lets say. hypothetically. that im a creep. and lets say, for the sake of argument, that i am also a weirdo. it stands to reason, then, that i don't belong here.
I think it's very funny that people have cropped William-Adolphe Bouguereau's "Dante and Virgil" from 1850 for the sexy detail so much that it's possible people think Dante and Virgil ARE these subjects.
When in fact, Dante and Virgil are THESE guys standing to the side looking like a couple of scandalized queens. I love how he's got his robe over his mouth. "Oh my god. They are just Going at it over there."
Anyway this is the full painting!
There is a LOT of great little details in it. It's definitely a huge favourite of mine and not just for the homo eroticism.
I think that the Thing that gets people about btvs when they talk about 'bad' characters and forgiving characters for their evil misdeeds is that the show is fundamentally about being a human... in completely unhuman conditions. Like especially when we talk about Spike and spuffy, there's always people asking 'but how can you excuse ___' and the thing is, its not about excusing certain behaviors, but rather giving them context that wouldn't exist in our world. Like spuffy s6 is super toxic- they hit each other, use each other, generally are abusive, and while that behavior is not excusable or forgivable, the context is that we have two characters who are literally mortal enemies trying to sort out complex human feelings for each other.
Its about taking flawed humans and putting them in fucked up situations AND THEN also taking away their soul, giving them a soul, giving them superhuman strength, giving them trauma that a human in the real world could never ever have because the supernatural conditions that perfectly aligned to fuck them over simply don't exist in reality. And in doing all of this, the show stretches the limits of the human condition, asks what ifs that we can't pretend to know the real answers to. Thats whats so great about the show, but also kinda hard to wrap your mind around, especially as a first time viewer
everything about house md is a tragedy huh. everyone lies, everyone dies, and the world turns on. maybe the subtle horror in the show is irony. the misanthrope lives for one person. the oncologist develops terminal cancer. the prodigal son becomes the second coming of his godlike father figure. the dean of medicine defends her wild dog from harm only to get bit by him. no one at the hospital is healthy; they're all sick in their own ways.
thinking about how nameless bard mostly frowns in the boy and the whirlwind cutscene. thinking about how most arts and scenes of venti depict him with a smile. thinking about venti looking in glass windows or the reflection in ponds and lakes, poking at his smile with both index fingers. thinking about venti staring at his own happiness and feeling a sense of wrong about it—this is his friend’s face, yes, but not how his friend smiled. this is wholly venti’s; something he has practiced for years, centuries, to be as perfectly human as possible.
(thinking about how if you break down enough walls, if you get him to laugh just enough, if you squint a little—his smile then would look exactly like his friend’s had. a wide, crooked, lovely thing.)
i am so tired of practically every joke involving dee being some variation of the gang being misogynistic with literally no pushback. i'm not saying that sunny shouldn't talk about misogyny but it feels like dee's been reduced from another asshole member of the gang to the token woman and i wish she would have plotlines and jokes outside of her being a woman.
and even when her identity as a woman is important to how the gang treats her, there's been such a huge shift in how sunny approaches it. take the gang gets invincible vs the gang replaces dee with monkey. in the first one, mac and dennis' mistreatment of her stems from their jealousy, she's much better at football than they are, rather than genuine dislike of dee as a person whereas in the second, the gang belittles and insults her for no reason other than just their hatred of her as a woman. also, her character in gets invincible as someone who is unable to succeed at things she is genuinely talented at because of her insecurity is far more three dimensional than her character in the second one, where she's just a failing actor who scams people. it just feels like, post s12, the gang's only interactions with her have been to say how much they hate her, and dee has had no development as a character compared to other characters like charlie and mac.
In spite of Schuylers black eyes, I have still a part for the public and another for you; so your impatience to have me married is misplaced; a strange cure by the way, as if after matrimony I was to be less devoted than I am now.
Alexander Hamilton to John Laurens, September 16, 1780
I was just re-reading this quote for the first time in a while, and realized it’s got some unique qualities that point to its integrity as a piece of evidence.
With the Laurens-Hamilton relationship, how many possible meanings a letter has is almost more important than what is said in the first place. This isn’t a quote that can be excused as humor or teasing or “how people wrote back then.” It’s a serious quote from Hamilton that talks about his relationship with Laurens, which we don’t have to many of. It’s not like the beginning of the April 1779 letter, which can be brushed off as “how people wrote.” It’s not innuendo that can be excused as “bawdy humor.” It’s a serious and non-flowery or sentimental sentence which contains many elements that point to a romance between Hamilton and Laurens. There is no other strong explanation for Laurens to be directly compared to Schuyler. (And especially the “black eyes” part-- in spite of something Hamilton is attracted to about his wife, he still has a “part” for Laurens...) The rest of the quote is even more implicating-- why would Laurens want Hamilton to be married so that Hamilton’s affection would wane? Why would their relationship need a cure if it was a socially acceptable friendship?
tl, dr: Because Hamilton’s writing is so direct and clear, with so few opposing interpretations, (but many implications!) or the ability to be construed as a joke, this letter is a pretty unique piece of evidence, and one of the strongest to suggest a Laurens-Hamilton relationship. (And good for refuting criticism.)