#pseudo essay

[not-souleaterpost]

opinion on gopher

Well no shade at any Gopher fans but not really positive so dont read further if you dont wanna be sad😂

To me Gopher kind of is one of the reasons for my controverial oppinion of the anime being better than the manga:

The most simple and least pretentious way of describing my thoughts and reasons is - I find him unfunny and obnoxious, while also feeling that he is a pointless charachter with wasted potential at the same time.

But to get more into detail...

When did he get introduced (if I remember correctly?): During that whole mini-arc about Maka wanting "to be an angel".

I have many problems with that part of the story, especially with how it turns Maka into some generic "tsundre kawaii girl who not so secretly likes the guy who she is bitchy too"

But I wont get too much into that, just the fact that I get the point - Gopher gets introduced as foil to her in that arc, to kinda give her a reality check of how unlikeable and childish she is acting.

But the point is, that even with the most charitable interpretation of the arc, Gopher IS just by his nature a charachter tailor-made (literally) to be obnoxious and annoying.

And unlike Excalibur, I find the way in which he is just groan-worthy and not charming and soothing (Yeah Excalibur is great, shout out to the OG)

But ok, maybe thats just bad impresions, does he improve later? Not really cause his whole gag stays this kinda creepy quasi incestious obssesion with Noah and idk, dont even wanna write about that part too much lol

But even if one just looks at it as a charachter trait with possible development, it leads nowhere, Gopher being static besides his final gag (which I admit is funny but also a bit ehh with the whole implication of what hes gonna do with 7 naked unconcious bodies...)

Still, one could say why am I'm expecting something out of a gag charachter? Just dont overthink it - maybe I wouldnt if Ohkubo didnt kinda setup a situation where it seemed there could be more to him, only to be just wasted panel time in the end:

What I mean is, the whole setup of him torturing and integoriating Kid - which seemed to be a perfect opportunity for charachter development for both of them - because they actually have some simmilarities:

Both are "created" and "reverant" to their Father-figure, both have unhealthy obssessions and both start throwing childish tantrums when things dont go their way. (also surface details like both seemingly being anime pretty boys appeiling to a specific demographic, with the dark hair and proper dress-code etc)

Yet all that didnt lead to anything - neither Gopher realised that his "master" is horrible compared to the other side, nor did it make Kid reflect about his own obssessions and how obnoxious and ridicolous he must look to others.

Neither was there anything about being sorta non human, "created" not born - but thats excusable cause that was revealed after the fact in Kids case.

Hell, still there could be even some strengthening of both sides negative traits, the tragedy of communication being impossible, but all lead just to an ok gag of Kids face being made unsymmetrical.

But also on a tangent, the whole "black wings" thing also just seems to be derivative - especially when the much stronger parallel of "angel vs demon" with black and white wings was between Maka and Crona, so yeah I think the whole obnoxious Maka and Gopher thing kinda deluded that meaning, but thats more of a pet peeve.

Still, to leave of not with just bitching, but an interesting thought, or atleast kinda funny in a stupid way (enough that I will prolly use it as filler in my iceberg videos):

So Gopher is a creation of Noah. But Noah is just one of seven other creations. Who are made by the Index, which is just a manifestation of a part of the Book of Eibon, which was written by the Wizard of the same name.

How many layers of being a tool is that?😂

#soul eater #gopher #soul eater iceberg #yeah...sorry #pseudo essay #answered ask #idk

[distant-screaming]

Unwavering loyalty is all well and good but at what point does it become insanity? What is too much? Is it okay to kill and grieve and hurt out of loyalty? It is okay to want? Is it okay to then take that loyalty and turn it into a love that is so deep and so immovable that it changes everything?

And does the answer change if the person has never asked for that loyalty? If they have only ever asked for a friend?

#<- guy who is super normal about the fictional rich kid and his bodyguard #haha. anyways #the underlying theme of loyalty that is written into nlmg - palm's dad to the kitthakulmaitee family. chopper to his dad. palm to nueng. #and the way it connects with love - with familial bonds and with bonds you have forged yourself #and just. hurting yourself out of loyalty and love for the other person. #taking that loyalty and making it such a part of you that it ruins everything else around you. #I won't inflict my entire pseudo essay on you guys but just. loyalty in nlmg. ough #nlmg #never let me go #never let me go series #never let me go the series #palmnueng #palmnuengdiao #distant screaming screams into the void

[ruiconteur]

Any chance you could explain the five poem references in the chorus of 山外? 👀👀👀

(I love love love ur tls and the accompanying notes for context/elaboration, you put so much thought and effort into them and it shows!! Just read ur tl of Hen Bie and cried ;-;)

i'll take any chance to obsess over classical chinese poetry so i'd be delighted to :D ty for finally giving me the motivation to flesh out my explanations of them in my translation bc i've been too lazy to do it before this, but also you might regret having asked me this by the time you finish reading this post lol

also i'm rly rly glad you liked my tl of henbie! the last line still gives me ulcers every time i think about it, it was so difficult 😭

anyway so 山外 chorus!! it has eight lines split into two stanzas and the first three lines of each stanza is a poetic reference which is absolutely insane to me?? lyricist大大 真是太佩服您了

the first line of both stanzas is 山外青山楼外楼 / beyond the mountains are yet more verdant mountains—beyond the towers are yet more towers. i translated it a bit more literally to get the parallel structure, but a more figurative translation might be something like an unending expanse of verdant mountains—the buildings stretch on for so long one cannot tell where they begin or end.

this line comes from the 七绝 / seven-character quatrain 《题临安邸》 / on the subject of the inns and residences in lin'an by song dynasty poet 林升 lin sheng. (note: 邸 here refers to an inn, but i've also translated it as residence to emphasise lin sheng's criticism of the government officials who have come, in his view, to visit lin'an in this poem.)

the poem goes something like this (aka, have yet another very rough tl):

山外青山楼外楼， / beyond the mountains are yet more verdant mountains—beyond the towers are yet more towers; 西湖歌舞几时休？ / at what hour will the singing and dancing on the western lake come to an end? 暖风熏得游人醉， / the fragrance wafting through the warm breeze sweeps the sight-seers into a drunken stupor; 直把杭州作汴州。 / they have simply taken hangzhou to be once-glorious bianzhou.

context! this poem was written after the fall of the (northern) song to the jurchen invaders. as the capital of the song dynasty, bianzhou (known today as kaifeng) was captured and sacked by the jurchen, and the song rulers who managed to escape fled to southern china, whereupon they made hangzhou the capital of the southern song. the emperor gaozong, the only one of the imperial house who wasn't in bianzhou at the time, took the throne in lin'an, which he favoured for being a 人间天堂 (paradise on earth, basically). the officials then proceeded to engage wantonly in song and dance—that is, in a life of degenerate extravagance and debauchery, and it got to the point where hangzhou was labelled a 销金锅 (lit. "a pot of melting gold"), which is now used to describe a place in which huge amounts of money and gold are frittered away. it was this exact attitude that this poem is criticising lol.

(i'm putting the rest under a read more because i am apparently incapable of shutting up)

the second line is 不如黄鹂鸣翠柳 / it cannot compare to the singing of golden orioles in jade-green willows. this line is adapted from the first line of the third (and most famous) of 杜甫 du fu's 《绝句四首》 / four quatrains: 两个黄鹂鸣翠柳 / two golden orioles sing in jade-green willows.

some background info on du fu because the guy is just ridiculous: he's known as one of the three greatest tang dynasty poets, aka the triumvirate 李杜白 lidubai, which stands for 李白 li bai, 杜甫 du fu, and 白居易 bai juyi. depending on who you ask, either he or li bai is the greatest classical chinese poet of all time. he's known as either the 诗圣 / poet-sage, for the way he engages with morality in his poetry, and also the 诗史 / poet-historian, because of his extant poetry (and it's a truly insane amount, btw, i mean, close to 1500, which is wild for a guy who lived in the 8th century), many were intended as political commentary and therefore indirectly shed light on the effects felt by the common people. anyway, he's also extremely notable for his range and technical excellence, because given just how many poems he wrote, it's kind of understandable that he ended up writing in all the poetic forms available to him at the time. but also wow.

the most incredible part to me about him is that he specialised in 律诗 / regulated verse (about two-thirds of his extant poetry is in this form) which is. holy shit. this form is incredibly demanding, and it's absolutely astounding just how easy du fu makes it look. i won't get into it here because i've already rambled enough about him, but if you watched shl, part of his poem 《登高》 / climbing the heights, which is one of the best existing examples of 律诗 out there, was quoted in the lyrics for 天涯客, and i explain it in the footnotes of my translation.

anyway, onto the actual poem! the context is that it was written after the an-shi rebellion was quelled; coincidentally, it was this exact rebellion that greatly influenced du fu's writing. after learning that his good friend yan wu, the governor-general of chengdu, had returned to his post, du fu too returned to his home in chengdu in great spirits. upon seeing the fresh and vivid spring scenery, he was seized by the impulse to compose a poem about it. the reason it's just named 绝句 / quatrains is because he didn't think of a title before writing it and was too lazy to come up with one afterwards (mood).

the couplet that's quoted also uses parallelism, btw. specifically:

两、一 -> number 个、行 -> measure word 黄、白 -> adjective: colour 鹂、鹭 -> noun: type of bird 鸣、上 -> verb 翠、青 -> adjective: colour 柳、天 -> noun: nature

(yeah he writes like that. constantly. how, you ask? excellent question, i don't know either.)

anyway, the full poem, as roughly translated by me:

两个黄鹂鸣翠柳， / two golden orioles sing in jade-green willows; 一行白鹭上青天。 / a line of white herons rise into the blue skies. 窗含西岭千秋雪， / within the window—snow atop the western ridges, gathered over a thousand autumns; 门泊东吴万里船。 / outside the door—vessels in anchorage, come ten thousand miles from eastern wu.

and now, finally, the third line! this one isn't a line from a poem, but the title of one: 春江花月夜 by tang dynasty poet 张若虚 zhang ruoxu, which i've translated as flowers by the spring river on a moonlit night. i won't be translating the full poem because it's incredibly long and this post is long enough as is, but it's gorgeous. it was praised by the poet 闻一多 wen yiduo as being 诗中的诗，顶峰上的顶峰 / the poem of poems, the pinnacle of pinnacles, and is also considered to have 压全唐 / surpassed the entirety of the tang [in poetry], which is insane considering just how many incredible poems/poets came out of the tang dynasty, aka the literal golden age of chinese poetry (if you recall, 李杜白 lidubai were all tang dynasty poets).

this is a 宫体诗 / palace-style poem, and each character in the title is described in great detail: 春 / spring, for the gentle and exquisite spring; 江 / river, for the winding and flowing river; 花 / flowers, for the hazy but resplendent flowers; 月 / moon, for the glow of the distant moon reflected in water; and 夜 / night, for the tranquil and melancholic night.

other than the scenery, this poem also explores the enigmas of the universe and human existence—specifically, how although each of our lives are short and limited, the existence of humanity as a whole stretches on unendingly, much like the bright moon that rises over the river day after day. it then goes on to describe the yearning of a wife for her travelling husband (fun fact: he's travelling by boat on the river), and the last line in particular is very, well. it's very li lianhua-core, shall we say? 不知乘月几人归，落月摇情满江树。 / i know not how many will return with the moonlight; the falling moon sways with the sorrow of parting, spilling it over the riverside trees. yeah. :)

next up is a quote from tang dynasty poet 王勃 wang bo, who wrote one of my absolute favourite couplets of all time, it literally rewrote my brain chemistry omg: 海内存知己，天涯若比邻。 / as long as there remains someone who knows me within the four oceans, we will be as neighbours even at the edges of the earth. (i definitely shoved it in here bc it's relevant to this post since zeng shunxi quoted it in his farewell letter to fang duobing and absolutely not bc i just wanted to :D)

anyway the ACTUAL quote is 物换星移几度秋 / landscapes change and stars shift—how many autumns have passed? it comes from the poem 《滕王阁诗》 / prince teng's pavilion: a poem, which is considered a founding piece of tang literature. in days of yore, this pavilion was constructed by prince teng, son of the tang emperor gaozu, and was often used by him to host great feasts and guests, but now that he's now long gone, the only thing left is the empty expanse of river water that flows beneath the railings. basically, it laments the ephemeral prosperity and declines of human life, particularly when contrasted against the perpetuity of the universe.

and now, at long last, the final poetic reference! the line in question is 举杯销愁愁更愁 / raise a cup to drown your sorrows, but the sorrows only worsen, which, apart from referencing a classical poem, also links back to a very similar line from the opening theme 就在江湖之上 / at the pinnacle of the jianghu: 千杯不醉入愁肠 / a thousand cups of wine lead not to intoxication but despair.

as for the poem, this one comes from 李白 li bai, the man the legend the icon himself, poet-drunkard-swordsman-hermit-he of the multiple moon and wine poems (although that pretty much describes all of classical chinese poetry so, eh). i only know three (five?) chinese poems by heart in their entirety and one of them is by this guy (静夜思, bc every cn diaspora kid learns that growing up).

this particular poem, 《宣州谢朓楼饯别校书叔云》 / ascending xie tiao's pavilion in xuanzhou for a farewell repast with uncle yun of the imperial record-keepers, is a leavetaking poem (clearly), and opens with the lines 弃我去者，昨日之日不可留。乱我心者，今日之日多烦忧。 / yesterday, which has abandoned me, can no longer be pleaded with to stay. today, which upsets my heart, causes me much anxiety. then it takes a rapid one-eighty into describing the gorgeous scenery (长风万里送秋雁 / the great winds escort the wild geese through the autumn skies) and the noble aspirations being discussed while drinking their fill atop this tall pavilion. and then right after the couplet 俱怀逸兴壮思飞，欲上青天览明月 / all harbouring intrepid and grandiose thoughts, in our surging states of mind, we desire to leap into the blue skies and take the bright moon into our arms, the poem plummets once more into the abyss of misery at the realisation that these ideals/aspirations sharply conflict with reality. (remind you of someone?)

here's where the couplet this song quotes comes into play: 抽刀断水水更流，举杯消愁愁更愁。 / draw a blade to stem the flow of water, but the surge of water only gets fiercer; raise a cup to drown your sorrows, but the sorrows only worsen. it is at this moment that the poet decides, you know what, i'm going to retire to live in the jianghu. specifically, he says: 人生在世不称意，明朝散发弄扁舟。 / since life in this world is so incongruous with my desires, i may as well let my hair down and drift through the jianghu on a small boat. :) everything's about li lianhua here huh.

and there you have it! 2,222 words about all the poetic references (that i'm aware of) in 山外.

#mysterious lotus casebook #li lianhua #li xiangyi #fang duobing #di feisheng #tagging them bc i think this song is about liansanjiao #莲花楼 #lhl #rui rambles #goddamn this is basically a whole essay alr #if you read this whole thing know that i am giving you a massive hug rn. or whatever else you prefer if you don't like hugs. #i'd like to thank my handy dandy book of 唐诗三百首 / three hundred tang poems for single-handedly carrying me through this pseudo-essay #couldn't have done it without you bestie

[nopenonoaaaahh]

Conrad and "Toxicity"

I've been seeing a lot of people throw around the word toxic, especially when it comes to Conrad. But, what he is doing is not toxic.

Yes, he is bad at communication, and that can be a fatal flaw when it comes to a relationship. As we saw with Belly. But, that is not an inherently toxic trait.

First off let's talk about what toxicity means in terms of relationships and people.

Toxic traits include:

Disrespect

Dishonesty

Not Supporting Others

Controlling Others

Manipulating Others

Not talking Accountability

He does not actively do any of these things. Yes, he has his moments. He was extremely disrespectful and petty after he found Jeremiah and Belly. But quickly after, once he had some time to cool off and come to terms with things, he explained and apologized and took himself out of the equation so as not to put pressure on Belly to choose. He apologized and told Belly she was justified in her reaction at the funeral. He respected Belly's decision not to date him as to not get in between him and his brother. He explained what he was going through and asked if it was okay for him to date Belly once he had the knowledge that Jeremiah had also been interested in her.

We are also shown throughout this last season that he is trying to work on his communication. It is hard to break out of the habit of closing yourself off and internalizing everything, but he is at least trying to get over that.

If he truly was a toxic character or boyfriend, he would be. He very easily could have been written that way. Not taking other people's feelings into account especially in times when it would service him, like the fireplace scene, he wouldn't take accountability for his shitty behavior in the past, he could've used the fact he loves her and used that to manipulate her to get her back, he could've thrown out the fact it was his brother and that they both just lost their mom as a way to guilt trip her into not being with him.

The fact is he doesn't do any of that. Because he is not toxic, he's bad at communicating, he's not emotionally available, and he should not have been in a relationship when he was dealing with his mother dying as well as his first year of college. That's all true.

Please stop throwing around the word toxic without actually addressing what the word means. Thank you.

#conrad fisher #tsitp #belly conklin #toxic relationship #the summer i turned pretty #bonrad #i don't know why i keep writing pseudo essays about this show

[whattraintracks]

5. Video Games - Multi

What's this? More Raphael angst? Why are we surprised.

So I was listening to Stay Down by boygenius while some prompts simmered in my brain, and when this one started boiling somewhere around verse two, I knew what I had to do.  

Would Raph even like this song? Who knows, but I sure do, so I am going to close-read the heck out of it and draw so many connections.

Video Games >> I'm just steering my life in a video game >> It's a half-life, it's a fallout 

before any of you wonder what this has got to do with the prompt, here it is! it's in the song. prompt satisfied

apparently, those are also references to video games

. . .

moving on

Fighting and Learned Behavior >> lean into the punch >> push me down >> hold me under >> stay down 

a.k.a. physical altercations as an allegory for Raphael’s life 

obsessed with the metaphor of him leaning into a punch

if he can’t avoid life's blows, he'll do what he can to make them hurt less

suffer the hit just to get it over with, or take it for someone else

on a less angsty note, I simply associate Raph with boxing 

he's a skilled ninja, but sometimes he wants to sucker-punch someone

cuz this boy really loves fighting, and that ain’t a bad thing 

>> wasn't a fighter 'til somebody told me I had better learn >> would you teach me I'm the villain

I think a lot about Raph and learned behavior 

when I tell you Rise and '03 Splinter altered my brain chemistry 

hiding their connection to the Foot/Hamato Clan

trying to spare their sons from anger, grief, trauma, vengeance, and wars that don't belong to them is fascinating to me 

but in every version, he teaches Raph how to fight 

and I've talked about how '87 Raphael still inherited those things from Splinter's

even the ones who don’t are still altered by growing up with him, looking at you M&M Raph 

it's not a coincidence '12 Splinter sees so much of himself in his son

Defense Mechanism and Love for Enemies >> lean into the punch so it don't hurt as bad when they leave 

Raph's anger often screams defense mechanism to me

if humans are going to hate him anyway, again he'll lean into it

be snarky and rude and scary and mean and give them something to really hate

sometimes, his anger is preemptive, but it's not always unfounded

I don't think even ten fingers are enough to count how many times a recurring character turned on the '87 turtles

Raphael should have been allowed to beat up Vernon as consolation

>> there you were, turning your cheek 

but wait! there's more! the Christian references in this song are not subtle

Luke 6:27,29 "Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you . . . if anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also"

I'm thinking about '87 Raphael's "Yeah, I'm with ya, but I'm bitter" and helping the guys protect a city that doesn't appreciate all they do

I'm thinking about '03 Raph, who is resolute it's not their problem that the city's at war but gets involved because Leo does 

I'm thinking about '07 Raph taking up the Nightwatcher mantle after Leo leaves New York 

Disconnection in Personal Relationships >> I look at you and you look at a screen 

this second verse, I think, is pretty open to interpretation, which works well given how many variations there are of Raph

linking "screen" to "video game" in the next line, I picture Raph reaching out and being ignored

like '03 Raph figuring his anger out on his own v. Leo getting sent away for serious/professional help

like '07 Raph missing Leo and hearing no word from him for years 

or I read "screen" with the connotation of concealment

like Rise Raph keeping it together for his little brothers until he can't

like their shock when he finally breaks down

the loneliness of Raph looking at his brothers and knowing them so well but feeling like they never really see him  

>> similar acts and a different name 

I am always struck by how similar Raph and his brothers are 

the little things they do the same because they were raised together

the ways they deliberately emulate each other  

it has to sting seeing so much of them in himself and himself in them and still be reduced to "the angry one"

especially when it's them thinking this way

(side note, Google has this lyric miswritten as "similar accent," which is hilarious in this context) 

Loss and Lack of Control >> I'm in the back seat of my body 

canon takes great pleasure in depriving Raph of control over his body 

how intensely all Raphaels experience their emotions 

off-screen and childhood trauma like “Savage Raph” in Rise 

on-screen trauma that must lead to dissociation, flashbacks, nightmares, etc. 

the two, at least that I know of, mind control events with ‘12 and Rise Raph

even ‘87 Raphael getting de-aged

you could also interpret this as gender dysphoria and I've seen a lot of good trans Raph headcanons

>> I'm just steering my life in a video game 

beyond losing control of his body, Raph never really has control of his life 

“turtle luck” and all that 

this often shows up when their stories shift

like ‘87 Raphael, who goes from a wise guy to a sarcastic grouch as his story drags on and takes a darker turn

as opposed to Rise Raph, who throughout the series, gets talked down from heroism and over-vigilance

but guess which behaviors get rewarded and reinforced during the Shredder arcs and Krang invasion

so as not to ignore the prompt any more than I already have, I do enjoy those episodes where “life in a video game” for Raphael is a little more on the nose

Combat Land (1987), Across the Universe (2003), Mazes and Mutants (2012) 

Literally Neurodivergent and a Minor 

(Shoutout to this art from @/20s-turtle-posting that inspired the name of this section) ((and, no, I did not realise this is an ironic meme and will be taking it seriously))

>> aren't I the one constantly repenting for a difficult mind? >> push me down into the water like a sinner, hold me under >> villain >> sinner >> half-life >> fallout 

I warned you about the religious imagery, but it's a little off in this verse

because repentance is about change as growth

but Raph feels like he has to change his "difficult mind" this ingrained part of himself

so he's stuck in a cycle of remorse and regret, unable to gain control

I think about running fast and far and anguished cries of “what is wrong with me?” (2003)

pushed into and held under, the waters of baptism are no longer cleansing and renewing but suppressing

it's the people closest to him saying “you are seriously twisted” (2012) and “you’ve got a rage problem” (M&M)

and having to decide between hiding those parts of himself or hoping they'll love him anyway

it's Raph feeling bad and broken, feeling like he's a danger and a poison to everyone around him

>> lean into the punch so it don't hurt as bad when they leave >> it takes so long for me to settle down and when I finally do, there's no one else around 

and I wonder if Raph's temper is ever tied to feeling unlovable, and one feeling sparks another in a vicious feedback loop 

a teenager testing the boundaries of care and affection, more defense mechanisms

how does he get himself to believe in their steadfast love even when he feels unworthy of it

to trust he's safe enough to feel all of his ugliest emotions when his life is so out of control

he forgets, his story doesn’t let him remember, that he’s still a kid 

he's got a lot of growing to do, and even if it takes a long time, he’ll settle down one day, find his balance 

his family’s gonna stick it out, and they’ll still be around when he finally gets there

tl;dr I will never be able to listen to this song without crying about Raphael now, so thanks, brain. 

#march for raph #cw trauma #discussed not shown #it's still the fifth somewhere right? #why did i think a pseudo-essay would be less work/time-consuming than a fic? great question #raphael splinterson #raphael hamato #tmnt #whattrainofthought

[fragmentedblade]

This seems to be a reference to Lorentz transformations? The first formula is apparently a derivation, and seems to be the inverse of the time part of the transformation (there's a space part too), for what I've been able to find.

The second formula is Newton's second law.

#I don't know physics so I've had to read about Lorentz transformations and I'm still unsure because I lack a lot of context #But it seems extremely interesting #It all seems to work so well with everything else Ratio has going on. The needed reference frame works well with his line in his ultimate #It seems the framework are usually cartesian coordinates? I have to check if it's not that in later physics #It all also seems to work in a Hilbert space for what I've read but I wonder if that's always the case #iirc Gauss was quite set on non euclidean geometry working on larger spaces #For what I've understood Newton used Galilean transformations and Einstein did Lorentz #Lorentz though still takes into account Galilean transformations and includes time if I've understood right? #Reading about this has made Poincaré look more interesting than he had ever before to me maybe I should look into it again #But mostly I've been thinking of Riemann. I don't know anything about any of this #but for what little I know of Riemann it crossed my mind several times that some of what I've read tonight pertaining Lorentz #would work nicely with him. Something about pseudo Euclidean spaces too iirc made me think that #I kept thinking of him from time to time so I was surprised I never actually saw him mentioned #Oh that reminds me I ended up finding an essay that proposed unlike atoms matter could be infinitely reduced and its implications #It was an extremely interesting read if nothing else also due to how it waved different fields. But I'm rambling #Veritas Ratio #Traces #I talk too much #Sorry for the tag again but I want to be able to find this in the future #I can't believe going to those group theory classes for fun has been useful in any way in my life #even if to help me understand with a little more ease something I ended up reading due to a gacha game haha #I don't remember much of what I studied back then but it was enough to recognise what was going on at times #and not struggle to understand the very very very basics of some things I read #ANYWAY again on my bullshit but so much of this could work nicely in Penacony and it will be so sad if they do nothing with it #Also I forgot to add that dp/dt is also used in medicine #It's a blood pressure ratio iirc but I haven't looked more into it bevande it seemed clear to me it was Newton's second law #Especially with the F. But I mention this to save the information. Who knows #Perhaps the formula was intended to be taken with that double sense to reference his medical facet #and perhaps it was intended also as a joke if it's really a ratio. I still think it's just Newton but yes I'm writing this down just in case

[yugiohz]

because no one has criticized the misogyny in jjk or shonen before?? there is way more nuanced criticism about the story out there already. media literacy is way more than just saying yeah this shit sucks and the author hates women lol we should put that term on the shelf where anime fans can’t reach it anymore.

1. if I want to casually complain about misogynistic writing in the mangas I read I will do so

2. why do you want to put the term misogyny on the shelf if that’s literally the issue lmao

#everyone can complain about the same thing that’s not a crime btw #acting like Im posting pseudo intellectual video essays on this manga you’re so unserious #asks

[yourresidentthembo]

Okay, I just freshly rewatched season 2 and my heart is not vibibg and I need to write things down

Because, it's like,

Crowley's whole thing is that he's a demon because it was the only other option. He actually sat in an ideology that was better than Heaven's but he couldn't divert or protest in a way that would create real change and became a demon first out of necesessity and then remained out of apathy.

And even in season 1 you can see how Crowley's ideologies make more sense than heaven's, that's the essense of his character and it's paired with love for an angel who has total devotion to the cause he represents.

Aziraphale couldn't be anything other than devoted to heaven because that is the essence of being an angel and so we see time and time again Azriphale falls deeper into this delusion that he belongs to the winning side.

And the whole point of season 2 is to show you places where Aziraphale chose Heaven instead of Crowley and it continues to go on and on and as an audience member you know Aziraphale's making a mistake and the world he thinks he's in is quite different to the world he's actually in; which has no better showcase than the ball in episode 5 where he makes insane assumptions about how people at a ball would interact.

And this dynamic of "better than heaven" and "devoted to it" is what the final fifteen is a culmination of - with Crowley finally losing hope as he realised Aziraphale cannot be persuaded to stop siding with heaven and in that realisation understanding that they can't be together and the fucking SYMBOLISM hits so HARD and I simply CANNOT I am UPSET look at how hard they set this up look at how much time and effort went into hurting us all

#unicorn talks #good omens #aziracrow #aziraphale #crowley #rant #pseudo-essay #MY HEART #I AM UPSET #this art made me feel something and I hate it for that

[tvisnoton]

Ranpo is one of the most complex characters in all of BSD, I'm so serious. I can talk my shit if yall want.

#bsd #bungou stray dogs #ranpo edogawa #ranpo bsd #i could write an essay about this #im not joking #dazai is pretty complex too but its like a pseudo complexity #dont get me wrong i love dazai #but ykno #worlds greatest detective

[snowddeong]

truly you are so smart and correct all the time w the yeji genderisms, like its insane she's so girl boyfriend im obsessed with her... want her want to be her yk how it is

Idk about being smart but thank you so much for seeing the vision with me hagahsh. Like. Sometimes I just sit and really ponder how itzy has both a legendary sapphic of sapphics as well as the living personification of if a man and woman had a baby, in THE SAME group

And not too be too personal and gay on main but god want her wanna be her but never in a gender envy way? I look at her and I just see yknow? Not even because of her specific presentation but just the fact that she's so so confident about it in the way that she is? None of it is even "fanservice", like she literally just dresses and carries herself like that, her most boyfriendism and fishing hat dad outfits are from her own closet.

I'm not saying she's actually genderqueer in any way that's not my business to speculate and it'd be kinda unfair to out kpop artists to hyperfixate on just that to "prove how genuine it is" but man stanning her has really made me understand my own relationship (or sometimes lack thereof) with gender and validated my nonbinary ass desire for mfs to move away from saying that genderTM looks one way cause fuck 😭😭😭 Yeji is so gender 😭😭😭

#not shy ask me (itzy) #anon #for ya'lls own sake don't send yeji and gender in the same sentence if you don't want me writing pseudo essays jagah #she makes my brain start braining #i love her so bad

[randomnameless]

I was feeling a lil’bit BaD about the “whoopee cushion” reply -

But seeing the shitstorm and discourse and reblogs "breathing” bad faith takes and agressivity and whatnot after someone made a well-thought reply and had the patience to reply seriously to all points made...

I suddenly don’t feel bad anymore.

I still think it’s kind of sad FE discussions devolved to this, it makes me think of the “parental control” ad from the switch, where Bowser Jr wants to try a chat, and you have a lot of “unwanted ghosts/guests” popping up in his back, so his dad disables the use of voice chat to protect his son.

And it’s not “unwanted” because it’s a different opinion, but it’s the complete refusal of engaging in discussion - in French we have an expression called “pisser dans un violon”, meaning doing something pointless. The point is not to make a compelling argument, the point is just to be a nuisance.

This is just like the ygotas parody of Tea being chased by “internet trolls”, they don’t have anything meaningful to say than “pwnd”.

Don’t agree? Okay, move on. Don’t like? Don’t read.

Damn, it’s really been a long time since I’ve been 14 lol

#fandom woes #I think? #i still think it was funnier back then when they were talking in capslock and saying stupid things #now they use 4 syllables long words they don't understand and make 10k words about it #it's like reading an essay where the premise is wrong #it's the same power of nuisance but now hidden behind pseudo intellectualism #oh well

[not-souleaterpost]

Fire Force as a One Piece ending prediction?

During my "research" for the iceberg, I did read all of Fire Force and thought quite a lot about it - a lot of the thoughts connect to Soul Eater, so I leave them for the Iceberg - but this specifically is such a weird thing I noticed, that I had to write it down - guess spoilers for both One Piece and Fire Force

Before we really start, I wanna make clear this won't be one of these 2009 "wow this generic story is like this generic story images"

But some comparisions that are simmilar to that will be needed (while keeping in mind that they may be common tropes and or cultural ideas, picked up through osmosis - which may even count into the more "plausible" explanation in the end)

So anyways, the whole premise of Fireforce at the start is "hero kid who everybody sees as a devil and can't stop smiling" - and one can ofcourse make the whole "Pirates with Devil fruit that smile comparison"

You may ask why I chose those images to represent that - because they tie in with my next point - because at the beginning of both stories the smiles had quite different meaning - Shinra's anxiety forcing his face to contort seems kinda different to the whole "Will of D, facing ones death with a smile because you lived your fullest life and know that your will is gonna be carried on" So what changed to make it not such a stretch - well this pun is what changed - the change from stretching gum, to stretching being a metaphor for imagination freeing reality, making one free - AKA the Gum gum fruit to Joy Boy retcon - aka, Luffy basically being a quasi reincarnation of a messiah figure, like somebody else...

One could say "well, Luffy rejects being called a hero" - but that still leaves the "unlikely person is the messiah" thing by instead of the one who looks like the devil being it, it's the one who doesn't care about it and wouldn't mind being called a devil.

But anyways, one could say, who cares, the "shonen hero becomes a japanese Jesus" thing is very common (one could write a whole essay on that) so what's the point, gonna pull in Naruto too? (enen thought there are some connections for Soul Eater with that, but I'll leave it for the iceberg) The answer is the thing I mentioned about imagination - Fire Force basically ends with Shinra using imagination to recreat a quasi perfect world free of the vows of the current world (which was cartoonified already) - and what does Luffys new power do?

Turning everything more goofy and cartoony... Emphasis on more, because One Piece allways was cartoony... (We get more into what that could mean later) I would put some pictures, but its literally to common to point out, so I better leave some space for more relevant shit. So both storys focus on the freeing aspect of using one's imagination anad dealing with death (i.e. the Will of D is realising in a way the imagined future to motivate the present to overcome the past) ((Maybe it literally means Will of Death instead of Dawn, Devil or Downloading pirated things is actually good))

One could say that is an coincidence too, but why then all the Sun God Symbolism? The sun as a symbol of hope, like the laughing sun of Soul Eater in contrast with the Mad Moon cackling in despair... And trust me, One Piece has enough of it's own Moon symbolism

So here we are - the era of the Moon as being the time of Madness and Oppresion, in both Fire Force and One Piece - yet the Sun is both despair and hope, destruction and creation - because that's what Shinra uses to get his stupid power scaler bait (like literally people on youtube see the ending and think "is he stronger than Goku", man if storys for 10 year olds are too complicated for you...) creation powers (his name literally meaning "Of All Creation") that let him in a blink destroy and recreat the world - while Luffy is also prophecied to destroy atleast an island, and probably the current "world" of artificial borders (probably creating the All Blue and shit but that doesn't matter at the moment)

But if still not convinved, lets talk about the other stuff that started matching up with Fire Force - a new super villian above all of the others that many think is a woman, while shrouded in shadow - is this the Evangelist or IMU? Devil fruits being revealed to be the dreams becoming real, like Adola being the collective unconsious, dreams and hopes. The Goverment is around something called "the mother flame" which is said to be both an amazing powersource and a nuke-like weapon - just as Ametarasu looks like a literal nuclear powerplant while also being a weapon that could explode and cause the literal cataclysm.

Also the whole point of an outsider force goverment ruling the world - especially with the early fire force hints of them being literal aliens, while there are alien hints in one piece too (and the real world metaphor of outsiders rulling your country, as many Japanese people may feel after losing WW2, but that is probably a controversial topic, even if certain weirdly nationalistic details in Fire Force make one have a double take...)

Anyways, there are too many circumstantial references to name and in the end one can just go "well they are just common tropes and cliche's" But if they are - that's kinda interesting in its own way - as outsiders, we look at these weird comics as if we get them, but if all these things are common enough to not be anything special, how clueless are we? Is so much interesting japanese discourse and thought lost to us? Maybe even some of the people considered "shizos" by the fanbase are actually on to something?

But so we have basically two possibilietes - either it is a very common idea in current japanese media (maybe influenced by Jungian stuff, or things like Devilman ((never read it)) or Berserk ((listened to some summary of it for 20 hours while drawing lol)) - or Ohkubo specifically picked up on all the hints, forshadowings etc and went "yeah I'm gonna do the same" - either because he got tired of waiting for the end of One Piece or because he wanted passive agressivly one up Oda maybe lol (he did say that he doesnt want his stuff go on forever like One Piece, so maybe its to show how to do it a lot quicker?) Anyways, in the end its not really a theory one can falsify, and not even one that may be "literally" true - but just realising the connections, even if they just exist do to a common culture and "canon" of works, maybe even works not read by either author but absorbed by osmosis, seem to lead one to a deeper understanding for why certain choices are made. And oh about the "more cartoony" world hint - well if fire foce was once the real world, and the bible exist in One Piece if really countries dont, what if that isn't the void century - the time when the world was like ours, or closer to it - basically all the sciefi stuff and metaphysical bullshit could lead to that - with the One Piece treasure being the literall One Piece manga (an old joke theory I had on some long banned throaway account, but people seem to keep now mention more and more...) - basically the guide of salvation, the power of imagination leading one beyond the fear of death and despair - maybe even why Ohkubo did the Soul Eater connection - he couldnt just copy One Piece one for one, so instead of the solution being the story itself, he went back to his own older story to get the same effect. But maybe thats too deranged even for my standards.

Anyways, I probably forgot a lot of stuff that would make it more convinving, like the out of nowhere "Flame Emperor Sabo" thing, and that the first candidate of the Messiah had a fire power with Sun themed attacks etc or that Luffys mom is unknown or that Ace was supposed to be killed in a simmilar way King Herod wanted to kill Jesus etc. Maybe this all just seems inchoherent, but Idk I had to dump it somewhere, maybe someone can work with this info and pull out something better, but if this all just feels like a waste of time:

Yeah... Sorry

#Fire force #one piece #thematic analysis #conspiracy #theory #analysis #atsushi ohkubo #explanation #coincidence #pseudo essay #idk it is what it is #spoiler

[saawek]

Idk if it's because I'm not that familiar with us english or if it's because I'm getting a bit old but sometimes I read things here and I'm like... wtf do y'all mean

#saawek rambling #i get this for jokes that are about the language itself like play of words #but sometimes also from some crazy pseudo tumblr academic essay #and i did study literature and philosophy for years

[that-was-anticlimactic]

okay but the skybound music is an absolute BOP

#i began my ninjago s6 rewatch during work today and got through eight episodes and i’m taking a break from my essay to watch the ninth and #GOSH THE MUSIC IS SO GOOD AHHHH #also i love flintlocke okay #and also it makes me so emotional when jay puts together his pseudo team🥺 I love them all #also i love how ninjago is (probably unintentionally) so anti-c.op it’s so funny they’re such idiots in ninjago and they can’t do the #simplest parts of their job it’s hilarious and so realistic sjdbsjbsjsbdjdb #anyways say what you will about s6 but the music is amazing and the end of last resort makes me cry every time and also i love #how jay gathered dareth echo ronin the commissioner and skylor SO TRUE !!! #also ed and edna are the best thank you and goodnight <3 #oH AND SOTO !!! forgot he recruited soto omg

[chaosintheavenue]

#brooding Trin time #chaos plays fallout 76 #Trin #it's my utmost hope that this will become the 'cover' of a pseudo-essay thingy in the near future

[pathetichimbos]

How would tommy be like during sex? rough or soft mb in between?

I have many thoughts. So many. I don't really mention a gender but the pp goes into something. what you decide that is is between you and god

Well, to start it off, we all know Thomas is a big man. 6'5, wide set shoulders, big tummy and just all around a big stature.

He's naturally strong from growing up on a farm and working at the slaughterhouse, especially given that he walks back and forth a lot.

And he knows it.

This is something I could write a whole essay on, but I'll keep it short for the sake of this post and it's primary objective: A lot of people think Thomas is unaware. They think he doesn't understand basic things, like in The Beginning, after the slaughterhouse is shut down and Jess has to kick Thomas out, resorting to insulting him after Thomas won't leave, a lot of people assume it's because his mind can't grasp the fact that it's shut down, but it just isn't true. Thomas is very aware, and he's a very intelligent man. No, he may not be able to read all that well, and math confuses and frustrates him, but he's not an idiot.

All this to say that Thomas isn't this dumb jock that doesn't understand his own strength, he's very aware of how strong he is. He's spent his entire life on a farm, and if you've ever spent a lot of time around animals, you know that you have to know how to control yourself and your strength to protect the animals and yourself from getting hurt.

He's a gentle man, with a kind heart. And this carries over to sex, with several other factors as well.

See, the thing is, considering the time frame and everything, it's safe to assume Thomas never got the sex talk. He knows that sex happens between two people, he knows that babies come from sex, and he knows that it's sinful to have sex outside of marriage, but that's really it. He has no other frame of reference.

Considering this, and his own self repulsion due to his skin disease and seclusion from his peers, I honestly believe that Thomas is probably pseudo-asexual.

I say pseudo because I don't think Thomas is actually asexual. I think he has those urges and thoughts, but pushed them away in his own form of repulsion due to his self hatred and the shameful aspect his mother projected onto him.

It's very likely that Thomas does in fact have sexual feelings, and most of his "experience", if you could call it that, probably came from media. When someone of particular attractiveness came on the TV, like the local weather woman, or the sultry voice of the unseen radio man crackled through, it gave him an itch he couldn't scratch.

He would feel ashamed at these thoughts, because not only was the feeling such a sinful act in his mind, but he also believed he was too worthless to deserve anything like that. After all, those feelings are reserved for people who are married and love each other, and he doesn't believe he can ever be one of those people.

At some point or another it gets to be too much though, and he eventually caves and starts taking matters into his own hands, but the guilt and shame that comes afterwards makes it a very rare occasion.

So, given all this, we can finally move onto answer the original question of how Thomas is during sex.

Given that Thomas doesn't really know what sex is, he doesn't ever make any moves himself. He doesn't know how, all he knows is that sex is meant for marriage.

But as the two of you date and become closer, it gets harder and harder to avoid the topic. Sure, he's been attracted to the people on TV and in the magazines, but this is different. You're really real, and you're really here, and you really like him too. All of those shameful feelings he's spent his life trying to push away rush to the surface everytime you touch him in any intimate way.

But he won't change his mind on waiting until marriage, he has way too many pent up issues to get past that. The two of you fool around, sure, (which leads to you realizing just how little he really knows, and to talking him about it all), but that never really moves past desperate, through the clothes humping, and the occasion wandering hands when that just isn't enough.

When that time finally comes, though, he's riddled with anxiety.

It takes a lot of soft words and easing before it actually happens.

He stays still for a long time after he first bottoms out, and he's trying not to hold you too tightly. He's overwhelmed with the emotions running through him, and you can feel his tears from where his face is buried in your shoulder.

When he finally does move, it's awkward, and bumpy, and there's no real rhythm. He's just desperately moving, holding you tightly. He's very loud, moaning and whining against you. He finishes way too quickly to give you a chance, but he's got a lifetime to make up for, so it definitely doesn't end there.

Skipping ahead a bit, Thomas gets a lot more comfortable (and better) with sex. I think overall, he prefers the slow and lazy. He doesn't like to rush things, he prefers taking your time and enjoying it.

But, he's honestly pretty moldable. He forms into whatever you prefer, he just enjoys being with you more than anything. He'll be as rough or as soft as you'd like, you just have to direct him on what to do.

Anyways, now that we've taken six detours, it looks like we've finally reached our destination. I hope y'all enjoyed, and feel free to send in more asks like this.

Thank you <33

#thomas hewitt #slasher fandom #thomas hewitt x reader #slashers #thomas hewitt x s/o #thomas hewitt x y/n #slasher x reader #thomas hewitt x you #slasher x you