@evanplschill - Tumblr Blog

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his-catness-tchalla

#THIS SHOW IS SOOOO GAY AND I LOVE IT #word of honor #censorship said ‘i’m busy’

darklesmylove

#i feel seen

joshua-beeking

"Accompanying you to sleep" Extra of the MDZS Audio drama with a Lan Wangji whispering sweet nothing into his husband's ears as he massages away a headache.

It's an instant serotonin boost.

Wei Wuxian definitely agrees.

#stop this was so cute #the untamed

radiqueer

here’s a thought: the reason why adult/minor friendships are looked upon with suspicion, and the reason why adults with minor friends are accused of being predatory or having bad intentions, is because we think that minors don’t have anything of value to offer adults that isn’t sex/a relationship. it’s a continuation of the way adults devalue minors and their perspectives and contributions to the world.

createyourselfasart

….No it’s definitely because there’s a huge power imbalance

dragon-in-a-fez

do you really think we solve that power imbalance with segregation?

op is absolutely right. this is coming from someone who researches and teaches on age and society professionally. modern western society is age-segregated to an unprecedented degree and there is ample evidence that it is absolutely fucking us over. it’s linked to everything from economic hardship to mental health crises.

intergenerational friendships are important. adults who never interact with young people outside of a defined institutional relationship with a built-in power imbalance (like being a parent or teacher) don’t develop the capacity to treat young people as equals, which reinforces patterns of abuse, neglect, social disempowerment, and silencing. young people who lack meaningful connections with adults outside of those same institutions miss out on an incredible source of support and guidance. and everyone misses out on the basic human joy of friendships that could have been really meaningful if we didn’t have this weird, broken ideology that says young people have nothing interesting to say, and no value to adults who don’t either want to raise them or exploit them or both.

op is right and they should say it.

stop-stalin-and-suck-my-dick

My life has gotten so much better since I hit college and befriended people six years older than me, and went to work and befriended people decades older than me. I could have been doing this years ago when I badly needed friends bc I had none. But no, minors can’t talk to adults except when they’re forced into a lesser role bc THAT’S healthy. :/

adrunkensailor

A college person being friends with an an older adult is one thing, a teen being “friends” with an adult is another.

radiqueer

fucking genius how you just missed the point. teach me how to do that

insufficiently-advanced

how the fuck are minors supposed to be able to identify adults with bad intentions if they don’t have any positive, healthy relationships with adults outside the context of said adult being an authority figure

like, sure, with any relationship between a minor and an adult, the adult has a responsibility that the minor doesn’t. some shit only comes from life experience. but like… that teen who comes to dnd on fridays, the younger coworker, that person met through fandom? i’m not gonna pretend we’re not friends just because i’m older than they are.

it’s not that deep

cottoncandysecretlair

Like I just. I’m so astounded by the whole “friends” thing that the person a couple posts above is implying just cause.

Intergenerational friendships are like??? So varied?????

Like maybe you’re 16 and working your first job, and you have an old Chinese man as a regular who sits at a table and reads the Chinese newspaper his family mails him, and you start sitting down and talking to him when it’s slow. And he tells you all about the life he’s lived, of being a child in the aftermath of world war two. And he talks to you about the prejudice he’s seen, and the way he sees people treat each other, and how much things have changed. And you learn a lot.

Or you meet a 30-something mother of two that walks with a cane in a group therapy session, and when you speak to her she opens up about her struggles with drugs, and how she wishes to stay better so she can be there for her kids. And she teaches you about having a more open mind when it comes to religious beliefs when you’re an edgy atheist teen.

Or you’re very isolated in your hobbies, and you meet a group of college students that share your interests and are fine letting you join in on their card games and D&D, and you not only learn the games but you get used to a group that’s accepting and just wants to have fun and make everyone comfy, and you learn not every group of people has to be judgemental and scary.

You’re saying that instead of making teens aware of the signs of toxic relationships, and keeping an open line of communication so we can help them take notice of and avoid these things… You’d rather we lock teens in a box where they’re deprived of the positives?

Force so many teens to be around peers that bully and disregard them, when they have prospective friends in local clubs and support groups that just aren’t necessarily in their peer group?

Hardcore Tumblr users really are just puritans huh? Hell even historically, households were made of many generations, and kids helped out in the community and met the adults that kept it going.

Ridiculous

literallymechanical

Back in college, one of my friends brought her 12 year old sister over to the dorm when her family was in town. For one night, the whole crew instantly adopted her and went out to a playground at 11 PM and had a blast hanging out together. She gave some solid relationship advice to one of the older members of the friend group (who was, in fact 30 at the time! My “college” friends included people >10 years older than the frosh), telling this woman more than twice her age that really, she needed to break up with her toxic boyfriend.

Years later we still get updates on her life, and a bunch of those people went to see her perform on stage six years later when she got the lead role in her college(!!!) production of She Kills Monsters.

Do you know how easy it is for a bunch of 18 to 30 year olds to hang out with a middle schooler and have it be a healthy, fun, and positive experience for everybody involved? Super easy! it turns out that kids are actual people with whole sentient brains and everything. Just be respectful and nice!

negatheimpmon9508

This. This, oh my God This. I absolutely adore speaking to people older than me when i meet them on discord in other servers, because they have so much to teach! be it 2 years or 10 years, i love friends like this. they can tell you so much ♡♡♡

kla1991-deactivated20210410

When I was in my early teens, I’d sit on the curb next to a man in his 90′s named Oswin, who would sit by the road in his wheelchair all day and wave to the cars. He told me all sorts of stories about his life (sometimes more than once, which helped me remember them). I wrote part of one into my novel.

I got really close to an adult volunteer with a queer youth group in high school, and she took me in like an odd, overenthusiastic niece. I did have a crush on her a little, but it was the sort of thing that teaches you what you like in a person without meaning anything more than that. She and her wife loaned me a pile of lesbian books to read, taught me to cook, and helped me learn to drive. They were like family.

My grandmother’s friends, who I’ve known all my life, are also my friends. One of them is in the last year of her life now, and as sad as I am to lose her, I’m so grateful to have known her, to have been friends with her as close as she and my grandmother were. I’m also grateful my grandmother and I can share this grief and joy.

It’s possible to theoretically have power over someone and not abuse it. It’s possible to love someone, to be vulnerable with someone, and not be hurt.

moving-blogs-aw

“It’s possible to love someone, to be vulnerable with someone, and not be hurt” is something I needed to hear today, thanks.

severeannoyance

As a teen, I spent many evenings at the house of the crossing guard of the elementary school down the road from my parents’ house. She’d grown up in the community; her mother had died in the 1918 pandemic, and she’d been living in my hometown from since before it was even much of a town, babysitting for the sheriff in the one room town police station, working at the restaurant that served the oil fields during WWII.

I also was going to city college at the same time and studied for my animal diversity final with two cis dudes easily in their 70s, one who worked at the aquarium and was in the process of renewing various certifications, and the other who was an engineer doing a biology degree just ‘cause. The three of us–the 16 year old and the two older men–wiped the floor with the rest of the class on every single exam.

I was also doing 16th century fencing with the local chapter of the SCA. My parents had no problem with this gaggle of college students giving me rides and taking me to overnight events. I’m still friends with them.

None of these people hurt me. None of them made me feel uncomfortable. They were good friends and we had a great time together, and also they modeled different ways to be adults than my parents did.

Intergenerational friendships are necessary and good for you. The only people who benefit in their absence are abusers.

deathcomes4u

There are too many people on this website who don’t know what hobbies are and have never belonged to a community organisation before and it shows

three--rings

My brother is 12 years older than me. You know who I spent a lot of time with as a kid? His peers. His girlfriend at like 18 used to bring me to her house for sleepovers and we would watch MTV (when they played actual music) and play dress up. His friends were always all over my house.

My husband when he was a teen got to be really close with one of his friend’s mom and she took him to yard sales every weekend and was the one who convinced him to apply for a gifted high school and tried to get him to go to college, despite his own parents resistance. They were really close friends and he NEEDED that because his own parents were…a mess.

I made really good friends with a woman in her late 40s when I was 19 and I can’t tell you the kind of perspective our long conversations about feminism gave me. (And okay yes at one point she thought maybe I was propositioning her and SHE turned me down and I was like, OH NO, that’s not actually what I meant, lol.)

And like, look, most people are NOT fucking predators, okay? Teach kids about warning signs, what to do when they are uncomfortable, the kinds of interactions to avoid…PLEASE. But the idea that all adults are scary and evil and to be avoided at all costs because they Only Want One Thing…well it’s very reminiscent of Radfem ideology except instead of men it’s adults.

snowyfuxue

He smiled, and his face was like the sun. (The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller)

#stop it :(#word of honor #PLEASE WATCH THIS MASTERPIECE

trisscar368

Rule one of fandom: there are some things that only exist for us.

Don’t send actors fics

Don’t give them explicit art ever

Don’t tag them in rpf questions or theories

Don’t try to bring them into fandom drama of any kind

Don’t hold them responsible for what the producers and writers decide

They’re still people. They have private lives, which do not include fandom.

keethus-arts

A lot pf people don’t understand this and it’s a shame

cat13potat-deactivated20240228

ALSO: DO NOT SHIP REAL PEOPLE WHO PLAY CHARACTERS WITH EACHOTHER??? THEY ARE NOT THEIR CHARACTERS!

trisscar368

No.

If you want to bash rpf shippers for *existing*, make your own post.

RPF has been a part of fandom since the beginning, and I’d highly recommend doing some research into the topic; as always, Fanlore is a good place to start.

The problem with RPF is when people breach the fourth wall, which fandom is doing more often as the internet expands and becomes the current culture, and newcomers to fandom either are not taught or do not care about the basic rules (i.e. the purpose of this post). The problem is not with people having fantasies or telling stories.

Fandom is transgresive by nature as much as it is transformative, because we are thieves and magpies and because here we’re allowed to talk about things that we’re not supposed to in mainstream culture. I have never seen a space like fandom creates, where people are able to share their desires and fantasies and kinks openly and *talk* about the taboo.

And when people come along and talk about how RPF shouldn’t even exist, it is frequently less rooted in a concept of “this causes this specific harm” and more “this is disgusting and I don’t want it near me, how can this even exist.” It causes discomfort because it’s rooted in taboos (talking about sexual fantasies in public, openly, even though those same fantasies are well acknowledged in pop culture - think about the concept of the “free pass”).

When people break the fourth wall and get the actors involved, sending fics (or letters back in the old days), explicit images, harassing them online or at conventions and concerts, they have committed actions that cause harm. And there is real harm, I’ve done my digging and seen the results in bandoms and fandoms (hell, my fandom has done some things over the years.)

Thoughts are not actions. Fantasies do not make you a villain, telling stories is not a sin (though it has been a crime). Sharing those things with other people is part of what makes fandom culture what it is.

There are conversations that need to happen about objectification and dehumanization, there are conversations (like this post was meant to be) about maintaining healthy boundaries and treating the actors as people when we interact with them; there are conversations that need to happen about how much more mainstream fandom is now than it was fifty years ago, and what that does to the relationship dynamic we have with our creators and actors, what may need to change as we move forward. The Hockey RPF fandom’s solution to that problem was to lock a great deal of their content so that the fourth wall could not be breached.

RPF is the single greatest squick I have dealing with fandom; the way people talk in my fandom hits my “someone is altering my sense of reality” button really hard. I frequently have to blacklist it to control my exposure to the low-level shipping that permeates everything in my community, otherwise I get punchy. But my discomfort with the topic doesn’t mean I’m ever okay with throwing those people out of the communities they helped build.

I don’t have to like something to defend it. Fandom is built by people who were told “you shouldn’t do that, go back to the shadows”, and we are not doing vague purity-culture and thought police nonsense tonight.

izhunny

OP, fantastic post but this rebuttal is a thing of pure beauty. Thank you.

#VERY that #hello tumbles

thesheergumption

Reblog if you’ve ever read fan-fiction that actually set the bar higher.

sheliesshattered

#yup#it’s so hard to read published fiction now#so much of it is just sooo baaad#but like#part of the gate keeper effect to publishing#is that they don’t get inundated with all these stories using similar tropes#tropes don’t get refined like they do in fanfiction#published fiction ends up feeling cliche and clunky and incredibly slow#where fanfiction works through every possible iteration of a trope or a technique in a matter of months#and then comes back and turns old beloved tropes on their heads#while published fiction is still floundering with the basics of something that fanfiction explored in depth years ago#it’s like when someone shows you a ‘cool new funny meme’ from fb#and you’re like#that was on tumblr in 2007#and it’s not even a particularly good example of the meme#it’s a mediocre example at best#from before the meme really got going and people got really imaginative#that’s how published fiction feels to me these days#in comparison to fanfiction#anyway#tag talking#fanfiction#reading (via)