#yet people still feel entitled to our work for free

[duckprintspress]

Special shout-out 🖕🏽 to the person who wrote "I just pirate it, that's free" in the comments of the book format poll.

Don't pirate books, y'all. Like seriously, fucking stop it. There's maybe a couple hundred authors in the entire world who make enough money to truly be able to afford the loss.

#unforth rambles #i blocked them #people pirating books makes me salty #gee i wonder why #maybe it's the way it's nearly impossible to make money as a writer #yet people still feel entitled to our work for free

[r6shippingdelivery]

There’s been a lot of talk about AO3 and censorship lately, due to one of the candidates to the OTW board. And I realised I have very strong Opinions:tm: about censorship and the freedom AO3 stands for.

Censorship is not a solution. It doesn’t work and it’s not even easily agreed upon where the line should be drawn. What some people might deem as immoral or reprehensible is not the same others will consider so. For example, you and me can agree that sexual stories about minors turn our stomach, yet other people would also include LGBT+ content there, even the sfw ones, and others might decide that any sexual content at all is immoral. So, how do we agree about what to ban, when nothing of it is even illegal?

because let’s be honest, it’s all fiction. As in, not real. Things like incest, rape and pedophilia are illegal irl, but not in fiction. Cause they’re not harming anyone. Really. You can find it disgusting, I certainly do, but I also recognize no person, no actual human, is harmed in the making of those stories. Because they’re made up and about made up characters. I won’t seek it out, and if I see someone making that kind of content I will most probably avoid them/block them (without harassing them), but they have the right to create any kind of fiction they want.

It always baffles me how readily understood that is when it comes to murder and violence in fiction. Nobody thinks that someone who writers murder mysteries or procedural shows really wants to go out and kill people. However, as soon as it’s about sex, people are up in arms ready to believe that those make believe scenarios are an indicative of someone’s real desires. Why is that? And since we’re on the topic of double standards: why are people clutching their pearls about fanfic, but literature gets a free pass, more or less? You go into a library and you’ll find lots of books with shocking and distasteful topics, including those that contain pedophilic content (like Lolita, to put a famous example), incest (Game of Thrones, among many others), rape, murder, etc. But they want me to believe that fanfic, the medium with severely impaired social acceptance and magnitudes smaller reach, is the actual problem that will “normalize” those ideas? Nah fam, I smell a moral panic, and people finding fanfic writers easier to bully into submission. Because this is all about controlling what forms of creative expression are deemed acceptable. Fanfic IS a form of art, popular art if you will, but still art. And by virtue of how AO3 is designed, it’s ridiculously easy to never see the kind of stories that you find objectionable.

Tags are a wonderful thing. I can specify what I want and what I don’t want in my story results when searching! Tags are the author being responsible and giving due warning. Especially the “dead dove: do not eat” tag, it lets you know that the content of the story will have questionable content, proceed at your own risk or keep scrolling. Same as the “chose to not use archive warnings” that one is a warning in itself that the story might contain triggering/upsetting content, and it’s the prerogative of each reader to decide whether they’re comfortable continuing reading or not. Ultimately, it’s all about taking responsibility for one’s decisions. People who are in favor of censorship in AO3 either don’t know how to control and curate what materials they access, or feel entitled to everyone else taking their morals into account instead of taking responsibility for their own experience in the archive.

None of the stories on AO3 is illegal. Fictional stories are not illegal, not even those dealing with unsavory topics. The archive makes people agree to continue reading whenever you click on a story with a certain rating (or without any rating at all, just in case!), so the reader is giving their consent to continue reading, they’re making an informed choice. Same as with the tags. They’re there, they’re a warning. If someone reads the tags, finds them displeasing and still continues reading, that’s on them. If I find a story with tags about rape/non-con, for example, I keep scrolling. Cause I know I will find the story displeasing and upsetting. The people clutching their pearls and going “but think of the children!” are, mostly, people who refuse that responsibility and ask the world to accommodate them and their morality. And then throw around words like pedohilia and accusations of “kiddie porn” careleslly, watering down the seriousness of such accusations. No, an explicit fanfic of twin, underage siblings going at it is not CSA. Cause there’s no real children involved in it. It might be disgusting for a lot of people (me included), understandably, but you can 100% avoid reading it and interacting with the people who write those. 

Finally, let’s not forget the recent history of fandom spaces, shall we? LiveJournal and Fanfiction.net both had purges of content, after some campaigns for censorship gained traction and popularity. So now everything relating to certain topics is eliminated! Well, except that also includes communities of support for survivors of sexual abuse (it happened in LJ). Well, except that the people pressuring for censorship weren’t happy with the gay smut either, so a lot of LGBT related stuff is now also gone! (happened both in LJ and ff.net). Except, in some countries anything sexual at all, is frowned upon, so why not ban that too? Censorship supporters will always move the goalposts, forever shifting their aim whenever they accomplish something. Because it’s easier and more comfortable to make others conform to their standards than accepting some artistic expressions will be uncomfortable to some people. And trust me, none of them will care if the dark fic in question was written by a survivor of similar experiences trying to cope with their trauma or raise awareness, or if it was done simply for titillation or to safely explore different scenarios in fiction. And the topics that were banned in those websites didn’t disappear at all, they just weren’t properly warned for/detailed in the summaries, so anyone could stumblre upon them by accident. The complete opposite of what happens in AO3.

AO3 was created by people who lived through those censorship events in different fandom spaces, as a response to it. To seeing whole communities and swathes of fan content being unceremoniously deleted overnight. AO3 is an archive and an online library, not a social media platform. It’s a safe haven for anyone to host their fan creations, but that doesn’t mean it’s a safe space as people understand the term in other platforms. In AO3 you make your safe space by using the tags. Because that is the only real way we can have a safe haven for EVERYONE. 

The thing about freedom of speech is that sometimes, you have to defend things you dislike (that, I repeat, are legal in this case), because experience has shown time and time again that as soon as you give an inch to the censors, they take more and more. And today they’re up in arms about “pedophilic fanfics”, but once that is done? It might be all nsfw content, it might be trans related content, it might be something else. But it will happen. 

#ao3 #fanfiction #fanfic #censorship #freedom of speech #anti anti #okay I'm entering the discourse I'm sorry

[dmagedgoods]

I really truly do mean this in the nicest way possible, but a whole petition (to a studio that has already offered giant and numerous free updates to an already giant game) feels a little… strange, I don’t know.

Fan content exists for a reason, and yeah it’s usually nice to be “validated” by canon in some respect.. but it’s totally unnecessary. This all feels kind of entitled and a little embarrassing.. There’s nothing wrong at all with just making the content you want instead of demanding time/effort/resources dedicated towards content tailored to you specifically.

No offense and none taken, anon, but I think you misunderstand what we're trying to do. First of all and most importantly, we don't demand a thing. We ask politely and make Larian aware that there is a large number of people who would enjoy a Raphael romance. Since we can assume they are still working on the game, add content (as they did recently with patch 5), finish the things that aren't round yet, and so on and so on, it is helpful for them - or so I imagine - to know what their fans would enjoy. So far Larian wasn't even contacted. I merely ask people on tumblr, and twitter, and discord who of them would like to have a Raphael romance in the game (or more scenes with him in general). A petition is simply the easiest way to name a sound number of truly interested individuals who actively said "This is what we wish for". instead of just vaguely gesturing towards some likes and comments underneath a random post. Larian will know: There is a group of people out there very willing to pay for a DLC of this very kind. Yes, pay. And that's the next point: We don't want anything for free. If you take another look into my planned letter to Larian (it's not the final version of it yet, just something to show around so people know what they are signing up for), you'll see that I added that we offer to pay for this romance if they implement it as DLC or in similar ways. We even would agree to pay the full game price again for it. I doubt Larian will truly decide on the full game price for it, but we let them know that of course well-written content and their amazing work needs to be compensated appropriately (and beyond - since it's a bonus we hope for and we are aware). No, nothing of this is the slightest bit embarrassing, entitled, or even uncommon. Larian asked for the input of their fans right from the start. They added the Halsin romance because people asked for it. They added Haarlep because people asked for this sort of content. They changed Wyll because apparently several people asked for it too (I'm personally not a fan of those specific changes for Wyll but that's not the point here). Larian is used to feedback of this sort, Larian actively wants feedback of this sort. And if they don't like our submission, they can do something very easy, costing neither time nor effort: Ignore it. I'm not going to send this in any inappropriate ways, I'll at them on twitter, maybe send it in their forum, and/or write an email to an official account meant for this sort of suggestion. This petition will be a mere addition to the letter to show them: No, I'm not a single fan with this wish, we are a large group. Larian won't think "Why don't they create fan content instead?", they will think "Is this group of people big enough to make enough money with this DLC the effort is worth it?" And maybe "How much of it is a good idea to implement to make our game even more enjoyable for our fans?" - As they did from the very beginning.

#raphael #bg3 raphael #raphael bg3 #haarlep #dmagedanswers #bg3 #makeraphaelromanceable

[thedreadvampy]

My housemate is moving out in January

She told us this a week or two ago, when she sat down and, after sitting with us watching TV for over an hour, said "hey so I bought a house and I'm moving out. We agreed on 2 months notice so I won't move until the end of January."

The last time she talked in the immediate terms about buying a house was in 2021, when the sale she was working on fell though and she was unemployed so it was a "when I'm back in a position to look I'll start looking again." Since then I've occasionally asked her how she's doing on the house buying front and she's been like "oh I'm getting there financially" but hasn't mentioned anything concrete.

She didn't tell us she was looking at places. She didn't tell us she had put in an offer. She told us when the offer was finalised. A week AFTER she emailed the letting agent about getting out of her part of the lease. And, it increasingly feels like, only because the letting agent's response was that we had to agree to change the lease.

The letting agent's response (which our housemate obviously didn't copy us into; we had to follow up separately and they copied us into the email chain) also includes that when we change the lease, they're empowered to change the rent, quote, "no cap". Rent was already going up in January - there's no possibility of Sam and I paying her share of the rent.

The really fucking upsetting thing is we're not strangers. This isn't a casual "housemate we found on flatshare" thing. She and Sam have lived together literally their entire adult lives. Me and her have known each other well over a decade. I lived in her and Sam's flat when I was homeless. We were the first people she came out to as trans. We're not super close but I thought we were fucking friends. And she's literally gone out of her way to not talk to us about this for what must have been months while the sale completed - which means she's lied to my face at least once cause I've asked her about her finances in that time (cause she's in a job she hates that she only took to get the house money, so it's like. when we've been commiserating about work stuff I'm often asking 'are you almost free?'). she literally went out of her way to talk to the letting agents before talking to us about putting us in a situation where we could lose our fucking home.

And she keeps. trying. to pretend nothing's happened. Every time I've seen her since then she's not mentioned anything or apologised or anything, she just keeps chatting away and offering hugs and fistbumps like nothing's happened. Like we're still fucking friends.

All it would take for us to still be friends and to be happy for her would have been one fucking sentence in the groupchat like "hey, just put an offer in on a house" or "I'm looking at properties, just so you know, that might happen in the next few months". Like nobody begrudges her for buying a house! It's very cool for her! She's 31 she's worked really hard to get the money I would love to be happy for her! Unfortunately she decided avoiding conflict is more important than giving the people she fucking LIVES WITH (who btw fronted her a month on the rent here while she was unemployed and agreed to take on a larger proportion of the move-in cost back in 2021, if we're still holding ourselves to shit we said 2.5 years ago), so no, you are not entitled to our friendship or to going back to normal.

like if she'd been honest with us it would have been something to process but we'd have had time to figure out our next steps. instead she's left us in a position where we have to find a new roommate before she gives her one month notice, which means finding someone by the end of December, which oh look that's the middle of the fucking Christmas holidays. and she didn't tell us anything until the START of December, or copy us into her conversation with the letting agent, meaning we still don't know what the rent on that space will be so we aren't yet in a position to advertise it. Has she offered to help find a roommate? Has she fuck. Has she offered to help out by moving her move-out date? Nah, she's moving as soon as she gets the keys because, quote, "that means her finances won't have to change". SOUNDS LOVELY. NOT HAVING YOUR FINANCES SUDDENLY CHANGE. I THINK THAT SOUNDS LIKE A REALLY REASONABLE FUCKING GOAL.

Thirteen fucking years she's lived with Sam. Four fucking weeks over Christmas she's left us to figure out a way to not turbofuck our living situation. And she's got the fucking nerve to try and pretend we should be interacting like nothing's changed. Jesus Christ. What a fucking unhinged way to treat...anybody, honestly. never mind the friends-your-entire-adult-life part. literally cannot imagine a scenario in which I would buy a house without telling the people I lived with.

(haha actually this is what my parents divorced over so apparently it's not unusual. although at least my dad had the decency to tell the woman he shared finances with at the point he put in an offer not the point the fucking sale went through.)

Like we'll be fine. It's a huge city centre flat with decent rent and queer housemates, hopefully even when the rent goes up it'll be an easy sell in a city with a huge housing shortage and big queer community. We've got a couple of people interested already, sight unseen - worst case scenario we have to live with someone we don't get on with. And it's given Sam and me a push to look at our own finances and as of today, we've got a mortgage decision in principle and can start looking at flats in the area - mind, we'll be transparent upfront and tell any prospective housemates that yeah, we're looking to buy and move out in the next 6-12 months, and we'll tell them if we put an offer in, because we're decent fucking people who aren't going to spring that on someone out of the blue.

But it's been I think 2 weeks and I'm so fucking angry I could spit. It's such a fucking betrayal. And frankly you know selfishly like. I just had a breakup a couple of months ago, I'm in the middle of moving jobs, both me and Sam have a history of housing instability and this has been the first decent, stable, safe, not-mouldy not-freezing home I think any of us have had, and this is so fucking triggering and upscuttling I could just start biting. like I was talking to my friend about it last week and it's just like. Can I have One Fucking Thing of the three main tentpoles of survival - home, work, relationships - that are fucking stable right now? because shit has been In Flux lately. and at least the work and relationship stuff has changed because of my decisions. going through all that work to make myself short-term unstable to gain long-term stability has been really hard and draining and then just as I was reaching the crisis point with work stuff BOOM, IT'S HOUSING INSTABILITY WITH A STEEL CHAIR. fuck. seriously fuck this and fuck her. we're going to make something good come of it but what a deeply, unbelievably shitty thing to do.

#red said #the other thing that bugs me about it is. ok and again this is old shit dredged back to 2021 when we moved in together #but i had my housemate. and Sam had her. and each of us were really close pairs who'd lived together a long time #and we tried looking for flats as a four but a) a flat with 4 good sized bedrooms in Edinburgh is hens teeth #and b) my housemate was pretty happy to live with me and Sam but increasingly felt like a 4 man flat was going to be a lot for him #and so in the end we talked about it. and through a combination of that and same housemate being in a pretty #unfavorable position housing wise. cause she was unemployed and had shit credit at that moment. #we agreed she'd move with us and Joe went and found a one bed #and in the end that's been really great for him tbh he's a lot happier and more confident and we were pretty sick of each other by then #and so we get on much better now #but at the time it was a real heartache i felt like I'd let Joe down i felt like our friendship was over #and honestly I have never been a huge fan of living with our current housemate. even before we lived here #like when i was staying with her and Sam too. she's incredibly messy and takes up a lot of space in conversations #I've always liked her as a person but she's exhausting and often unpleasant to share space with #and there's a bit of me that's like. we bent over backwards to accommodate you when you were precarious. #like it would have been WAY easier for us to look for a 2-bed during 2021. and if it was a 3-bed I'd have rather stayed with Joe. #but we moved with her for her sake. and she left Sam to clean up their old place (and there were Literal Rats) #and she got really pissy about driving the moving van even though a) that was her idea and b) she's the only person with a license #and c) i walked all MY shit over by hand anyway and the only reason she hired the van was to move her tv #me and Sam found all the core furniture. me and Sam sorted out all the viewings. me and Sam did all the planning. Sam set up all the bills. #we spotted her for rent!we took a bigger share of the costs! because we fucking cared about her and wanted her to have a fucking home! #and she can't even do us the courtesy you'd offer a fucking lodger you found on fucking gumtree

[yoonia]

https://www.tumblr.com/darkwitchgardener/746072202665967616/why-are-some-tumblr-writers-so-fucking-entitled

as a writer do you have an opinion on that? personally i think it’s rude but most people under that post seem to agree but i bet they never post anything

Okay, let's talk about this. I personally do think that this post is not only a weird take, but also rude and disrespectful. let me dissect every part of their nonsense and share my thoughts in this

why are some tumblr writers becoming so fucking entitled?💀 like why are basically forcing people to reblog your work?

Let's look at these tumblr writers, shall we?

Most of us here have real life outside of this site and outside of fanfics. Some of us are struggling to finish school, college, some are even on their way to achieve their PhD titles and yet they still spare their precious time to sit down and write fanfics for free between writing down their thesis and studying for exams. Some others have 9 to 5 jobs, or maybe freelance jobs that don't have a steady working hours (meaning they could have been working 36 hours nonstop without sleep, aka just like me), while also dealing with a spouse or children to take care of in between jobs and they are still writing fanfics for YOU to read for free (ps. when I say YOU here doesn't mean I'm talking to you, sweet anon. I'm directing this to the OG poster and whoever is agreeing with their take)

I feel like looking at this alone, if a writer wants to be entitled to have their work promoted through reblogs, to be circulated around by their readers, and to have any kind of feedback, then they are allowed to. After all that hard work put on a free content, the many hours we spent and the lack of sleep we all get to finish a fic, whether it's 100 words or 100k words, the least a reader could do is show a bit of support or any form of appreciation

(I'm not saying that readers should treat us writers like Gods and celebs either, or for us to be placed on top of a pedestal, by the way. This is an entirely different kind of writers entitlement that I'd love to talk about in a different post, but this isn't the kind of 'entitlement' that's being talked about here, so...)

Why do writers ASK readers to reblog our fics?

Because tumblr's reblog system is the main reason why we chose to post our fics on Tumblr in the first place. Reblogging helps our post to be circulated around, while keeping our copyright safe/still belong to us instead of being reposted by others, and each time anyone finds our fic in their dash, these new people will be directed back to us without any reblogger/reader having to get into any amount of trouble of having to link you back to us or credit us (like reposters on wattpad barely do)

Likes and kudos may help boost our fics if it had been in any other platforms, but the same can't apply here on Tumblr. Because liking a post only helps YOU, a reader, to keep the post that you like to be 'bookmarked' on your 'liked' list. Not anyone will be able to see those liked posts unless you make them public or if these other people would spend more time perusing your blog

I personally don't mind if readers can only leave a like, even if I can't tell if it means you're actually loving the story or you're only bookmarking it to read later. At least, a like on my circulating fic indicates that you've seen my work and that's already enough for me. And I can also tell you that I, as many other writers, will always appreciate deeply those who take their time to at least leave a comment whether it's on reply or an ask if they can't help reblog the fic. Which means, if you can't reblog it, we can't really force you to do it, but we WILL love it if anyone do it

Talking about "Only likes will be blocked"

I have never once seen any of my writer friends saying this on their posts. Do I agree with this? No, not really. But I also don't agree when the OG poster said something about a writer adding this on their disclaimer because the writer thinks they have 'a power over other people's blog'. Like...this is another weird take.

Because for me, the only power that this disclaimer gives a writer is the power to curate their own blog and their audience.

I may not agree with a writer putting said disclaimer (especially when it leads to people clumping them with a bunch of us who don't think this is necessary to do) but I can't fault them by adding this disclaimer on their blog. Maybe this writer has a problem with silent readers or is fed up with the imbalance between likes and reblogs that don't do much in helping boost their fics?

We'll never know what's the reason behind this disclaimer but, I'm going to turn this one back around to the OG poster and their supporters and say, who are YOU to think you have the power to decide how a writer should be running their blog?

I've seen other writers doing things that I don't agree with, but it's their business and it's not my problem how they're handling their blog and their audience. If you can't agree with one writer's way in how they are running their blog, then perhaps you can turn away and support other writers instead? some of us don't bite and aren't rude to others. some don't even care what you do, as long as you're not stealing their work. some others don't have enough energy to do either one of the above and are only here to post fics and have fun (like me lol)

just don't post your shit at this point lmaooo 😭😭

This one is the part that makes me smh the most. Let me ask you this, which one would hurt a fandom community more: when writers or content creators suddenly feel like they have enough of entitled readers and choose to stop posting, delete everything, leaving nothing behind for other people in the fandom community to enjoy, or a loss of followers?

Content enjoyers and readers come and go, we all know this, we've all experienced this, but not everyone is willing to spare their time to write or create content for other people to enjoy. Fandom community will keep growing. New audience will keep on coming. But if nobody is creating anything, what happens to the community? What is there to enjoy?

I agree with you, anon. I don't think this person knows anything about what kind of hard work goes behind a fic or a content. Because if they'd known even just a sliver of what goes behind the scene and how these contents they are enjoying here in this site came to be, they would have never said any crap on what a creator does in order to feel appreciated and supported by their audience

#💌 for dia #Anonymous

[archivalofsins]

So, let's talk about Milgram fandom and isms. This has been a long time coming. Plus putting it in the dog cat post I was drafting up would take attention from the main point so here we are.

So, isms are thrown around a lot when it comes to Milgram's writing and the fandom perception of characters.

Now, I've done this too. I'm not immune I am only human as well. I've discussed racism, fascism, sexism, ablism and I don't particularly plan to stop doing so. Because these are all things that color my worldview and matter to me. I believe these things should matter to everyone. They are firm social biases that disenfranchise every person that lives on this earth and are worthy of being discussed.

Yet, I must be emotionally honest for a moment. The reason I discuss things and isms to the extent that I do is simply because isms are easier to understand and identify than the root problem would be. Because if I were to discuss what I believe the root problem to be it would hurt a lot of feelings.

Because when I discuss the use of these isms it is not in the context of Milgram the series but Milgram the audience. Something that I believe should be discussed in a civil but firm way. Because it is a firm judgement of many people, I do not personally know but have seen how their biases are displayed and from my own experiences have formed an opinion on that display.

I discuss it this way because the content in Milgram is very up to interpretation. It gives people what they take away from it. Nothing more nothing less. So, the opinions we form from what is presented does say something about the type of people we are. Milgram very seldom hard confirms anything.

There's evidence of what is or has occurred throughout the songs but Milgram doesn't look directly at the camera and go this is what they did you're right and give the viewer a little thumbs up. This is why all our opinions on information can remain so varied and voting can conflict in the way that it does. Despite the fact we're all working with the same information.

So, what's this thing I've been holding off on discussing under the guise of isms. Well, it's the big P where all biases come from-

Privilege

If you don't think you have let's take stock in check.

A. The priviliege to content for free and shared information.

B. The priviliege to judge others with no possibility of negative repercussion to oneself. Be it anonymously or openly.

Yet, in turn Milgram's staff has priviliege as well.

A. The priviliege of a large and supportive fanbase.

A fanbase is a very lucrative and helpful thing. Yet at the same time it can turn into a doubledge sword of sorts.

B. The priviliege of having the engagement that work hinges on.

If no one voted nothing would anything within Milgram change? If it was all 50/50 would it impact anything. An effect cannot happen without a cause.

So ultimately the fanbase and Milgram are in a very symbiotic relationship. However, the fans have more power than the staff in this case. If everyone just stopped voting one day would it still be Milgram? If the fans weren't having these discussions would this all still be going the way it's going.

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it. It does make sound but does that sound matter?

In the same vein it's important for individuals to take stock of their own personaly privileges to better examine their personal biases. It is a privilege to have the time to cositently vote on a character whether Innocent (Forgiven) and Guilty (Unforgiven) each day and feel entitled and secure in that judgement. It does say a lot that so many people have the time to consistently go online each day and decide to dogpile on fictional characters in the way they did.

To the extent of making a Kazui Unforgiven Shrine. To the point of this,

Amane was like seventy percent innocent on the day of her songs release. Something that had remained stable in consistency since the beginning of trial two. The fact that hers has gone down the extent it has we people couldn't even make a dent in Mu's goes to show just how hated these two are.

Like people really went on that website each day and voted them guilty pridefully. Comsistently in their judgement of them being wrong. That is commitment that is hater energy.

Without a single thought of, "Should I just mind my business? Don't I have better things to do with my time then make a fictional characters day worse?"

Yuno

Tear Drop

"Just shut it, will you? You know it all."

Futa

Second written interrogation.

Q.18 Do you regret anything?

No, it's them that did something wrong first if they didn't then they wouldn't be here in this narrative.

"I do. What was I even doing that stuff for in the first place?

What other people are doing doesn’t have any impact on me."

Not a single thought of, "Hey, is this too much? Should I lay off."

Mikoto

"Is this selfish? This isn’t too much is it?"

It's okay to vote for any reason though. Even if it's just for fun. Even if I just dislike. I don't have to think too hard about just,

Kazui

"Keep it simple."

If i like I forgive if I dislike I don't. That's all there is to it. Something like that doesn't say a thing about me as an individual. I'm not doing anything wrong.

"Should I show the forgiveness that I would want myself or those close to me to receive if they messed up? If they were in those circumstances..."

Mu

Voice trailer snippet

"How would they know...whether to forgive me or not? People can't understand what I had to go through."

First Voice Drama

"Prison guard you're human as well. So... I'll do my best. I'll figure out what kinda person you're fond of." - "Hm... Actually.. If it think about it, compared to those good for nothing police trying to catch me- Someone's who's definitely not in the wrong. Milgram just might be better for me."

It's Not My Fault

"Hey, what if- If I am a bad girl? Don’t hate me. Don’t even try to prove anything from “After Pain”. Hold on. It’s not my fault! You knew it, right?"

Nope, clicks guilty. Then instead of blaming the fans that are making the choice to do this everyday all by themselves the blame is shifted to the media. There are fans that abstain from voting you know nobody has to be taking advantage of the privilege to vote. No one has to consistently spend their time every day being critical of another persons choices fictional or not.

Like, people are choosing to be here and do that based on their assumptions about the work. I'm no different in that regard. I just have no ill will towards the content as it is because it's not the content that is the issue for me. I just don't like how some people interpret it.

Something that is a clear personal problem and something I do not have to seek out or interact with. Everyone interprets things differently, which should be rightfully respected unless their interpretations are actively causing harm to others. Which under these circumstances I have to state is not people voting anyone's favorite character Guilty in mass even if it feels like it.

Something I have to immediatiely follow with fuck that shrine shit though. Along with the fact that it is incredibly sad to have an in real time example of how easy it is to shift the vote from seventy to fifty because it highlights how widely dogpiled on Mu was this trial and Mikoto was last trial.

My next point is going to be a highly personal one. Based off of my experiences but it's funny to me to see people crying about bad representation so often. Because it highlights a certain aspect of privilege that goes consistently overlooked.

Not all media is about you and if you think it is that's a sign of privilege.

I was discussing this in private, but the way most fans discuss the writing of Milgram truly highlights how privileged a good majority of fans may be. Each time I see statements like this, my immediate response is to go huh most of the individuals who make up this fandom must have never been told,

"If you don't like how you're being represented then go write it yourself. If you don't like how we treat you as a customer then go make your own business."

To have the community they are apart of do exactly that in every possible field and be historcally undermined at every turn.

I just have to recognize that a lot of people haven't grown up seeing those like themselves represented in media as just one specific trope. That rarely ever overlaps with what your experiences are actually like. Then, when people like you do begin creating content of their own, watch them be held to incredibly high standards in regard to inclusivity. Simply because as a minority they should know what it feels like to not be included, so they should do better to be inclusive and represent everyone well. They have a responsibility.

No, they don't. People society routinely ignored don't owe anyone a seat at the table they fucking build. I feel the same can be said here. Yamanaka has consistently discussed overlooked and taboo aspects of Japanese society along with the issues that come from those. The way an artist creates does not need to be sanatized to any one person's specific standards or tastes.

Discussing such topics as the ones being handled here is going to rub many the wrong way at times. Because it is showcasing the aspects of society and the individuals within it that go routinely overlooked and shied away from. Expecting all representation to be squeaky clean and good is harmful. Take it from someone who grew up under the construct of black excellence or look up anything regarding the model minority myth.

There is no exactly right way of being a creator and no one's personal vision is going to please everybody. Creating something like that is actually impossible. Even when representation is heavily sanatized in order to be considered socially acceptable their will still be people who criticize it for being that. Because it doesn't leave room for individuals who don't fit into the norms of society to mess up or be flawed.

It gives this impression that it is on them to be the model citizen at all times or risk ruining it for everyone causing all progress to backslide. Because societies acceptance of your difference is no longer true acceptance but instead a trade where you keep bringing stuff to the table in the hopes it's good enough that they allow you to sit down.

At this point I really believe this is just a culture gap on my part but I did want to say something about it anyway. Not just because I'd personally been avoiding the topic of privilege since entering the fandom myself but to draw more attention to how the audience itself is a character in this narrative. Along with how a good majority of our behavior and reasoning has begun mirroring that of the prisoners in Milgram or Es'.

Because I believe that aspect of Milgram is very interesting! Whelp that's enough of that I'm going back to writing about the dog and cat thing.

#gunsli rambles

[gabessquishytum]

I am on a fucking roll, cause I got another trope for you folks! The remote fleshlight/onahole, yes people, we are going there, and what I love is that it is entirely possible for Morpheus to do something like this with his powers. I will die on this hill, don't @ me. As always, I love my noncon/dubcon Dreamling, feel free to imagine sexy roleplay instead. And also, I'm gonna add a loss of virginity here just for kicks.

In this scenario, Dream is finally willing to acknowledge to himself that he loves Hob but is unwilling to confess yet (and also he's still a possessive/obsessive jerk), so instead, he stalks the man's dreams, especially even his wet dreams. And 2 possible catalysts here, either Dream sees that Hob is dreaming of having sex with someone else and gets insanely jealous or he sees someone flirting with Hob in the waking world and gets insanely jealous XD. This is so Dream istg, as a king, he feels entitled to Hob and his time, and while he's trying to work up the courage to confess, he makes sure Hob can't get with anyone else.

What does he do? Dream fashions a fleshlight that is actually connected to Hob. The first time it happens, Hob is at home, he feels something poking his hole, then several thin somethings, moving around, spreading his pucker. He is panicking, cause what the hell is happening. And it should hurt (he's never had anything up there before), but it doesn't; he does feel something wet dripping from his ass, kinda like lube but that's impossible. The things suddenly brush against something inside him, and he jolts at the sensation, the things start attacking that terrible spot exclusively. And Hob is a mess, he's confused, crying, drooling, and finally cumming hard from the stimulation. He can feel the things sliding out, is it over? Nope, he then feels something big, thick, and insanely hard pushing its way inside, and it doesn't leave him alone until hours later. I love the image of Hob - face an absolute mess of tears, and drool - lying partially naked on the floor, frantically trying to find out what was going on, ends up with his legs spread, his own fingers up his hole to get the big thing out. All he gets for his trouble is the thing absolutely ramming his prostate as if mocking him, plus his own fingers adding to the pleasure. Good thing the walls are soundproof, cause man oh man the thing doesn't stop ramming his sweet spot until Hob is a twitching screaming mess.

And so Hob spends nearly every day getting absolutely railed by a phantom, time and place are random. He's had to excuse himself from class so many times to run into the nearest restroom to hide until the "episode" is over, all the times he had to bite my lips and hide his face behind his bag on the tube/bus. He has no idea what's happening, and he is still scared, mostly of how good it feels now. Maybe, maybe he could ask his friend Dream for help..... Dream will make the thing go away right?

Thank you and goodnight folks, I love you all.

-Yan Anon <3

Sskdkdjfjd I love you yan anon!!! I love all-powerful sex beast Dream and I LOVE me some virginity kink. Fucking yum.

So Dream uh. Doesn’t always make the best choices, right? Our Fave Is OCCASIONALLY Problematic. So I’m entirely willing to get on this train of Dream trying to like….. cure himself of his feelings?? get some relief from all the sexual tension?? By using Hob. Maybe he doesn’t even see anything wrong with what he’s doing! Hob likes sex, therefore he will naturally enjoy whatever Dream does to him. Right?? Dream has seen too many of Hob’s wet dreams to let go of his sexual desires by this point. It seems like every time he peeks in on Hob in his realm, the man is the middle of some explicit fantasy of fucking a pretty girl or guy. And well, if he’s so desperate for sex, why shouldn’t Dream be a good friend a help him out?

The thing is, Hob probably would jump into bed with Dream immediately if asked, but Dream is too stubborn. And he wants to be completely in control. Hence, the long distance fucking. What Dream doesn’t know is that Hob has never bottomed before (for whatever reason, maybe he didn’t get around to it yet, maybe he’s still nervous about being so vulnerable… maybe he’s saving himself for someone special).

And god. Hob is having a rough time. He’s weighing up his options: either he gets Constantine to exorcise his arse, or he goes to Dream for help. Ultimately he picks Dream because he trusts him the most. He asks his friend to come up to the flat, and he’s wringing his hands and biting his lip, terrified that it’s going to happen mid conversation… oddly enough, it doesn’t. He explains in fits and starts what’s been going on and Dream…… he’s basically having a mini stroke. It doesn’t show on his face, but he’s listening to Hob talk about the mysterious phantom in detail and he is fucking. Dying. He expects his sister to show up to collect him any moment. She doesn’t, but she is giving him a very stern look from a distance.

So Dream internally is like well I obviously can’t tell Hob that it’s me because he doesn’t seem entirely happy about this whole situation… so he comes up with an alternative. He tells Hob that he can get rid of the phantom, but there’s only one way to do it. Dream will have to fuck him.

And Hob is like oh?? That’s so simple!! As long as you don’t mind!! And he pulls Dream off to the bedroom. Because now Hob’s had a taste of bottoming from the phantom, he’s actually a bit addicted. He’s wanted Dream for hundreds of years, this is like the best possible outcome!! He’s on his hands and knees on the bed with his arse out within minutes, waiting for Dream to give him what he needs.

And it’s a funny thing, because Hob knows, realistically, that every penis is different… and yet Dream’s cock feels exactly like the phantom!! Same girth, same length, same ridges where his veins protrude slightly. It feels identical, and Hob isn’t complaining because it’s the best feeling in the world but still. A little odd. He mentions it to Dream afterwards but Dream distracts him moments later by fingering his sloppy hole and telling him that he’s such a good fuck, especially for a virgin…

And Hob can’t for the life of him work out how Dream would know that about him, but hey. It doesn’t matter as long as Dream keeps fucking him. If only they’d done this sooner!! ; ))

#yan anon #cw dubcon #cw noncon #nsft

[frownatic]

My take on some of the arguments on the current HB discourse:

1: "We fund the show through merch/donations were owed transparency"

I found this gem of an opinion after someone said people shouldn't act like this towards a free show.

The answer to this one is sweet and short: No

When buying merch you're entitled to the item you're buying, nothing more nothing less. When given donation you're entitled to a vague knowledge to what it will be used for (in this case to fund production), but unless explicitly stated otherwise you're not entitled to a complete rundown of production and/or any hurdles they may face.

Now if they weren't fulfilling their patreon tiers you might have a point, but as far as I know no patreons have come forward claiming it to be a scam.

ㅤ

2: "Since Ep 8 isn't character/plot heavy it's worthless/it wasn't worth the hype"

This is an incredibly odd claim since episode 8 isn't out yet, but I digress

Helluva boss isn't a plot heavy show it's very episodic, if you don't like shows like that that's fine, but it doesn't make the show less than.

I'm actually still super hyped since they said they focused on the animation in ep 8 and that's my personal favourite part of the show. It feels very insulting to the entire team when you claim their work is worthless for not catering to your desire.

ㅤ

3: "We're allowed to be upset and voice our disappointment"

This one is especially fun regarding the hypocrisy in combination with the next point

Yes you are! Crazy I know.

But you aren't allowed to insult/harass/threaten Vivzie and her crew. I'm amazed I have to state this, but you can feel bad without being an ass.

If the only way you can express a negative emotion is by hurting others you might need therapy.

Again if you're upset/disappointed and are cordial or just normal about it, I have no problem with you, you're entitled to your emotions.

ㅤ

4: "Vivzie is toxic/guilt tripping for being upset"

I'm gonna try to keep it short, but know I'm passionate about this subject in particular

Breaking News: Content creators are just human.

I find it insane that after getting insulted and harassed voicing your grievance is seen as manipulation. Humans are impulsive and emotional and if Viv had any malicious intentions she wouldn't have deleted the tweet.

She's allowed to feel bad, she's allowed to vent, and I don't understand how the people who claim they're just sharing their emotions/reactions are shaming Viv for doing the same.

#Yes I've seen all of these takes #no joke I saw someone say ppl were toxic for saying you shouldn't harass people #what is even going on #the entitlement in the fandom is unbelievable #if you disagree please block me lol #helluva boss #hazbin hotel #hellaverse #twitter #vivzieverse #vivziepop #vivienne medrano #helluva #hazbin

[suomeen]

Chapter 1: Discomfort zone

As the war started, the world opened up to embrace Ukrainians. But I didn’t go. The second day of war, when things looked pretty bad, I went to my sister who lives in a village in the heart of Ukraine. There we stayed in a small house with 8 people for a month and a half, until it felt safe enough to return to Kyiv.

Back then I got several concerned messages from foreign friends, offering help. One person offered to help me relocate to Germany, another even offered to stay at their house in England. I turned them down. I wasn’t desperate. I still had a home and didn’t feel eligible to go. I was also feeling excessively optimistic about the future. A few months ago, I looked back on those offers and seriously thought if I should have left back then. There was so much more support. And, as pragmatic as it may be, it was a window of opportunity. But the truth is, I was not ready.

After nearly 2 years of war, people grew weary of supporting us. And frankly, it was partly our fault. I heard lots of stories of our people acting entitled and rude, getting into fights for handouts, seemingly indifferent to the real suffering back home. And then there are a lot of us. By some estimates, 9 million people left Ukraine to go mostly for Europe. Over time, counties began to close up, the payouts and privileges got cut down. So, by the time we contemplated leaving, there weren’t many good options. The only countries who were still truly welcoming were the Baltic and Nordic countries. One of the most supportive ones was Finland. Sure, not as it used to be. At the start of war, Ukrainians could enjoy free trains and public transport and even things like zoo tickets. Little by little, it got cut down. Still, Finland was accepting Ukrainians and granting temporary protection almost to anyone with a UA passport. But the main reason for choosing it was that Mum had a friend in Finland who recently married to a local man. She had been telling us to come for a long time, offered her help, but we didn’t listen. 

For a long time, I resisted the idea of going abroad. It was too scary, too uncertain. Moving to a richer country out of convenience seemed wrong, even if a lot of people did it. And yet, things at home have only kept getting harder. There were more and more air attacks and explosions and the Winter was only beginning. The thought of leaving began to resurface.

I was desperately trying to cling to my comfort zone – my room, my PC, my things… Until there was no more comfort left. There’s no peace of mind when you sit in your corridor listening to killer drones fly in the skies above. Still, I had to ask myself “Do I deserve protection? Have I suffered enough? Sure, I heard explosions and sirens all day, had drones and missiles flying over my head, but the chances of me being actually killed are low. Surely, this isn’t for me. There are so many people who need this more.”

And then there was the guilt of leaving your country in crisis. But I realized that there was nothing I could do to help it. I admire the soldiers, the medics, the volunteers and everyone dedicating their lives to protect and help others. But I couldn’t be one of them. I don’t have it in me. I would be broken by trying. I was already broken by these two years. And I have battled depression and anxiety for most of my life. Things were hard for me and, just as I was starting to feel like maybe they might actually get better for once, it all broke down. 

Sidenote: I was the happiest I ever was in my life just before the war started. And it’s not like I won a lottery. I just got a job that I loved, that paid modestly but fairly and my health was alright. Of course, the war wasn’t a complete surprise. We have been anticipating and dreading it for months. We have joked about it at work just days before. One of our team members was Russian and I remember I made a joke about the invasion. Another colleague told me it was too much. Yeah… I was the closest to that Russian boy. He seemed very nice. Talked about wanting to work for Red Cross. Funny that, since I am now living under the protection of Red Cross here in Finland. When the war did start, all the guys from work wrote to me, asking if I was ok and if I needed help. Except the Russian boy.

It was even harder coming down from that high. But perhaps, it gave me a little reserve of resilience, a little joy I collected, like an extra life to spend. So, when shit went down, I was strangely calm and collected. I still was the first year. We were riding the high of our initial success. But hope is a volatile resource. After two years, there was nothing but burnout.

Initially, I rejected the though once again. It was too drastic and it felt like I’d just be swapping one type of stress to another. And, in a way, that was true. Though in the end, hearing sirens all day is not the same as asking strangers for directions.

But the last straw fell when I was trying to find a job. I got completely burnt out at my last job the previous year. Not to get too into it, but it paid very little and required me to write Economist-grade texts in a few hours. I remember sitting in the corridor, listening to explosions and worrying I had a text about Taylor Swift’s dogs to finish. Then came the blackouts. I was physically falling ill from the stress. So I quit. But there was nothing part-time and I couldn’t even get jobs I was ridiculously overqualified for. I tried to find something reasonable for months, but it was just no use. Finally, I passed a test for the country’s major TV channel, 1+1. They offered me a translation job. Except it wasn’t official in any way and the pay would only come some 2 months later. Also, the project was some MTV trash. I came up to my mum then and she said it wasn’t worth it. So I went “You know what? Fuck it! Maybe we should just go. It can’t be worse than this.”

So I catapulted myself out of my comfort zone way across 4 countries.

Finland threw a lifebuoy and I grabbed it.

[cagedchoices]

About using AI to write replies... Why does it matter if people do or not? Maybe they don't have time to come up with a reply on their own but still wanna be active on tumblr. I just don't see why everyone paniced the minute this came up and jumped to banning anyone who might use it.

It matters because as of now, there's not really very many restrictions on what writing AI language models are allowed to pull from or not.

OpenAI is being sued in California because reportedly their AI was found using material protected by copyright from two best-selling authors. The authors were hosting both published and unpublished work on SmashWords. This means that the artists who created the work that the AI used and Frankensteined together, weren't paid or credited for their contribution to its dataset. This is currently a HUGE concern being observed with AI art and AI voiceover capabilities as well, with the fear being that if you can just use an AI to make a painting or replicate a voice for free or otherwise at only a small cost, then why would you pay an artist or actor for their time and effort? And I believe it is a valid concern.

I saw a thumbnail for an AI cover of A.rthur M.organ singing on YouTube just yesterday. I didn't even click on it. I blocked the channel, which was called "Made With A.I." or something like that. Because what this means is that R.oger C.lark, the actual artist who portrays the character of A.rthur M.organ, is most likely not getting paid for his work even though the AI is pulling from audio/video clips of dialogue he recorded and then emulating the voice by cutting together and simulating all the different sounds it needs to process to make it sound like A.rthur singing. Thus, now YouTube is profiting from the site traffic and ad revenue that video is creating for them (because they put ads everywhere now regardless of if the video is monetized or not), and the company that built the AI voice program is profiting from its use, and possibly the channel creator is profiting off of posting these kinds of videos. The actor is not getting paid even though it's his voice on the line.

When it comes to fan works such as fanart, fanfiction, tumblr roleplay, we are in a different boat. We legally cannot claim copyright infringement or make a profit off of our work in any way. Everything we do and everything we make falls under a social contract.

Most of us believe that stealing is stealing. When people repost art and other graphics or writing and claim that they made these things when they didn't or they trace over or repaint someone else's fanart, we call them out for it and tell them to reblog from the source, give credit to the original poster and stop being an art thief. That's generally what the social contract is. AI as it stands right now, violates our social contract. It doesn't give credit to anything it finds on the internet. It assumes that everything it finds is fair game.

Now all of that said, I have not personally picked out anybody using AI in the rpc yet. What I have seen is a confession blog in which somebody stated in one confession post that people were starting to use AI chat bots to write positivity for them and they hated the idea of that. I found some evidence that something like this has been happening on ao3. Bots are allegedly using the usernames of existing ao3 members to leave anonymous comments, most likely after datascraping fics so that the number of hits don't look as suspicious in proportion to the number of comments and kudos.

There have also been more than a few comments on anti-AI posts in which other users admit to using AI language models to continue unfinished fics they stumble across, with some feeling entitled to do so because "well if you leave a fic unfinished for a year i'm gonna assume you're never coming back and take matters into my own hands to get the ending i deserve" Which is an insanely entitled cold take.

And for another thing, we can't trust the companies who are developing all of these AI programs, because they could be lying to us. Currently there's a bit of a panic going around concerning Google's new beta AI assistant. There have been several conflicting reports. Some have been saying that the AI scans all of the Google Docs you've saved, public and private. Others claim that it only looks at documents you have set to public, and still other claim that it doesn't scan or save anything that it scanned without your permission. The problem is that Google as a company has shown us repeatedly through past experiences that they cannot be fucking trusted. Remember when they said they would never sell your data without permission? And then they got caught and 'apologized' for selling everyone's data without permission? Yeah. It's that lack of transparency surrounding how the AI actually works that truly makes it unethical.

I'll admit that yeah it may have been a little hasty of some of us rpers to start adding rules against using AI to write as quickly as we did and with only a minimal 'wait are people actually doing this?' mentality, but the way I see it is, I would rather outline my stance on it now before it becomes a huge problem, than risk leaving it alone until it's effectively too late to matter.

And as for being a roleplayer in a hurry to get replies done... I think we should address the root of the problem there. People are so anxious and afraid that their writing partners will ditch them and move on or that they won't seem interested enough in writing if they aren't pumping out replies all day every day and honestly, that's sad and it's really reflective of how transactional fandom spaces have become in the modern day, I think.

Using an AI to poop out a reply so that you don't have to feel anxious about not replying fast enough is not going to help us get out of that situation. It's just gonna make it worse. What we should be doing instead is encouraging people to go at their own pace. Not driving them right into the arms of AI authoring by stressing and pressuring them to respond within [x] amount of hours/days.

#mobile tbt. #long post. #i...went off i'm so sorry 😭 #the thoughts kept coming and they didn't stop #mel vs AI

[lowkeyclueless5137]

book 6 is gonna be a h o r r i d time in the reverse brother haunting au. jfc

For both the brother haunting au and the reverse, it's a horrible time for the Shrouds.

Ps: in both cases, their actual overBlot episode is during the 2 Halloween event, which makes the Ignihyde book be the 2nd book. We also get to explore the dorm a bit more too :v

For the normal brother haunting au:

Ortho would be so done and over. Like please end him then and there. He is classmates with VIL of all people! And Idia is just trying to diffuse the situation before his lil hooman brother has a seizure. Like please, he's brimming with anxiety, can y'all act like reasonable beings for like 5 mins???

Idia also being more confident, immediately is able to wipe everyone into their place. Like their parents are off to some more important business and all they have to do is watch over them for less than 24 hours, then everything can get to fucking normal and everyone would be happy and free.

But nothing can be simple when 1 sparkly French IKEA lamp looking ass guy busts in with Epel and Yuu.

Like in the king of Blots Au, Grim is the one that stirrs up the chaos, this time sensing a blot stone that was out of an experiment and transported around. In here, the whole situation drives poor Ortho to the point he cries his eyes out because 'WHY can't you just not act like entitled bastards for a bit?! I don't wanna do this yet you blame me for it?!'. This also touches a very low spot for Idia, who absolutely hates to see his lil brother crying. Cue threatening these mfs to cooperate and catch Grim before he decides to open the gates of the underworld and throw them in there to rot with the rest of the Phanthoms.

Bad part is that these bitches don't feel any kind of remorse for making Ortho cry. Like when the Shroud parents return(they immediately hurried back to STIX, so they came a few minutes after our guys left) and find this absolute mess, with their youngest still sniffling a bit, oh it's a whole shitshow. Mrs Shroud wants to decapitate those guys and Idia actually hypes her up. Mr Shroud is the reasonable guy who firstly calms down Ortho and makes sure that at least the boy is well and no one was severely hurt. The damage was out of both brothers's control, so neither get grounded. Instead we get a nice lil family time. :3

Now for the reverse brother haunting au:

Idia in here has a bit of more calm to him. Ortho tries to convince his brother that since in the end they will erase the memory of these guys, maybe they should try and attempt to bond a bit.

Well Grim goes hairwire and shit hits the fan. Unlike Ortho in the og au, Idia is filled with rage since really, these guys are testing his patience. Ortho, poor Ortho, gets so overwhelmed and worked out about it. Like they were supposed to have a sum nice time and now they are arguing while Grim is rampaging through STIX. Like please stop it.

And this is when Ortho cries, this time out of his robotic eyes real human tears pouring out. The others try to brush it off as being a malfunction of the robot, but Idia immediately fusses over his little brother, trying to make him stop crying. This, of course, brings in more rage to Idia, to the point his whole hair is red and BOI is he ready to tear a new one to these bitches. How dare they disregard his brother while in his home?! Like at school Idia would give it a pass, maybe get annoyed at worst, but here? Here he lives. This is basically his house. And even in his own home these guys don't give a damn about his wish to simply acknowledge Ortho as a person? Nah. He's not having it.

So he speaks his mind. He is doing his best to hold his crying brother, covering Ortho's ears while he yells at the rest for being reckless and pieces of shit in general. He went through the same procedures as them. He was in a similar position of subjects, but every procedure was told in advance and in detail, yet still, they are entitled enough to act like this?! To make Ortho cry and disregard the very serious situation at the moment?! Idia tells them that maybe his parents aren't around here, but he's in charge now and maybe he'll just go over a notch and lock up these guys until the whole things is settled. Ok? No more Mr nice guy, you either listen to him and help contain the rabid Grim or you get cuffed and locked until this whole ordeal is over.

To rub that salt into the wound, after this whole fiasco, Ortho is enrolled as an official student at NRC, which means he has the right to be considered someone. He has every fucking right to be respected and Idia would rub it in the faces of the STIX incident group.

#twisted wonderland #asks :3 #Brother haunting au

[shera-dnd]

Continuing with our new Suletta Sunday tradition I'm bringing you guys chapter 3!

This time we follow Chu Chu's POV as she tries to sort out her own feelings and maybe take a step towards forming a polycule

enjoy the read

To claim Chuatury Panlunch was having a bad week would be an understatement.

Because somehow, against all odds, that stupid spacian bitch managed to make her care for her. 

Honestly. 

Chu Chu of all people, caring for some thoroughbred, rich, entitled spacian girl?

Bullshit. 

Absolute insane bullshit!

But there she fucking was. Worrying about Miorine. Spending every idle moment thinking about the last words they said to each other that night. Sure, those were words Miorine needed to hear, even if Chu Chu could have used a lot more tact.

It wasn’t her fault. 

She was raised to say what she thought and never let people silence her or her feelings. That meant standing up to the spacians who saw her as trash, and that meant giving her princess the wake up call she needed.

“Her princess.”

That was so fucking stupid. 

Why did she let herself get attached? 

Miorine was Suletta’s princess. She’d been her princess from the moment they stepped out of that cockpit together. And yet a part of Chu Chu hoped Miorine could be hers too, that maybe just maybe, if she made her realize Suletta loved her, then she would realize Chu Chu–

Nope! 

Not going there! 

Not touching that with a 10ft pole!

Let those two gay idiots be happy! And if Miorine figures out she still has it bad for Chu Chu, then she’ll let her come to her, not the other way around.

She has better shit to do than to be barking at her boss’s door, asking Suletta if she can have her wife as a treat .

So she focused on her work at Gund Arm, and spent all her free time working out her stress at the gym.

Chu Chu would just focus all her feelings into the punching bag in front of her, and then proceed to beat it up until she was completely exhausted. It wasn’t the healthiest coping mechanism, but it helped her pass the time.

She had been in the middle of one of those violent venting sessions when she heard a voice call for her.

“Chu Chu!”

She turned to glare at whoever had the guts to interrupt her, her eyes boring a hole through the soul of the unlucky bastard who said her name.

That is, until she recognized the red hair, and painfully cheery personality of the last bitch she wanted to see right now.

Suletta Mercury.

“S-Sorry,” Suletta stammered, “am I interrupting something?”

Chu Chu inhaled deeply, then exhaled, her body sagging as the rage left along with her breath.

“No,” she answered, beginning to take off her gloves, “I was just about done.”

She tossed the gloves aside and walked up to the woman she had been cucking for several weeks now. 

Fuck , this was weird.

“What did you need me for?” Chu Chu asked, trying to sound as friendly as she could.

Suletta scratched the back of her head, then looked around to make sure no one was looking. 

“Miorine and I had a… conversation the other day, and I wanted to talk to you about it.”

Yeah, there was no escaping it now. Her stupid decisions have come back to bite her in the ass.

“Right,” she grumbled, “let me finish things up, and we can talk somewhere more private.”

“Of course!”

And with that Suletta was off, leaving Chu Chu behind to regain all the stress she had punched out earlier.

The next few minutes had been tense to say the least. 

There was no real reason for it, Chu Chu had already accepted that she would bear the consequences of her and Miorine’s mistakes. It was just that as she went through what was a pretty mindless routine, her thoughts had been freed to torture her in the anticipation.

Once she was no longer smelling of sweat and had changed into some clean clothes, Chu Chu stepped out of the gym with all the cheer of a convict on the way to their execution.

Suletta - for what it was worth - seemed completely unbothered and accompanied Chu Chu with the same joyful energy with which she did everything.

After a good amount of walking, Suletta seemed satisfied with how isolated they were, and came to a stop, turning to look at Chu Chu.

“Look, I’m sorry,” Chu Chu surrendered, “it was a stupid mistake and I should not have fallen for Miorine’s crap like that.”

“What?” Suletta looked at her with that confused puppy look that she always seemed to have, “why are you apologizing?”

Now Chu Chu too was left confused, “because I fucked your wife?”

“Oh!” she exclaimed, “I already knew Miorine was seeing someone else. I’m just glad it was a mutual friend who I can trust to take care of her.”

Baffled. She was genuinely fucking baffled. 

Who hears that their wife is cheating on them with one of their friends, and takes that as a positive?

“You mean you are not mad at me?” Chu Chu asked.

“I wanted to thank you actually,” Suletta answered with her usual sweet smile, “if you hadn’t talked to Mio-Mio, then we’d probably end up miserable and divorced. Our marriage was saved thanks to you.”

That… made some sense. 

It still felt strange to be thanked for something like this.

“Uh, you’re welcome?” Chu Chu tried, not fully sure of what to do now, “I just couldn’t take Miorine’s crap anymore, you know. Like she obviously loves you so much, but she keeps doing this self-sacrificial shit, because she can’t believe we could actually like her back.”

Wait. 

Fuck!

Suletta beamed in a way that could have blinded half the space station. 

“You like Miorine too?”

Chu Chu crossed her arms and scowled, “and what of it!? I’m not gonna be fucking that little princess again, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

“Aww, you call her princess,” Suletta giggled, not caring one bit for Chu Chu’s aggressive tone, “that’s really sweet.”

With a groan Chu Chu dropped her tough bitch act, her shoulders sagging and even her hair poofs seeming to fall a little lower.

“Look, that was an insult… at first at least,” she admitted, “the first time it happened it was some heat of the moment stuff. Miorine kept trying to get under my skin, pissing me off every chance she got, and I just snapped. I just wanted to put that spoiled spacian princess in her place, so I did.”

“I-I-I-I see,” Suletta stuttered, her face looking as red as one of Mio’s tomatoes.

“But she has this way of making you care for her, and make you worry, and want to see her happy, and–ugh!” she clenched her fists just thinking about it. 

How dare she fall this hard for such a bitch, “it’s like seeing some old broken mobile suit, and knowing that if you just give it the right kind of care, it would become the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen.”

It felt downright humiliating. Like she was admitting defeat.

But of course that wasn’t how Suletta took it. 

Suletta saw Chu Chu at the height of her shame, and could only offer the most tender and understanding of looks. 

Because she got it. Suletta knew exactly how Chu Chu felt, because she loved the same woman as her. 

“I knew I could trust you to care for her,” Suletta said, full of confidence.

Now it was Chu Chu’s turn to blush.

“W-Well, what do we do now?” she asked, desperate to move on from her embarrassment, “you two figured things out and it’s great and all, but where do we go from here?”

“That’s why I came here actually,” Suletta informed her, “me and Miorine wanted to talk to you, and figure out exactly where things stand between the three of us.”

Okay, a little chat with their princess, Chu Chu could do that.

“But first,” Suletta called again, “you still made my wife cry, and I can’t just let that go.”

Oh no.

“Chu Chu! I challenge you to a duel!”

She sighed and shook her head. 

She really should have seen this coming.

“Alright,” she answered, “bring it on.”

Chu Chu was about to take one hell of a beating.

#fanfic #g witch #witch from mercury #mobile suit gundam witch from mercury #chuatury panlunch #chuchu #miorine rembran #suletta mercury #mioletta #sulemio #chulemio #chuchu x miorine #chuchu x miorine x suletta

[septembersghost]

it's almost as if everyone involved in the production of better call saul inherently understands that jimmy getting life in federal prison is a shitty ending that should not have happened, otherwise they wouldn't be engaged in willful denial of it. i've been thinking more and more that the finale is not going to age well once enough time passes for people to think about it objectively. it's sad because this was my favorite show but it is what it is

this has been in my inbox since august 22, and i think i've answered it in my head a hundred times, and every time the response is inadequate. that said, i get where you're coming from and think you're entitled to it.

the post i wrote a little while ago about kim exemplifies my biggest issue with the show's final episodes, but i've also been clear on my very real issues with the prison ending and the lack of middle ground (ie: did it have to be seven years or LIFE? why did they feel the need to use adx, which is hell on earth, and not the place someone like jimmy deserves to be incarcerated? the fact that jimmy only got all or nothing testimony, rather than a nuanced examination of both his trauma and his culpability, etc) - i understand why they felt prison was necessary, but i disagree with the way it was presented. i also still get stuck on the fact that it doesn't feel like a proper ending to THIS story. it feels like an epilogue to breaking bad, and maybe that's by design, but it was jarring for me to be taken out of bcs the way we were, to have so little of our protagonists in those final episodes.

i'll reiterate that i wish so much that peter had given kim a flashback, i feel like there is such a dearth of her in those last episodes, and there's this sense i have of mourning her terribly despite her appearances onscreen, most of which are nearly silent. and i'm never going to be comfortable with framing prison as a happy ending. the american prison complex is inhumane and corrupt, and they did a 180 of sorts on its thematic impact from what it meant in this universe previously. the mutual i was discussing kim with brought this up - how exactly does jimmy heal and reclaim his identity in a situation where he has no free will? where every choice is made for him, and he is sentenced to the punishment of the system for the rest of his life? i know every single person involved keeps saying he'll get out, but that's an intentional misunderstanding of what they themselves constructed, because that's not how the federal system works. we have to suspend disbelief so far - which i support! give them any hope we can - but on some level, we know that's not going to happen. if they'd emphasized what a tragedy the ending is, i'd have less cognitive dissonance about it, but the idea of prison ever being "happy" has driven me further from it. they earn their love back and yet can never truly have that. the cost is immense.

since a little over a month has passed now, i will admit that as time has passed, i myself have become less okay with it the more i've ruminated over it. it was my favorite show too, which is saying a LOT. i have unending love and respect for this show's actors and writers and directors, and i am so grateful to have had it and experienced it. my respect for them is not undermined by critically disagreeing with some key points about the last run of episodes, but it does carry a particular sadness. it shadows a lot of the story in a way that, for me, is much less fulfilling than the romanticism of, say, jesse's escape and walt's blaze of glory death. it feels like they were trying to get some element of that, but swung too far in the direction of punishment, which is not the same as atonement. there is romanticism in the last moments with kim, but the grief is profound.

#anonymous #letterbox #bcs spoilers #not putting this in the main tag

[ukrfeminism]

2 minute read

"It feels like we are punished for having children."

Mums are sharing just how much they’re forking out for childcare before their children start school and honestly, some of the figures will make you want to cry.  

On October 29, tens of thousands of parents are set to join Pregnant Then Screwed’s March Of The Mummies, a national protest to demand government reform on childcare, parental leave and flexible working.

Ahead of the march, the charity has urged parents to share selfies holding pieces of paper showing just how much they are spending on childcare before their kids start school – and some of the figures are eye-watering. 

The lowest figure is £12,200, but this climbs to £80,900 for one mum [pictured below] who has three children.

“You know how outraged people are by the notion that energy costs could be £4,000 a year,” wrote Pregnant Then Screwed’s founder Joeli Brearley in an Instagram post. 

“Just wait until you add up what you have spent, or will spend, on childcare before your child is five years old.

“The government and much of the public are completely oblivious to the amount of cash money we are forking out just so we can go to work – this is literally your work tax, on top of your actual work tax.”

To bring this to the nation’s attention, protests will be taking place in London, Glasgow, Manchester, Leeds, Belfast, Cardiff, Exeter, Norwich, Bristol, Newcastle and Birmingham on Saturday. 

The UK has one of the most expensive childcare systems in the world, according to data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), with a full-time place for one child costing around £12,000 a year on average.

All parents are entitled to 570 free hours of childcare per year when their child turns three – usually taken as 15 hours a week for 38 weeks of the year – but many still have to pay extra charges to nurseries and childminders to account for food and supplies. 

Hannah Harriman said she’d love to have another child, but she simply wouldn’t be able to afford it. Her total childcare bill is £36,000, despite her child not even being full-time at nursery. “This is more than a year’s salary for me,” she wrote in the caption of an Instagram post sharing her childcare bill.

“This is an absolute disgrace, people literally cannot afford to have children anymore and our government do not care in the slightest,” she added.

“It feels like we are punished for having children.”

She said she would love to have another baby, but if she did become pregnant, it would force her into poverty.

Figures show that 43,000 women left work to look after family in the last year, according to a Guardian report. This is a 3% increase on the previous year and part of an ongoing decline.

Caitlin, who preferred not to share her surname, is a mum of twins. The 38-year-old who lives in London has a PhD in population health but decided it would not be worth re-entering the workforce because the cost of childcare would be more than she would earn.

“It’s a loss for the economy,” Caitlin wrote in a caption on Instagram, next to a photo of her holding up a sign explaining her situation. “It’s time for things to change.”

Elena Rubiu, a Sardinian ceramist based in Leeds, said she’s spent almost £38,500 on nursery fees in the past three years – and her children didn’t even attend full-time. “In Italy it would have been for free,” she added. 

Replying to a comment on her post, Rubiu revealed her partner had to quit his PhD last month as the nursery bill was higher than his salary – yet the family still aren’t eligible for benefits because they are European with pre-settled status.

“I am self-employed,” she added. “All of our savings are gone.”

Samantha Sweetman, 34, from Herefordshire, worked out she’ll pay £46,000 in childcare fees for her two sons before they start school – and that’s just for term time, as she has the school holidays off. 

“For me to be able to continue my career and my husband to continue in his full time job, we have to pay for the boys to be in nursery from 7.30am to 5.30pm for four days a week,” she said in the caption of her Instagram post.

Some people might suggest she works part-time or give up work completely, but that’s not an option for her. 

“The truth is I need to work. I am a better mum for working,” she said. “I need something for me. I LOVE being a mum and I LOVE my children dearly but I also deserve the chance to continue in a career that I worked really hard for and I do love my job too. Why should I have to give up work? Or my husband?”

She suggested the government needs to do more to support parents. “The tax-free childcare takes the edge off, but nowhere near enough,” she said.

The free hours entitlement when children turn three “is a joke”, she added, as lots of nurseries need to charge a top-up fee to bridge the gap between money from the government and what it actually costs to provide the free hours.

“So many parents are in a situation where they have to give up work because it just isn’t viable to pay the extortionate bills,” she said. “It shouldn’t be this way.”

[hopelessrromantix]

Me thinks, you using general tags is what attracts the rude people in your blog? If you want to target the same people who interacted with your posts when you didn’t use the general tags, use that same exclusive tag again. Idk I feel like people are getting triggered for nothing (not you but the people on your inbox stating their opinion on your concern). They had no reason to come to your blog, they had nothing to do with it initially. but with the general tags, they see it, then they give their unsolicited rude opinion, then you get extra rude people aside from those who disrespected you in the first place.

Idk if I got my point across? It’s like the people infiltrated your safe space. They’re inside it. But you are talking to the people outside of it. So instead of fighting just the people inside, you also put out an open invite to the people outside.

Tho don’t get me wrong, I get you, you want to be heard, respected, and acknowledged. And I truly hope you get your safe space in this hellhole. Just real worried, bc dealing with aholes here could be very fucking draining. Yet, ( I realized while typing) how can you raise awareness without that risk? And I believe it’s also the reason why you want it to be seen by as many people as possible. So that the stigma, entitlement, and misunderstandings from the others could be eradicated. So, power and consensual hugs to you!

(Ps. I just ALSO realized after writing, that this too, is an unsolicited opinion. So pls feel free to ignore this whatsoever. I still do hope you find your people and your safe space without dumbasses. Keep doing you, as long as you don’t do anyone or anything wrong.)

All good, man. I tagged general because people who reblog my posts do the same, and thus they end up on those tags. Those people on general tags may not see my past stuff asking not to read, and thus the general tag.

Yeah, I really thought it was a simply concept but ig not. I've got guys in my inbox thanking me for standing up for them and women saying I'm a misogynist pig so idk. I think it's working out.

My mom was one of those old school "beat the shit out of men" feminists from the 70s and if that woman saw me as a misogynist I would be a pulp on the floor lmao.

Idk why it's hard to grasp, but I hope y'all in my inbox know I appreciate the kindness.

I totally get the fuel to the fire argument. I'm absolutely making it worse but ig i love dumping gasoline on flames so here we are.

Like I said, you're 100% right about the tags. Though I hate that we have to be sectioned off to our own little corner to make the cis women happy, oh well. I tag x male reader stuff on my usual posts.

Thank you for a less heated chat. I'll never stop someone from sharing their thoughts, though Ill react badly when they're assholes about it.

Have a nice day

#secret admirer

[raraeavesmoriendi]

there is. Something. about the fact that trans people who are most often treated by the cisgender patriarchal state as Failed Cis Women are getting some serious ‘friendly’ fire in the conversations about peoples’ anxieties re: the state of modern feminism and how those issues have been treated as somehow sidelined

sure, they’re still capable of misogyny. but so is Everyone. it came Free with being raised in a Patriarchal Society. there is no gender, cis or trans, that is somehow immune to being misogynistic.

like, the fact that some trans voices are finally being spotlighted in the feminist movement is much needed and long overdue.

but spinning around to point at people who aren’t women, women-adjacent, or even aligned with any gender, and accuse them of being The Misogynist All Along like some sort of scooby doo villain feels like it’s still vastly missing the point.

like. the people who have the most access to patriarchal privilege are the same white supremacist perisex guys who are passing the laws to try to erase all of us from existence, and the same white supremacist perisex rich guys who have been funneling them money. it’s the cis perisex abled (usually) straight white guys who still get preferential treatment at our workplacss and are still making more money than all of us. it’s the guys who have a whole church congregation behind them. it’s the perisex cis (usually) straight men who are moving to fight feminism bc they think they’re losing something they’re entitled to, the ones who think that male privilege is their birthright. it’s the fucking judicial system. it’s the electoral college we’re staring down the barrel of in november, and the powers that be that want to keep it there.

it is not the guy who also gets misgendered when we both have to show up for our fucking planned parenthood appointments, or the rest of us who always get talked over when we say “please for the love of fuck can we call it reproductive rights instead of tying it to bioessentialist bullshit, there’s more people than just cis women that have issues getting proper care, trans women included” and then got told by well-meaning gen x feminists that “we have to call it women’s rights for now if we want to save roe, we can educate people later”

…and here we fucking are anyway, by the way, which is absolutely part of the reason that the general public needs their concept of feminism refreshed.

but. call me insane (and I am Mad so sure). I don’t think it should be somehow an offense to consider there are multiple types of transphobia to think about as we update this conversation, and the fact that a binarist perisex system will swing itself in different ways to best hit different targets. these discussions are all owed their due. I think there are more complex things at work here than, as typical, gets kicked around in snappy internet posts.

there’s this weird conception right now that people who figured out they aren’t actually women anymore (or never were, define thyself as thou wilt) are somehow amnesiac to misogyny, that suddenly there’s some huge gap there, when like. I don’t know any of us who ever actually escape it.

I still see post-op trans men - with full beards! - who get called poor mutilated, deluded women, and the violence towards them is gendered as such.

I have many, many non-binary or bigender or genderfluid colleagues and friends who, because they cannot afford to medically transition yet (or don’t want to, as is their right) have their social transition outright ignored. and then have the trauma that comes from having your actual self denied in every facet of your life treated as like, ‘woman lite’ or, more heartbreakingly, ‘easy mode.’

like it’s easy, being told from all sides “no you aren’t” when I have my proper pronouns posted every fucking where I can think of, personally and professionally, and there’s a 25% chance they ever get properly used and I ever get acknowledged as myself, because I still have my tits. that if I try to stand up for myself as often as I honestly should and deserve, I will be treated as a difficult and delusional woman. when people (usually cis men) threaten me with violence, it’s misogynistic violence. I am repeatedly misgendered as a woman when I try to see a doctor about anything to do with my uterine system that I did not choose and am actively trying to get rid of, because as long as I have it, people will overlook the part of me that is true for the part of me convenient to their system.

I am a scholar in my genre who specializes in researching the lenses of feminist and queer theory both. they have saved my life on multiple occasions when I did not have hope for my present. I have been aware of my place in the feminist struggle before I knew I was anything other than a woman. part of my gender struggle was a feeling of loss at realizing that maybe, actually, I wasn’t one, no matter how happy I am now in living authentically.

some of the most misogynistic people I have ever had the misfortune to meet are, in fact, cis women. me and the rest of the “theyfabs” are not the ones who are out here talking about “girl dinner” “girl math” “girl roman empire” “why did feminists fight for women to work I don’t want a job.” me and leaf and newt are not the people causing trad wives and stay at home girlfriends to do numbers on video apps. that is cis women. the majority of white cis women, demographically, tend to vote and pass legislature in anti-feminist ways, which is no surprise given the white supremacy involved there. but like. the call is still coming from inside the house, yet I don’t see them being reviled as perpetrators in these posts about feminism needing a revamp in the public eye. only deluded victims of the patriarchy who don’t know what’s good for them. which is also… not great, for misogynistic reasons.

like. I don’t know, this is long and not very articulate, but every so often I see a post circulate that I in theory should be very encouraged and relieved to see, as it affirms something I’ve always known —

only to wonder if I am suddenly going to be specifically charged with one of the main oppressions I have been struggling against my entire life and likely will be until I die, no matter how I try to assert my own autonomy over my life

or if I’m going to be talked over and have my autonomy rejected and ignored again, because I happen to have “what makes us girls.”

“well sock—” like. I apologize, but I don’t understand how I’m supposed to be in on the joke.

#anyway. #long post #rae grumbles #non-binary stuff #genderqueer stuff #first person to come at me with terf rhetoric or call me a dumb theyfab gets me crawling through their walls at 3 am