I fucking love how Our Flag Means death has explicit, unabashed queer romance and character but ALSO has wall-to-wall metaphors and symbolism. We can have the kiss but we can ALSO read into the colors of wardrobes and whether a character wears gloves or not. We can read into the metaphor of Stede’s secret closet and letting Ed in, and ALSO have a fully fleshed-out storyline about a gay man in a loveless marriage telling his wife “his name is Ed.” We have the red silk scene in the moonlight, of gently handling a bit of cloth to represent a heart, and we have “what makes Ed happy is…you.”
We get all the subtle details of brief touches and meaningful glances, but not instead of explicit queerness—it’s that the unabashedly queer characters and story deserve that level of build-up and poetry.
I am starting to think most people have no idea what enemies to lovers is. Enemies are hostile. That is the trope.
Stop throwing the word abuse at every chance you get in your ship wars. People shouldn’t have disclose their private life to defend a fictional pairing.
So there’s a lot of posts differentiating between laziness and executive dysfunction and that’s all well and good but can we please acknowledge that lack of motivation and interest can also be symptoms of things and they don’t necessarily mean people are lazy either
If you wanna fix America you gotta get priests to support unions I’m dead serious.
The smartest thing the right ever did was convince a large portion of American Christians that wealthy capitalists are so successful because they were blessed by god
Wealthy capitalists in the early 20th century spent an incredible amount of money and time trying to associate capitalism with God and communism with immorality and godless atheism specifically because a significant amount of American preachers saw socialism as a christlike economic policy.
“I adore the way fan fiction writers engage with and critique source texts, by manipulating them and breaking their rules. Some of it is straight-up homage, but a lot of [fan fiction] is really aggressive towards the source text. One tends to think of it as written by total fanboys and fangirls as a kind of worshipful act, but a lot of times you’ll read these stories and it’ll be like ‘What if Star Trek had an openly gay character on the bridge?’ And of course, the point is that they don’t, and they wouldn’t, because they don’t have the balls, or they are beholden to their advertisers, or whatever. There’s a powerful critique, almost punk-like anger, being expressed there—which I find fascinating and interesting and cool.” ―Lev Grossman
Their interaction in the Bentley in 1962 is not a rejection, it did not break Crowley’s heart. It was not hard for Crowley to hear “you go too fast for me”. He did not spend one moment torturing himself with that line. Crowley has his big slapped in the face rejection by Aziraphale moment and it is this one:
By not just refusing to even consider obtaining holy water but also not listening to Crowley, and calling their relationship–something Crowley was planning on fighting Heaven and Hell for–“fratenising” Aziraphale reaches right into Crowley’s heart and smashes it. He definitely replays Aziraphale’s exact delivery of “fratenising” over and over in his head for years to come.
But this:
This isn’t a rejection. This is hope. Crowley isn’t broken by this interaction. He is moved. That isn’t sadness. Well, there may be some sadness there. But in the same way that we may we cry at weddings or over newborn babies. It is awe, a kind of reflective openness. It is tender and hopeful. He is aware he has been handed something precious and for the first time has hope that there’s more to come with just a little patience.
By handing over the holy water Aziraphale is undoing his great rejection of Crowley and acknowledging that they do have their own side and it is worth fighting for. By saying that one day they might have a picnic or dine at the Ritz he is saying that they might have a future together after all.
In spite of the “too fast for me” this isn’t Aziraphale putting on the brakes, if anything this is Aziraphale speeding up, rushing towards Crowley to meet him halfway with promises of more to come.
For Crowley, this interaction is probably the clearest confirmation he’s gotten in 6000 years that Aziraphale actually does feel something for him too and might one day act on it. There’s no way he goes home from this depressed. He goes home deeply moved, hopeful, and reflective. What he’d been thinking for so long was a unrequited love might be requited after all.
Again,@tsilvy, why would you hide this in the tags
are you a “filters tags from my mutual’s new obsession” Tumblr user or are you a “learns about their new obsession (semi-forcefully) by osmosis” Tumblr user
Since once in a blue moon I actually discover a decent rule for adulting, and since I know I have followers a few years younger than me who are just entering the workforce, I want to tell you about a very important phrase.
“I won’t be available.”
Imagine you’re at work and your boss asks you to come in on Saturday. Saturday is usually your day off–coming in Saturdays is not an obligation to keep your job. Maybe you were going to watch a movie with a friend, or maybe you were just going to lie in bed and eat ice cream for eight hours, but either way you really, really don’t want to give up your day off.
If you consider yourself a millennial you’ve probably been raised to believe you need to justify not being constantly at work. And if you’re a gen-Z kid you’re likely getting the same toxic messages that we did. So in a situation like that, you might be inclined to do one of three things:
Tell your boss you’d rather not give up your day off. Cave when they pressure you to come in anyway, since you’re not doing anything important.
Tell your boss you’d rather not give up your day off. Over-apologize and worry that you looked bad/unprofessional.
Lie and say you’ve got a doctor’s appointment or some other activity that feels like an adequate justification for not working.
The fact is, it doesn’t matter to your boss whether you’re having open heart surgery or watching anime in your underwear on Saturday. The only thing that affects them is the fact that you won’t be at work. So telling them why you won’t be at work only gives them reason to try and pressure you to come in anyway.
If you say “I won’t be available,” giving no further information, you’d be surprised how often that’s enough. Be polite and sympathetic in your tone, maybe even say “sorry, but I won’t be available.” But don’t make an excuse. If your boss is a professional individual, they’ll accept that as a ‘no’ and try to find someone else.
But bosses aren’t always professional. Sometimes they’re whiny little tyrants. So, what if they pressure you further? The answer is–politely and sympathetically give them no further information.
“Are you sure you’re not available?” “Sorry, but yes.”
“Why won’t you be available?” “I have a prior commitment.” (Which you do, even if it’s only to yourself.)
“What’s your prior commitment?” “Sorry, but that’s kind of personal.”
“Can you reschedule it?” “I’m afraid not. Maybe someone else can come in?”
If you don’t give them anything to work with, they can’t pressure you into going beyond your obligations as an employee. And when they realize that, they’ll also realize they have to find someone else to come in and move on.
IMPORTANT!! PLEASE READ!!
Just like with many other parts of life, learn to say ‘no’ to people. You are important. Don’t kill yourself for another person, esp. if they are your boss.
season 2 of good omens but it’s just one of those “5 hours of ambient noise” videos on youtube. camera in the living room of the south downs cottage. fireplace crackling. aziraphale taking an occasional sip of cocoa as he turns a page in his book. crowley muttering to him, every now and again. getting some soft murmur in response.
season 2 of good omens but it’s just a “peek into the now mundane lives of two supernatural beings who have decided to settle down together in the south downs.”
So we’ve all considered a quirk that can turn the kids into even smaller kids but have you considered:
Teenager!All Might
All Might just walking around Yuuei trying to be a teacher when BAM oops someone’s quirk turns him into a younger version of himself which happens to be around the same age as his students. Sixteen year old All Might, blooming with new youth, and he’s free once again of his enormous title and his PAIN. But he’s also quirkless once again.
He still has his memories and his experience so he’s still on as a teacher, but the difference is extraordinary. The teachers all carry a certain skepticism that his youth isn’t clouding his judgement and treat him like one of their students sometimes, but the students are friendlier and more comfortable around him as well and even more willing to tell him their problems so that he can help fix them (to varying degrees).
The media believe that he’s All Might’s long lost son (because no way is anyone outside of Yuuei is allowed to know what’s going on) and they hassle him constantly so some students form the Young Might Protection Squad to keep the press away.
AND THE VILLAINS. They view All Might’s younger condition as a way to get back at the All Might they believe is his father so now we have Young Might, quirkless and painfully ordinary, trying to fight off full grown villains out for his blood. He’s gotta learn to fight, not just with his fists, but with his whole body like he’s never had before. There is no extraordinary strength for him to rely on anymore, no ability to overpower with no need for skill and come out on top, and his fists will break if he even hits a wall too hard. So what’s he gonna do?
He’s gotta Git Gud. Martial arts lessons from Aizawa and Ojirou, basic first aid lessons from Recovery Girl, and basic shooting skills from Snipe. He’s becomes a jack-of-all-trades on the field, not the greatest hero but still a hero in his own quirkless right like his first stint as a hero. He’s a new inspiration to his students and his fellow teachers and he finds that even old dogs can learn new tricks if given the chance.
But what he didn’t expect was to learn so much from Izuku, who still looks at him like the sun shines out of his ass and that his awkward pats can heal the sick. He learns that if he limits himself to only what he used to be, he’ll never take this gift to become something newer and what he has the potential to be.
He has to convince Izuku not to return One for All back to him, because All Might’s age is done and Deku’s is just beginning. And maybe, just maybe, Toshinori Yagi’s heroic works are just beginning too.
hot take i think we should start representing trans people at different stages in their transitions instead of just slapping top surgery on some guy and calling it a day
like y’all can’t say to stop associating bodies with certain genders and then continue to only draw trans people with the most cis passing body types possible
“Fanfic authors should be versed in classic literature so they don’t get caught in a feedback loop of endlessly recycling the same self-referential tropes” no, fanfic authors should be versed in classic literature so they can steal pithy quotations for the titles of their fics.
Wait sorry is someone claiming that classic literature isn’t caught in feedback loops of endlessly recycling the same self-referential tropes? Back up I feel like we need to address that bit first.
@called-kept, I’m going to quote from our conversation about AUs and fanfic tropes yesterday:
“Something something soulmates not as destiny but as choice / I would find you and choose you in any world / on purpose on purpose on purpose I love you / in sickness and in health / in coffeeshops and in dragons’ lairs / in reverse order and in the future and the past” “we tell the same story over and over and never get bored / God makes the daisies with the eternal delight of a child / saying again! again! again!”
Look, there are only so many stories to be told. To say a story is worthless because it tells a familiar story when you break it down into essentials is to say that no story is worth telling. Deconstruction? Why tell a story in order to break that story? Find the true story in the story. There’s value in reading many repetitions, different in detail and the same in essence. It’s like printmaking: many versions of the same picture, different colors.
Ofcourse it’s good for writers to know many types of stories, to immerse themselves in other genres than the one they mostly read or write in. But to write the same story again and again is no shame.
I LOVE this. The philosophy and theology of storytelling is like my favorite thing to talk about ever, and this makes me absurdly happy (and also respect fanfic a whole lot more).
The reason why you couldn’t find the quote is because it’s actually from Chesterton (Orthodoxy)!
Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical ENCORE.
@hollers-and-holmes You found it too!! THANK YOU! YES! I misattributed the quote to my main man C. S. Lewis. Apologies to G. K. Chesterton; you’re very valid too.
Re: respecting fanfiction: aren’t all stories secondary creations? Are not all stories derivative of others? Is it so terrible for a story to be a tertiary creation—a story based on a story based on God’s creation?
I think part of the reason why we feel so sad is that we’re too far away from raw, numinous experiences. Like you know that post with a picture of the unpolluted night sky where people are reacting in terrified awe not realizing that’s what the stars really look like?
I think it’s like. You need vivid experiences that can’t be easily repeated. You need elemental things. I don’t mean this in a crunchy hippie just-try-yoga way I mean this in a way that’s like…we’re inside all the time and most things we experience are scheduled ahead of time. When there are sidewalks, we follow them, and there’s always some boring place to go. You need things that no one has any control over and that no one can sell for money.
You need to be outside in a storm and see lightning strike very close to you. You need to meet a wild creature and have to stand very still and almost not even breathe and watch before it vanishes. You need to be alone somewhere very big. You need to go to a place because it looks interesting and be at the wrong place at the wrong time. You need to climb over a fence instead of going in by the gate. You need to hear the exploding sound of a huge flock of birds flying. You need to watch live theater performed by kids on a low budget. You need to be lost somewhere. You need to be barefoot somewhere. You need to sing with other people who are singing. You need to get soaking wet with all of your clothes on and come inside shivering.
I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: it’s more important to know and understand fully why something is harmful than it is to drop everything deemed problematic. It’s performative and does nothing. People wonder why nobody has critical thinking skills and this is part of it because no one knows how to simousltansly critique and consume media. You need to use discernment.
This is ultimately why propaganda is going to work on you. Because you never learned how to think for yourself and the actual ideology behind things. You simply rely on group think and the bare minimum explanations to tell you what’s good and bad.
Sawthis article linked on twitter yesterday and…. yeah. YEAH.
