#well people are still acting affronted that they’re not telling the exact same story as the books in the tags so

[clearancecreedwatersurvival]

Look the real reason so many book fans are mad about the wheel of time adaptation instead of having a great time with it regardless of changes, is that the production is putting a very strong focus on updating the worldbuilding and characters in specific ways, as well as changing individual events in favor of a more streamlined way to make The Same character beats happen.

Because this is an adaptation to film, and of course they have to change stuff. Come on people. Be realistic. You know how long the series is.

And there are parts of the book series that Do need updating. RJ was trying to be as progressive as he could in a lot of his approach to the series, but what was progressive in the 90s is not as progressive now so of course they are updating it. If you didn’t think this show was gonna have queer people and polyamory then sorry about it. Dear Mr. Jordan was Really Good at writing romantic relationships between women when he thought he was just writing friendships, he did it A Couple times. I would Bet Money on Avilayne becoming canon. This series is being created by a queer showrunner he is absolutely doing a queer reading of these books. Which I am Very Here For.

And he is doing a reading, and changing things. Which again, is Necessary. The book series is Super long and they have 8 seasons to do it in. They’re gonna change individual events to make sure that the main characters go through all the necessary character beats. And you’re just being recalcitrant if you can’t admit that season two Rules in a lot of ways. They are still making sure every important character has all their moments. And each individual episode has focused on some of the most powerful themes of the Entire book series. Including the inherent tragedies inherent to channelers such as: being cut off from the one power in various ways through shielding and stilling, having their own control of the one power taken over by others through weaves and ter’angreal, and living extended lifespans and thus leaving behind their loved ones. They’re doing a Very good job of keeping to the core themes and character beats and also changing stuff around to make the story work on a shorter time frame.

Also they’re working really hard to make sure Every character is as well fleshed out as possible. Meaning that yes, a lot of focus is being spent so far on the other main pov characters and all of the important aes sedai who will matter in the conflicts to come. That’s a good thing. Sorry to the people who only cared about the ta’veren boys or whatever but RJ wrote a ton of interesting and powerful women and they’re all getting their Due in this adaptation that is a feature not a bug.

It’s not like there isn’t stuff to be improved in the original! There is a huge chunk of the wheel of time that a lot of fans refer to as the slog! Where most of the main characters are separated and the plot is barely moving so some characters only show up in like two chapters of a single book, because there are so many individual things happening, before the plot starts moving faster again towards the end of the series. (And then there’s the crimes committed by Mr. Sanderson on the last three books but we’re not going to talk about that right now.

Which personally I would disagree that the slog is where the series is least enjoyable. The section I usually skip when rereading is the first two books, #having a great time right now actually with the show skipping through as much of the minutiae of books I and II as they can. The wheel of time is not a perfect series and Robert Jordan kept trying to finish it in one to three books at first and the first two books suffer as a result.

If you stopped reading in books one or two PLEASE just try to make it to three Trust Me. Or just watch the show and then read the battle of falme in book II and then read book III. You will appreciate books one and two more on a reread after all the stuff he does bring up there has really paid off. And also just have fun watching your faves be more happy than they are in later books ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The show is not Trying to be the books and frankly I’m glad it’s not! This is another turning of the wheel, another version of events, a parallel universe to the randland of the books. And I think they’re doing a pretty brilliant job of telling a version of that story so far this season.

Adaptations will change things. That’s a good thing. Judge it on executing the ideas it is bringing up and staying true to the core of the character arcs and themes of the original. And frankly it’s enhancing a lot of character arcs right now. There are many things that I think the show is already doing better than the books did tbh (Min, Liandrin, Selene, making Perrin spend less time dithering about the Wolf Stuff, speeding up Mat’s healing from the dagger so my best boy gets more time to shine)

Adaptations are transformative works. To lesser and greater degrees they reinterpret a work through a different artistic lens and medium. The changes are not bad because they are changes. Judge it on the execution of the story it’s actually telling instead of a close comparison to the books. And they are keeping as true to the books as they can whether you acknowledge that or not.

If you’re a person who reads fanfiction but you can’t judge a film adaptation for what it is instead of what it’s not then please try Slightly harder.

And if you’re just mad that it’s all queer and polyamorous now and the boys aren’t the only main characters then die mad I guess. I will continue having a pretty great time watching this show chock full of extremely powerful (and sometimes evil) women. I think RJ would have liked it tbh.

#my only criticism is they got rid of the weaving opening #bring it back #the wheel of time #wot on prime #wot show #wot #unreasonably attractive fandom #Caitie speaks #this is a mat cauthon stan account #I know I know I’m still talking about this #well people are still acting affronted that they’re not telling the exact same story as the books in the tags so

[austennerdita2533]

A/N: Just a Literati trifle in celebration of GG’s 20th Anniversary Week. I still have another chapter or two to write but I wanted to get this out before the event officially ended. (Canon compliant + OS + divergences)

Also here: (AO3)

Enjoy! 

xx Ashlee Bree

An Archive of Words Between Us

One day, many weeks into it but still no closer to clarity about what it is between them, Rory does what she does best: she makes a list.

Marked at the beginning, from when she and Jess first met, she soon starts to add to it with frightening regularity. A new entry comes any time there’s news, insight, questions, or growing confusion to report. She writes it all down. Out. She compiles everything in a beat-up old notebook she’s taken to carrying around.

Over the years that follow it becomes a confessional of sorts for her, a still developing story. She reaches for a pen whenever the mood strikes, and writes…then writes some more…

Committing to paper all the things they’ve said to each other over the course of their history, as well as many of the things they didn’t.

- i. things we said when we were strangers -

“Hey, Dodger, wait a minute,” she calls out before he disappears behind the gazebo. “Is this a gimmick of yours? Do you always write margin notes in the books you steal from strangers?”

Jess stops. Casts a cursory glance over his shoulder before turning back around with hands in his hoodie pocket.

“Depends, I guess.”

“On?”

“Does it matter?”

Rory shrugs.“You could be a literature-defacing miscreant on the lam for all I know. Your face might be tacked to Wanted posters all over New York City. I’ve got to edge my bets, protect my assets.”

“What,” he says, “you aiming to sentence me without a trial or something?”

“Thinking about it.”

“Wow. I can’t believe you’re going to bust out the cuffs already, Judge Judy,” he chuckles, raising his hands in supplication before rocking backwards on his heels like he’s been shot. “That’s not very neighborly.”

“Sounds like there’s evidence to be had if I dig a bit.” A pause. A teasing quirk of an eyebrow. “Is there?” she asks.

Though he stays silent at this, a spark of something catches deep in his dark eyes as their gazes meet, and Rory's stomach flips.

“Well?”

“You tell me,” he says, all smooth and inscrutable and James Dean cool as hell.

“I’m no Agent Scully at the FBI, but the truth is out there. Don’t think I won’t uncover it,” Rory replies, her wit flowing strong and sure. “If I think it’s warranted I could hire Kirk to lay chase for a while…he likes detecting. Takes payment in Skittles, too. Boxes of which I will have no trouble acquiring, I assure you.”

“Who the hell’s Kirk?”

“Let me worry about that,” she beams back at him coyly, bouncing the book he’d pilfered earlier against her hip.

“Save your Skittles, concerned citizen. I’m clean.”

“Oh, yeah? And why should I believe you when I hold proof to the contrary?”

“Because—” Ambling backwards in the middle of the street, a crooked smirk forms along the corner of Jess’s mouth as he gives her one last idle loll of his shoulder. “I only leave notes for people who might appreciate them. Start with the one on page three, by the way,” he adds with a farewell salute. “It’s a doozy.”

Curiosity piqued, Rory ignores the warmth in her chest as she watches him turn to leave a second time. Instead, she buries her nose in the margins of Howl and peruses. Losing herself in his tiny blocked script the whole walk home.

- ii. things we said because we were lying to ourselves -

Pacifying the town's fears about their friendship isn’t easy.

Especially not after Jess outbids her boyfriend at the basket-bidding festival to win an afternoon of her company. Or the night he shows up on her doorstep unannounced, bearing food and intellectual discussion after she swears to everybody else she wanted to spend the evening alone. Or when he wrecks her car on their way back from a spontaneous hunt for ice cream cones.

Then there’s the time she misses Lorelai’s graduation because she’s stuck on a bus next to some scruffy-looking creep who spits chew into a soda can while he mumbles the names of state capitals under his breath in an Appalachian-sounding litany, Rory having skipped town impulsively to visit Jess in the Big Apple after Luke had sent him packing because of an accident that had no real bearing or blame. At least not unless it was half hers to share in, too, in any case.

She expends a lot of energy defending what they are to people. Clarifying what they’re not.

Pretty soon a truncated version of the truth skips from her mouth like a message she’s spent months concocting, memorizing, and then recording, with her smart enough not to speak it aloud until it sounds convincing. And it does. She makes sure of it.

Tensions abate after that, for a time. Mostly because of the distance.

Mom and Dean, in particular, seem to breathe easier with so much of it stretched between them. They’re much happier once Jess is no longer there to lurk around Luke’s, or clog the aisles of Doose’s, or stake out chalkperson outlines on the sidewalks of town where he can draw her closer to him. Too close for comfort, as far as anyone else is concerned. Even if his only aim in doing so had been to imbibe her in intellectual conversation.

Rory finds it funny how his absence from Stars Hollow makes it both easier and harder for her to placate everyone’s misgivings. The words may be simple to say, but the meaning behind them feels deflated. Half-bodied at best.

Like calculus, it causes her headaches. Forces her to work twice as hard to make everyone believe she doesn’t care that he’s gone and likely never coming back again. That the vacant space he’s left behind doesn’t sting whenever her gaze passes over it, remembering.

Exhausting though it is, however, she does her best. She makes the effort.

She starts by dolling out extra attention and assurances to Dean about her commitment to him. To their relationship. Then she pivots around mention of Jess’s existence to her mom because she knows she doesn’t approve of him let alone agree about any of his good qualities. With Lane, she focuses on school and Mrs. Kim and music they can add to her floorboard collection. And in front of Luke, so as not to burden him with more disappointment, she acts as if nothing is different. Pretends that nothing much has changed.

Omission quickly becomes a habit for Rory. A way of life.

Only once does exposure threaten to spoil everything when her mom confronts her openly one afternoon about a placeholder that’s slipped out of her copy of For Whom The Bell Tolls.

“It’s nothing,” Rory says as she makes a quick grab for it in the kitchen and blushes.

“Really? Because nothing to me looks a hell of lot like a paper plate fragment. One that’s smudged in pizza grease and blue scribbles.” Laughing, completely unaware of her daughter’s wide-eyed discomfort and humiliation, Lorelai hands it back to her without inspecting it closely. “I’m surprised by your choice is all. Messy and makeshift isn’t your typical bookmark M.O., hun.”

“Yeah, well, that’s what happens when Paris accosts you at the break bell. You drop things. People jump, drinks spill. Beloved bookmarks go soaring…”

“Ah. I take it she was yelling in dog decibels again?”

“More like she put out an APB on all aliens living a few hundred million lightyears away and then gave them exact shouting coordinates for where to find her. So same difference, really.”

Her mom snorts. Passes over the ranch dressing.

“She’s a pill, that one. I’m telling you Pink wrote that song with her in mind.” Shaking her head, Lorelai closes the fridge behind her as she bites into another French fry. “So how’d you come by the plate?” she asks, her mouth full.

“It was spontaneous. I was running late so I nicked it from the cafeteria on my way out,” Rory lies, knowing full well Chilton never dispenses paper or plastic dishes for dining.

“Oh.” Her mom considers this. “Well, I suppose there were times even Madeleine Albright couldn’t find anything better to use in a pinch. That was very…replateful of you.”

“What can I say,” she exhales with relief, feigning amusement as her fib is accepted with alacrity, “the Forks was with me.”

“Only the Forks? Don’t tell me you’re leaving out the spoons and the knives. How could you?” says Lorelai, aghast, as she scoops stray kitchen utensils to press them against her chest in a bodily cuddle. “It’s cutlery discrimination!”

“No, it’s punning.”

“Says who?”

“Me.” A pause. A nibble of pizza. “Also, Shakespeare would agree.”

“Psssh, Shakespeare! That old killjoy,” her mom says dismissively, rolling her eyes in good humor as she tucks a box of strawberry Pop Tarts under her armpit and motions toward the living room. “What’s that you have written on the inside there, anyway? French? Calculus? Rolling Stone lyrics? A blueprint for the evil plan you’ve hatched to shoot Grandma to the moon? I’m dying to know.”

Waving her off, Rory tucks the shard back into the spine of her book where it belongs. Hiding it from view. “It’s for school,” she assures her as they settle onto the sofa.

“So tell me about it. I don’t care if it’s boring.”

“Pass.”

“Come on! I could use a good Chilton-instigated snooze.”

“Too bad. No beauty naps for you.”

Lorelai pouts, fake affronted. “Rude!”

(Turns out that ‘shard,’ that ‘thing for school’ which is stuck between the pages of Rory’s Hemingway, isn’t boring at all. In fact, it has a history. A story. The truth is it’s a souvenir she’s saved ever since she and Jess talked books over pizza at Antonioli’s on basket-bidding day.

Toward the end of the meal he’d ripped off a piece of plate so he could jot down his phone number and a quote. Only sliding it into her hand, folded in half, crinkled up like a note passed between desks at school, in the moments before they parted ways and headed home.

It’s stupid she’s kept it. She realizes that now. Stupider still to slip it between the pages of each new book she reads or unfurl it in the privacy of her bedroom to puzzle out if the line he’d included from A Moveable Feast is meant to have double meaning:

“We ate well and cheaply and drank well and cheaply and slept well and warm together and [liked] each other,” it reads.

Stupidest of all, she can’t seem to bring herself to stop looking at it. To throw the darn thing away. A note…a number…a greasy sliver of paper plate!)

“Like I said, Mom,” Rory swallows before smiling over at her convincingly, “it’s nothing. Really.”

- iii. things we said on the verge (of something) -

In early June, Sookie’s wedding day arrives.

Things are static again. Serene. Normal.

Granted, slight changes do sprinkle into the mix here and there because of her dad’s presence, because Dean holds her a little tighter around the waist now than he once did, but mostly it’s the same here as it’s always been. Pleasant people fade into gossip and nonsense while fun blurs into peculiarity.

Life feels simple once more. A tad plain and colorless, maybe, but simple.

Then Jess returns to town on a whim or a fluke or a who the devil knows what he’s thinking and everything goes sideways, pear-shaped, belly-up-and-down in seconds because this is the last thing she’d been been expecting and suddenly the only thing that registers is the length of the grass plus the number of steps it will take to close the distance between them. All that matters is he’s here, he’s back, he’s near enough to touch, and she’s smiling so hard she can hardly breathe as she drinks him in from head to foot like a glutton: her pulse leaping, her heart lurching free from the cage of her chest.

The whole world tilts. Collapses. The pale yellow of the sun shines down like a spotlight so it’s only a rippling alcove she sees. Just him, just her. Just them canopied beneath these flittering fronds of green.

Any rational thought Rory possesses scatters across the wind with the pollen. And then before she knows it, the ground tilts out like a ramp underfoot.

It pushes her forward. Outward. Sliding her toward him until she’s thrust and tangled in his arms with no memory at all of how she got there, or why their mouths feel so hot and wanton like this, so damn unsatisfied. It all seems impossible considering they’re still pressed together in a kiss that can only be described in one way: illicit.

“Not a word,” Rory pants when they stop and Jess pulls back, his jaw taut, his expression shuttered, to nod once understanding.

“Okay,” he says.

“Promise me.” The huskiness of her voice feels at odds with this demand, with the trembling fist she still has curled in the lapel of his jacket, but she cannot think about her stinging mouth or his tongue right now so she clings to desperation instead. “Can you do that?”

“Okay,” he repeats, all eyes, eyes, eyes. And with that single look, she forgets to breathe let alone digest anything he’s promised.

In the end, it’s an impulse that overtakes them not a decision. It’s a moment of clandestine passion they share, not a confession that will alter the circumstances any.

And yet it’s guilt, not regret, that begins to pull like an anchor in her belly until she’s running in shoes that chafe the back of her heels. It’s terror and confusion, not apology, that ripples along her nerve endings until she’s dashing through the trees like a coward or a swindler because she needs to believe behind her there’s still a haven of black and white she can cross with both feet.

Only when Rory stops does she feel the change. Does she discern the difference. It takes one sting, one breathless stitch in her side, for her to know she’s tumbled forward into color without noticing.

Looking down, and there it is. His name already singed across her chest in scarlet letters.

- iv. things we whispered on the hood of your car -

“Tell me something no else knows.”

“About what?” he asks around midnight the following April, the two of them sprawled on the hood of his car at a deserted rest stop off the I-95 on their way back from a concert in the city.

“You, silly.”

“Funny you’re thinking about penning my biography already, Churchill. I’m honored, truly, but aren’t I too young for that sort of enumeration?”

With a roll of her eyes plus a protracted har-har, Rory lifts their intertwined hands, watching, mesmerized, as their fingers thread then unthread as they lay side-by-side parked beneath the Big Dipper in this forsaken parking lot. Though they’ve been together about six months now, prying Jess open has been slow work. It’s like taking a crowbar to cement: one chip, one crack, one crumble at a time.

“Stop deflecting, Mariano,” she warns. “Evasion’s for chumps.”

“Fine,” he sighs. She presses a kiss of reward against his knuckles before curling tighter into his side. “How about this: every year roughly sixteen hundred people in New York City are bitten by other humans.”

“Bitten?”

“Yep.”

“Why?”

“That’s just it,” he says in his best horror story voice, “could be vampires, could be cranky commuters, could be urban mania or road rage…nobody knows.”

“Oh, please. As if I’d let you off the hook with that obvious dodge. You’re killin’ me here, Smalls!” Rory says with an elbow rib and tsk. “Second of all, you so made that biting thing up.”

When she edges her head back onto his shoulder to look at him, Jess drags his pointer finger down her forehead before bopping her affectionately on the nose, his expression neutral.

“Didn’t you?” He shrugs in that cute off-the-cuff way of his then smirks into her hairline. “That’s unbelievable!”

“It is what it is.”

“So, what,” she says as she throws her leg over his hip to lug him closer, her arm already stretched out across his middle, “is there a case of zombiepox going around that the CDC has neglected to inform us about? Because I’ve got to tell you if that’s so then I’ll need an inoculation ASAP, mister! Frazzled, bloodshot, and half-rotted is not a good look for me. It just isn’t.”

“Oh, I know.”

“Hey!” she exclaims.

“No offense, critter of Frankenstein,” he chuckles, absorbing her retaliatory swat with a grunt and rolling her further on top of him, “but I’ve seen you pre-coffee. It isn’t pretty. We’re talkin’ bolts out your neck, monster glares, frothing purple mouth and everything.”

“Yeah, yeah. Keep up your running tally and you might find I bite you next. Rory the Ripper does have a nice alliterative ring to it—you best remember that,” she warns all narrowed eyes and silky breath and arms folded under her chin.

Jess cocks his left eyebrow, brushes his thumb over her bottom lip. “Idle threats don’t scare me, Gilmore.”

“They should.”

“Maybe.” A lazy grin forms at the edges of his mouth. “But yours don’t.”

“Fine,” she blows out a breath. With her head resting in the center of his chest, Rory fixes him with one long steady look, her voice dropping an octave lower as it drains free of sarcasm to assume a more serious edge. “Name one thing that does then. That scares you, I mean,” she says.

He doesn’t answer right away. In fact, he fidgets so long beneath her that by the time he settles with his hands clasped behind his head, lost in thought and translation, peering up at the sky, she’s half convinced that silence or deflection is the best she can hope to expect from him in reply.

Reticence is a quality she’s come to recognize in Jess. It’s one she can reflect back at him in part because they’re both cut from the same quiet, introspective cloth. However, it’s also one that restricts her access to his thoughts and feelings when she most wants it, and that can take a toll. Makes her wonder if they’re parked at different weigh stations in this relationship or not.

It’s bizarre to reconcile how she can understand him so well in some contexts, to the point where she can predict his next reaction or sense a good joke hanging in the periphery that's about to descend; while in others, he’s a total head-scratcher. Like a Sudoku puzzle with numbers that don’t add up to anything.

The silence between them continues to stretch. It becomes an awkward, formless wall.

The stillness, too, which is illuminated only by the light of the moon and the faint din of the car radio, hangs between them until he draws her up his body and folds her over him with a green plaid blanket. His fingers tracing languid strokes up and down her spine.

“Swans,” he says at last, his tone subdued. Scratchy. “Swans scare me.”

“What else?”

“Tennis balls. They’re too small and fast as they zip past. I hate how they can leave imprints on your face like ugly yellow snitches.”

“Okay then. Weird but fair. What else?” Rory asks all warmth and eagerness, her eyes searching his for something he wouldn’t want to slip free.

“Pennywise.” Though she snickers at that, it’s a valid fear. Clowns unsettle her, too. Evil ones especially. She’d had nightmares for eight months after she’d read Stephen King’s It for the first time, and had taken to sleeping with the bedside lamp on for years.

“Anything more?” she asks.

“Cricket bats.”

“Ooh-ho!” Poking him, “So Mrs. Kim got to you, did she?”

“Listen, I tried to be cool and unaffected but who knows what would’ve become of my head if she’d taken a swing with that thing?” Jess shudders at the same time she imagines Humpty Dumpty and laughs. “Jeez.”

“Things would’ve gotten messy,” she adds honestly.

He stalls a moment, then blinks back at her all wariness to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. “How messy are we talking here?”

Rory cocks her head and bites the corner of her mouth, musing. “Think pumpkins.”

“Smashed ones?”

“Yep.”

“Figures,” he mutters miserably.

With an encouraging pat, “Don’t worry, I would’ve stepped in before Mrs. Kim buried your handsome yet indignant face beneath the floorboards or behind a brick wall in the catacombs with Fortunato. It’s the least I could do since I sort of like you and all.”

“Sort of?” Jess asks.

“Yeah. I’m no unreliable narrator girlfriend who'd escort you to your doom, you see. I’d much prefer to keep you,” she says with an adoring grasp and swivel of his chin, which he deflects by tickling her breathless as she bends down over him.

“Gee thanks, Casper. Nice to know you care about me.”

“Not about you exactly,” she teases, her flip-floppy giggles still piercing the air. “Just your head.”

That stops him. “My head, huh?”

“Sure.” Still a little breathless, she reaches toward him to fist her fingers through thick black tendrils along his nape. “It’s pretty.” She gives the strands a little tug. “Full of thoughts I’m hoping to pilfer for further study.”

“You know, I always thought there was some hoodlum in your DNA. Now I’m convinced,” he says as he leans over to commence the tickling again. “And you will pay."

The two of them continue to roll then thump against his windshield all elbows and knees until the levity starts to leaden and transform. As Jess reaches over to cup her cheek, their gazes meet in the silvery darkness and hold, kindling like flint.

Quiet washes over them again for a moment. Only this time, it’s bloated; it’s heavy. It’s a mess of a hundred thousand decipherable something’s teetering on the precipice of expression.

A flicker of alarm passes over his features as he frames her face with his hands, palms flat against the car. He hovers aloft, unsure. Indecision mixes with fear to tangle with retreat even as gravity beckons him nearer, his head dropping low enough for their foreheads to touch.

“I sort of like you, too, you know,” Jess breathes softly, his lips lowering to press against her mouth in a quick but lingering kiss. “A lot.” His jaw clenches. “Maybe too much.”

Suddenly there’s a tightrope pulled taut and vibrating in every direction because there’s no shrinking back from the dense electricity pulsating between them. There’s no more room to dance around unnamed emotion whenever it identifies itself in blown pupils, in a bobbing Adam’s apple, in hands that slip and slide until they fit together like aligning planets.

In that instant Rory knows. She knows right then and there she’s falling in love with him, that she’s half fallen already. And it’s both a revelation and a fact so natural she can feel the truth of it whistling from deep in her bones.

Looking nervous, vulnerable, more fragile than she’s ever seen him, he swallows hard then shifts to squint out at the shadowy tree line while scratching at his nape. “It’s just…so many people have treated me like garbage that all I know how to do is spoil things. I destroy, Rory—ruin what’s good. It’s what I do best. It’s all I know. I’m trying here and all, but I…don’t know how to do this,” he says, gesturing lamely between them. “How to do us right.”

“Hey now,” she thumbs his cheek, tries to turn his head back toward her but it won’t budge, and neither will he. “That’s my boyfriend you’re talking about. Go easy on him, will you?” He nods into her palm, softening a little. The tension leaves his body as he gathers her in his arms again, her head conforming to the crook of his neck, but she’s not convinced all is well yet.

“There’s no rulebook or anything,” Rory says placatingly. “We’ll figure it out together, okay? You and me.”

“Yeah.”

“We will,” she says with an emphatic, assuring squeeze. “I know we will.”

With a caustic laugh, a heavy sigh, he runs his teeth over his lip, “I’m a screw up, Rory.”

“Hey. Not true.”

“I am.” Jess sounds so resigned, so convinced, it ties her into knots thinking he sees himself that way.

“Not to me, you’re not.”

“No,” he says with a deadened inflection, with a sad downturn of his mouth. “Not to you.”

Frowning, she feels his cynicism, his self-deprecation, descend like a slash across the gut. Helpless to do anything but try to be a soft place for him and his insecurities to land, she pulls him toward her, embracing him, quieting him, caring for him more with each passing second even though a warning gong goes off in her heart when she leans in to steal another kiss.

“Maybe I’m not a screw up to you yet,” he whispers, “but I could be at another time. On another day.”

“Stop,” Rory declares forcefully, holding her finger against his lips so he knows she means it.

Jess relents. “Okay,” he sighs. “Just know I’ll get it if you change your mind.”

- v. things we cried out at a crossroads -

Strained.

Silent.

Distant.

Those are the best adjectives to describe the status of her and Jess’s relationship as the bus pulls away from the curb a couple weeks later. After the party from hell. From her place on the sidewalk, her chest full of a heaviness she can’t name, Rory stares after it - after him - with little to no regard for the hour’s lateness or for the morning bell which signals the start of homeroom.

It’s the middle of May. That means finals, graduation, and summer loom on the periphery but she doesn’t care. None of it resonates. In the background she can hear Paris barking orders at a few trembling freshman and minted sophomores, but she does nothing to intervene. She makes no move to prevent her frenemy’s yellow journalistic splatter from crushing the innocents to smithereens.

Instead, she watches the hum and bump of the vehicle’s dusty rubber wheels as they roll down the street. She tracks the plume of smoke swirling from the exhaust pipe into the sky, which clouds over with blacks and grays instead of with clearing blues and radiant yellows. She waits until the bus turns left, its engine loud, roaring, to putt around the corner. Disappearing from view.

I hope he calls later, she thinks with a pang, with an iota of hope. We need to talk soon.

Rory’s eyes want to keep traveling with him long after he’s gone. So do her feet. They seek to follow along wherever Jess has gone, to ride beside him until they’re able to make sense of this mess between them and fix it. Fix them again.

Unfortunately for them both, they don’t. And it’ll be some time before they can, let alone before they do.

#gilmore girls #gilmore girls fanfiction #literati #literati fanfiction #ggturns20 #gganniversaryweek #ashlee bree's writing endeavors #it needs editing #but hopefully it's not as awful as i'm imagining it to be #*bites knuckles and hides*

[mittensmorgul]

They are filming ep15 right now (Cas and Jack are working alone on a case) and the fact that Misha will miss one more ep due to his contract makes me think they dropped the empty deal arc. I just cant see them playing it out when they have to set up Jack to be the God killer, Cas to fix heaven, Amara plotline in 4 eps. Plus Dabb implied that Michael!Adam would also come back to defeat God in some form. Thoughts?

hmmm...

*does math in my head* *admits this is dangerous*

So we know that Misha is scheduled to be in 15 episodes this season, leaving five he will not appear in. So far, he has not been in 15.04, 05, and 10. Of the remaining unaired episodes (including the ones he’s already filmed, but haven’t aired yet), that leaves two more that he won’t be in.

And yeah, I really don’t think there’s time to explore the full weight of that deal, especially given that the entire cosmic situation has shifted since he made it. I mean, even the fundamental REASON Cas made it was so Jack would not end up in the Empty. And then Jack... ended up... in the Empty...  Kind of a dick move for the Shadow to still try and cash in on that deal, right?

I just think it’s more a factor of them having committed to end the series at the end of s15 that led to the reframing of the deal, you know? If they had intended to go on for a s16, I think it would’ve been heavily dealt with in s15, or even in the back half of s14, but instead things needed to happen to accelerate dusting AU!Michael off the table to make room from Chuck to get all uppity with the story. :’D

They could bring it up as a potential way for Dean and Cas to deal with the rest of their communication issues. Like Cas could tell Dean about the deal, and Dean react to it with a Normal Amount of upset, because it IS reasonable to be upset to learn your best friend literally sold his own happiness in exchange for what he thought would make you happy, you know? Worst Gift of the Magi AU ever. All Dean wants is for Cas to be happy, but he’s willing to trade “enjoying that in a peaceful, not world ending life” and stand by Cas’s side through all their battles to make that happen. All Cas wants is for Dean to be happy, and he’s literally willing to sacrifice his own happiness and life to make that happen.

I think this was at least partly delved into in 15.09, with the very real threat of Cas having taken on a Mark like the MoC, which would eventually drive Dean to a point where he would’ve had to lock Cas in a ma’lak box forever, effectively losing Cas forever. It wasn’t the Empty deal, but the Empty would’ve never been able to collect, because Cas would’ve never been happy after that, you know? But again, I personally think that deal went out the window the moment Jack burned up his own soul to kill AU!Michael. Because I don’t think the Empty ever really wanted Cas... I think the entity was biding its time until everything was ready to bring ALL of Jack to the Empty, as we saw in 14.20... There was a bigger game afoot, and we don’t entirely know what that is yet.

Is Billie’s plan really to kill Chuck? Or is she, like Death always has, pushing at the Winchesters (yes, including Jack and Cas) to do something specific with no intention of them actually DOING the thing, but knowing that Cosmic Level Nudge will set into motion an entirely different sequence of events? Because Death... can’t act directly. Billie has come closest to just saying it outright, in 12.06, and this was before she ascended to that Bigger Picture View of Creation:

Mary: How would it work?Sam: Mom?Mary: You just kill me again?Billie: Reapers don't kill people. Rules.

So many rules... and Billie is so, so good at working around those rules. Even better than OG Death was. 6.11 is still a prime example of how Death functions.

DEATH So, if you could go back, would you simply kill the little girl? No fuss, no stomping your feet?DEAN Knowing what I know now, yeah.DEATH I'm surprised to hear that. Surprised and glad.DEAN Yeah, well, don't get excited. I would have saved the nurse, okay? That's it.DEATH I think it's a little more than that. Today, you got a hard look behind the curtain. Wrecking the natural order's not quite such fun when you have to mop up the mess, is it? This is hard for you, Dean. You throw away your life because you've come to assume that it'll bounce right back into your lap. But the human soul is not a rubber ball. It's vulnerable, impermanent, but stronger than you know. And more valuable than you can imagine. So... I think you've learned something today.DEAN Want to know what I think? I think you knew that I wouldn't last a day.DEATH I have no idea what you're talking about.DEAN I lost. Fine. But at least have the balls to admit that it was rigged from the jump.DEATH Most people speak to me with more respect.DEAN I didn't mean --DEATH We're done here. It's been lovely. But now I'm going to go to hell to get your brother's soul.DEAN Why would you do that for me?DEATH I wouldn't do it for you. You and your brother keep coming back. You're an affront to the balance of the universe, and you cause disruption on a global scale.DEAN I apologize for that.DEATH But you have use. Right now, you're digging at something. The intrepid Detective. I want you to keep digging, Dean.DEAN So you're just gonna be cryptic, or...DEATH It's about the souls. You'll understand when you need to.

Just like Billie’s command to Dean about the Ma’Lak box in 14.10:

Billie: And just look at you now. Do you remember visiting my reading room? The shelves and shelves of notebooks describing the ways you might die?Dean: Yeah. Upbeat classics.Billie: Well, it's the funniest thing, but they've all been rewritten. They all end the same way now -- with the archangel Michael escaping your mind and using you as his vessel to burn down this world.Dean: All of them?Billie: All of them. Except one.

Except... ALL of those books... were wrong... even that one that said the ma’lak box solution was the thing... And I think Billie was HOPING to get that EXACT reaction from Dean We’ll Find Another Way Winchester. But if she hadn’t TOLD him about that one anomalous book of fate, Dean wouldn’t have known to even TRY. And in doing so, in attempting to build that box, his loved ones realized something was super fishy (lol I didn’t intend to make an undersea pun, but there you go) with Dean, and stepped up to support him until out of nowhere, a wildly unexpected solution presented itself. BECAUSE Dean drew strength to keep Michael contained beyond the original prophesied ends... Because Billie “interfered.”

I don’t think Death actually KNOWS what will happen after she shakes up reality, you know? She just knows where to apply pressure in order to force a rewrite of destiny. This was also the entire point of 13.19-- the things you CAN change, versus the things you can’t. And how to give just the right nudge to set those changes in motion.

Well, that went off on a tangent... >.>

Point is, I don’t know for sure that Jack will end up as a God Killer (I mean even in a practical sense, the ONE THING the CW has ever said was that they were not allowed to kill God... I assume that hasn’t changed and am basing my own personal expectations accordingly...). So I’m thinking that whatever the final plan will look like... we haven’t seen it yet. Okay, now back to the point... Cas’s Deal with the Empty.

So regardless of the why (because I try to avoid using a doylist rationale like Misha’s contract or the remaining number of episodes in order to justify narrative choices, because no matter how you slice it, that’s Bad Science right there...), I don’t really see the Empty deal as a threat to Cas anymore. Unless Cas is destined for a tragic end and will be sucked into the empty in the series finale-- which, again, would mean that DEAN would also never be able to be happy, because it’s been explicitly established in text that Dean can’t be happy without Cas, and again, I don’t think the series CAN have a tragic ending, so it’s so unlikely I’m not even bothering to consider it. Except... Cas might not know that because of everything else, his own happiness won’t spell his doom, you know? Which leaves some interesting possibilities on the table for really cool CHARACTER stuff instead. Cas’s fear of finishing that conversation with Dean that Dean’s Purgatory prayer began, for example... because heck that’s treading really dangerously close to words that could make Cas happy... And could be holding him back from continuing that dialogue now, at least for a few more episodes of tension between them.

They may just bring it up again as a WTF Cas? How could you not tell me? moment, just to demonstrate that Cas and Dean truly HAVE resolved their interpersonal conflicts, by having Jack confirm that the deal is null and void because of his arrangement working with Billie and the Shadow now. Or even Cas himself already knowing the deal has been nullified when it’s mentioned in conversation, allowing them to finally have a conversation about what would make them happy, using Cas’s continued existence as a prime factor in Dean’s happiness, and Dean wanting him to stay to be a prime factor in Castiel’s happiness... I think this could be a really interesting way to use the fact that the deal had existed at all could spark that revelation, you know?

But again, all of this is just theory at this point. I could be 100% wrong about all of this. But as you said, with only 9 episodes left (and two of them theoretically not even including Cas... and heck they could do a speed run through the Empty for one of those episodes too... I have no idea what they have planned), I don’t think it’s going to be a long, drawn-out ordeal, you know? They’ve refocused all of the character arcs back into the main story now, and they’re all converging on what will eventually be the series finale, not flinging them all out in opposite directions to generate drama and angst, you know? Different point in the story, different options available to wrap up open threads.

#spn s15 speculation #spn 15.11 #castiel winchester #Anonymous

[cyb3r-ph03n1x]

A “quick-ish” dissection and response to “Not all men”

//For context, this first comment (in blue) was my own. I made this response on a post a woman had shared to a group I was in. Her post consisted of a screenshot depicting a message exchange she had experienced, in which a male stranger had began the exchange with “how do you feel about pineapple on pizza?” to which she says “I love it!” and his immediate following response was “Now what about me on top of you?” Sure, looking back on this, the conversation is so sudden and shocking it does elicit a little bit of laughter because of how strange the behavior was. However, this had me thinking a lot on modern behavior and how it seems like sexual innuendos and just the subject of sex is more commonly mentioned in otherwise unrelated discussions and context. In my experience, both online and interpersonally, I have found that the majority of these scenarios are perpetrated by men, in which they would bring up the subject of sex, make a sexual joke etc., in strange contexts, in which the recipient is usually a woman he just met or just started talking to. This is what motivated my response.

So as the day goes on in the world, somewhere in the internet hemisphere, a man within the group had read my comment to this interaction, in which he was insistent in replying to my comment, amongst the hundreds of comments making various statements but all in the same vein of, simply put, “what the fuck?” Okay, context is set. This is quickly going from “quick-ish” to tedious. You’ll find a lot of my posts are like this. Please bear with me. I didn’t feel the need to respond to this man’s comment because ultimately I believed there would be no reasoning. Contextually, it was obvious his mind would not be changed, and any effort on my part to try otherwise would prove to be just wasted energy and lost spoons (Spoonies represent!) Of course, when I say I didn’t feel the need to respond, what I mean to say is “I am honestly raging and am feeling some sort of emotion, and I will most definitely write about it, but I am still an anxious wreck that usually avoids conflict and confrontation at all costs.” Go figure.

So to that unnamed man who I have clearly upset by my words, let me say that I am sorry for causing you distress.

I am well aware that it isn't all men. If it truly were all men, I would have cut off all my male friends, I definitely wouldn't be dating a man, and would have otherwise left them all behind to whatever abyss is available. I haven't. I am usually apprehensive and cautious when it comes to being friends with just about anyone, but especially men, because past experiences have shown me that my trust can easily be taken for granted and my own virtue to see the good in people just leads me to being harmed and sacrificing so much of myself to try and "overlook" the red flags. A story that is all too familiar for many women. The men that are currently in my life, from lifelong friends, mutual friends, to my loving partner, all know that I never mean all men. They also know better than to make a pretentious comeback about "women begging for attention." 

Those "women with no personality begging for attention" happen to be some of the kindest and most beautiful women I know and have encountered. They have a strong worldview and can hold a multitude of conversations better than many people, including the men who have some sexual innuendo to send two messages in to a conversation on a general social media platform. 

Far too many women have had the experience of unsolicited overt sexualization, unwanted advances, unsolicited dick pics, and so many more abhorrent things, at the hands of men. These women also know that statements about men do not usually mean all men. We are aware that it isn't all men. In fact, that's the other thing you've seemed to miss. 

Truly good men understand that while they personally may not act or behave in such a way, they understand that as a whole, there are problems and standards that are perpetuated by and upheld by men that directly affect women and also cause harm to men (toxic masculinity, etc.) 

As Ms. Banks sings, "though we adore men individually, we agree that as a group- they're rather stupid." This brings me to the most important point of all:

It may not be all men, but it's still *too many* men. Too many men with a sense of entitlement to women's bodies and minds. Too many men who view women's confidence and sexuality as a personal affront to them. Too many men acting in violence virtually or physically against women. Too many men on the constant defense men's manhood that they'll apologize and defend a man for anything that is lodged against or spoken about them. Too many men playing "devil's advocate" and "master investigator" when it comes to women coming forward about atrocities committed against them by men. 

The fact that you had to make a comment in my thread trying to tell *me* that it "isn't all men" while making a pathetically misogynistic comparison would suggest to me that the shoe fit you just a little bit too well, or maybe fit too well on someone you know, and so you needed to defend that. And how ironic is it, that in the process of trying to defend your manhood and the manhood of men, you showed yourself to be the exact man I referred to. I believe it is you who should be the one to take a step back. 

Because it may not be all men, but it sure as hell is you.

#not all men #yes all men #feminismisforeverybody #feminist #feminism #listen to women #intersectional feminism #this is why we walk #women #tired of your shit #oped #facebook #writing #sexualization #overt sexualization #unsolicited dick pics #unsolicited opinions #too many men #too many words #misogyny #toxic masculinity #patriarchy #dont @ me #cyber phoenix

[thisdiscontentedwinter]

Stella and the Wolf - Chapter 22

You can read it on AO3 or find the Tumblr Chapter Index here. 

Stiles might not have much experience at being the center of attention at school, but Jackson and Lydia certainly do. They’re waiting in the parking lot, leaning against Jackson’s silver Porsche—if it was scratched on Friday night by Peter’s journey through the back roads of the Preserve, the damage has already been buffed and polished out—looking ridiculously attractive. Both of them.

“Hurry up, Stilinski,” Jackson says when Stiles pulls in nearby.

Jesus. What a dick. Except Stiles gets the feeling that it’s all pretty much an act now—it’s a fucking good act, he’ll give Jackson that. He’s totally committed to the role, for sure—so he slings his backpack over his shoulder and picks up his pace as he reaches them.

They both look like they’ve stepped off the front page of a glossy fashion magazine, whereas Stiles is pretty sure he has peanut butter on his shirt.

But they make room in between them like he belongs there, and stride toward the school like they expect there are cameras watching.

Are there classes or something? On how to be this attractive and intimidating? Weekly sessions in a secret undisclosed location, with a teaching staff made up of supermodels and disaffected beautiful people? Because Beacon Hills seems to have a lot of that going around, but Stiles never got sent the prospectus.

The crowds part for Jackson and Lydia like they’re celebrities. It’s weird. Everyone is looking and whispering, probably wondering if Stiles’s kidnapping makes him suddenly cool enough to be elevated into Lydia and Jackson’s social sphere, but nobody dares approach. It’s like Lydia and Jackson project a force field that the regular kids can’t penetrate. And Stiles would know. He was on the other side of it as recently as Friday.

They escort Stiles to his locker, and then to the door of his homeroom.

“You’re eating lunch with us today,” Jackson tells him with a haughty expression.

Stiles sees right past it.

“Okay,” he says. “And Jackson?”

Jackson cocks an eyebrow at him.

Lydia takes her compact out of her purse and inspects her perfectly applied lipstick.

“What you guys did the other night, both of you, was just…” He swallows. “But you got Stella away from her, Jackson, and like, I owe you. I owe you everything.”

Jackson flashes him a cocky smirk. “Whatever.”

Stiles rolls his eyes.  

Jackson lowers his voice. “Is she okay?”

Because heaven forbid anyone overhear him and realize he has a heart.

Lydia snaps her compact closed and slips it back inside her purse.

“Fuck you,” Stiles says warmly. “You pretend to be this total douche, I see through you now, you asshole.” He looks at Lydia. “I used to wonder what you saw in him, but I get it now. I get it.”

“Are you saying he’s your type?” she asks.

Jackson snorts. “I’m everyone’s type.”

He’s such an asshole.

Stiles loves him.

***

In Chemistry, Harris is still a total dick to Stiles, so some things never change.

In English, Allison looks totally shell-shocked and when she tries to look for a pen in her bag, she spills the contents all over the floor and Scott scrambles to help her pick them up.

Stiles wonders if she knows.

***

“She doesn’t know,” Lydia says at lunch, stabbing her salad delicately with a fork. “I talked to her yesterday. She’s buying the whole story about her aunt being a domestic terrorist.” She slips a piece of lettuce into her mouth and chews for a moment. “Scott should really tell her.”

Stiles laughs weakly. “Scott? Why would—”

“Don’t play dumb, Stilinski.” Jackson rolls his eyes. “Derek told us everything when we were burying his uncle.”

Right. Grave digging duty. It probably brings people together and stuff. Nothing like a bond formed over a shallow grave.

“Also, nobody gets that suddenly good at lacrosse,” Jackson mutters, like he’s still personally affronted by that most of all. “Not when they were so freaking lame to start with.”

They’re sitting alone at the popular table. Scott keeps casting Stiles worried looks from where he’s sitting with Allison, but as far as Stiles is concerned he has werewolf shit to discuss with Jackson and Lydia, and if Allison’s not in the loop then it’s not their place to bring her in. That’s on Scott. Also, her crazy hunter aunt tried to kill him and his family on Friday night, and he’s still processing that. He really doesn’t have the capacity to deal with her inevitable shock at any werewolf reveal in addition to that.

“Anyway, she doesn’t know,” Lydia says. “And Mr. Argent says that his father is coming to town for Kate’s funeral, and he’s apparently just as crazy as Kate was, which is the reason Allison’s parents don’t want her to know anything about hunters, and werewolves, or anything that could drastically lower her life expectancy.”

Wow. Apparently while Stiles was reading Batman and watching TV over the weekend, Lydia was on a fact-finding mission at the Argents’ house. Also, that explains Dad’s phone call from Chris Argent last night.

Lydia catches his look and shrugs. “You’re not the only one who likes to get the complete picture.”

Jackson helps himself to one of Stiles’s tator tots. “How’s Derek?”

“I don’t know,” Stiles says. “I mean, he just lost his last family member. How do you think?”

Jackson and Lydia exchange a look.

“What?” Stiles asks. “What?”

“It’s nothing,” Lydia says airily. “So is Derek staying with you?”

“Yeah.” Stiles feels like he’s been sidelined somehow.

“Good.” Lydia clasps her hands together. “We’ll come and visit him after school.”

“Wait, what?” A part of Stiles’s brain snags on the idea of Lydia Martin in his house, and he shakes his head to untangle himself. “Why?”

“Because Gerard Argent, Allison’s grandfather, is very likely going to have Derek in his sights when he comes to town,” Lydia says, explaining it like he’s slow. “And an Alpha needs betas to be strong. At least two, preferably more.”

Stiles squints at her. “How do you know all this in two days?”

Jackson snorts. “Guess you’re not the smartest person in the room for once, Stilinski. Now you know how the rest of us feel all the time.”

Lydia flashes Jackson a warm smile, and turns back to Stiles. “I told you, I did my research.”

“So what?” Stiles asks. “You’re still chasing the bite, Jackson?”

Jackson reaches for an apple and takes a bite. “So what if I am?”

“Even after the other night? You saw what hunters do.”

“This time I’m not chasing it,” Jackson says. “But I’m volunteering. An Alpha needs a pack.”

Stiles fights down the sudden rush of jealousy that wants to tell Jackson that the Stilinskis make a fine pack, thanks very much. Because it’s not exactly true, is it? Derek has the Stilinskis, and they could be a family for him—last night Derek folded laundry and sorted Dad’s socks, and it doesn’t get more family than that—but maybe Jackson’s right. Because Derek is an Alpha now. Maybe an Alpha needs more than a family. Stiles isn’t a werewolf. He can’t know the difference between family and pack, but he should know better than to assume there is none. Maybe an Alpha does need a pack, and there must be times where the meanings of the words overlap—he thinks of Derek’s story about Peter kidnapping the Hale kids for a Disneyland trip—but it’s possible they’re not an exact synonym.

And maybe Jackson isn’t being selfish. Maybe he’s not looking at what the bite can give him, but at what he can give Derek instead.

Stiles remembers in third grade when Jackson had a meltdown in class over one of those dumb family tree projects, and that’s how everyone found out he was adopted. Maybe, for Jackson, family was never quite what he needed to be. Maybe he thinks pack will give him something that he still feels he’s missing.

“Okay,” he says. “I mean, there’s no harm in offering, is there? If you know the risks.”

“I do.” Jackson crunches down on his apple.

Stiles glances at Lydia. “You said betas? Are you volunteering as well?”

Lydia huffs. “God, no. Trust me, that’s not even an option.”

“Because Scott’s no fan of Derek’s,” Stiles says. “Like, at all.”

“We know,” Jackson says, and rolls his eyes. “McCall is a dick.”

Stiles bristles out of habit. “Takes one to know one.”

Lydia elbows Jackson before he can retaliate. “We’re working on it, Stiles.”

Working on it? What does that even mean? Does she have an alphabetized list of potential beta candidates lined up or something? Will they have to submit résumés? Will there be interviews?

He’s just about to open his mouth to ask when he becomes aware of someone approaching in his periphery. He turns his head to see Allison standing by the table, her eyes red-rimmed and her hands clenched at her sides.

“Stiles?” she asks in a fragile voice.

“Oh. Um, hey, Allison.”

He’s aware that the entire cafeteria has stopped to watch this exchange, and wonders if they’re expecting fireworks.

Allison draws in an audibly shaky breath. “I just wanted to say that I’m really sorry for what happened to you, and your father and Stella. And I understand if you don’t ever want to talk to me again, but—”

“Oh, hey!” Stiles pushes his chair back so quickly that he almost overbalances, and leaps to his feet. “No, Allison. I mean, she was your aunt, but you didn’t know. I’m not going to hold it against you just because she was, well, crazy pants.”

Allison’s brow creases.

Okay, so that wasn’t the best way to phrase things. Stiles tries to regroup. “Anyway, if I was going to judge you on your relatives, okay your aunt tried to kill us, but your dad came through, so that totally evens things out, right? Math for the win!”

Lydia groans, and Jackson winces, but Allison only tilts her head and stares at Stiles blankly for a moment.

“Oh god,” Stiles says. “I can’t believe I said that.”

Allison blinks, and tears brim in her eyes, but at the same time her mouth twitches and a small, strangled noise escapes her. It might even be a laugh? “So we’re good, you and me?”

“Totally,” Stiles promises.

She shows him a tentative smile. “Thank you, Stiles.”

And then she darts forward and hugs him quickly before turning away and going back to sit with Scott.

No fireworks in the cafeteria today.

Stiles sits back down, shooting an accusatory look at Jackson when he sees his diminished amount of tater tots.

Jackson smirks. “Hey, I’m carb loading for lacrosse. What’s your excuse?”

“My excuse is I paid for those!”

Jackson shrugs.

“Asshole,” Stiles mutters.

Jackson’s smirk grows.

Lydia rolls her eyes, but she at least shoves her salad in Stiles’s direction so he doesn’t starve to death.

#sterek #Stella and the Wolf #my fics #discontentedwinter

[theearthsheep-blog]

and i’m feeling in a particularly venty mood right now so fuck all y’all we’re getting politlcal

and no fuck you i’m not putting this under a read more. if you follow me i want you to read this.

a) first of all yeah i don’t really get political on this here website very often and that’s not because i don’t have political opinions or because i’m worried that they’ll be unpopular, i expect most of my followers and i agree on pretty much everything. the reason i don’t post politics is mostly because they make me anxious and i’m on this website in my spare time when i don’t want to deal with it. with that in my mind, fuck the mentality of “everyone who doesn’t reblog this is a fascist”. first of all it’s very “with us or against us” and i understand where you’re coming from but there are plenty of valid reasons to not want to reblog that kind of stuff. i’m going to call out a specific post here just because it’s the one i remember and i want to give an example, but there wasn’t anything particularly egregious about it. it was a post supporting jews, i forget the exact wording but it was something simple like “this blog supports jews” and someone added on to it with something in the vein of “i’m watching those of my mutuals who aren’t reblogging this very carefully” and like... that made me feel really shitty because that’s not the kind of thing i like to post but here was this post telling me in no uncertain terms that i’m an affront to the jewish community if i don’t constantly tell everyone i’m not.

and i know there are plenty of people out there who would read this and their first thought is “oh sheep is just closet anti-semitic”. like, seriously, reconsider your worldview if that’s how you’re thinking right now. you can’t be this black-and-white.

and, like, look, i get it. i’m trans. i know what it’s like to know that a big portion of the world is literally out to get you, literally hates your actual existence. i know what it’s like to watch those around you like a hawk for any warning signs of being the kind of person it’s very unsafe to honestly introduce yourself to. i get it! but i can’t just assume that anyone who i follow who doesn’t post support for trans people on like, a monthly basis? is transphobic. and honestly i couldn’t really even assume that anyone who DOES post support ISN’T. it helps certainly but at the end of the day that’s just words. this may surprise you but people can just say words and it doesn’t necessarily mean anything. like you know how you were in elementary school and they made you say the pledge of allegiance? and after like two times it stopped meaning anything to you, and you were too young to understand it when you learned it anyway? don’t make everyone say the pledge of allegiance on their tumblr every morning, regardless of what allegiance it is you want them to pledge.

and to set the record straight, of course i support jews. anti-semiticism is disgusting. at the same time, (and this is getting into the shitty “who has it the worst” arguments that i hate) i think jews probably aren’t priority 1 right now. i’ve seen some buzz about a sudden upsurge in anti-semitic actions over the past few months (since trump got elected) and no statistics i’ve seen have actually supported that. it looks like it’s been a steady growth for several years now and like that’s worrying enough on its own but trump has already taken direct action against both muslims and latins and i feel like those are the people who need the most support right now. and honestly? i genuinely believe that trump isn’t anti-semitic, though particular members of his administration certainly are.

anyway.

that isn’t even what i wanted to talk about.

b) and this is what i’m here for, really. come on guys, you really need to fact check some of this shit. i’m not playing around here, if you think “spreading the word” or “keeping people informed” has any value at all then you NEED to curate the content on your blog. i’ve seen tons of posts that i’m sure mean well but are exaggerated or downright wrong. this plays directly into trump’s hands. especially right now, his message is that the “media elite” are conspiring against him and making shit up. this does not seem to be true in any meaningful sense, but every time some news organization uses some hyperbole to grab clicks and then every other outlet takes even the original CLICKBAIT out of context, misinformation flies quick. and it lends credence to trump’s “fake news” message.

right now, the story is the 100,000 national guard trump is secretly plotting to deploy to support ICE in removing illegal immigrants from border states (and a few that are adjacent). so where did this story come from?

the associated press claims that they have a leaked white house document that describes an executive order trump may give which will allow the deployment of the national guard of same states to support efforts to deport immigrants. this is worrying enough! this is bad!

however, the AP doesn’t just announce that. that doesn’t fit easily into a tweet and it doesn’t bait clicks. instead they say, and this is the exact quote: “BREAKING: Trump administration considers mobilizing as many as 100,000 National Guard troops to round up unauthorized immigrants.”

the 100,000 number is nowhere, even in the document the AP says they have. - oh and just as a sidenote i’m going to keep saying the AP “says” they have a document. for what it’s worth i do believe that they genuinely got it from a white house employee, but i’m just trying to be clear here that it’s just them saying that, there’s no evidence for it either way. for what it’s worth, the white house denies the validity of the leak.

anyway. the 100,000 number actually seems to be in the neighborhood of the sum number of national guard in the states in question. in fairness to the AP, they did say “up to”, so i guess they’re covered (in that 0 is “up to” 100,000), BUT a significant fraction of the national guard are already deployed on various tasks, so it’s literally incorrect to say that anyone is considering deploying the full 100,000. plus, trump couldn’t mobilize these people even if he wanted to. the national guard for each state answer to the governor of that state. each of the fourteen governors have the final say on whether, and how many, of the national guard would be called into service.

okay, so, we have the Associated Press telling an exaggerated BUT still basically true tale. but because it was exaggerated, the exaggeration is what people will remember. in this case, it’s the number 100,000. i’ve said it enough times in this post, even if you only read this, it’s probably the first thing you’d remember about the story.

so what happens if or when this executive order actually gets signed? in a few weeks the news story comes out and says “5,000 national guard deployed to support ICE across fourteen states” and, “wow, look, that’s WAY less than those alarmist liberals told me there would be! see? everything’s fine!” so trump gets to say “the news media spun everything way out of proportion; the liberals worked themselves into a froth; and the world didn’t end”. and at the same time he literally used the military to fulfill a civic goal, which is about as big of a warning sign for fascism as i can imagine.

it is entirely possible that the white house is intentionally leaking documents that they know the news will whip into a frenzy over, just so that when the truth is less bad, people will think that it’s okay. this is trump’s path to victory, and if so it’s working alarmingly well. this is why you need to be careful. your voice matters and is valuable, don’t misuse it.

3) one last thing, john mccain just spoke at the Munich Security Conference, and his speech was decidedly anti-trump. mccain has been a critic of trump pretty much as long as trump has been a politician, and now he’s making some very, very valuable points. he may be trying to garner support in the republican party for a sort of “anti tea party” movement back to moderation, probably partly as an attempt to save the party from getting swept in the next few election cycles, and partly because john mccain isn’t absolutely fucking insane.

this is the kind of thing to watch out for, and support. even if john mccain isn’t a perfect person and he’s not my first pick for the oval office, he’s better than trump. i know that’s a low bar, but that’s what we’re reduced to. if such a movement among republicans were to occur i would happily volunteer for their campaigns if i thought they had a better chance than a more leftist candidate, and someone needed to keep actual fascists out of congress.

anyway that’s all largely speculative and not really what i wanted to talk about. 

here’s a selection from his speech, sourced from the Washington Post:

[The founders of the Munich Conference] would be alarmed by the hardening resentment we see towards immigrants and refugees and minority groups -- especially Muslims. [...] They would be alarmed that more and more of our fellow citizens seem to be flirting with authoritarianism and romanticizing it as our moral equivalent. [...] I refuse to accept that our values are morally equivalent to those of our adversaries. I am a proud, unapologetic believer in the West, and I believe we must always, always stand up for it. For if we do not, who will?

now i know that it’s popular around here to hate on america. yes, we’ve been involved in some shit in the middle east and elsewhere. yes, there are tons of stains on our history of civil rights. yes, our treatment of american indians has historically been abhorrent and isn’t getting much better.

We are not as bad as Russia. We are not as bad as China. We are not as bad as North Korea. We are not as bad as ISIS.

the United States, and the rest of NATO, have the unique power to act almost unilaterally to promote western values around the world. and when i say “western values”, i don’t want anyone reading this to fucking scoff. i’m talking about freedom of speech, of the press, of religion, of assembly. i’m talking about the belief that a liberal education can make you a better human. i’m talking about the belief that people are inherently valuable. these should be a given but they are NOT.

yes. i know. the united states is not perfect, even in granting those things above to its own citizens. but it TRIES. it doesn’t fucking assassinate journalists. it doesn’t have its secret police raid meetings of non-state-sanctioned political parties. these are REAL THINGS THAT HAPPEN TO REAL PEOPLE AND IT IS OUR RESPONSIBILITY TO CARE AND TO FIGHT FOR THEM.

the united states pulling out of NATO, or of just being too isolationist to do anything about these very real threats to very real people, is i think the most plausible worst case scenario from a trump presidency. and i am SO willing to fight for moderate republicans who agree with that. people like john mccain.

like, you can probably tell i’m getting kind of emotional over here but i literally want to kiss john mccain right now.

what has 2017 done to me