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[avoli]

One thing that I find interesting is how when people talk about nuance it’s only really given when people can identify with a character or a cause that is being represented in the media they consume.

I want to use my Modern Drama class as an example because I feel like people are less emotional in classroom settings in comparison to fandoms, and also because I just liked the play that I’m going to discuss.

Last semester I read the A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen with my class and we discussed the character of Nora Helmer. When we started the class the teacher said that the stuff we’d read wouldn’t always meet modern sensibilities and said that this play in particular led to a huge uproar when it debuted. Based on the description and what our teacher said I had a feeling that that wouldn’t be true, but I was wrong.

When it was time to talk about Nora two of my classmates expressed how upset they were that Nora left her children with her husband when she decided that she needed to leave her family in order to grow as a person; one even said it was wrong because if she ever returned her children may not want to reconnect with her. I understand exploring hypotheticals but I thought it was an interesting perspective since a man leaving his family for a period of time wasn’t too strange back then, even when I was younger I was left with my grandmother for a year when my mother returned to the military. My interpretation was actually more in line with a male classmate. The way I saw it Nora was leaving her children with a well off father and a nanny, and in the story we don’t really see Torvald interact with his kids, something my classmates didn’t seem to mind. In fact the thing that Nora did prior to the play which led to the main conflict of the story was something that my classmates didn’t even seem to care about.

Nora was judged based on the perceived role a woman should have, despite the fact that she was naive and infantilized by her husband she is still seen as responsible enough to raise three children. Her naivety was something my classmates also discussed so it wasn’t even something they didn’t consider. During my modern drama class I would get frustrated when reading, especially if I had trouble making out the themes, but I made an effort to remain numb while reading and taking notes so emotions didn’t cloud my interpretation of the text. The only time I had trouble maintains this numbness was when I read Blasted by Sarah Kane. The protagonist was very difficult and it didn’t feel like the protagonist had much to say, it felt like it was meant to be shocking but it just left me bored and frustrated since I had trouble answering any of the discussion questions we were assigned. I cared more about my grade than interpreting the text, but that wasn’t really exclusive to Blasted writing about required reading that I don’t find interesting can be difficult. My classmates didn’t have much to say about the play either, all it really did was make me worry about my mental health a little bit since I wasn’t too upset when the protagonist was assaulted by the soldier near the end. Me not looking at Blasted through a nuanced lens wasn’t because it made me angry it was just because I couldn’t understand what the author wanted to say so I just didn’t have an opinion on it. Maybe it was about the way people isolate themselves from the world in order to ignore hardships until it’s right in front of their face? Since the protagonist lock themselves in a hotel for the entirety of the play until a hole is blown through their room and they have to acknowledge the war outside.

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One thing I think is funny when it comes to parasocial relationships and forgiveness is that people kind of forget that since we don’t know celebrities and creators there is no reason to forgive them for anything and what they receive when we do forgive them is their reputation being prepared. Sure, there’s something to be said about harassing someone for something they’ve done in the past but I’ve also seen people (usually fans) who get mad about people not interacting with or supporting celebrities. As a fan you hold this person in high regard so you want to see them as a good person and forgive them. For someone who doesn’t have this parasocial relationship with a celebrity they’ll just move on.

When people we know and care about hurt us we’re willing to overlook things , even if it’s something we should examine, and we can stand alongside these people and watch them grow. You can’t do this with a creator or an actor when all you get from them is their performances.

[avoli]

Distinctly remembered how as a kid if I was being touched inappropriately by a classmate and I complained teachers would hand-wave it (except for one time and it was a kid I had problems with for awhile anyway) but I had a male friend who’d touch me in 5th grade and suddenly everyone including my classmates were upset. Like they’d go to the teacher and say he was bothering me when I was clearing smiling and laughing.

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Just remember this fish my grandma had that was long, had whiskers, and white markings. It shared a big tank with one of her goldfish (she had like 3) and lived long after the goldfish died. It was always in its castle like vertically since there was a little hole you could see it through and one night it just came out and laid on the floor of the tank. I never saw it leave after that but it died years later. No one noticed at first due to its behavior so when my uncle realized and cleaned out the tank it was skeletal according to my grandma.

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My mother is so inconsistent cause one minute she’ll talk with my family about how much I look like my uncle and in private complain that I look like a man. This is like when her pastor complained about the woke transing kids and his example was “When we ridiculed young girls for being gender non conforming they’d grow up and conform, but now they’re questing their gender and sexuality.” Like, if it weren’t for you guys I would’ve never thought of any of that in the first place.

[avoli]

I’ve finished volume 1 of The King’s Beast it’s still early but I think it’s funny that even though the ML is having ML moments with the protagonist but he doesn’t go on about how feminine she is. Everyone notes that she’s small but that’s it for the most part. I’m just used to the male leads in stories like this going “He’s so attractive… BECAUSE HE LOOKS LIKE A GIRL!” Like the author is saying “no homo” whenever they want to make a scene romantic.

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I remember when infinity Nikki first came out and I tried playing it but when I tried to talk to a male npc it just froze

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one of my mom’s favorite pastor has the church chanting “Do not go to Gaza” and is going on about how they eat ppl. He literally repeated “They will eat you like gizzard” 6 times before repeated long the chant. According to ppl in Africa he’s a hack

[avoli]

Just watched an anime that had an aespa song as the op and some weebs were like “Anime music is way better than this.” Like what is “anime music” do you mean j-pop and j-rock? It’s not that serious but stuff like that drives me up the wall I can’t.

[avoli]

Right now there are some interesting conversations going on in regards to the YouTube commentary community which I think is applicable to media in general but conversation around something doesn’t automatically lead to productivity. Like, people are complaining about people not engaging with content that is actually intellectually stimulating and people only want to interact with “slop” but I do see people interact with intellectually stimulating content. The problem is people don’t always mull over this content or pay attention to what’s being said. At times a creator will have something important to say in a video and all anyone in the comments wants to do is like farm or make the funniest comment or get the attention of the creator.

Then when it comes to other forms of media like TV or books people don’t want to look for something to analyze, they just analyze the things they already like. Everything that they consume is deep and has a lot to say even if the content is very shallow. It’s to the point I’d rather consume media that doesn’t try to touch racial discrimination because most of the time fiction stories that try to draw from the real world are written by authors who don’t actually understand what they’re writing about.

In my experience you have high standards for everything you consume you end up not consuming nearly as much. Some people have said that they want to unsubscribe from creators they no longer see any point in watching and I understand that. Although I’m fine with consuming “fluff” content I’d much rather consume the fluff I actually enjoy instead of letting it hold me hostage hoping that I’ll finally see it the way others see it.

[avoli]

Just remembered that when I was a kid my friends would tell me about obviously fake deleted episodes that involved the protagonist of a TV-Y7 show committing mass murder, but in reality a deleted episode from a animated kids show would be deleted for mentioning periods or having a character hold a bomb only for the episode to be aired during a major terrorist attack.

[avoli]

I remember once I saw someone compliment Dandadan’s writing of Momo by saying “She’s a character, and not just a love interest.” And all the comments under the post were like “She is a love interest stupid the author made that really clear, do you even read the manga.” And honestly that should’ve raised my alarm bells and convinced me to leave the sub way earlier than I did.

[avoli]

If weebs can have slop isekai and women get to have slop dark romance doesn’t that mean kids should be able to have coco melon adjacent shows too? Also from an adult perspective it’s nice to watch a show where the biggest challenge the cast will face can be solved within eleven minutes.

[avoli]

Whenever someone tries to set themselves apart from others for having reasonable takes, they almost always show their ass in the middle of doing it. It’s a lot easier to get people to agree with something questionable if you wrap it in something more palatable and claim that the average person who would agree with the normal part of your take is actually the crazy opposition.

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Had to read Death of a Salesmen for a class and my professor was talking about how great it was and Willy's character but Willy and Biff's relationship just reminds me of me and my mother so I just hate him.

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Anyone else notice in shonen that there will be like the one character that is so powerful or unbeatable and no one on the heroe's team can defeat him, but the one or two characters that have abilities powerful enough or versatile enough to do that just happen to be out of commission. Like its so obvious that's why the author left them out and I'm just like "ugh just change their power or make it so they have a strategy that can combat the other character!" I saw it in MHA with the Mirio fight and I started a new show and I'm suspecting that that's why one of the protagonist is taking so long to recover from her anemia.

[avoli]

I hate when I'm reading yuri or a queer story and if the protagonist's male friend doesn't call her homophobic slurs after she comes out to him then the fans only focus on him and his feelings. Like I see men and woman do this, also hate the "She needs to find a friend of hers to set him up with." like why does she owe him because she can't return his feelings?