU is like y/n in many fanfics where everyone (except for the “big bad villain” who in this case is Tony and 117 countries) seems to love her and want to protect her from facing the consequences of her actions. Anyone *ahem Tony* who has a bit of problem with her is suddenly the enemy. Not to mention how Wanda seems to have a knack for causing destruction in African countries (Johannesburg, Lagos, Wakanda)

6. And fandom behaviour from the Team Cap stans

7. Also, why is Civil War not an Avengers part 3? It’s better than making it a Captain America trilogy and then trying to frame Steve as being right.

8. I do believe that the accords were sped up which left little time for the Avengers to discuss and compromise on certain issues. If they were given more time to discuss, compromise and negotiate, I think the movie would have ended better than it had.

9. In addition, I also agree with Team Cap stans on how the UN arbitrarily deciding to shoot Bucky on sight is a human right violation.

10. “The safest hands are our own” why does this sound like a white saviour talk point from Steve? The accords is about 117 countries wanting you to respect their boundaries and the best you can come up with to refute that is saying something a white saviour would say?

11. “Even if the whole world is telling you to move...” just shut the fuck up, this is no way comparable to 117 countries trying to assert their sovereignty.

12. Look if I have to choose between surrendering a few rights as a hero and just dismissing that of civilians as potential damage, I’d go with the former because the people whom I’m suppose to protect come first. For me to dismiss their deaths as “we can’t save em all” is just not it.

13. “She’s just a kid”, a few years later and I still hate that term. One, it’s infantilizing an adult white woman (something white men have historically done and we all know how that went) . Two, while Tony was obviously wrong for not informing Wanda about her house arrest, he was right to keep her in the Tower when they were people who would harm her with every chance they could find. **

** after watching WandaVision, some people might find every reason to want to harm her.

14. Let us also discuss the motivation of those in Team Iron Man vs Team Cap

Team Iron Man

Tony: feels guilty for the events of Age of Ultron, believes that he’s stepped out of line and the Avengers need oversight.

Natasha: believes that the Avengers should listen to the public and the UN after all, if they had one hand on the wheel, they can still steer.

Vision: believes that the Avengers as a whole bring challenge which brings conflict and then catastrophe.

Rhodey: a soldier; believes in following orders especially when it is from the UN and 117 countries.

T’Challa: dude is just there to kill Bucky. I’m sure if Bucky was on team Ironman, my guy would have joined team cap, lmao 😂.

Spider-Man: not really there for a reason except to bring in Steve to Ross. I do agree that Tony shouldn’t have dragged him to the fight without Peter making an informed decision.

Team Cap

Steve: didn’t want to sign because it takes away his “right to choose”. Idk what that means or how it is relevant to the Sokovian Accords but okay. However, I understand his mistrust considering a few movies ago, we found out HYDRA had infiltrated SHIELD and as much as I believe governments are corrupt and the UN is shit, you cannot just enter a country anyhow without warning ahead of time.

Bucky: was his motivation given? I mean, I believe he joined Steve’s side to stop Zeno from unleashing the other winter soldiers. Not that that’s a bad reason, it isn’t.

Sam: again, I don’t think the movie gave us a reason for him being against the Accords. Did he also believe it was taking away his “right to choose”?

Wanda: undecided as of moment of discussion. Joined team cap because Tony placed her on house arrest. While I agree that Tony should have informed her that he was putting her under house arrest and stated the reasons why, I believe it was for good reasons especially when some people might decide to carry out witch hunts (you get it, witch hunts? 😅)

Clint: only joined because Wanda was placed under house arrest. We aren’t given any reason why he would oppose the Accords.

Scott: fan boy of Captain America, need I say more?

15. Also, to Team Cap stans blaming Tony Stark for Team Cap being imprisoned, grow the fuck up. The people in Team Cap are all adults who made their own decisions yet Tony is to blame for them breaking the law (because they did break the law), wtf.

16. “Are you capable of letting go of your ego for one damn second?” Like Steve’s ego didn’t play a part in all this too, lmao.

17. Okay, the final battle was intense and while I believe Bucky was also a victim, I can understand why Tony lashed out at him. The one to blame here is Steve because even if he had no clue Bucky was responsible for the Starks’ death, he still lied to Tony by not telling him who was responsible. It is more appalling to learn that Steve, in an attempt to “protect Tony and Bucky”, was actually covering for HYDRA!

Also, the way Steve stood emotionless while Tony watched a footage of his parents being killed. Yet, he could shield Wanda from watching the news because of how it affected her, okay.

“I can do this all day”, fuck you, Steve

18. Clint exploding at Tony is so fucking hilarious. Tony is right, Clint has a family yet he decided to fight in a war that didn’t concern him. Also, his comments about breaking backs is so tone deaf after Rhodey just broke his back!

19. If Sam was Captain America, I think Civil War wouldn’t have happened at all, from the dialogue in the Raft.

20. Overall, this movie is a fucking mess and I hate it for dividing both the Avengers and MCU fans.

Before I close with this, I want to add that I am not anti-Steve but Civil War really made me hate him. I get, Steve is supposed to be a Boy Scout and shit like that, but he’s a Gary Stu in the MCU, let’s be honest about it. Civil War should have been an Avengers movie, rather than a part of the Captain America trilogy. The Avengers should have been given more time than three days to discuss the Accords and make necessary amendments; after all that went down in Lagos, Wanda should have been made to sit out missions and maybe we could have had someone like Doctor Strange help in training her; Crossbones would have made a great villain but it is what it is; Peter’s introduction to the MCU could have been as him actually interning for the Stark Industries and forming a kind of acquaintance with Tony Stark before Tony finds out that he’s Spider-Man; Steve should have told Tony about HYDRA‘s hands in his parents’ deaths. Anyway, I’ll go read Civil War fix-it fanfics and fanfics where the Avengers are more like family. Fuck Civil War and I’m outta here.

Edit: okay this was a thought I had when I was trying to sleep but it was too good to ignore. Rhodey has a point about Steve arrogance (if that’s the correct term) in saying “the safest hands are our own” and here’s why:

Like he stated “this is not the World Security Council...neither is this SHIELD nor HYDRA” (paraphrased). This is the UN as well as 117 countries. Look, I am as anti-government as one can go and I don’t believe that the UN are reliable (plus, if we really want to go by the AoS version of the Accords, the Accords are flawed and they need amendments), however, given the US records on disrespecting boundaries in many third world countries, I can understand why 117 countries are wary about a bunch of superpowered Americans entering their country.

To us, the Avengers are saving the world. To these 117 countries and the people who have families who were killed in the crossfire (Zemo is a good example), the Avengers are a bunch of nuisances who leave destruction wherever they tread.

I am still neutral on the whole Accords as I don’t know exactly what it entails but for Steve to go “we are surrendering our rights to choose” (again, how is the Accords threatening the Avengers’ right to choose?) when asked to be under oversight is tone deaf.

#marvel cinematic universe #captain america civil war #team cap critical #mcu critical #not anti steve rogers btw #wanted to clarify #steve rogers critical

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becca-e-barnes · 3 years

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The "minors DNI" posts that I've been seeing crop up everywhere by fic writers are always so interesting to me.

First and foremost, I 100% support your decision to post a "minors DNI" for your safety and their safety. You're being responsible, doing your due diligence as a responsible adult, and trying to ensure that everyone enjoys what you put out there in a safe way.

And I know you specifically have not said this so this is not a slight on you by any means, but I think you'd be more open to the discourse of such an interesting topic like this—the problem I have with some fic writers is that is them saying they will block anyone who does not have their age posted in their blog.

This, I believe, is an incredibly dangerous precedent to set. On the one hand displaying your age if you are over 18 seems like a non-issue, right? Sure. But setting the precedent that people should display their age in their blog encourages minors to share their age on the internet which in turn can make them an easier target.

Personal preference for me—I'm a thirty-two year old lady (plz sing this appropriately) and do not share my age in my tumblr because, well I don't want to.

We're all technically violating TOS anyway, so it doesn't really matter if a minor interacts with your fic or not at this point—by interact I mean like/reblog/comment, not DMing you to talk about sexual stuff. That stuff you should absolutely block/delete for obvious legal and safety reasons.

And while I understand the legality thing, if you are not explicitly engaging with said minor, there's not a whole bunch that could hold up in court. How many lawsuits do you think E.L. James gets for 13 year olds waltzing into a bookstore or buying 50 shades of grey off amazon and reading it? There was actually an interesting article written about the "common sense" engagement with this book back in 2012.

Anywho, you are right to ask and set a boundary, and do what you feel is right to protect yourself and using the DNI minor blanket statement is ultimately a good thing, especially if it's a personal uncomfortableness with minors reading your work. However, even if a minor just decided to lie and say they were 21 and read your stuff anyway, unknowingly interacting with a minor is just as bad legally as knowingly doing so so at the end of the day, we're still just taking risks. The safest thing for all of us would probably be to not interact with anyone or ask everyone to use anon, but there's not fun or friendship in that. Your mutual who has stated they're 25 could still be 16 and you wouldn't know it.

My perspective may also just be entirely outdated as well because I grew up in the internet age of it being a lawless wasteland and everyone lied about everything, so I don't see the value in trying to police my work when people will just read it anyway and I don't have any control over that at the end of the day other than to tag appropriately and/or not post anything at all ever.

This was long and not necessary to answer, I'm just always fascinated by the rigor at which fanfic writers are so quick to banish people for not putting their age in their bios when I think it is inherently more dangerous for minors to do so because it puts a target on their back.

Before I start, I recognise that we’re of the same line of thought! I saw this long message and panicked thinking that someone had taken an issue with my stance on it and I’m glad that’s not the case 🙈 Anything I raise here is in the interest of discussion and I completely respect your point of view. 💗

This is really interesting actually and truth be told, I’ve avoided any discussion on this topic for a very long time for fear that I won’t adequately explain my stance on it. I feel like I’ve had a chance to do that and I hope it’s been taken up by everyone as I intended.

I will admit; as a minor, I read smut. Without going into detail, it entirely warped my perspective on how relationships should look. To provide a little context on my stance, at 14/15 (and younger), I had no business reading the things I was reading. Unfortunately, I was in a “relationship” at the time and I fully believed that I had to engage with my boyfriend in ways that mirrored what I was reading. I ended up in situations I didn’t want to be in. To me, it’s my responsibility as a writer and as someone who learned the hard way, to ensure that younger people don’t make the same mistakes I did.

I do fully agree, minors stating their real age on their blog raises all sorts of different issues, as you rightly said. You’re absolutely right, to a minor there are no advantages to displaying your real age on here. Fic writers will block you, creeps will be more likely to engage with you. So I fully understand that this might seem like a reason to lie or provide no age at all.

Leading on from that though, if a minor lies on their profile and claims to be over 18 and they interact with my smut, from a legal perspective, that is not going to have any repercussion on me. I have put my disclaimers up, I vet as many profiles as I can and I do everything I would be reasonably expected to do in the eyes of the law. (This isn’t an area of law I studied in significant depth but that standard of reasonable expectation would still apply). I do as much as I can to protect myself and them.

You brought up 50 Shades and I understand your point but the issue here is not just the fic itself. If anyone comments/ reblogs my fic, I like to send a little reply back! I love when people take the time to give me feedback and I want to thank them for it, as a lot of other writers do! The issue here being that if the blog commenting is a minor, the writer would be engaging in a conversation about sexual material with a minor. And that’s fucking messy. This is mainly where fics differ from a teenager buying a copy of 50 shades. In that situation, there’s no interaction there between the author and the underage fan so it loses that personal element.

On the issue of blogs with no age, I see where you’re coming from and I see that you both read and write fanfiction. But I also see it from the other perspective given that a lot of writers like to do as much as possible to protect themselves and potential minors.

I totally support that’s a boundary that you set and it’s your choice. In the same sense that it’s a fic writer’s choice to protect themselves by blocking you. It’s a matter of boundaries clashing at the end of the day. I really do see both sides here. I’m a really organised person so honestly, if anyone wanted to send me a private message just confirming they’re over 18, I’d put them all into a list to make sure I don’t accidentally block them for interacting. But of course, not every writer would be able to do that and I’m sure many readers would want to do that either! I just see it as the only way to compromise on that issue and keep everyone happy.

Thank you for sending me this! I hope I covered everything and if I haven’t been clear enough in some areas, feel free to come back to me! 🙈 And I really appreciate actually having a discussion on here! It’s so great to hear others’ points of view in a nice, respectful way. Tumblr loses that sometimes! Have a lovely evening 💗

#asks answered <3 #anon #long post #discourse #peep me getting to use my degree ahahaha #tw: sa

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dancer-me · 3 years

Text

Fic Writer Questions

@hopeintheashes tagged me (that was pleasantly surprising, so YAY) as well as anyone who wants to play (so if you want do - just do it!!!) 1) How many works do you have on AO3?

I have nine!

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

106,461! I broke 100,000 on AO3 and didn't notice =O

3) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

For posted fanfiction, I have written for 5 fandoms at this point. Naruto (this was my early days, around 2007 to 2015, with pretty huge gaps inbetwen), Merlin (oops), High Seas (just the one small fic because Netflix had me angsting hard enough to break my hiatus), and of course 9-1-1 and 9-1-1 Lone Star!

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1. Express to Nowhere (911 / 911 Lone Star) 2. Giving up Ground (911 / 911 Lone Star) 3. Quarter Life Crisis (911) 4. Pull me Under (911) 5. Coming Soon to a Theatre Near You (911)

5) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

I hesitate to say this about a WIP but I'm pretty sure it's going to be Giving up Ground when it's done. Not that it's going to have a sad ending, but that it's part of a continuous series and I already have the next part planned out and partially started (titled "Overdrawn" for anyone interested) so it will leave things feeling hopeful but open-ended, which can be construed as angsty. But really, all my other stories, while they have angst for the most part, have happy endings because I'm a sucker for it. Chaotic Energy is slow burning itself to the happiest of endings.

6) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

Hmm... I think it's Coming Soon to a Theatre Near You! This story was just such a fun blast of drama, hijinks, and hilarity, with our two leads getting their love story at the end of it all :) All my completed works have very happy endings, but this one resonates because there really wasn't any angst at all in the whole thing. Just good fun!

7) Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

The only cross-over I have ever written or been compelled to write in my life has been with 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star, and that's my Chaotic Energy series. I don't know if it's "crazy", though it's turning out to be crazy long, since my original plan for it was 5 separate one-shots and Captain, that ship has long since sailed. We're deep at sea now, SOS. I love what it's become, though, and I hope everyone who reads it is enjoying the journey :)

8) Do you write smut? If so what kind?

Weeeeeeeeell. Here's the thing. I wrote m/f smut back in the day, on ff.net and carried my one shots over to AO3 when I made the move. I'm talking way back in the day - those two "E" stories are dated 2015 but I actually originally posted them in 2011 - TEN years ago!! I haven't written smut since (I'm not counting TK and Carlos getting frisky in chapter 2 of Giving up Ground). It's not that I wouldn't, but that I haven't been inspired and with time somehow I have also become ragingly self-conscious over whether I could still do a good job. My smut has always been emotion based though, as I've never been able to truly go PWP. That said, I'm actively open to and considering some m/m smut for my current fandom. Fingers crossed I don't embarrass myself.

9) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I do on all my recent work on AO3 (basically my 9-1-1 and lone star fics that I've written since coming out of hiatus).

10) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Not on any of my AO3 work, though I have received hate on my much older work on ff.net to varying degrees of reasonability. So far the AO3 community has been very kind to me! I’ll get some comments where I think readers had hoped I’d go in a different direction, but nothing has ever been too much.

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of! Imitation is the greatest form of flattery but also no, stop, don’t do that.

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, actually! I wrote my first ever published fic for Naruto called “Stand Alone” back between 2007 and 2011 (took a couple years off in the middle there to, you know, finish high school…) that someone asked me if they could translate into Russian. At the time I thought that was super cool, and it still is, but now I look back at that story and I think oof, now we can cringe at it in multiple languages. (more on that later)

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No, but I’m not opposed to it! I’ve seen some excellent fic partnerships and it’s so great seeing writers leverage the creativity and talents of their friends and peers.

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

Y’know, before 9-1-1, it was Merlin x Arthur, but Buck x Eddie have 110% of my heart and attention now.

15) What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

On the topic of Merlin… I started writing “The Quest for the Knife” back in 2015 at the peak of my Merlin fixation after painstakingly planning it out. I have pages upon pages of outlines and notes for a 14 chapter adventure… somewhere. I found a piece of it like an archeological dig when I was moving this pandemic season, but the rest seems lost to time. I’m sad because I had gotten so excited about it and loved my first two chapters, but I don’t think I’ll ever finish it. I might take it down so I can stop wallowing in guilt.

16) What are your writing strengths?

I like to think I write good action / adventure scenes and plot lines, because I love painting vivid pictures of what I see playing out in my head whenever I think through my stories. I like to incorporate subtle (and not so subtle) humour as well in my work, which is born from my very active internal narrator voice as I go through my day-to-day and try to find the humour in everything. I also like to make outlines before all my bigger stories too, which ‘usually’ means I avoid cringey plot holes and can make some fun connections.

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

*looks at the camera very seriously* writing convincing smut. Well, that, and the kind of emotional, flirty love and fluff that I love devouring in fics. I don’t think I do nearly as good a job there. Get in a character’s head and angst them up? Sure. Wax poetic in a convincing and not jarring way about how much Character A is in love with Character B without making it seem like it was a bit too much of a leap? Debatable.

Also… I tend to require my readers to suspend a lot of disbelief to enjoy my fics with elements of adventure, because I tend to do exactly 5 minutes of Google research for something before I decide I’ve had enough and go ahead.

18) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Here we revisit the cringe of “Stand Alone,” where I tried in the first half (the 2007 portion) to incorporate Japanese since I watched the anime in Japanese and felt this was the best way to try and have the character’s voices come off the page. It… is really just a big ol’ cringe, because I didn’t know the language, and I definitely didn’t use suffixes right at ALL. So… I tend to avoid it personally because I don’t want to cringe at how wrong my use of other languages is.

But if it fits you, your story, fits your character, and you know the language confidently enough to not embarrass yourself? You do you *carefully side steps around discourse and leaves the room*

19) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Naruto!

20) What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

I think it has to be “Express to Nowhere” these days. It was wanting to write that fic that pulled me out of hiatus and helped me find joy in writing and sharing my work again, and I have nothing but love for it and how it turned out.

Holy Cow I was warned that this level of introspection was going to take a minute but whew this was a good chunk of time. Fun to do and think about though!

Tagging: @221bsunsettowers, @onelonelytortillachip, @blueeyedbuckley and anyone who sees this and thinks, "hey, I have an answer for these questions." Because I am madly curious and would love to see your take!

#danswers #fic writer game #she's a long boi

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contraststudies · 3 years

Text

Thank you for tagging me, @tawnyontumblr! I’m very bad at doing these writer meme things, so here goes nothing.

1) How many works do you have on AO3?

45 and counting!

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

376,429. Holy moly that is a fuck ton of words (I only properly started posting on AO3 last May iirc).

3) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

Four: Critical Role, Good Omens, Hades, and Kill La Kill.

4) What are your top five fics by kudos?

This list is bookended by two PWPs, which I find hilarious given that I seem to have misplaced my smut brain cell sometime in the last couple of months.

On The Matter of Traffic Violations (Good Omens, E)

“Officer Fell,” Crowley says, and leans forward, enough to give Fell a good view of his décolletage. He tilts his head in the way he knows people find deliciously coquettish, glad that he’d had the foresight to apply some mascara before heading out. “I’m so very sorry about this,” he says, looking up at the officer through his lashes. “It’s late, you know, no cars around… Didn’t notice how fast I was going, that’s all.”

[Or: Crowley flirts his way out of a traffic violation.]

Unbinding (Critical Role, T)

This is a great honor, Essek reminds himself, trying not to recoil as fingers run through his hair, working through the tangles. A braid is made of three strands, symbolizing the inextricable bond between the soul, the den, and the Luxon. A recognition of an achievement by the drow who bears it. With each braid, the soul is bound ever closer to its den and to the Luxon.

It is a lesson Essek learned long ago, but one he is never permitted to forget.

[Or: the story of why the Shadowhand wears his hair cropped short.]

No Church In The Wild (Good Omens, E)

The stem of the wineglass in Aziraphale’s hand snaps cleanly in two, but no one seems to hear it—every eye in the room is trained on the redheaded dancer sashaying to the gleaming silver pole, centre stage for all to see.

Oh, Aziraphale thinks faintly. Good lord.

[Or: the one where Aziraphale gets assigned to the red light district.]

abide gold with me (Critical Role, T)

“Okay, Cay-leb,” Jester says, stretching out the syllables affectionately. “You sit right here so we can watch you and Essek try an orange for the first time.”

The Primal Scene (Good Omens, E - a collab with @lookitsstevie!)

Harriet notices that there’s a crack of light at the end of the hallway coming from the door to the library, and her mood brightens considerably. Perhaps the tutors are still here, putting together their lessons for the next day before they leave for the night. She leans down to pick up a piece of cloth that’s fallen on the rug. Her breath catches in her throat when she realizes what it is – a necktie with a familiar tartan pattern.

She nearly drops the tie in shock at the unmistakable sound coming from the closed door of the library. A sharp, quickly stifled moan.

[Or: Harriet Dowling accidentally bears witness to divine ecstasy.]

5) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I try. I really do. My friends (and maybe some of my readers) know that this is difficult for me, mainly because any sort of recognition reduces me to a gibbering pile of tears. I’m working on it though, even if it does take me a million years to respond to anything on AO3.

6) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

God, which one do I choose. I have been referred to as an angst gremlin for a very good reason. I’m gonna go with The Remains of the Day, a Good Omens fairy tale AU I wrote loosely based on Bluebeard.

7) Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

I HAVE. I wrote philtatos, a crossover of Good Omens and The Iliad/The Song of Achilles. It’s the only crossover I’ve ever written, unless we’re counting Variations of an Arrangement, which could loosely count as a crossover of the book/radio/TV versions of Good Omens.

8) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

I have not. And hopefully never will.

9) Do you write smut? If so what kind?

I do, and it’s usually of the angst with a happy ending variety.

10) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Hm. How do we define stealing? Just kidding. The short answer is no.

11) Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope!

12) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Got one in the works for Critical Role!

13) What’s your all time favourite ship?

Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes was actually the first ship I ever really got into, and they’ll always have a special place in my heart even if I never wrote anything for that fandom. Crowley/Aziraphale from Good Omens of course, and more recently Caleb Widogast/Essek Thelyss from Critical Role.

14) What’s a WIP you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Variations of an Arrangement. I loved writing it, and I still want to finish it one day, but it took a lot of brainpower to write and keep track of the plot and I feel like it’s beyond me, at least right now.

15) What are your writing strengths?

I… hmm. Judging by the way people are always yelling at me in their comments, I guess it’s that I can write stories that make people feel things very deeply.

16) What are your writing weaknesses?

I repeat words so often, it’s embarrassing. I use too many “-ly” adverbs. Also, I find myself using the same turns of phrase across several fics lmao.

17) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Language is a tricky thing. I don’t want to bore you with discourse. I try not to write dialogue in a different language (especially if it’s not one I speak myself) unless it’s absolutely called for, or if they’re just basic phrases and I’m 100% certain I won’t be getting it wrong. I have read fics where this was done very well though, and I’ve found that it really adds to the atmosphere in those cases.

18) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

It was for this old anime called Princess Tutu. I danced ballet when I was younger and loved it so much – I believe I was only twelve at the time?? But I think the fic may still be floating around on FF.net somewhere.

19) What’s your favourite fic you’ve written?

I wrote philtatos in a four-day fever dream. It’s not the most technically perfect fic I’ve ever written or anything like that, but I think it’s the one that reveals the most about who I am as a person. That is an incredibly cheesy thing to say, I know. I always joke that posting that fic felt like offering my still-beating heart on a silver platter to the void, but there you are.

For Critical Role, surprisingly enough it’s this ficlet I wrote called sinners, a small bite of Shadowdrei where I was parsing my ideas on Astrid and Eadwulf’s dynamic and where they stood when it came to Bren/Caleb and Essek. I didn’t realize how fully formed my thoughts were until I wrote that. Fascinating what your own writing will show you about the things that are in your mind.

Tagging with no pressure whatsoever: @naromoreau @jenanigans1207 @saretton @theseedsofdoom @musegnome!

#about me #writing meme

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thegrandkinghimself · 3 years

Text

who is oikawa tooru?

i guess that’s a weird way to start off a post, considering just how popular oikawa is in this fandom. i’m absolutely certain that he’s still one of the most popular characters if i can take the #oikawasear trend on twitter a couple of weeks ago seriously. (i will be mourning that iwaoi is no longer the top ship in this fandom. it’s devastating to me on a personal level). and i can’t say that i’m any different, either, otherwise i wouldn’t have made this blog or this post. but i guess the reason i’ve been itching to write this is because i’ve been in this fandom--and more specifically, a fan of oikawa--for about four or five years now. i devour the content available, and i can assure you that i’ve read too many of the fanfictions on ao3 to be healthy, and never before have i seen a character whose characterization is so hotly disputed.

and i get it. he’s a complex person. he’s kind of awkward in that there is a very clear disconnect between his outward personality and who he is alone. it’s a very hard balance to strike, especially when you consider just how much conjecture goes on in his characterization among fans and in discourse. he’s really easy to project and certain traits, correct or otherwise, are amplified based off how authors perceive him. there’s plenty of presumptions that can be made based on his on-screen actions/thoughts/beliefs that can be taken to some very logical conclusions.

but i’ve also seen people write him in ways that don’t strike me as particularly truthful. he’s type casted into stereotypes that don’t do him justice, or made into something that is vaguely like oikawa, but not quite. in the following post, i’ll be trying to dispel misunderstandings of his character, if only for my own sanity.

tl;dr i think that oikawa is chronically one of the most misrepresented characters in fandom and i want to fix that

exclaimer: i am solely an anime-watcher; i have seen snippets of the manga and therefore have a general idea of what is going on.

let’s establish some very very basic stuff. just to keep it simple, i’m not going to talk about anything beyond what has been published via the anime (as of season four).

Oikawa Tooru | 及川徹

gender: male

d.o.b.: 1994.7.20. or 20 July, 1994

height: 184.3 cm

weight: 72.2 kg

occupation: high school 3rd year, class 6

position/number: setter, 1 (captain)

here’s something that’s never pointed out: oikawa is in class 6 which, if we go off the trend of every other school in haikyuu!!, means that he is in a college preparatory class aka he’s pretty dang smart. it’s not confirmed or anything, but it a. follows the trend of every other class 6 student and b. is the highest class available among seijoh 3rd years (classes 5, 3, and 1). don’t get the idea that he’s dumb or unintelligent, or even that his strengths only lie in the classroom because that would be a gross understatement of his skills.

anywho.

generally speaking, i like to start with the building blocks of his personality because there’s so much room for assumptions. here are the things that i think make up his core personality:

intelligence/knowledgeable: not only academically speaking, but he’s also well-versed in people. he knows how to play them--what will make someone more confident, more doubtful, what will help his teammates succeed. clearly, oikawa is very knowledgeable in human thought patterns. or he’s dedicated a lot of time to knowing them.

loyalty: of all of oikawa’s traits, i think this one gets talked about the least, but we know it to be true. we make jokes about “you should have come to shiratorizawa” but it really shows you exactly how loyal, how much trust, oikawa has in this team that he has spent three years shaping. he never stops believing in the work that he has put in, and especially the hard work that his teammates have put into their volleyball.

hardworking: one of the most well-known things about oikawa. most fans already know that his white knee pad is actually a knee brace. ‘nuff said. i salute you, good sir.

insecurity: oikawa’s insecurities are perhaps his most notable trait. in a sense, he’s sort of the underdog--so good, but never quite good enough to accomplish what he’s set out to do. and we know that he’s struggled with his doubts since junior high, literally since he was 12 or 13, and that’s informed all of his character from the moment he ran into ushijima. oikawa is someone who is defined by his insecurities.

oikawa is a lot of things. he’s introduced as someone who is very flamboyant--he’s built up by kageyama as the best setter, his senpai literally and figuratively, his initial shots are all of smug smiles and easy, unfaltering swagger in the face of this new team. even his theme, all rambunctious brass and jazzy, is meant to be all in your face, here’s the big boss! he’s someone who is petty and silly and seems to favor shallow conversation. but he’s oikawa, so there’s a surprising amount of depth in the little time that we have with him. there’s a reason that, in any other franchise, he’d probably be the protagonist.

he is someone full of contradictions. he’s childish and he spends time with a bunch of girls and is very clearly someone who likes to project a certain image of himself to the public (see: his cute lil’ humming run after his yell in s4e23 to make him seem kind of normal). but he’s also spent a lot of time with himself. in fact, if we take the few scenes we have of him alone and his bedroom (bare, spartan, meticulous) into account, oikawa actually is much more solemn and/or serious than the image he projects. he’s comfortable in the silences between all the white noise. he’s alright just being with iwaizumi. he allows himself to dwell on the past and his shortcomings, while also looking forward to the future. his ambition and passion to improve drive him, but his past failures weigh him down. they haunt him.

personally, i think that he’s naturally a pretty silly guy when given the chance. it’s not just for show. iwaizumi would even corroborate this à la oikawa’s introduction speech in s1. he likes having fun when he can with his friends. if we assume that oikawa is most himself with iwaizumi, then we definitely know that’s the case (see: “are you my mom, iwa-chan?”), and there’s nothing wrong with that. but i think that the most basic traits of his character, combined with his experiences in volleyball, have pushed him to be this person who is mired in doubt. it’s forced him to go down a path where something that he once loved for the fun of it has now become the source of his ire. it’s really just that simple. maybe in another life, things would be different and oikawa wouldn’t have to struggle as much. but that’s really just a part of the human experience, isn’t it? and, in all honesty, would we really love oikawa as much without all his vices?

and maybe this is getting into speculation, but i don’t think it’s a difficult argument to make that oikawa is really mature. he’s introspective. i say introspective because the revelations that he’s had in regards to his own strengths and weaknesses--those are things he’s had to confront and deal with since he was in junior high (starts at 12 years of age). it takes someone with a lot of maturity and self-awareness to realize those kinds of things about himself.

and he’s stronger than he gets credit for. most people depict him as a crybaby, but he’s really not. he doesn’t cry or give up in the face of ushijima or kageyama’s unfettered growth and successes, he doesn’t cry when faced with defeat. oikawa is there to support iwaizumi in his own doubt as ace, and lend support to his teammates. and oikawa doesn’t get stuck on the what-ifs or has-beens. driven by his infamous ambition, he looks forward to the future.

it’s kind of a double-edged sword. it’s pushed him this far--he’s put in this much effort to be one of the best in the prefecture--because of his competitive spirit, but it’s also something that has caused him serious injury. oikawa’s motto (”if you’re gonna to hit it, hit it until it breaks!”) is the very epitome of this mentality. it’s a message to work hard to finish what you started, but i also think that you could interpret that hard work breaking you, too. he’s steadfast—obsessive, really—to the point that oikawa will let his passions break him before he would ever give up. it’s the point of all the strife in his life, because he would never have the problems he does if he were even a little less enamored by this sport.

and you really have to wonder where he would be without ushijima and kageyama as his obstacles. his drive will always be there, that is an intrinsic part of him, as are the standards to which he holds himself, but you really have to wonder just how good oikawa would be if he didn’t have such direct competitors. this is an incredibly important question to ask about kageyama and oikawa in particular. yes, oikawa does loathe ushijima: for his disregard for oikawa’s decisions, for his disregard of oikawa’s loyalty, for his flippant attitude of seijoh, who oikawa has poured his blood and sweat into creating. but ushijima is an opposite hitter. oikawa is a setter. those are two very different positions with little crossover. but with kageyama--that is a clear rivalry. they push each other to be better, made all the more potent by their differences as players; one setter’s growth as a player directly impacts how the other performs in each subsequent game. seijoh’s defeat by karasuno in season 2 just feeds into oikawa’s drive for the future. he has not intention of giving up. a light was lit under him, pushing him forward, to do better, to be better.

this is something that has been pointed out in a different analysis (linked below) but, narratively speaking, oikawa is kageyama’s foil. their interactions inform their characters and are a major cause of tension in their development. their relationship is really the most complex in the story that i have noticed, and is something that has not been appreciated enough. the iwaizumi-oikawa thing has been expounded and studied in every facet possible (i love the alexander the great/hephaestion allusions), but it’s true that kageyama has impacted oikawa the most. they begrudgingly respect each other’s talents, what it is that they bring to the court, while also envying what the other has in spades that they do not. in oikawa’s case, his strength clearly lies in his interpersonal relationships--his ability to intuit exactly what his teammates need to be at their best. kags is just a fount of overwhelming technical skill who has a really hard time getting to know those around him. living up to the standards that oikawa places on himself, in tandem with kageyama threatening his position as setter, leave oikawa floundering, fearing his own incompetence against opponents who are naturally much better than he. so he’s left with the knowledge that maybe his best isn’t good enough, but he still continues on anyway. he pushes himself past a seemingly unreachable threshold just to go toe-to-toe with this monster. it’s the purpose of his character--to tell this story of the ordinary v. the extraordinary--and it is perhaps the most relatable arc that a story like haikyuu!! can tell.

their connection naturally causes oikawa to seek out help, seen in the flashback scenes where he is talking to an unspecified coach/adult. that coach’s words then become the creed upon which oikawa plays, maybe even more than what iwaizumi has taught him, and is the final push that completes oikawa’s character arc in s2ep24. that change in mindset allows oikawa to see kageyama’s unbridled talent not as an obstacle but as a challenge. it’s very nuanced, but it makes all the difference. it’s why, following seijoh’s defeat, oikawa has the audacity to declare to kageyama and ushijima his plans for the future. in a sense, karasuno and kageyama and ushijima have won the battle but not the war. it’s the tipping point in his story and, more than anything, what makes oikawa so compelling. we have seen what has led up to the change, but now we want to know what he’s going to do to meet that challenge. what will he be doing beyond the story when he is no longer relevant to the narrative? we don’t know the details at this point, but we know that oikawa’s love and ambition for volleyball have been reaffirmed in this moment.

but to bring it back, the kags-oiks connection also makes us question what it is we are watching, makes us as the audience think: what qualifies someone as a genius? are there any limitations to what that genius can do? what can ordinary people do in the face of those geniuses?

these are questions that exist beyond the reality of sports and transverse into other disciplines. for me, those are very real questions that i have had to ask myself as a musician. i have dedicated nine, almost 10, years to my practice but there are still 10-year-olds who are just better at it than i ever will be. part of it is time and practice to be sure, but some of it is just innate. and i think the more appropriate version of those questions would be this: what qualifies someone as a prodigy? are there limitations for prodigies? what can we do in the face of prodigies?

oikawa is a genius player--he knows the ins-and-outs of his sport better than anyone, and he can accomplish great feats that others in his same position can’t. but even with all that veritable experience and skill, he is ultimately still overtaken by a prodigy whose talents seem endless. it’s why he can hate ushijima but fear kageyama. one is something he can actively fight against, the other is inevitable.

and really, i think that’s the beauty of oikawa tooru, why he’s so beloved by the fandom, even years after he has stopped being relevant to the narrative. beyond the fluff and goofiness and hijinks, there’s someone there who is really, truly, human.

an aside with much less significance/why do people think this??

so here’s one thing: even though oikawa has fangirls, i wonder what he actually thinks of them. for one, it’s only natural for anyone to be super flattered if people think you’re hot stuff. that’s just... i don’t think he’s weird if he pays attention to them. but i think that people are conflating his being kind to them to being genuinely egotistical due to the attention. actually, i think these are opposing ideas and a contradiction of who oikawa is. when you’re an arrogant person, you think that you deserve all the attention you’re getting and you’re not going to bother with the people who worship you.

but that’s not at all what oikawa does. he’s rather kind to his fans. i would never say that he’s self-effacing, but knowing what you’re worth is different from being pompous. and think about it. it’d be a real jerk move for oikawa to not say nice things to them and thank his fangirls when they spend time, energy, and effort to make him food and see his games. he would just be a genuinely awful person if he didn’t at least give them thanks. it’d be more alarming if he didn’t talk to them, at least in my opinion. more than anything, we should consider this: why is it that oikawa has the fan club and not anyone else on the seijoh team? i’m sure a part of it is because he’s attractive and the captain of a team, but i think it’s more than that, too. we see these interactions from other perspectives, but i think that reflects more on those around oikawa than oikawa himself if they don’t understand why he acts the way he does with those girls.

another thing: i don’t think that anyone can question that oikawa is very pretty, or handsome, or whatever descriptor you would like. it’s prevalent in fandom (see: pretty setters squad), but he is also the only person in canon to be acknowledged by other characters as being particularly good-looking. maybe the miyas count at this point? i’m not sure. but i don’t really understand where people get the idea that he is particularly focused on his appearance, though. there is literally no indication of that from the material that i have seen. and maybe he uses that to his advantage with his fangirls, but i highly doubt that, in all honesty. i think that it’s fun to imagine him being into these things as a hobby, but it irks me greatly when i see that people spend time saying that oikawa wakes up extra early just to fix his hair or slather on foundation/concealer just to look presentable.

he’s a teenaged boy who clearly has other things that worry him, he’s a full-time student, and volunteers to coach at lil tykes volleyball classroom in his free time. he wouldn’t have time to spend on his hair or makeup. and we even seen in the hanger tooru special that he even wakes up looking like that.

he is au naturale, my friends. and we even know how little he gives thought to his own body, if you take into account his knee brace. for oikawa, his body is merely the medium through which he can accomplish his goals. we even have evidence of this when we see oikawa up all night studying karasuno game play or via his knee brace. he doesn’t know how to stop or understand when enough is enough. he breaks himself if there’s no one to watch him.

also, just... how would makeup work, logistically speaking? i don’t wear makeup, but i’m thinking that foundation and concealer and hair product would be, um, really bad. like, it’d run down his face and stuff. also, it’d probably get into his eyes, too? seriously. i’m not against oikawa wearing makeup in the slightest cause he’d be even prettier, but we know that oikawa would absolutely not jeopardize his chances in any way.

thank you for reading this long-winded, probably awful look into my favorite character of all time. and i do mean that. he is my favorite character in all of media. which, like, says a lot when he’s competing against the casts of a:tla, call me by your name, and my actual favorite book, the song of achilles. after all of that, if you would like another (better) analysis of oikawa’s character, i suggest this reddit thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/haikyuu/comments/94irsi/character_analysis_16_oikawa_tooru_discussion/

#oikawa tooru #haikyuu #character analysis #i'm so sorry about this #i just had to get this off of my chest #thanks for coming to my ted talk

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raayllum · 4 years

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the part in your last post where u said “i’m obssessed with rayllum” made me remember of when some ppl on twitter were like “it’s so uncomfortable seeing adults obsessed about shipps with teenage characters” and. it’s not that deep?? 😭😭 it’s just a bunch of drawings/PIXELS in a screen?? 😭😭😭 i get that fiction can influence reality but Damn, some people take it *too* far

if fiction could screw with people like that i’d be fucked bc i was reading greek mythology (incest, murder, people killing their own children, and more) from age six. and my book of myths was sanitized, sure, but barely. but i’m not. if anything, my long held interest in mythology has added a lot of joy and light to my life, including helping me earn my english degree, in which how literature affects reality is literally something i’ve taken courses on. the anti vs. everyone else discourse stretches back to plato and aristotle, so you can imagine how tired i am of it. because while fiction can influence reality, fiction is not reality, and treating fiction like it’s reality is what’s actually harmful.

it’s also not uncommon or weird at all that adults — people who were once *gasp* teenagers themselves — would enjoy revisiting that time in their lives vicariously and with beautiful hindsight in hand? like “coming of age” films and anything with child or teen protagonists are written by adults. looks like we have to chuck out the entire varied YA genre because the authors like ships between their teenage characters.

it’s also like when i was fourteen, my fave ship was between two side characters who were 13 and 14. but i shipped them and wrote stuff about them well beyond that age, because i exist in reality and grow beyond the source material, and it’s not that much of a stretch that i would want to take those characters with me and have those characters exist beyond the limits (age or otherwise) of their source material, too.

then when i was 16, my favourite ship was between characters who i always saw as 25 and 23 years old. sometimes in my fics they were even 28 and 26. because it’s almost like i’m drawn to dynamics and change and interesting development more than any arbitrary idea that i should only like couples who are my age. (not even getting into how much younger fandom shits on older fans in their 30s and 40s who — like me — probably grew up in fandom since their teen years). which is stupid, to say the least.

and now i’m here at 20 (aka i only just stopped being a teenager like 1-2 years ago) and my favourite ship is rayllum, who are each a month shy of their 15 and 16th birthdays respectively. and like my other ships, i’m gonna love ‘em forever, and we don’t know how old they’ll be by the time the series is over. maybe they’ll be my age (and i would’ve surpassed that likely by the time the saga is over anyway) or maybe they’ll only be 17.

really, any argument against adult fans being invested in certain aspects of a source material shows a complete ignorance for fandom history from the 60s — fandom has always 90% been an adult space and still is — but just shows a complete lack of like, empathy and long term thinking. like zero braincells and imagination.

i’m writing a series where my main characters, at the start, are between the ages of 11-15. by the end, they’re 16-20. i started writing them when i was 12 and i’m probably only going to have the whole series finished and published when i’m 35. can i not dedicate 20+ years of my life to writing about teenagers that i created and the war they’re going through and the relationships they have??

because yeah, they’re teenagers, that’s where the series starts and ends, but i know exactly what they’re like in their 30s and 40s and further?? i know who has kids and who doesn’t?? and i write about it in my own little document that will never be published because it doesn’t matter within the series as a whole, but it’s still fun. and the only main difference between having fun with my own canon and having fun with someone else’s is ownership.

like if i imagine my own characters in ways that are technically canon, because they’re mine, figuring out life in their 20s and including sexual relationships sometimes and child rearing etc., then why can’t i do that with the characters of a source material i didn’t create firsthand? there’s no imagination difference.

but then, according to that sort of twitter thinking, aging up teenage characters to ages that adults probably relate to more, for a variety of reasons, is also wrong. so then you’re circling back to having adult fans only being able to write about the characters as teens — which goes back to the shaming principle i mentioned earlier.

which comes back to using shame to make people feel guilty for liking the characters they like with a convenient moral panic with dangerous and desensitizing insinuations. (ever heard of alarm fatigue?) because that’s not what the late 1800s women’s movement did to sex workers or born out of puritanical christian / terf or aphobic rhetoric (teens can’t be ace bc teens should be sexless, etc).

not to mention, it acts like teenagers are a monolith who not only can’t know how to curate their own content (infantilization + helicopter parenting) but that it’s not important for them to learn critical thinking skills. (shocking that twitter is seeing the meltdown of that and poor reading comprehension now). it acts like teenagers never like any “problematic” ship. that “protect the children” rhetoric never means harassing said children. like my worst experience when i was in an anti infested fandom was when i was sixteen year old (questioning) sex repulsed asexual and i was called a pedophile by grown adults, bc i protected my privacy rights and didn’t have my age online, and bc i shipped two characters who didn’t have canon ages in the show and i saw as 25 and 23. (there was age discourse over the 23 year old, who was an alien, and dated another alien who was 10,000s of years older than her but looked like he was in his twenties, and then she dated a teenager. so. very objectively clear, isn’t it? *eye roll*) like if you need to know someone’s a minor so you won’t repeatedly and violently harass them with moral & illegal accusations — although i’m sure i would’ve been harassed anyway — they’re not the problem here.

which is to say: twitter anti rhetoric? tis bullshit

#anti purity culture #thanks for asking #anonymous #fandom nonsense #twitter #anyway cheers to that nonnie #Anonymous

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capricornsicle · 4 years

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I have a feeling your ask box and I are going to be familiar. You might be hot-taked out after that killer Satomi discourse. But whenever you’ve got it in you, I’d sure love to hear what you think about Kira and her Jeff-deemed-absolutely-necessary departure.

Oh, definitely. And I do love content, so...

Kira Yukimura was done so dirty by the writers and Jeffrey “I’m not racist I’ll prove it by arguing to poc calling me out for it on twitter” Davis. Her treatment was racist, tokenizing, and it wasn’t even high-brow racism. It was sloppy and lazy. If you’re gonna write all your characters of color off the show, commit to it. She went to the desert like 5 times before she stayed. Cowards.

Kira was only meant to be on the show for the Nogitsune storyline in 3b. However, fans liked her so much that, as with Theo in season 6, she was brought back for more episodes. The difference is that Cody Christian is white-passing and male and Arden Cho is not. Female characters don’t exist on Teen Wolf without a relationship to a male character. Hayden existed for Liam. Tracy existed for Theo. Melissa existed for Scott and Argent. Allison existed for Scott. Lydia, the female character with the most screentime of all of them, spent a lot of her time existing in relationship to Jackson, Stiles, Parrish (shudder), and other male main characters. Women on the show were reduced to love interests and mothers more often than not, and Kira was the same.

I loved her character. I loved her arc. I loved Arden Cho, who in real life is as sweet and kind as her character. I enjoyed her parents, both Noshiko, who’s surprisingly funny and a total badass, and Ken, who’s the most wholesome man in the universe. The only straight man we stan. I love him.

Anyways, Kira was getting a fun arc outside of being Scott’s girlfriend, with her parents and her powers and all, and then wham, white-passing boy shows up and no more main character status for Kira. Guess there wasn’t enough room to keep the only interesting plot line of all the ones happening in s5. Personally, I would have chosen Kira over the Marrish garbage fire of underage relationships, but that’s just me.

Then. The Skinwalkers. I could write a whole essay about them, but this is a Kira post, so I’ll limit it to her. At least Luther got sent to the moon for a reason. Kira got sent to the desert for “rEaSoNs”. There was no indication that her power was out of control, but every indication it wasn’t. She was growing and learning. Then, suddenly, she was “too powerful” so she had to go to the desert and disappear for a few episodes and then go back and forth for a while before they wrapped up sending Theo to the upside down or wherever he went and she could finally go... hang out with the people who we were told could help her control her power but who only threw spears at her and gave her a season finale ex machina. Then back to the desert with you!

You can tell something was going on backstage in her treatment. Arden Cho wasn’t informed she was being cut, she had to be told by fans. Her departure was carried out as swiftly as possible, and not for any real reason. Kira would have been tremendously helpful against the hunters and in a lot of later scenes, against the Ghost Riders (and let me remind everyone that KIRA WAS THE ONE WHO TOLD LYDIA ABOUT THE WILD HUNT), against pretty much anything. Immune to electrocution? Don’t help with the hunters who love electrocuting people. Sloppy writing through and through.

And what’s more is that Kira was cut just in time for the Scalia thing, which was so fucking rushed oh my GOD nothing has ever been less natural- this is a Kira post, calm down capsicle. Anyways, Kira got replaced as Scott’s love interest and not much else by a white girl, no hate on Malia or Shelley but much on the writers. I loved Malia and Kira’s friendship, and if anyone should have gotten with Malia, it should have been Kira. (The first time I saw Malia I wondered if we were getting another ambiguously brown character, actually, but no, just Georgian and well-tanned. But I bet not all my followers knew Tracy was played by a Chinese and Cherokee actor. Or that Nolan was played by a Mexican and Caxcan actor. Or that Theo was played by a Penobscot Native actor. The list goes on of white-passing POC who got to stay marginally longer than Black or brown characters.) The “Scott ends up with a white girl he has no chemistry with” threw me for many loops, especially after I was surprised to find myself liking Scira, even though I’m usually bored by straight relationships because of their one-sided focus and nonexistent chemistry. Kira got to be a character outside of Scott, and I liked their romance better for it, and then desert for a thousand years!

TLDR on the canon end of things is that Kira and Arden were done dirty by a group of powerful white men who wanted to tell a cishet white story.

Now, on the fandom end of things, I’m stepping into the real hot water. It’s safe to say that Kira’s story was sloppy and Arden didn’t deserve that ending, but it’s less safe to say that this fandom doesn’t treat her that well either. Here’s the most popular x Scott ships on Ao3, under the Teen Wolf tag with no other filters.

Scott and Allison. Scott and Stiles. Scott and Isaac. Then Scott and Kira, in dead last. Scott and Malia don’t even make the top ships list, probably because of how rushed and sloppy it was, but I digress.

People love Scott and Allison a lot, and I get that. I liked her too. I was also sad when she died. But, unlike a lot of sentiment I see in this fandom, I don’t think she should have been brought back to fight the beast in season 5 and get back with Scott. Not only do I think bringing characters back to life without very good reason and explanation (which they wouldn’t have, come on) cheapens their death, and that bringing characters back to life is weak storytelling in general, but let’s recall that Scira is still a thing in season 5. They’re still madly in love when Kira leaves. Allison should not have come back and love-triangled so Kira could be written off for a different white girl or so the massive amount of young white girls in the fandom who love Allison would be angry at Kira for breaking up their OTP. That would have been the one thing that could have made season 5 worse. (Well, they could have made Marrish a thing or killed Mason, but Jeff Davis thought about it and a shiver went down his spine because the ghost of Christmas future hears my name in its nightmares.)

Even if people aren’t “bring Allison back” campers, they largely ignore Kira’s entire existence. People who post gifsets and posts about Allison or Lydia don’t give anywhere near the same amount of attention to Kira. I see more Malia posts, actually. And while all of them had more runtime than Kira, none of them paired with Scott quite as perfectly, or had such strong independent storylines. Lydia almost did, but it kept petering out and she kept going back to main plot only. I see lots of appreciation posts for Allison and Lydia and Malia and the men, obviously, but NOTHING for Kira or Arden Cho. We all know what happened backstage because we read the same post in 2016 or whenever and then we all stopped talking about it.

Even the racism in this fandom skips Kira. Scott antis, I’m looking (controversially) at you. I’m glad Kira isn’t the subject of a bunch of obvious racism (as much as “bring Allison back!” makes it subtle), but not because she’s a forgotten side character. Kira made the main credit sequence! She has a sword! What else could you all POSSIBLY want?

And here’s where I burn at the stake: Kira was written off her own damn “look Fun Japanese mythology” storyline half the time so it could center around Stiles. A white boy. There were numerous issues with the mythology before that — “Oni” means demon, not “firefly samurai ninja”, and it refers to a similar mythology as the western “fae”, a large collection of creatures benevolent, malevolent, and in between, with different traits and origins. Kitsunes are meant to be red or white, not gold, and they’re foxes, not cats, animation team. “Nogitsune” refers to the malevolent class of “low” Kitsune, or “wild” Kitsune, who didn’t align themselves with the goddess Inari and do divine and pious work. There are many of them and the most they really do is harass people at shrines, not murder indiscriminately for funsies. They’re only malevolent in that they like doing bad deeds, not that they’re serial killers. And they’re not one of the usual 13 low Kitsune, two of which are bad of their own accord! (Spirit and Air. Google it!) They are meant to be dealt with by Inari-aligned high Kitsune, not your average tricky fox. Among other things.

So Stiles. Outside of the Kira storyline, he’s used in a lot of fandom discourse about racism and sexism. And queerbaiting. Y’all love a scrawny white boy. Anyways, Stiles gets possessed by the Nogitsune (that’s NOT how that works but okay Jeffrey) and suddenly s3 is about him. Kira’s not evil, now let’s look at Stiles being tired and messy and killing people. Dylan #1 did a great job playing that part, no hate on him, but the fact that a white boy became the main character in a Japanese (or Korean, if you’re Jeff, same thing) girl’s storyline is. Hmm. How do you call it? Blatant racism. And erasure. Which is racism. YIKES, Jeff. There is so much wrong with Stiles being the Nogitsune and controlling the Oni and his whole story (and oh my god the other guy who got possessed was also a white boy instead of a Japanese character played by the same actress Jesus fucking Christ). I’m not going into that, because that’s its own essay.

Anyways, because of how much this fandom loves Stiles, it’s easy to ignore how Kira and Japanese characters were treated. People project onto Stiles with glee. He’s white. He’s awkward. He’s (supposedly) not super attractive. (Yikes.) He’s ditzy and bouncy and all that fun stuff, but he also always saves the day. He got written off for most of 6b and he still saved the stupid day. And hey, dark!Stiles (let’s not get into calling him dark instead of Nogitsune that’s just too much wine we’d have to crack open to say it) is a fun trope and people like posting and creating about him. Except that he’s the white boy who took Kira’s storyline. Her independent story about Kitsune and the like was all given over to him, not just by the show, but by the fandom. So now every post about Kitsune is a Stiles post, even if it started with Kira. And because it’s Stiles, and this fandom loves him, and is easily offended by people leaning too hard on the glass house around them and him, Kira gets forgotten and swept aside. Everyone would rather talk about Stiles. Who is incapable of bad. Or cultural appropriation. But if you attack him you’re being ableist because he has ADHD. This is why I relate to Nolan for anxiety feels instead.

TLDR on the fandom end, y’all don’t treat Kira better than the show did. I see a few posts here and there from some dedicated users — typically the same people posting about Boyd, Deaton, Morrell, yeah that’s it I’m the only one posting about Kali. (Un-fun fact: Kali was not played by an Indian actor, but by a half-Black actor. Jeff Davis, when called out on twitter, said “wow ok idiots we tried to find an Indian actress but it was hard actually SUPER hard so shut up and stop telling me how to write MY show”, which is paraphrasing with intent to make fun, but exactly what he said.) Y’all who know about Arden and Kira should diversify your blogs to include more POC, especially ones where the actor AND character were rudely sidelined for vague white people reasons. Post gifs of Kira along with Allison, Lydia, and Malia. Post ship stuff of Scira too. Post about kitsunes, the origin story of the Nogitsune, when you post about the white boy who became the main character of that arc. Call the show out. Call the fandom out. Stop making every bit and piece of her story about Czechoslovakia White Boy. Demand Kira in any future runs of the show, if season 7 or whatever does happen. Include her in your fanfictions, in your headcanons, in your art. You don’t have to love her, but you have to remember that she’s as there as any of the white characters are.

This take is very hot. If I receive racist asks and/or messages about this, I’m going to make fun of each and every sender.

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off-in-the-moors · 3 years

Note

It is not the responsibility of art to be morally instructive. It is 100% YOUR responsibility to research something if you know you are a sensitive person, take responsibility for your self. Art does not need to be some clinical sanitized morality play, get over your weird Puritanical obsession that all art must conform to your specific world view. Either engage in challenging works or stick to children’s cartoons where you can feel ‘safe’.

Dear Anon,

I’m truly confused by this. I have no idea what are you referencing and what “inspired“ you to send me this “ask“. But I will do my best to give you something.

(It only took me this long to answer, bc I don’t log in very often.)

Let’s start with your assumption of me.

I’m not a sensitive person, in any meaning. I actually love reading and engaging in media that’s morally questionable or straight up morbid and disturbing. Some of my favorite thing are: paintings by Goya and Beksiński, folklore/mythology (in it’s most unchanged form), “Perfume“ both film and book, Hannibal tv series, true crime, to name a few. Your assumption that I’m just “a girl obsessed and only enjoying modern cartoons“ is insulting.

I actually do agree with you that art, in any form, isn’t responsible to be morally instructive, but every work of art is made to send some form of message, be an obvious one or hidden between pages. In my opinion, authors and writers should be aware of what message they want to send with their works and what messages they are sending with what and how they’re presenting.

On your “It is 100% YOUR responsibility to research something if you know you are a sensitive person, take responsibility for your self“ this is also true. But on the other hand, given media should provide you with some kind of warning and not a third party entity. For example, if I pick-up a YA book from a bookstore, bc of its synopsis or someone (be a person I know or a creator) recommended it to me, I don't expect "spicy" scenes or blatant a*use of a character by its love interest or just "torture p*rn" scenes in it but here they are. With no warning. Is it my fault? Partly yes. Is it the media's fault for not giving me any warnings? Also yes.

Even with researching "warnings" isn't that simple. When it comes to books, the only way is reading reviews or recommendations. With reviews, they're either positive and say nothing book related or are negative and full of spoilers. Recommendations nowadays most of the time don't even give you what the story is about, just "it has x, y and z in it", let alone "warnings". From my own experience, they either don't tell you about "unappropriated" stuff (be r*pe, d*ug a*use, a*use, etc.) or they down play them and in worst cases, excuse it or say "it gets better/it's addressed in the next book/later in the series".

But if you feel the need to micromanage everything you engage in, go for it. But most people don't and a warning would be nice.

(This of course doesn't apply to thing and character's actions deemed "problematic". If said stuff is well handled and addressed, it's perfectly ok to portray it. But again, if it addressed and/or showed as wrong, and not ignored, excused, or played as a joke.)

I don't know from where you took the "your weird Puritanical obsession", bc 1) I never petitioned for that in my posts, and 2) I'm actually against censuring and sanitation of media.

Now, on to what "inspired" you to write this.

Again, I have no f-clue. So here are my best guesses:

If it's about Pathologic: I only have problem with people forcing their politics, modern sentiments and opinions/interpretations on to something they don't fully understand, because they're from a different cultural climate. An American can't fully (or in some cases, refuses to) understand something made by Europeans (in this case Russians) for Europeans in mind. I don't want to mix myself into the fandom discourse/drama, because I don't care what people think or how they interpret stuff, even if it's taken from something minor or from nowhere with no support (or even is debunked) in canon. I don't care if people like or hate this one character. Just don't police people for liking things, you don't like. Nor do public shaming or send people on those you don't agree with. You don't like a pixel man on platform shoes? Fine. Just don't bully and attack people who do.

If it's about my post about B*rdugo's adult book: I will admit, the wording and presentation wasn't the best. I was writing it from a place of strong emotions, but I'm still standing by my opinion that some things should not be presented with graphic details in a book without any type of warning. Here we could have a discussion about trigger warnings in books, hers response to the idea of putting them on her book and what is consider "too far", but this isn't about that. I actually have a lot of problems with B*rdugo and her fan-base, besides that. Her use of Russia, it's history, religion iconography and culture only for aesthetic and not doing proper research (she called her series "Greg's trilogy") or showing any respect for it (with characters, how are not main and secondary characters, a Slavic stereotype); her portray of dyslexia and how the fandom likes to use it as a joke in relation to this character; or people shielding her from any form of criticism with "She's is xyz, so she can write this". But I don't care about her and her works.

I stopped reading YA books, because I can't stand them any longer and their "handling" of topics, with people holding up every-single-one as "the best book ever written", not because of the quality or story but because the author is xyz, and spitting at every book written before 2000s. I'll get flag for it but YA novels are the Pulp fiction of our times (of course not all, but most of the popular ones are). I stopped trusting people recommending them to me, because 90% of the time, I'm just disappointed by them.

If it's about K and TRC: I already said so much about this. Margaret isn't aware of her audience, she writes for herself (which she admitted on a podcast) and refuses to change it to please anyone. She created and killed K for two reasons: to further Ronan's character arc (to be used for teaching him to dream better and a (not working) foil of him (or Adam... or Gansey)) and as her weird catharsis of killing everything she hates (who she apparently was; "fratty boys and chortling men") personified as one boy (and yes, boy, because this fandom likes to forget he’s only seventeen, the same age as the Gangsey. If you excuses their actions, like Ronan and Adam’s racist jokes or Gansey’s toxic behaviors towards Adam with “they’re just teenagers”, why K is excluded from being a stupid teen?). With Jordan, it's now obvious that she has a bias of suffering/dealing with your trauma (and addiction) "in the right way", of which in her eyes, K wasn't. She could not create K or she could not make him a harmful stereotype of a Slav, but she did. In a book targeted at 13-18 year olds, we have a drug-addicted boy committing a public s*icide and being demonized and forgotten by everyone.

But I'm done with this fandom, I never had a place in it. TRC fandom is 80% P*nch with a 1% being about K, but even this little corner is "too much" for the stans. I left for a reason, the only thing I regret is not apologizing for my out-burst. If someone who knows what I’m referencing is reading this, I’m truly sorry.

So, yea. I hope, I addressed your issue, Anon.

#ask anon #ask #pathologic #anti leigh bardugo #anti trc #anti maggie stiefvater

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chappedandfadedvds · 3 years

Text

Nov 24th, Tuesday 20:13

„Chug. Chug. Chug. Chug!“

Four pairs of eyes were strictly focused on the little square on the bottom left of their video chat, showing Moyo attempting to empty a whole bottle of beer in one go. While the others watched and laughed and cheered him on. Even Sander had abondoned his work in favor of joining them, as he sat behind Robbe on the bed, watching over his shoulder.

They had just finished their English, Geography and, lo and behold, their Dutch homework, not fifteen minutes ago. Now strongly convinced they deserved a beer to celebrate today’s achievment. So they had stormed off to raid their kitchens and were back within seconds almost. Moyo just shouldn’t have told the group that he could chug his beer completely whenever he wanted to.

Moyo came surprisingly close to finish it. There was just the tiniest bit of beer left, which sadly proofed to be too much, and made the poor boy splutter it all across his desk he sat at.

Very much to the enjoyment of his four spectators. Who immediately began to toasted each other, taking a large sip of their own bottles respectivly, while Moyo ran off to get anything he could in order to clean the mess on the table.

Everyone was busy joking and teasing their friend, as he wished off the beer, cursing when he found that his phone hadn’t been spared.

„So, mhm guys?“ Jens finally found enough courage to speak up about the one thought that had plagued him all day. He needed to apologise for his absence last week. He had thought he would do it right away, but when they all had appeared as if nothing had happened, he hadn’t been able to bring it up.

„Yeah?“ Aaron asked, a little confused by the sudden mood change, but did put his attention towards the screen.

„What’s up?“ Came the question from Sander, who seemed a little more casual about it. But then he wasn’t actually part of the broerrrs. Or at least he wasn’t with them as long and in chat, to actually be offended by Jens ghosting them.

„So, I wanted to apologise for last week, it was just a lot going on and I didn’t mean to cut you guys off. I don’t want to talk about, yet. I will, I promise. Just need some more time. That’s cool?“

Moyo looked a little unsure with forgiving Jens that quickly, but shrugged anyway in the end.

„Sure, bro. Just let us know when you have a bad day, okay?“ He added with a small smile, that certainly helped Jens to not feel as bad any longer. Maybe Robbe had already talked to them beforehand.

„Yes, definitely. I’m sorry.“

„It’s okay. We are still the broerrrs, right?“ Robbe was an angel, as he rose his bottle to the camera, grinning as waited for the others to follow his example.

„Hell yeah! Cheers!“ Aaron yelled overly excited. They didn’t needed to be told twice.

„Broerrrs.“ Moyo called to toast emptyhanded.

„Broerrrs.“ The choir of Sander, Robbe, Aaron and Jens chimed in cheery, as each of the boys took a sip.

„Fuck I missed you.“ It definitely was the thruth, now that they actually were simply talking and chilling, being the dumb boys they were supposed to be, Jens could almost forget all the other bullshit his life constantly threw at him.

„You’ve seen us on sunday, man.“ Aaron reminded him of their group chat from only two days ago, as if he somehow had forgotten about that.

„Yeah but, I mean you guys. You know. This.“ Jens threw his arms up, moving them about in some general way to indicate he meant this moment right here.

„Same.“

At least Moyo got him. The two boys nodding at each other in a mutual understanding.

„I love you guys.“ Aaron blurted out into the small break of them more or less talking over each other permenantly.

„Dude.“

The prompt uncomfortableness that settled in Moyo’s reaction was definitely causing the other three boys to further their display of affection, blowing kisses at Aaron.

„We love you too.“ Sander, Robbe and Jens exclaimed brightly in unison. Aaron was more than happy to reply with a big smile.

„I’m gonna get another beer.“ Moyo interrupted, trying his best to sound annoyed, but instead laughed and shook his head at his friends before he got up and left. Right before the phone next to Jens on his bed lit up.

His hands were fast to open up the notification. It could only be one person. And Jens was right.

Lucas 20:27: should be there in 10 minutes. just got off the train. ❤️

Jens smile widend as he read the message one more time. He sat up a bit straighter on his bed, his fingers busy to type a quick reply.

„Good news?“ Sander inquired. The biggest grin gracing his lips knowingly. Wich made Jens a little worried that he was too obvious. He prayed it was just because the two boys knew about Lucas, because Robbe’s expression was not looking much different from his boyfriend’s right now.

Jens did the only thing he could think off. He flipped them off, like the newly turned adult he was.

„Am I missing something?“ Aaron certainly looked a bit puzzled as much as he seemed curious, wanting to to be let in on the joke.

„When aren’t you?“ Moyo provided casually, as he had returned, now busy to open the bottle and not chug it this time, before he added: „But yeah, what’s up?“

„Nothing. Sander is an ass.“ Jens replied simply, certain that it would get them off his back. He knew his friends. Jokingly insulting each other was their primary activity. Nowadays a little less insensitive than last year. Which was a good change to have gone through.

„Toast to that!“ Robbe was the one to call for his friends to join in, much to Sander’s displeasure. The older boy trying hard to pull an annoyed face in light of the betrayal by his own boyfriend. Yet not quite able to hide his underlying amusement.

It gave Jens a moment to rethink his former dismissal of Aaron’s question. He probably shouldn’t hide Lucas that much. The broerrrs knew the boy. They had spent at least some time together. It was normal right? They were friends. Just also a bit more than that, but he hadn’t to bring that up. Two out of four knew already anyway. It was fine.

„Actually Lucas is coming over. He is alone most of the week, so he is here every once in a while.“ Jens said, not sure if he wanted to regret it immediately. Perhaps he shouldn’t have told them and just bid his goodbye instead.

Jens was very glad he hadn’t, given the following second.

„Oh Robbe, careful! I think Jens is getting a new best friend, now that you left him to suck a dude’s dick.“

Jens was snorting so hard at Moyo’s teasing, that he literally chocked on the beer he just had taken a sip of. This response towards Lucas coming over was glorious and to be honest Jens was pretty much on his way to do the exact same thing to Robbe, so really, they did that to each other. Not that Moyo would actually know that. Jens just couldn’t stop himself from finding it hilarious, even less when he saw the scandalised face Robbe made.

„Moyo.“ Robbe shouted shocked, gaping at his screen.

„He is not wrong, you know.“ Sander provided confidently, looking way too cheeky, as he wiggled he brows suggestivly at the camera and then at Robbe. His boyfriend not taking any of Sander’s shit and tackling the giggling boy instead out of frame.

„I have never....“ Robbe declared laughing loudly. He broke off midsentence, as he turned back towards his laptop, obviously not sure what point he actually wanted to make in the first place.

Well he definitely hadn’t sucked Jens’s dick, that was for sure.

The truth didn’t made it less funny. Jens was wheezing at this point through all of the discourse unfolding in front of him. Which was stupid because it shouldn’t be that funny, It had simply been a throwaway line from Moyo. So perhaps it was the easieness of them all being together again, or the influence of the alcohol, or the simple exhaustion from their schoolwork. Maybe even all of the above.

„Lucas should join us. Get him a beer when he arrives, otherwise he’ll probably run straight back home.“ Aaron deverted the topic. And blessed be he.

„Sure.“ Jens barely was able to get out, while he was busy calming down his breathing between occasional coughs. Sander was back in frame kissing Robbe, leaving a very confused Moyo to watch them.

„You know something else I have here, to make this evening even better?“

The voice of Moyo caught everyones attention as he proceeded to pull out some weed from a drawer next to him. Sander was the first to declare his happy approval, as he picked up a jacket from somewhere on his left and proceeded to present the group with a little bag of weed and paper. The older boy loosing no time at all to roll one for Robbe and himself.

Jens smirked nodding at his screen, very pleased with the direction this call took.

They haden’t smoked together for a couple of weeks now. He almost had forgotten how nice it felt to be high and dumb with his friends, even if it was only over a video chat. So Jens leaned over to grab the little bit weed he had safely stashed away under his bed, holding it triumphant into the camera for the others to see.  Who all cheered in return, except for Aaron.

„Am I the only one without weed?“ The boy said pouting as he shook his head with a frown.

„Sucks to be you, bro.“ Jens replied nonchalant, knowing that Aaron wouldn’t be too mad anyway. Since he was with Amber he had told them he would smok a lot less. Basically exclusivly at parties. And that was fine with everyone. Jens lit the poorly thrown together joint and leaned back, waiting impatiently for Lucas to ring the bell downstairs.

Any minute now.

__ __ __

tagged: @odi-et-amo85, @tayspots

#week 5 #wtfock #skam #vds #jens stoffels #lucas van der heijden #chapped and faded #broerrrs #plus sander #love these idiots

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pochapal · 3 years

Note

rank every year of the 2010s from best to worst i want some pochapal lore

[warning for discussion of my fucked up mental health and my myriad traumas. we’re really opening the pandora’s box here gang]

ok time for me to overshare on the internet again! super long post because i can’t shut up and you asked for it. anyway, by objective ranking:

#1: 2012 - halcyon era, my personal peak. spent the whole year writing hunger games oc fics with my deviantart fanfiction besties whom i still think about all the time and always hope are having the best possible day. if you were here for this era understand i still hold you so closely and dearly in my heart <3.

#2: 2013 - god i was such a good example of a human being back then. was the year my writing like actually took off and i had a healthy balance between creative stuff and a social life (said social life consisting of spending lunchtimes at school breaking into classrooms and discussing fandom shit with five other people. reading homestuck updates in the music room on one person’s really shaky mobile data...legendary). highlight of the year and maybe my life was in the april of 2013 when i got out of failing to submit a hard deadline essay by telling my english teacher i wrote a whole novel over the two week break and then producing said novel. god i wish i had that level of like. fucking confidence back me back then knew what i wanted and how to get it.

#3: 2010 - the last year of childhood. i was 12 and played pokemon all the time with my friends and went places and had a moderately successful youtube channel and it didn’t matter that i was bullied so badly at school because i was basically high off life. summer of 2010 was so good specifically. i’d used to get the bus with a friend and go see movies and break into historical sites and get into normal childhood mayhem and maxed out my pokewalkers twice a month and i was buzzed because i had two (2) whole friendship groups to choose from and that was such a huge deal to me the terminal social outcast. it was so simple and carefree and even though everything and everyone involved in this era grew up to suck except for one specific person i kinda really miss it.

#4: 2018 - this was the first year i wasn’t depressed to the point of nonfunctioning. it was 20gayteen, i was on antidepressants, i was as close to thriving as i got at uni (going into town with people once a week, attending art and culture events, getting good grades across the board), i started to write for fun again, i got my cat whom i love dearly, i was exhibited in my uni’s city’s literature festival, GOD i actually nearly attended a pride event that year can you imagine. this year was basically my life’s second peak. miss getting the 8am train and daintily sipping on a cherry coke to keep me from passing out. wish this time could have lasted longer.

#5: 2019 - kinda absolute middle of the road year not for lack of anything happening but because the overwhelming amount of good and bad things cancelled each other out. so like there’s the fact that i was at the top of my uni game this year, was basically making the first steps into a professional writing career (covid i will never forgive you for killing all that dead </3), finally saved up enough to buy myself a gaming pc, and the summer after the homestuck epilogues, but equally 2019 was the start of the Pochapal Gender Fiasco which is by far the most horrible thing i am still currently undergoing and i burnt myself out mentally about halfway through the year (being stuck overnight in a hospital for a panic attack absolutely horrible horrible irredeemable) and then got like super death plague flu that i was sick with for three months (literally recovered less than a month before rona hit. god’s cruel karma.). so like...it kind of averaged out? the good shit was good but not as great as other years and the bad shit was awful but nowhere near as terrible as it could have been. gotta give a shoutout to 90% of my current mutual cohort for following me in 2019...omelette route gang make some noise !!

#6: 2014 - oof. this year essentially marked the start of a four year long downward mental health spiral because everything fell into awful alignment. i’d just turned 16, finished secondary school, had all my friends up and ditch me at once, was home alone for a whole summer, and was hit with Sudden Intense Body Image Issues that i couldn’t explain until uh. after very recent developments lmao. this one goes out to the me of july 2014 who did nothing but lay in bed and listen to the same two marina albums on a loop because fuck i’m attracted to men and also my facial and body hair are really starting to come in and if i think about this for too long i will literally kill myself because oh god i can’t handle getting older which is clearly and definitely the issue going on here. my brain fucking broke super hardcore and it’s a miracle that an overeating disorder was like the worst thing i walked away with.

#7: 2015 - downward spiral year two!! i was so volatile this year it was such a mess. i was totally socially isolated after a brief stint of falling in with a group of people at the start of my first year of sixth form until january where in quick succession a) it turned out every single one of these people was friends with the person who sexually assaulted me whom i obviously had a lot of complicated feelings towards and b) baby’s first crush came out as bisexual but in the “women and also trans women” kind of way which tore me up so terribly in ways i couldn’t begin to understand. no words for the experience of seeing a girl kiss a boy and crying so hard at night you threw up because you could never be her no matter how much you wanted it. actually kinda get the sense what was going on there was bigger than just some crush lmao. then after that i was so mentally ill i basically attended school less than half the time and it was the only year in my life i failed my exams. i ended up having to resit my entire set of first year a level exams because jesus christ was i in such a bad way it was a miracle i even showed up to them. all i did was either have anxiety attacks or enter bedbound depressive slumps for weeks at a time. but it’s okay because it gets worse.

#8: 2016 - downward spiral act iii: the spiralling. prefacing this by saying that i actually had two whole good months (april - may) in that i was functioning enough to do my exams and finish school with decent grades. the rest was super extra mega terrible. my school attendance for year 13 dipped below 65% and literally the only thing that kept me from being kicked out was the fact that i was naturally smart at the subjects i took and also because the school would have a lot to answer for after letting me get to that state despite having a hefty file on how damaged i was. keep in mind every single part of this was fully untreated btw - i was just floundering around and letting it all fester. i spent three solid weeks going to school but locking myself in the bathroom all day every day and having mental health episodes then going home like nothing else happened only to continue the breakdown that night. then things got kicked into fucked up overdrive when i moved out to uni and was cut off from what little support structures i did have. it was so bad all i did was cry all the time and never went anywhere to the point where three separate sources recommended me to the wellbeing and crisis counselling service that i stopped going to after two sessions because i was fucked up in ways cbt techniques could not even touch. at least i tried to make an effort for the first two months of uni which like. good for me?

#9: 2017 - what lieth at the base of the spiral. helltrench year. i was at literal rock bottom. i stopped going to class, i didn’t hand in a single piece of work. i lied to my parents and would book trains each day only to go back to my student flat and sit there and contemplate suicide. like i would just slump on the floor in a catatonic state and vividly contemplate one of four or so ways i could end my own life. i only didn’t because i wanted to wait until the summer to collect my last student loan and transfer it to my parents as an apology for my death which obviously didn’t end up happening. honestly i can’t remember much of the first half of 2017 that’s how bad it was. i remember taking a gender studies class and the teacher made it Weird that i was the Only Male Student in the room and then she sent me a scolding email after i walked out halfway through a class and never returned. apparently i got into a lot of online discourse in this year but i don’t remember anything other than being put on a blocklist by the milkfic author over ace discourse which is funny if you have the context. mostly i just baited terfs and weirdo freaks to get them to say horrible things to me as what i guess amounts to some kind of digital self harm. anyway breaking point came in late august when i got kicked out of university and then nobody could ignore it any more so there was no choice left but for me to seek out help and recover enough to function which luckily i did. i really Do Not remember 2017. you could tell me anything about that year and i’d probably believe you.

#10: 2011 - extra circle of hell for this little fucked up gem of a year. on the surface it wasn’t actually that terrible, until the Summer 2011 Domino Effect Of Bad Shit. up until like may/june it was a pretty all right year! i was 13 and had a surprisingly successful youtube channel uploading pokemon soundfont remixes to an audience of i think ~350-400 subscribers at my peak? anyway then i got hit with the early summer triple combo of childhood friends moving away, cute and quirky sexual assault at the hands of a person in my friend group, and then having some Really Great and Super Appropriate interactions with adults on deviantart. like obviously there’s the actual ptsd-inducing event which totally disrupted and killed the person i was right up until that moment and reshaped every facet of my life for better or worse (there’s an alternate timeline where that didn’t happen and i got into electronic music and/or coding instead) but really it’s the events that followed in its wake which were kind of more fucked up. so like all of a sudden i was super aware of my body and me growing my hair out and being mistaken for a girl in class suddenly became this Less Innocent thing and i ended up spending hours overnight going to transgender questioning forums and looking up hrt timeline videos and having the wikipedia article on tracheal shaving saved because it was a life raft to me whose voice was imminently gonna deepen and i was simultaneously reeling with constant trauma flashbacks and the whole thing was so so fucked up. then i was on deviantart and i don’t remember exactly how but a small group of furry guys ten to fifteen years older than me started messaging me and encouraging and requesting me to produce nonsexual fetish stuff for them and talking to me about stuff like if i’d ever thought about growing up to be gay and i didn’t think anything of it for a long while because they called me a very talented writer and it felt so good to have someone be nice to me after being so alone and isolated for months on end. anyway the only reason i got out of that before it got bad was because they invited me to one of the big furry sites and i was weirded out because i thought it was a porn site and thinking about sexual stuff was a huge trauma trigger so i just ended up blocking them all and pretending like it didn’t happen. at the time half this shit didn’t bother me but in retrospect holy fuck 2011 was such a damaging year. to think if like three events didn’t happen i wouldn’t be the fucked up mess you see before you today.

god fuck this turned out super long but i’m not apologising because this was a therapeutic exercise for me and also constitutes as one of the biggest pochapal lore dumps of all time. come get your food or whatever.

#Anonymous #long post #read all of this if you have vested interest in knowing intimate details about my life or whatever

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02/08/2021 DAB Transcript

Exodus 28:1-43, Matthew 25:31-26:13, Psalms 31:9-18, Proverbs 8:12-13

Today is the 8th day of February welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it is wonderful to be here with you today as we get into this workweek and reach out for the next step, move further into the Scriptures and into the stories that we are immersing ourselves. In the book of Exodus, we are…well…we’re listening to God begin to weave together the culture of these recently freed slaves are gonna look like. So, what God wants His people to present and model for the world, this is what we’re beginning to hear. And if we understand that then, you know, some of the stuff is tedious like, how long, how far should the polls be spread out on this tent and, you know, but what we need to understand is that this tent is something that God is saying, “I want to build this and this is gonna be in the center of the camp and this is going to represent the fact that I am dwelling among you in the middle of it all.” And, so, for God to have some specific specifications about what this is to look like not only has practical value because it needs to be movable, it needs to be portable because they're moving around, but also because it needs to fulfill a specific purpose among the people. This is the place where God is among them. It’s something physical that they can see. It's something that makes them aware that in the middle of everything there is God. And, so, let's dive in. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Exodus chapter 28.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in the book of Matthew for the last couple of days we've been reading Jesus discussion about the end times. And this whole thing began by Jesus and His disciples being in Jerusalem, and them admiring the construction of the temple. And the temple, in Jesus time, this is the second Temple, so this is the Herodian temple, and it would've only been completed for about 40 years. So, this is pretty new, and Herod is one of the greatest developers in world history. As crazy of a person as he was, paranoid as he was, he was an unbelievable developer, a builder. So many of the Herodian constructions are still in existence today in ancient Israel. So, this would've been the temple that they would have been…would've been observing and they’re just admiring it and Jesus is like, “the whole all things coming down”, which is what began this discussion because later on they’re like, “tell us when this is all going to happen.” What Jesus tells us is that things get worse before they get better when we reach the times of the end, and that essentially the things that are observable like wars or famines or rumors of wars, these kinds of things, these are like contractions that a mother has when she is in labor preparing to give birth, but the contractions aren't the birth. The birth is the birth. And I’m kinda using this line of reasoning, the birth is that all things will be made new again. And, so, this in affect is called an apocalyptic world view and Jesus was known from the outside as like an apocalyptic prophet because He said the things that He’s saying. He's saying things about the times of the end. A lot of times…we already talked about this…we’re trying to date things, trying to find the right month just plan it all out, which has always up until this very day been 100% incorrect every time a guess has been made. And Jesus during this discourse claims that He doesn't even know, that the only one who knows is the Father. And, so, His…His discourse, this conversation that's been going on isn’t really to instill terror it's just simply to say this is…this is how you will know things are moving in a certain direction when you see these kinds of things happening. Well, these things…these kinds of things have been happening for a long time. So, this is where we find ourselves, contractions or labor pains or the pains of birth depending on which translation you're reading in, that this is what we’re seeing but this is not the end. And even Jesus…that like nobody…nobody knows that day but the father, which then leaves a little bit of unrest, right? Because how could you prepare for what you don't know? It's just like an ominous cloud of dread that hangs over everything. And, so, Jesus then goes into a couple of stories saying this is what the posture should be. So, He does a story of the virgins and the bridegroom, the banquet, the wedding banquet and half of these girls, they came prepared with extra oil in their lamps because they didn't know exactly when he’s gonna show up. The other ones just came to the party excited about it but were not prepared for any kind of lengthy waiting. And, so, their oil ran out. They all fell asleep their oil ran out but when the bridegroom came the wise…the wise maidens woke up they had oil. The other three are like, “give us some of your oil. We don’t have enough.” And they have to go buy more oil and in the process, they miss the bridegroom. So, in the context of what Jesus is saying about being aware of the end and just being like just being able to see the signs of the times, what would be the moral of the story? The moral of the story then would be the ones who were prepared, right, the ones who didn't know when the bridegroom was going to show up, but they were prepared are the ones who got to see him. So, in other words, like bringing this out of a story we would say we don't know the day the end of things. We have some signs that are observable, but we don't know exactly when. Only the Father knows that. We are supposed to be ready any time as if it's in the next five minutes. Like we’re always supposed to be vigilantly ready and aware. And then Jesus tells another story about a master who gave five talents to one person, one servant, two talents to another servant, one…two to a third servant and then went away. Two of them doubled what they were given. The one with five had ten by the time the master came back. The one with two had four by the time the master came back. And the person who was given one talent buried it in the ground and did nothing with it. When the master did return it was, “well done thou good and faithful servant. Enter into rest. Enter into my joy” for the…for the two that had taken the risk and actually stewarded what they were given by the master and doubled what they were given by the master. That worked out well for them. The one who had the talent and buried the talent, it did not work out as well for him. So, what do we pull out of that in light of being aware and prepared for the end? We would have to say that the ones who recognized what they had been given and did everything that they could to steward what they had been given so that the kingdom of the master would have an increase, those who were at work and were not afraid, those were at work and prospering, they got the “good, well done.” The one who just took what they had and…and hid it so that they wouldn’t lose it and just went on with their lives, not paying attention that didn’t work out so well. So, Jesus has given us…well …first of all, an apocalyptic worldview which we all share on some level. That is the…just the general awareness, the general sense that we were born into an ongoing story, the story of humanity and this story continues to go on generation after generation and it's all ultimately headed somewhere. It's all…like we’re in a story that is going somewhere. From apocalyptic perspective we’re expecting that things will get worse before they get better, but we have the perspective that these are contractions that are unto something, the birth of all things being made new. So, we have that kind of baked into us, It’s just back there. But it has a profound effect on the way that we live, far more than we realize, unless we’re paying attention. This is what Jesus is speaking to, and so this is why He was known to some the way that He was, an apocalyptic prophet. So, we get into today's reading and then Jesus is talking about when the Son of Man comes and how He’ll will be like a shepherd and He will separate the sheep from the goats. And the separation, the distinction between the sheep and the goats was how they had cared for the vulnerable, how they had cared for the least of these, how they had cared for those who were marginalized. That should prick us pretty profoundly and invite examination of our own lives. We should also be able to read into this that it's a great encouragement for the hearers of Jesus because Jesus primary hearer, they were marginalized, they were suppressed, they had…they were subjugated. They didn't really have a voice or representation in the culture that they were in. And, so, they were simmering and stewing, So, these kinds of words about the least of these being important to God would have been very encouraging to them. But ultimately what Jesus said is that when you care for the vulnerable you are caring for Jesus. When you don't care then you are not caring for Jesus. And it's fascinating what happens as He ends this discussion, this discussion at least for us that’s taken several days to move through. He finishes this discussion and I'm quoting from the book of Matthew here. “Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the courtyard of the high priest who was named Caiaphas, and they conspired to arrest Jesus in a treacherous way and kill him.” That is their response to Jesus teaching about where this is all going and the posture of heart that we must have to be able to observe it, a posture of vigilance and awareness and preparedness, a posture of understanding that we are steward…like what we have, the talent in the story of Jesus, what we have been given we are to use to advance the kingdom of God and be participating and collaborating in it. So, this general sense that we need to be awake and aware or to put it more clearly in Jesus vernacular, that we have eyes to see and ears to hear, and that we are seeing and hearing the vulnerable. The religious leader’s response to this is to plot the assassination of this guy, Jesus, who is stirring up the hearts of the people. Now, obviously we are reading the story of the life and ministry of Jesus. So, it's clear who is against Jesus and it happens to be the religious elite. And we can very easily make judgments about them, but we must examine our own hearts. Are we prepared? Are we awake? Are we alert? Are we understanding that what we have has been given to…given to us to steward? Are we focused on the vulnerable or is it more our custom to simply rehash the political talking points that are going around at any given time? We’re actually invited by Jesus to step all the way away from all that and focus on people and be aware of people, be aware that our impact actually matters, that this is the way of God's kingdom not paid people who interpret the news and tell us what to think. The Holy Spirit is here to lead us into all truth no matter what gets said to polarize us from each other so that we can be manipulated. This is the stuff that Jesus was against. He was against of the things of the world because the things of the world had grown false. Everything had a veneer of falseness about it. That's the way of the world now. That's the way of people now. We’re all hiding things and Jesus is like you…you have permission to be true and…and when more and more people are then the kingdom becomes more and more evident. It becomes a city on a hill. It becomes a light in the dark. It becomes the salt that preserves things. These are the kinds of examples that Jesus uses. And, so, we’re never going to be able to just look at Jesus and go, “that was a pretty story.” There's nothing about Him that's not gonna challenge something in us because what He's after, what He was after in His earthly ministry and what He is after now is that we be free through the truth and not through the next conspiracy theory that comes down the pipe. And, so, maybe we should be listening to Him. And, I mean, maybe this is a good time to review, go back and read the entire discourse Jesus is laying out in the book of Matthew on our own because the point here isn't that we finally learn what the Bible says. Just…that…I mean that’s the tip of the iceberg. The point is that we hear what it says, compare it to our lives, andt hen understand that there are things that must change if we’re going to come into alignment with wisdom and that we can’t do this on our own. It requires surrender to the will of the Holy Spirit in our lives. And, so, yeah, this isn't going to go away. That's the thing. The quicker that we…if we really want this, we want to live this faith, if we want to be in this faith, if we want it to actually work instead of it just being a set of principles that are supposed to work but really don't. If we actually want to live into this then we’re going to have to be willing to live into this, to take up our cross and follow.

Prayer:

Holy Spirit come. We ask every day. Some days, we are so full of hope and encouragement and some days we are pricked. And…and we thank…we thank You for that. We thank You for the disruption. We thank You that the Bible isn't pandering to us. It's looking at us in the eyes and showing us how things are. It’s leading us away from falseness and into the truth and we need, but sometimes it's disruptive and we need to get used to disruption because it's the thing, it's the catalyst that shakes us that makes us get off the couch, it's the thing that makes us move. So, come Holy Spirit into all of this we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here like I say every day because it’s where you find out what’s going on around here. Of course, if you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app you can find out what’s going on around here as well. So, check it out.

Be familiar with the Community section. As I say often that's where the Prayer Wall lives. And knowing where that lives, that…that's a destination, that’s a destination to know about because sometimes…sometimes we need to reach out. Sometimes we’re shouldering burdens that are crushing us for no reason because we’re not willing to humble ourselves a little bit and reach out. And, so, the Prayer Wall is a great place for that. So, be aware of that.

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And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app, that's super easy no matter where you are or there are a number of numbers, telephone numbers that you can use. In the Americas 877-942-4253 is the number. In the UK or Europe 44-20-3608-8078 is the number. And if you are in Australia or that part of the world 61-3-8820-5459 is the number to call.

And that's it for today, I’m Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hello good whatever it is wherever you are whenever you're listening to this. This is just another Joe calling in on Wednesday February 3rd 3:13 my time. Against my logical self I'm throwing my log in on the campfire. I've been listening for many years, but I never really felt like I needed to call in and speak. I just want you to know that I'm standing behind you and agreeing with whatever you ask for in prayer. I love you guys. Can't wait to hear…

Hi my name’s Amie calling from Canada and I was initially going to respond with a prayer request but instead after listening these last few weeks and indeed the last few months and just growing into the Daily Audio Bible, loving it to pieces I am so grateful for this ministry. Thank you so much for what it has given me and so many around the world obviously. But I really wanted to just reach out to a couple of people individuals who called in and requested prayer. One, the young girl with the so-called whatever brain problem that she described. Honey, you are so loved by Jesus. And when you asked for prayer, I envisioned His hands on your head and may His hands be your helmet all day long. There will be healing, and I pray for you every day. I also pray for them mum who called him with a daughter she has to be strong for. You were just diagnosed with breast cancer. I am a daughter of a woman who has just survived breast cancer and mama wherever you are I am praying for you. Remember, God does not give you what you cannot take He does not give you more than you can take and…and you will be strong. You are strong in the Lord. Rest in Him on His rod and His staff. You may walk through the Valley of the shadow, but it is just a shadow. He loves you and I am praying for you.

Well, I just wanna say if anybody is hearing this that God is good and personally just coming to Him within I would say about a month been kinda crazy but, you know, coming from a life that's been, you know, so against God. When I was a child and going to church and stuff not really knowing what it meant, you know, coming to God, just, you know, view changing it's encouraging. Like I actually have, you know, a purpose in life. And it's awesome. And, of course, there's bad days and there's good days like He says. God doesn't change for a season. I'm really trying not to. I really want to, you know, get the same truth out to everybody else. And, yeah, I hope that He comes back some because I feel like I miss Him. I miss my __ here but I love all you guys. And everybody who’s hearing this know God loves you. Literally, all you have to do is chase Him with your full heart, ask Him, talk to Him like He's a real person, He is a real person, He made us into persons but have a conversation like you have a conversation with a real human being. That's all He really wants. And, yeah, He'll show Himself to you. He's got you like he did me. I'm just trying to, you know, chase after Him. And I know I will find Him. Amen. Amen. Amen.

My name is Tyler I've been trying to pray for a less critical spirit, and I can't pray for myself anymore. So, I need prayer from other people around me. I appreciate all of your prayers that I've heard and listened to. Jesus loves all of you. Thank you for the Daily Audio Bible app.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make straight your paths. I've been reminding myself this…of this scripture quite often over recent days because everything seems a bit manic, everything seems a bit busy, you know it's all uncertain as…as it has been for the past year really. And I'm tired and that doesn't help matters either, you know. I’m eating properly, I'm getting sleep and yet I'm still tired. And yeah, it doesn't help. And…and I make plans and then things happen that could potentially derail those plans and nothings certain. And, so, at this time it's…you know I'm choosing to cling to Christ, I'm choosing to trust and the Lord that even though I've made plans that His will will be done. And I'm praying for wisdom around that as well. Yeah, and yet…I'm…I'm…I'm choosing to rejoice, rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. This is Michaela from Gloucester. I hope you have a blessed day wherever you are. Thank you for your prayers. Bye.

Hello DAB family we just thank God for your lives and also thank you to the Hardin family for this amazing podcast. I just have a strong urge to encourage those who were adopted fostered moved from family home to family home or those who generally feel abandoned by their own parents, it could be either physical or emotionally they are not there, and they feel unloved. Just remember that God wipes away your tears and He hears your cry. He is mending your hearts. Abba Father is our true Father. He gives us the love that no earthly parent can give us and comfort you when you feel alone and emotionally drained. We have to also remember that in Galatians 4, 6 and 7, it says because we are His children God has sent the Spirit of His son into our hearts prompting us to call out Abba Father. Now you are no longer a slave but God's own child and since you are His child God has made you His heir. Amen. Please be encouraged. God bless you all. Praying for you all. And this is Sarah from London.

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