Noah Kahan
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PR's Tumblrdome
cherry valley forever
shark vs the universe
almost home
noise dept.
Kiana Khansmith
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roma★
Cosmic Funnies
todays bird
bliss lane
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pixel skylines
The Stonewall Inn
Interview Vampire Daily
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★
KIROKAZE
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@coloradojessica
WE GOT FUNDED Y’ALL!!
I’m super late on posting this because work slammed me into the ground, but we reached our goal on Oct 1. I’m now in the process of finding an editor and graphic designer and making some surface edits before I send it off for editing. Look for delivery in February 2018 and thank you all so much for your support!!
Just over a week to go! Help us slide into that finish line by sharing and making personal recommendations. Ebooks start at just $5! Thank you all for your support!
It’s like Law & Order, but with witchcraft.
Rachel Collins isn’t sure sarcasm is an actual method of self-defense, but she keeps testing the theory. But when a vindictive serial killer kidnaps her brother, she must choose: save him, or save her soul.
Buy your copy today at Kickstarter! http://kck.st/2OBICjC
People have written a lot of touchy-feely pieces on this subject but I thought I’d get right to the heart of the matter
This is 1000% more motivating than every preachy “real writers write every day” post on all of Tumblr.
I call this the “two cakes” rule and remind myself of it when I start comparing myself to other people.
Can this just live on my dash and never go away pls thank you.
Y’ALL WE MADE IT TO 50%! There’s two weeks left in the Kickstarter, so if you haven’t pledged, now’s the time! Ebooks start at just $5. Please share to help get us over the finish line!
Kickstarter here: http://kck.st/2OBICjC
Rachel Collins isn’t sure sarcasm is an actual method of self-defense, but she keeps testing the theory. But when a vindictive serial killer kidnaps her brother, Rachel–cop and secret witch–must choose: save him, or her soul.
We’re on to our next push–$2000 by Sept 1! We need just over $600. Will you help by reblogging– or, better yet, by personally asking a book lover you know to buy this book? Personal recommendations are the biggest reason people buy anything, especially books. It’s a cost-free way to show your support!
Back this project now! http://kck.st/2OBICjC
We’re at $395 to go and 11 days! We can do this, y’all! Please signal boost and recommend to book-loving friends you know. Chapter 1 is up under Update #2 if you want a sample. If you’re so inclined, ebooks start at just $5. Thank you for your support!
Help a girl out with a reblog!
Rachel Collins isn’t sure sarcasm is an actual method of self-defense, but she keeps testing the theory. But when a vindictive serial killer kidnaps her brother, Rachel–cop and secret witch–must choose: save him, or her soul.
We’re on to our next push–$2000 by Sept 1! We’re $824 a way. Will you help by reblogging– or, better yet, by personally asking a book lover you know to buy this book? Personal recommendations are the biggest reason people buy anything, especially books. It’s a cost free way to show your support!
Back this project now! http://kck.st/2OBICjC
Day 3 and we’re at $1379! Only $621 more go to! The referrals are working–all my friends and backers, please continue to personally ask book-lovers you know to back this project. We can do it!
This is my book under a different blog name. We’re doing well on our Trip to $2000! Let’s keep the momentum going. Please reblog and make that ask! Let’s get there By September 1!
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
AVERT YOUR EYES!
Zelda and Link Portraits by mrbabes
How the Old Spice commercial was filmed. Practical effects.
Not at all what we thought!
This makes these commercials 100 times better
Good lord I love practical effects
Old Spice - 1 Most movies these days - 0
MHA SEASON 3 ▪ Create Those Ultimate Moves ▪ MIDORIYA IZUKU
BORN officially 25% funded!
WHOO HOO Y’ALL WE MADE IT TO OUR FIRST $1000! As an update, I’ve posted the first chapter up on Kickstarter. Have a look and if you are so inclined, please back the project!
http://kck.st/2OBICjC
Adventures in translation (NSFW language!)
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So since March, I’ve been living in Japan.
And I’ve been dating. Now, I speak Japanese at what I say is a “conversationally fluent” level--I can maintain a conversation for a couple-hours’ long dinner date but I still have to use my phone to look up words and some of my more complicated sentences wander into the WTF territory. But mostly, I understand and can be understood.
Unless we start talking about @archeronfx.
I was recently on a date with a guy, we’ll call him K, and we got on the topic of discussing differences in translation between Japanese and English media. I said I watch shows like Brooklyn 99 with Japanese subtitles, and some things (”Bingpot!”) just aren’t translated the same. K agreed, saying he’d recently watched The Hangover and even though he didn’t speak English, he knew some things were off. I, being a huge fan of the show, brought up Archer as an example of a show that must be difficult to translate. K asked me for an example.
Now, there are a lot of catchphrases on Archer. “Phrasing!” would’ve been simple to explain. “Do you want ants? Because that’s how you get ants.” Even “Holy shitsnacks!” would’ve been fairly easy to communicate. But my brain did not choose one of these. No, in that moment, my brain could only pick out, with laser-like focus, one singular line:
“He even types like a gaping dickhole.”
Let’s examine this phrase. A gaping dickhole is bad, and so to type like one would mean to type in an undesirable way, but it’s in a particularly annoying and irritating way. It doesn’t even really make sense in English, and yet we all know exactly what it means. There’s some sort of cultural understanding here that grounds the phrase, and this is the phrase I chose to try to explain.
This was a mistake.
I know how to say “dick” in Japanese, so I started there. And I know how to say “hole.” I put these two words together in hopes that K would understand. Let me state here that Japanese has a helluva lot of nuance, moreso than English, so I’m not entirely sure my use of the word “hole” was the correct implication.
And then I started trying to explain “gaping.”
I don’t know this word, so I just said すごく大きい, which means “really big.”
K was looking at me with something akin to mild horror, but I continued on. It was my sole desire, nay, obligation, at this point that this 40-year-old Japanese man understand this specific Archer line. I’d gone too far, and there was no coming back.
Let me also state that the restaurant we were in was incredibly small. Like, there were only four tables, and we were so close our chairs were almost touching. So there are approximately 10 strangers now listening to this crazy foreigner explaining what seems to be some abhorrent American slang that involves putting holes in penises. Because what this trainwreck of an explanation really needed was an audience.
Then I began to explain the “He even types like” portion of the phrase. It’s easy enough to say, but K could not make the connection between typing on a computer and a gaping dickhole. He kept asking me why the dickhole was gaping. He asked how one types like a gaping dickhole--like he wanted the actual physical mechanics of it, as if I could produce a CAD drawing that would explain it better. In defense of my culture and a show I think is hilarious, I soldiered on. I didn’t even care about a second date at this point. All I wanted was for K to understand the irritation of typing like a gaping dickhole.
The crowd of strangers around me continued to shoot me bemused glances in my continued struggle bus of an explanation. I felt like a great cultural failing would occur if I did not succeed in my duty. At long last, K finally nodded and said, “あーなるほど。めんどくさいね.”
“Ah, I see. It’s annoying.”
That’s it. After all my efforts, I wasn’t sure I’d conveyed to him how annoying. He then asked why a gaping dickhole was annoying and I conceded defeat and told him I didn’t know. This 10-minute endeavor into cross-cultural communication had ended with the simplest of phrases, and yet I still felt like a failure. K had gone from mystified, to horrified, to confused, to resigned, to mild comprehension. I’d given him 0.5% insight into American humor and it left him reeling.
Surprisingly, K still talks to me. Next time he asks me for an example, though, I’m going with “Phrasing!”
The Rachel novel, BORN TO BE MAGIC, is now live on Kickstarter. http://kck.st/2OBICjC
This novel’s been in the works for six years and is finally ready to meet the public. Please help my dream come true! Ebook pledges start at $5 and any shares I’d greatly appreciate!
So I’ve been living in Japan and teaching English, and a lot of stuff is crazy, BUT I have exciting news.
The Rachel novel, BORN TO BE MAGIC, is now live on Kickstarter. http://kck.st/2OBICjC
This novel’s been in the works for six years and is finally ready to meet the public. Please help my dream come true! Ebook pledges start at $5 and any shares I’d greatly appreciate!
you know what the biggest fucking lie you're told growing up is? no one tells you how fucking hard living is.
and i don't mean like jobs and work and whatever, but just existing. the daily work of being a functioning human being instead of a couch burrito slug. everyone hides how hard it is, and it's fucking hard for everyone except like, i dunno, bill gates maybe. they hide it because they think it's only hard for them, as if they're the only ones struggling--like how you won't ask a question in class because you're sure you're the only one dumb enough to have that question but in reality everyone else is fucking baffled too.
so no one tells you how HARD it all is--the endless decisions, balancing a million things, the disillusionment, the fear, the anger, the sadness that you feel when you think that this was not supposed to be your life. Depression and anxiety are one of the most common afflictions in our society, and is it any fucking wonder why? We throw young people into this maelstrom that we've hidden behind a Wizard of Oz-like curtain and then make them feel like there's something wrong with them if they're struggling because everyone else is too goddamned cowardly to speak up. It'd drive any person crazy. Like there's no fucking instruction manual for life, and that's okay, but a warning would be nice. "Hey, you know what, shit is hard, and it's going to be hard for forever, but it's hard for everyone and it's okay to struggle and be confused and make mistakes."
Living is fucking hard, man. I wish we'd just be honest about that.
I wanna take a minute and write about privilege and what it means to expand your view of the human condition and be an actual ally. My privilege lies in being cis and white passing, in my socioeconomic class and education, in being married to a white, cishet dude. Most of these areas I understand well, and I understand--although not KNOW, because I don't have that experience--the obstacles facing people who do not have these privileges. One area I am still learning about trans* issues, and that's the example I want to use here.
When I was living in Japan, there was some weird ass game show (because that's what Japan does exceedingly well, weird ass game shows) and one of the challenges was to place contestants on a seat and blindfold them. Then, on a platform that slid along a track toward the chair, there was a rather large man wearing a dress and make-up. The idea was the contestant had to hit a button to stop the man from moving closer--whoever let him get the closest won. If the man on the platform got all the way to the contestant, he kissed him. One of the contestants didn't stop the platform, and the man in a dress kissed him and the contestant passed out. Everyone on the show thought it was uproariously funny.
I laughed too. At the time, I thought it was funny too.
I cringe writing this now because fifteen years later, I see all the things wrong with that set-up. It's transmisogynistic. It's homophobic. It's fatphobic. It's gross. I don't defend my past self for laughing. I don't write it off as "just a joke." I was a teenager and the culture I lived in, both American and Japanese, taught me that transwomen and gay people were objects of ridicule, punchlines, lesser. So when a man in a dress kissed another man, I laughed. I took what prevalent culture taught me and didn't question it.
And that's the problem with privilege. You don't see the harm unless it's affecting you directly. You don't question the culture that taught you it's okay to use human beings as the butt of jokes. It stems from ignorance, in the dictionary definition of the word. There will be a time, though, when your ignorance is challenged. When someone speaks up about an issue about which you know nothing. At that point, you have a choice: You can either continue to be a part of dominant culture--a culture that causes real, tangible violence to people--or you can fucking listen.
If you choose to support the dominant culture, it's easier. It's more comfortable. You don't have to write public stories about how you laughed at a man in a dress and feel embarrassed over exposing your own biases. You can pretend you are a perfect ally--but you won't be. You won't be because whenever someone corrects your errors (and you will make them, because you're human), you'll get defensive. You'll not want to give up the humor you find in ridiculing others. You'll feel uncomfortable and indignant and you'll bemoan how everyone's upset about everything these days, but you'll get to write it off as other people "not taking a joke" or being too serious or too angry.
It's infinitely easier, and you'll never risk anything because you'll still be part of the dominant culture. But make no mistake-- you will NOT be an ally.
Allies take the road that forces them to investigate their own internal biases. To question the gut reaction they have to things that are outside the dominant culture. And to do that, you have to listen. You have to listen to perspectives that aren't your own, and you have to actually, actively choose to incorporate that information into your worldview. You'll probably have to recognize that you've done some fucking problematic things in the past, but it's okay--the first step to change is to identify the problem. What matters is what you do now.
I'm really tired of privileged people getting defensive, particularly over comedy. If you live in a world that's so safe and comfortable and secure that not being able to make racist, homophobic, transantagonisic, sexist, abelist, etc jokes is such a problem that you get upset about it, check your goddamned privilege. And I don't mean that ironically. I mean take a hot minute and consider that your right to laugh at someone does not outweigh that person's right to exist. Exercise compassion. Listen. Take the uncomfortable road that requires self-awareness and a change in worldview and a shift in your understanding of people.
Or don't. Hey, it's a free country. But don't you dare call yourself an ally if you can't be bothered to make any changes in yourself. You're claiming to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with someone who suffers real harm, but what you're really doing is wearing their suffering as a crown of acquired justice. You didn't fight for it. You didn't help obtain it. You just stood there and stole some of the light so you could feel good about yourself. That makes you a thief, not an ally.
So do what you want. But understand that your actions, the way you react to your privilege and the voices of the marginalized, they'll garner reactions too. No one owes you praise and if you truly care about the issues you claim to, be brave. Take the uncomfortable road.
“Over the years, we met every kind of person imaginable.” “You stupid cunts here to take back my advance?” “But no one makes worse first impressions than writers.”
From SAGA Vol. 3, by Brian K. Vaughn
