an editor pretending to be a writer @hallowpen - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
an editor pretending to be a writer
@hallowpen
Koda - They/Them - AfroAsian
Sapphic Domination 2k26
Thank you for coming into my life and changing my world of grey...
and turning it into a beautiful pink.
HallowPen on ao3 and bluesky
I figured I might as well compile all of my Royal Records posts in a masterlist for easier searchability. To any new TLP viewers, welcome!
Koda's Royal Records were designed to give personal cultural insights (from a Thai perspective) into the series The Loyal Pin. I talk about the structure of Thai Royal Society, language, food, and customs/traditions etc. episode by episode...
EPISODE ONE (+) | EPISODE TWO | EPISODE THREE | EPISODE FOUR
EPISODES FIVE AND SIX | EPISODE SEVEN | EPISODE EIGHT
Constructive criticism: to comment or not to comment?
That is the question!
Many artists are always pushing themselves extremely hard to better themselves. So what’s the harm in affirming what might seem slightly off? Or rather, what’s the harm in giving tips to an artist that may help achieve a desired look or effect? You type in a comment and hit submit, smiling while knowing that what you wrote may help the artist become even more amazing.
Enter Criticism
As it turns out, not all criticism is the same and as a criticizer you may be hurting more than helping. There's Constructive criticism, which provides a positive or negative look at the artist’s work while offering some kind of info that can benefit the artist. Then there’s what I call Destructive criticism, which provides only a negative look at the artists work with no helpful intent.
Both provide the artist with an observer’s opinion, but in a different way. You may notice that internet trolls tend to use destructive criticism for obvious reasons. However, many people provide destructive criticism without even realizing it.
Before I continue I should say that I’m not an expert at criticism and have made mistakes with criticisms before and still today. However, I have been on the receiving end of heavy and harsh criticism myself through teaching. It can really mess up your day when you read an evaluation and a student you had really lets you have it regardless of the reason. For that reason I sympathize with many offended persons. So let’s dive into those cold waters, eh?
Criticizers - ABC (Always Be Constructive)
This seems like common sense to some, but I still see comments out there that are blatant and harsh. Here are a few real examples of “bad” criticisms:
“The head looks weird.”
“WTF is her leg doing?"
"I don’t like the way the shading is on the feathers.”
In all of those cases, there is nothing positive to be said about the art and there is nothing to be gained. The criticizers may believe they are offering the artist good criticism, but really this is the destructive criticism I mentioned earlier. The comments only put down the picture and don’t offer anything at all to the artist for improvement. Furthermore, never express such blatant general disgust or disappointment. Now to show the opposite, here are some real examples of constructive criticism:
“The head looks a bit disproportionate to the body, but otherwise this looks great!
"The background makes it too hard to focus on the pair in the pic.”
“You need to lighten up the image. It’s too hard to see some features.”
Notice the difference? In those three examples there is a reasonable point a comment is making and there is info the artist can use to improve. It is important to remember that constructive criticism doesn’t have to be positive, but it helps. If you are going to comment on a particular issue you see within a picture, just remember to Always Be Constructive!
Artists - Be a good sport
Criticism does not only invoke responsibility from the criticizing party.
Any criticism is not just a post, but a conversation between one person and another. Likewise, a receiver of criticism is also responsible for interpreting criticism in the appropriate way. This is something that isn’t understood by many folks and it took me years to even grasp the concept. Just like a joke made at your expense among friends, you must react the appropriate way and how you react will affect your friends’ view of you.
The internet makes interpretation of criticism a bit difficult, but most can tell the difference between lighthearted remarks and malicious trolling. As an artist, if you wish to place your art on public display you also have to learn how to handle criticism, even the bad kind. You may be tempted to get offended at all criticism you receive. After all, you’ve put hard work into your craft. However, you have to remove yourself from your work emotionally when reading comments. Remember, regardless of how harsh a critical comment may be, there still can be something to gain from it as long as it’s constructive. Try to look past any negativity you see. It’s hard, but can be done.
Criticizers and artists - Opt out
This is a valid option if you really just want to avoid criticism as a whole.
Many artists wish to not receive criticism. This is fine. Artists don’t always want to improve themselves based on their observers’ comments. They may wish to just be left alone and figure things out for themselves. Or perhaps they are just happy with their skill level. Regardless of the reason, when an artist says they don’t want any criticism you should respect their decision. Don’t play the “I can say whatever I want,” or “I’m just helping you out” cards. You will only offend the artist more.
Likewise, perhaps an observer sees something that seems a bit off in a picture, but doesn’t want to offend the artist or isn’t sure how they will handle the comment. Even if the artist welcomes criticism it is perfectly acceptable to say nothing at all regarding the picture’s flaws.
Remember, I say artist a lot in this post, but this applies to writers as well.
Doing a little late-night wrapping of my gifts for our queer book exchange at my job. I work for an extremely small publishing agency where only six of us are ever in the office at the same time. We wanted to do something nice just between us (that was affordable) for Pride.
So...
BOOKS!!! AND YURI!!! AND SUPPORTING TRANS AUTHORS!!!
some of my favorite things hehe
For anyone who's curious and wants to check out a few queer stories for Pride Month and beyond, these were my choices:
1 - The Fall that Saved Us by Tamara Jerée
2- The Crier's War Duology by Nina Varela
3- Hearing Red by Nicole Maser
4- Fable for the End of the World by Ava Reid
5- Queen of Faces by Petra Lord
I never saw Blank the Series, so I wasn't part of the FayeYoko fandom. But, after learning the truth about what actually went down between Faye and NineStar Studios, I developed a newfound respect for her and swore to support Faye in all her future endeavors.
It was empowering to see a strong and independent (and loudly proclaimed sapphic) woman, who was being punished for being self-sufficient and having smart business sense, stick up for herself and stand tall enough to walk away from a situation that no longer held her best interests at heart. Despite efforts to villainize her from multiple fronts, Faye stepped away from Yoko with as much grace as she possibly could by setting very firm boundaries with fans... as was her right as a now independent artist.
She's now planning to release a new GL series, under her own terms with full creative freedom, through her own company Fable Entertainment. In honor of her boss bitch energy, I hope Broken of Love is a big fat friggin success!!!
Been pondering it a bit more, and I'm thinking that a problem with the arguments on queerbaiting and BL-like fanservice is that they don't really hold when applied to Thai BL and its main audience.
We all know that the primary audience of Thai BL has always been sao Y. I previously mentioned elsewhere that the "I'm not gay, I only like you" trope exemplifies how this audience has never really cared about queer authenticity in BL. Despite how creators have increasingly introduced queer lenses and voices into their works, Thai BLs still cater first and foremost to the local sao Y audience, at whom the vast majority of promotion and fanservice is aimed. On the other hand, the majority of Thai LGBTQ+ people probably still would not say they feel represented by BL. (Not to mention that "media representation" is a recent Western concept that has not yet gained traction here in Thailand anyway.)
So the argument of queerbaiting - when works are promoted in a way that misleadingly teases or promises queer representation, then renege on that - doesn't really hold in this context, when neither the intended audience nor the LGBTQ+ population is expecting any such "representation" in the first place.
Nor does it make sense that non-BL actor duos engaging in the same promotional activities as actor pairings from BL works - using the "BL playbook", so to speak - are exploiting LGBTQ+ audiences, when LGBTQ+ audiences have never been the target of any of those promotional activities. On the contrary, the target audience of sao Y were the ones who created demand for such promotion, which they willingly consume, to begin with.
Of course, all of the above is considering only the local Thai context. With international reach, the context inevitably changes, and people elsewhere will naturally view the issue through their own frames of reference. But it would be misguided for them to make assumptions, without considering the local context, about how and why certain decisions are made.
Within the Thai context, the perennial controversy has long been (and continues to be) whether the entire BL genre itself is exploitative of the LGBTQ+ community, with how it appropriates the gay identity as a commercial product. This, I'd say, is a much more fundamental question that needs to be settled before the queerbaiting issue can be properly considered. Many of those commenting from overseas seem to have already made their own conclusions, equating BL with LGBTQ+ representation, which in turn enables the queerbaiting arguments. But on the ground, it remains a very much open question.
Auto-translate, grain of salt, etc. but I saw this tweet from a Thai fan yesterday when it had 3k retweets and it's, uh, gained some traction since then.
Now that I'm only using a burner account to collect videos and interviews, the Very Sensitive Algorithm shows me more Thai tweets than it ever did when I had an active account tweeting in English. And something I've noticed is that Thai fans tweeting in Thai are often discussing completely different things compared to interfans tweeting in English.
Like the whole Songkran thing.
I saw Thai fans criticizing BL actors for performative behavior in an ambiguous public role while not actually pushing for issues relevant to the queer community.
Pointing out that openly queer actors don't get the clout that closeted/straight actors do.
Asking when Songkran became a time for BL actors to farm for engagement—because this only started happening last year.
And obviously not all Thai people were upset. Some responded going, "Eh, who cares, let them do whatever."
But the general tone of what I saw were Thai users criticizing actors who were seemingly using public displays of affection during Songkran as guaranteed engagement bait since it was such a success for some imaginary couples last year. But if you've been in this fandom or lived in Thailand longer than that, you'll remember that they didn't do this in 2024. Or 2023. Or any year before that.
And as @hallowpen pointed out—
—to behave like that in 2026 is dangerous because since the recent election, Thailand is becoming increasingly conservative. And it's one thing if the actors themselves are part of the queer community and choosing to display public acts of affection as a form of rebellion. That's their choice, and it's up to the queer community in Thailand to judge whether that's helpful to their movement. It's quite another matter when the actors are straight or have a real-life partner at home (which Thai fans often know because they have a wealth of information we don't) and they're just using the social media engagement for personal gain.
Then, after all this, we had irresponsible accounts like this one on Instagram spreading this bait about Thai people:
And then interfans did zero research as usual and jumped to the conclusion that Thai people must be homophobic.
Like.
Asking, "Can someone explain what really happened?" and then taking the only commenter's explanation as reliable is par for the course on the internet these days, but that also explains why Thai fans ended up getting demonized for bigotry they weren't even practicing.
It was surreal to see tweets defending the queer community somehow twisted into, "JUST LET THEM KISS OMG!!"
I even saw interfans here on Tumblr accusing Thai fans of being homophobic for the Songkran criticism. Like, I'm sure there was some of that on Twitter because it's Twitter and Elon Musk owns it and he loves homophobia, but why weren't any of the viral tweets getting any attention at all?
The problem on Tumblr is that interfans outnumber Thai fans, and so there's a feedback loop. So don't take my word for any of this either, because I'm an interfan, which is why I led with the Thai tweet currently going viral at 12k retweets.
The issue we face as interfans is recognizing that Thailand—and Southeast Asia generally—is a very difficult place to speak freely in.
I was fortunate enough to get here right before the "youth-led protest movement" of 2020, so I watched as this movement gained traction, and I've watched what's happened in the years afterward.
Thailand has had twelve successful coups (and more attempted) since 1932:
Ever since transforming from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional one in 1932, Thailand has been rocked by clashes between conservative monarchists and pro-democracy reformists. To some extent, these two groups (represented in the 2000s by the 'yellow shirts' and 'red shirts') reflect deep social divides between urban elites, and the impoverished, but increasingly politically aware rural population. Historians have described a 'vicious cycle of Thai politics', in which unstable democratically elected civilian governments alternate with military rule, installed on the pretext of restoring order. Since 1932, Thailand has been through 12 successful coups (as well as many more attempted ones) and multiple constitutions.
I've seen Thailand described as a "competitive autocracy," and a non-confrontational culture (เกรงใจ) combined with the controversial results of the most recent election make it extremely challenging for (especially marginalized) people living in Thailand to speak out, even on the internet.
Since the 2023 election, the royal, military and judicial elites have increasingly relied on political accommodation rather than direct domination to contain reformist challengers. This strategy has involved the pragmatic incorporation of actors long viewed as adversaries, including Pheu Thai. The current election represents a continuation of this accommodation — what binds these actors together is not a shared political vision, but a mutual interest in office holding, stability and access to state resources.
So it is difficult to find out what's actually going on in Thailand, but that's why interfans should be cautious before jumping to conclusions about their true motives or beliefs.
And, of course, while interfans should never speak over Thai people, we can and should uplift those who are kind enough to take the time and energy to offer us information.
Here on Tumblr, @hallowpen is making an informational series about queer media representing Thailand over at @thai-in that people can follow along with soon.
And also check out the work @recentadultburnout has done on AO3: 23 pages of information on Thailand for fic writers and people in general to learn about and get a more informed appreciation of the country and culture. They've also made posts about the meanings of character names in series under this hashtag with the full list here!
Ultimately, we are guests in their house, and it would be kindest for us to treat them with the respect that hosts deserve. <3
Not me crying on a Friday night, because this is so important to me.
I've been involved in various fan spaces on Tumblr that have resulted in me leaving because of deliberately malicious ignorance or just plain blatant racism.
I've met some of the most important people in my life during my time here, @thebroccolination amongst them. And when Key reached out to me, it was never just about using me as a resource for Thai QL... but an offer of genuine friendship that later allowed space for genuine communication about topics where they were willing to actually listen to and engage with my point of view.
My goal of participating in certain fandoms has always been to curate an atmosphere of open communication, but it's become so hard to do that lately with the amount of contrived ignorance and hurtful name-calling. My goal was and still is to use @thai-in as my last ditch effort to help interfans understand Thai fans before I graciously bow out from fandom interactions regarding Thai QL as a whole.
...and I hope that it will help create more opportunities for communication and more genuine friendships between Thai fans and interfans that can mirror the one I have shared with Key.
This is the last time I'm addressing this. But as a point of clarification...
YES! You should absolutely be allowed to be who you are in public spaces and use your voice/actions to invoke radical change.
We want that... we need it.
However... when you have an artist that is very much the face of an industry brand, lines become blurred. Because by shining a light onto expressions of queerness, it becomes a question of whether or not that person is actually queer and just living authentically OR just selling the brand.
If it's the former, then obviously it's their business whether or not they come out publicly. But the latter raises a lot of questions surrounding boundaries. Because there is an unfortunate crusade that follows of needing to know whether someone actually identifies as queer, otherwise the behavior feels inauthentic as it becomes less about activism and more about engagement... which doesn't actually represent the needs of the queer community.
Is it unfair pressure... yes. No one should be forced to disclose their sexuality if they do not want to. This is an awful consequence the industry of branded pairing created.
So when Thai fans are saying the atmosphere feels inauthentic, that's what they mean. It's not meant to shut down the queer community or to stop advocating for activism. It's questioning the motives behind the branding.
Not the official Thai fanclubs showing their homophobia again and telling fans to stop sharing videos of the actors being clingy and affectionate with each other in 2026. God forbid anyone have some fucking fun at Songkran. Why do these people even watch bl if they can't stand the idea their fave might be lgbt.
If you don't live in Thailand then you probably have no idea of the (even more) conservative shift happening there and how it is extremely more harmful toward people who are perceived as publicly queer. Songkran, specifically, is being used by government officials and authorities as an example to regulate the sale and consumption of alcohol, enforce stricter public dress code, and ban what the government considers to be "obscene and indecent" behavior (meant public displays of affection).
One of the things that always frustrated me when I was living in Japan was how little people living outside Japan knew about the political atmosphere there and how strangling it could be for marginalized people. Like, yaoi and shounen-ai and BL are all terms that originated in Japan, but they still don't have marriage equality there. In fact, part of why I left Japan five years ago was because the reality for queer people living there felt so bleak, and it's only gotten more conservative since.
And I think that's a big part of why so much of BL is so deeply rooted in comphet values. The Top is a masculine man, the Bottom is more feminine. They've twisted "love is love" from its original subversive intent into "queer people are no different from straight people, so we don't need queer issues in queer media. :)"
It's why GL is sidelined and so rigorously feminized. No masc lesbians here. Maybe short hair if you're lucky. No trans rep unless it's for comic relief or, more recently, body horror.
Thailand may have legalized marriage equality, but marriage isn't the final boss of queer issues. And as everyone in the world has seen by the rampant political backsliding in the U.S., human rights are never set in stone. Thailand isn't a queer paradise because they sell gentrified queer media as a soft power, and actual queer people there are still very much unsafe.
Thai fans are usually the first on the metaphorical frontlines protecting the actors we love, and in this case, it's not that they're trying to keep potential queerness out of sight because they can't stand the thought of their artists being queer; it's that they're living under threat of a political powder keg, and they know better than most how dangerous it could be for people in the spotlight to be perceived that way.
Not the official Thai fanclubs showing their homophobia again and telling fans to stop sharing videos of the actors being clingy and affectionate with each other in 2026. God forbid anyone have some fucking fun at Songkran. Why do these people even watch bl if they can't stand the idea their fave might be lgbt.
If you don't live in Thailand then you probably have no idea of the (even more) conservative shift happening there and how it is extremely more harmful toward people who are perceived as publicly queer. Songkran, specifically, is being used by government officials and authorities as an example to regulate the sale and consumption of alcohol, enforce stricter public dress code, and ban what the government considers to be "obscene and indecent" behavior (meant public displays of affection).
Always remember Hanlon’s Razor–”Never assume malice when incompetence will suffice as an explanation.”
That’s said, never forget Fred Clark’s Law, either: “Sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice.” There’s a certain point at which ignorance becomes malice–at which there is simply no way to become that ignorant except deliberately and maliciously.
