When I was at the movie theatre they were advertising a romcom where the premise was that unmarried people are only legally allowed to have sex once a year and that one, that one made me put my head in my hands.
You know it’s especially odd because historically there have actually been legal bans on premarital sex in many places. Fornication laws and whatnot. Like this is being used as the premise for some kinda goofy little romcom but it’s also just like? Real life? But with a one day exception for some reason?
People are gonna have sex anyways. I feel like I’m losing my mind.
Yeah lmao like in the trailer the main woman judges her friend for going to bed with a guy she met in line for the bathroom and it’s like girl this is the one night she can have sex and brag about it. let her be. You had the whole year to find a guy if you wanted it to be special.
In the beginning of the trailer as well the main characters are having a conversation about like “what do you miss most about sex?” and for like a second I wondered if there was something in their personal lives stopping them from having sex that they were bonding over but no. They live in the fanfiction universe of Dunkin’ Donuts product placement so it’s not allowed to be that interesting
https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/7asxci/oc_ygathok_the_ceaseless_hunger_final_boss_of_our/
This is the reveal of this ridiculousness during their game
Let's debate about superhero capes (feel free to comment your own arguments as well)!
Capes are too dangerous (the Edna Mode argument)
Cape can get caught on things (e.g. branches, mechanical doors, exposed sharp objects)
Heavy capes can reduce mobility (e.g. weighing them down when running and climbing) and get in the way
Capes can be grabbed by an enemy to choke or restrain the wearer
Capes can increase visibility (especially for flying heroes when contrasted with the sky)
Capes can lead to instability and loss of balance at high speeds
Capes can be tactical (the Batman argument)
Capes can conceal movement, making attacks hard to read
Capes give the wearer a dramatic silhouette that can intimidate criminals
Capes can be used as a weapon or tool in a fight (e.g. using it to obstruct an opponents vision, distract them, wrap around a weapon to disarm, or cause an opponent to flinch or create distance)
Capes can be reinforced to provide some small amount of protection against weapons
Capes can be modified into a glider, parachute, or other tool
Capes can obscure body shape to protect secret identities
Capes can provide basic weather protection by using waterproofing for rain or insulation for the cold.
And now for the poll:
Which argument about superhero capes do you find more compelling?
Edna Mode argument
Batman argument
I am allergic to taking sides
Which argument (much information about said argument in above ask so go read or don't I'm not your mother) about superhero capes do you find more compelling?
Very few heroes just tie a random length of cloth around their necks and go. Despite looking simple the capes of heroes other than Batman either have a specialized purpose (Superman's cape is woven out of the Kryptonian equivalent of cotton and is also invulnerable) or any downsides are negated by their powers. The number one use for a superheroes cape is as a bulletproof shield that can be used to protect civilians and this is an important tool for any hero to have and pretty much all modern capes can easily by dropped or released when they become a liability.
Would also point out that capes or cloaks were traditionally used in fencing because they could be used to deflect the blade of an opponent, and this is where the phrase "cloak and dagger" comes from. The Batman argument genuinely has basis in reality.
Additionally, capes are actively better against projectiles than the same material worn in a static position on the body.
I've seen people testing this with regular-ass cloth, and basically any type of looser fabric, like a cape or cloak, has a chance to deflect projectiles, including some types of arrows, up until the point where they are sharp and fast enough to pierce armor.
It is generally accepted that most superhero capes of this type - like as with Batman - are not regular-ass cloth, and have an actual bullet-resistant-fabric property to them, which has already been noted.
But I'd like to also add that wearing as a cape has cases where it is specifically better than just wearing it as armor.
This is probably also related to the fencing note from a couple reblogs up, with a cape's general ability to deflect energy, but I did think it relevant to note the case for projectiles, as they are probably a more relevant problem than sword blades most of the time.
Anyway, the fact that it can move freely is an active defensive measure.
Also for some added Doylism, capes look cool and can help add flair to action scenes and make movement clearer, as well as provide a useful way for artists to cover up things they don't want to/have time to draw in detail and make it easier to churn out pages.
in hindsight, growing up as an aromantic person who didn't know aromanticism was a thing...it woulda been really easy for me to assume that something was wrong with me, that I was "broken" or "missing" some piece of humanity.
luckily I was autistic, oblivious, and had a huge ego. it literally never occurred to me to frame it as a "me" problem. i just thought every single person i knew was a dumbass
im so sick of unnecessary dinner scenes in movies 😡 every fucking movie they just want to titillate you with some food because they think you’re a dumb animal who just wants to see mashed potatoes bouncing. if its an IMPORTANT dinner scene where they explain lore then whatever i understand. but they shove useless meals into every movie these days and its disgusting
When I was at the movie theatre they were advertising a romcom where the premise was that unmarried people are only legally allowed to have sex once a year and that one, that one made me put my head in my hands.
You know it’s especially odd because historically there have actually been legal bans on premarital sex in many places. Fornication laws and whatnot. Like this is being used as the premise for some kinda goofy little romcom but it’s also just like? Real life? But with a one day exception for some reason?
People are gonna have sex anyways. I feel like I’m losing my mind.
he was there during siege of the North. he infiltrated the spirit oasis. he has an uncle who studies spirits and the spirit world. he watched the sky go dark then the moon suddenly reappear like everyone else in the entire world did. and most importantly he watched zhao get eaten by a giant godzilla fish spirit.
Also, Iroh was there? He literally watched Sokka make out with the moon spirit. And you want to tell me that a romantic sap like him would not have immediately told Zuko about this romantic tragedy? Please, Zuko has known about this for ages, he just knows that this is not an acceptable situation in which to say “yeah, I know.”
When you meet Edward Elric he gives off the impression that he's the short-tempered hot-headed "violence is the answer to all life's questions" kind of protagonist, and it's in fact incredible character craft that he's actually the character who ends the series with a negative-3 kill count.
God's worst soldier Edward Elric. Showed up as the youngest member of the Amestrian army, took millions of dollars from them, never followed a single order, helped dismantle their fascist regime, left with a lower kill count than he arrived with, then fucked off to go be a house-husband. Character of all time.
You know, when you said "negative-3 kill count," I, who haven't seen the anime, thought, "He resurrected 3 people?????" But I'm seeing here on the wiki that apparently resurrection in this anime is a terrible idea.
ignoring everything the pandemic response specialists were saying was good for the economy tho. State governors and federal agencies with no medical experience and no economics education told us so
Lately I've been thinking a lot about a pattern I've noticed more and more, where people try to critique queer sex scenes in prose fiction by saying that the reason one didn't work for them is that the author has never had that kind of sex. Obviously, some of this is coming from the current round of "Is it ok for straight women to write m/m?" (yes) but I also see it very regularly from people talking about out queer authors, and many of these critiques are invasive and striking. They make me feel there's a bigger problem I want to be alert to.
Underlying theme: There's an assumption that if the representation is bad, it's inauthentic; so people will argue that it's inauthentic as a substitute for discussing why they think it's bad.
Trend 1: Just assuming it can't be personal.
It's very common for amateur reviews on sites like Goodreads, Storygraph, and Amazon to criticize books with gay relationships with variations on "I'm so over m/m books by women," even on novels written by queer men. I also frequently see "The author so obviously doesn't understand what sapphics find hot about other women," on books by women who thank their wives in the author's notes. Both of these are more common if the reviewer is specifically criticizing the quality of sex scenes. So it's clear that even authors who have made it unambiguous to strangers that their m/m and f/f books are #OwnVoices will still be criticized by some as if they were cishet women writing. But I have only once seen a positive review making the same assumption. (Btw, I do see this on authors I'm very confident from public information are cis, and so their reviewers are unlikely to be discounting their identities out of transphobia.)
Trend 2: "Gender-affirming" transphobia.
By which I mean people quibbling with the accuracy of queer sex scenes by saying something like..."It didn't seem super accurate to me, but the author is trans, so I'll cut them some slack." This is almost always a situation where the characters having sex on page are cis, but I've seen it once or twice when people were assuming a nonbinary character and author did not have the same assigned gender at birth. Many of these reviewers are perfectly correct with the authors' pronouns and say nothing negative that's directly about them being trans. I have even seen people who are trans/nonbinary do this, and I wonder whether they realize what they're doing. Which is publicly speculating about a stranger's transition and private medical history, because what the reviewer usually means is that they're making an assumption about an out trans author's genitals, in order to say that the reviewer is justified in calling a sex scene not perfectly realistic. Maybe a different personal experience is the reason sometimes! There's sexual fantasy, but there is such a thing as mistakes. It still isn't okay with me to talk about trans people this way to your followers on BookTok or Bookstagram in telling them what a book's weaknesses are.
Trend 3: Timeline investigation.
This is most commonly done about authors who are out as bisexual, especially (numbers-wise), bi women writing f/f. It's when people will go..."Well, I didn't think the sex in that one is hot. She's bi, but she was already married to a man when she started publishing, so I don't know if she's ever done cunnilingus herself." I think we can speculate about a stranger's sex life while talking to a friend in a car and splitting French fries, but I don't think this is okay in a very large Discord while telling a culture professional whether a book is worth reading to feature in their work. (For example.) I especially don't think people should be using clues about the author's life to guess and support whether the author has had the opportunity to experience a sex act. The option to say "I didn't find it hot," and stop is...right there.
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And, again, in all of these cases, across all of these trends...the starting premise doesn't hold water. An authentic portrayal of queer sex might still be poorly written, not hot to you, or portraying something you think is a problem. Many people I am friends with write well about genders, orientations, and specific sex acts that have nothing to do with their own lives.
The sex life of an author cannot be a substitute for analyzing what you like or dislike about a sex scene. I'm not criticizing being curious about other people, or even talking about them. I am saying it concerns me that a lot of people, including in queer bookish circles, will do it in very public-facing ways to make a case for, ultimately, whether the book is worth reading or not. I think that sucks! I think it's a choice that people who do any sort of reviewing/recommendation giving/blogging/influencing can and should curb.
Analyzing sex scenes can be difficult and feel exposing. I think this is one of the reasons looking for an external justification (it has to do with the author, not me, the reader) is common. You don't have to formulate a reason. You don't have to share a reason. It's okay to stick to simple liking or disliking. But I think the trends I've laid out here are profoundly inappropriate, and it troubles me a lot that I most often see them from people who indicate they're queer themselves. I think queerphobia inside the community is only part of the story.
I don't know what the takeaway is if you're reading this post. I don't have a call to action, except...if you do this, don't. If you don't do this, maybe criticize this behavior when you see it. Maybe think about why it might be happening. (And maybe don't comment telling me this never happens and I'm making it up.)
So here's the thing: I don't think "Word of God" should ever be used as a trump in analysis in general, because the intent of the author matters less than what's on the page. She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named will tell you her books are feminist and inclusive; that doesn't make it true. JM Berrie would never, ever have called himself homosexual; that doesn't negate the value of the queer readings of Peter Pan.
And that goes triple for comic books, because comics don't have a "God." They have entire pantheons of creators: writers, editors, pencillers, inkers, flatters, colorers, letterers, publishers, marketers -- they all make their own contributions and had their own input.
That goes quadruple for creators specifically like Chuck Dixon, who have decades of interviews where you can track the way the story of "his time at DC" has changed over the years, most prominently the many, many retellings of why his tenure running the Bat-office ended where he makes up any reason he can for it not to be his own fault.
So it frankly does not matter that Dixon didn't intend Jack Drake to be read as neglectful or abusive. He didn't intend Tim, Connor, Babs and Dinah to be read as queer, either. Or for every scene and storyline he's ever written with a Black person to be screamingly racist. That doesn't negate those readings, nor does it somehow counteract the bit from the 90s Bat-Bible that uses the term "neglectful."
What Dixon intended doesn't matter. What's on the page does. And even though Jack genuinely isn't the cartoonish abuser often seen in fanfiction, the foundations of that reading didn't come from nowhere. They don't get negated just because the conservative fuckwit who wrote the piece goes, "Nuh-uh that's not what I meant."
at some point in your life you will be boiling fruit, water, sugar, and lemon juice in a pot to make a syrup or jam. the instructions will tell you to simmer for a certain amt of time. your timer will go off and you will look at the pot and go, "hm, this doesn't look thick enough. maybe i'll let it go for another 10 minutes." this is the devil speaking. it's only so liquid right now because it is at boiling point. it will thicken when it cools down. learn from the follies of my youth and do not let this happen to you
at some point in your life you will be making a sauce or a stew in which you need to add cornstarch to thicken it. and you will prepare a slurry of starch in cold water and think "this looks like way too little starch to thicken this amount of liquid." this is the devil speaking. cornstarch instantly polymerizes at 95°C and if you add too much it will turn into an impossibly thick goop.
at some point in your life you will be making some sort of cream based dessert that requires gelatin to thicken it. and you will soak some gelatin sheets in water and think "this is too few gelatin sheets for this amount of cream." this is the devil speaking. it will thicken in the fridge and if you add too much you will end up with milk jelly
at some point in your life you will be baking cookies. you will take the sheet out after twelve minutes as the recipe instructs and the cookies will still be glistening and soft. "these don't seem cooked enough," you will think to yourself, "i should place them back into the oven until their edges are nice and golden." this is the devil talking. this is how you get dry, overdone cookies. the cookies will continue to bake on the warm sheet for several more minutes and then harden up after sitting on a rack for a while. trust the process. trust the process.
at some point in your life you will be adding a small pasta to a soup and you will think "that is not enough small pasta." this is the devil talking. the pasta will absorb the stock and expand. this is how you end up with a soup that is a solid mass of soggy ditalini.
At some point in your life you will be adding garlic to a dish and you will think "that is not enough garlic." These are angels speaking. They are correct. Add more garlic.
Suddenly struck with a need to explain to you how boat pronouns work (I work in the marine industry).
When you're talking about the design of the boat, you say "it".
When the boat is still being built, your say "it".
When the boat is nearing completion, you can say "it" or "she".
When the boat is floating in the water you probably say "she", unless there is still a lot of work to be done (e.g. no engine yet) then you say "it".
When the boat is officially launched and operating, you say "she". If you continue to say "it" at this point you are not incorrect but suspiciously untraditional. You are not playing the game.
If you are referring to a boat you don't really know anything about you may say "it" ("there's a big boat, it's coming this way"). But if you know its name, it's probably "she" ("there's the Waverley, she's on her way to Greenock").
If you are talking about boats in general, you say "it" ("when a boat is hit by a wave it heels over")
If you speak about a boat in complimentary terms, it's "she" ("she's a grand boat"). If you are being disparaging it may be it, but not necessarily ("it's as ugly as sin", "she's a grotty old tub").
If she has a boy's name, she's still she. "Boy James", "King Edward", "Sir David Attenborough"? The pronoun is she.
If it's a dumb barge (no engine), you say it. But if it's a rowing boat (no engine), you say she.
I hope this has cleared things up so that you may not be in danger of misgendering floating objects.
