i don't really want to weight in on the "using big words in your writing is ableist" discourse happening on tiktok because i'm like 90% certain it's an anti-intellectual psyop to stir up drama in online circles to promote the use of ai to summarize literally everything and thus feeding the LLMs and lowering the populace's mistrust of such tools but i also have to say: dictionaries and thesauruses are the most accessible they've ever been. if you use an e-reader of any kind you can look up a word without leaving the page. there's a plethora of online dictionaries and if you just type a word + "meaning" into google it'll usually give you a definition. we used to have pocket dictionaries we used when reading in class. i have two on my shelf right now that i used in high school. stop letting the fascists purposefully misuse anti-ableism rhetoric to trick you into never thinking again.
I love that the PHM movie went âalright hereâs your main character played by Famously Attractive Actorâ and the entire fandom went âthatâs great, give him to Markiplier, I want the morally complicated German lady with the comfy sweater and caffeine addictionâ
âoh no, my audience has begun to guess the big twists of my story and are accurately predicting what will happen!â
incorrect response: write the rest of the story to be as twisty, shocking and counter to expectations as possible, regardless of whether this is a logical or satisfying way for the plot to go
(youâre not stupid. I posted this thinking it would amuse a handful of mutuals who all knew the context and that would be about it, so I didnât think about providing any other explanation. I had no idea it would spread this far.)
Iâll start from the very beginning just to be thorough. so this is Alex Hirsch, creator and head writer of Gravity Falls, a show which had a big focus on mystery, conspiracies, codes and ciphers, etc. the whole plot is kicked off by one of the main characters finding a mysterious old journal in the woods, which detailed all kinds of weird and supernatural things, but then ended abruptly with the author saying they had to hide the journal because they were being watched. the central driving mystery of the show, therefore, was the question of who wrote the journal and what happened to them.
now, the thing about Gravity Falls is that, while it must be said that the writers werenât always quite as sure of their plans as we tend to like to think they are, it is very much a fair play mystery, with legitimate clues to what was going on. but the writers were caught off guard by how quickly the show attracted a dedicated audience, including a lot of people outside the primary presumed demographic, who started solving the clues faster than expected. so some of the fans were able to correctly guess who the author was before it was revealed in the show, and the theory started spreading. this put the writers in something of a panic, because this was THE mystery that the whole story revolved around, with ž of the show building up to the dramatic reveal in the middle of season 2. they wanted it to be a mystery that could be figured out, sure, but they werenât prepared for people to solve it so far in advance of when it was planned to be revealed, which would have really taken away from the big moment. they werenât going to change the main story itself, but having been caught unaware by how much attention the fans were paying, they wanted to up the ante and make the mystery more complex to solve going forwardâbut first they needed to buy some time and throw the fandom off the scent for a little longer.
hence, Alexâs plan as described above. they whipped up a fake shot that appears to give away the identity of the author as being another character in the show, put it on a screen in the studio as if it was a real animation frame, took a picture of it, and âleakedâ it online. it was initially decided to be a hoax (albeit, I think, presumed to be a hoax originating from outside the production team), until Alex posted this tweet:
âŚbefore quickly deleting it (though not so quickly that it didnât get seen, of course).
it worked well enough to distract most people for a while, and wasnât revealed as a hoax until a year later, when an episode aired that definitively proved that the supposed screenshot could never have happened, at which point Alex owned up to the whole thing as seen in the tweet above. by then the episode with the real reveal wasnât far off, and while people did still work it out ahead of time, it was more of an âOH MY GOD I KNEW IT!â moment than a âbooooooring, weâve known that for agesâ moment, which of course was what the writers wanted all along.
personally I find this a fascinating approach to dealing with the problem of spoilers, because it doesnât affect the story itself at all; if you watch Gravity Falls todayâor if you were watching it when it aired without any significant contact with the fandomâyouâd never know about it. ultimately, the problem the writers were facing wasnât that some people might guess the answer to the mysteryâthey never wanted to make it completely impossible to predictâso much as it was that they hadnât designed the story to stand up to so many people working on the puzzle together, which resulted in a sort of total output of puzzle-solving ability that far outstripped the capability of any one solo human being. so their solution is something thatâs very much targeted toward delaying that group problem-solving, without actually affecting the experience of any individual person watching the show.
plus, itâs very in keeping with the overall tone of the show.
Parents: "children should be taught that actions have consequences"
Okay, let them stay up till 5 in the morning and feel like shit for the next day, eat a bag of candy in one go and have a huge stomach ache, go out without an umbrella and catch a cold, watch a violent movie and get scared?
Parents: "actually, we mean screaming and beating the crap out of them when they try to do these things"
posted this in a community, but I think it should be out there as well, what to do in case of controversy:
1. don't take everything said on the internet as 100% true, there's lots of disinformation, mistranslation, misinterpretation and misunderstanding
2. do your own research, usually there's gonna be some stuff released to the public, and if you want to get into the controversy â gather your own info, read and learn for yourself
2.2. form your own opinions, you can and should listen to what others say, expand the possibilities, but I beg, form your own opinion and don't just go follow the crowd. people get crushed in crowd surfe for a reason, it's unstable, chaotic and harmful
3. don't jump to any conclusions until (and only after) every (!) side of controversy has spoken, again, pressure controversy as an example, we all got lied to by the "victim", so keep in mind that it is high possibility for one or the other side to try and drag other down
4. absolutely do not spread hate, you are actually becoming an active contributor to the whole situation and do not help (I have been mindless like that once, hounded and harassed someone just because a person I was following hinted their audience to do so.. less to say I hate this now and wish this never happened, the person turned out to be innocent btw)
5. restrain from giving money to the supposed problematic side, just in case
6. be cautious with the victim side, I'm not saying to not trust them or call them liar, just be careful and mindful about what they say, every coin has two sides, the question is whether or not it'll have different face there
7. do not go harassing and bullying one who still enjoy product, kindly inform them of the whole situation, provide instructions, if they state that they support the supposed problematic side, do not attack them and/or call them names, that's just immature, rude and unnecessary
just move on, you did everything you could and should, do not go waste your nerves for something that has no clear rhyme or end to it
if you have any questions â feel free to ask them, there's no white and black, everyone and everything has a pattern, a reason, a cause, even if it's the one that is morally wrong or you don't like/accept
Whatâs funny about being goth or punk is that kids generally arenât scared of you. When Iâm all dressed up with the big hair, dark makeup, and spiky clothes, little girls in particular treat me like Iâm a disney princess
it really pisses me off when adults sit there and drill it into kidsâ heads that their youth is fleeting and tell them things like âenjoy your childhood while it lasts because this is the best itâs gonna getâ. why are you telling children that adulthood is the worst thing they can experience? seriously what the fuck is wrong with you, why are you trying to make them feel like growing up is a fate worse than death? trying to convince them their life is over before it even begins? iâm tired of that shit. because tell my why my 12 year old cousin told me when she turns 30 sheâll be so depressed sheâs just gonna cry all the time. what the fuck. kids donât need to hear that their already stressful and overwhelming lives are never going to get better, that the abuse and lack of autonomy they face is apparently the highlight of their lives. they need to hear about adults who are happy to be alive and happy to have made it to their age. they need to know that growing up rules, itâs a gift and life does not have to suck for them, that they have a future thatâs worth sticking around for. this rhetoric is so damaging mentally and iâm about to start hitting the adults who parrot it. iâm sorry you hate your life but you donât get to dump your issues on these kids. donât piss me off and leave these babies alone!
The problem with being low support needs is that people mentally autocorrect that to âno support needsâ and then proceed to give you absolutely nothing and then get surprised when you implode after six months.
The FUCK you mean Miku's vocaloid system is a spanish invention in collaboration with Yamaha?? Spain and Japan have a daughter and she's called HATSUNE MIKU????
funny thing about anxiety is sometimes it kind of breaks your sense of danger. like i am known for repeatedly putting myself in situations that make my friends go "bro you couldve died. werent you scared?" and the answer is đ yjeah. i did it scared. i do everything scared. i didnt know that was the actual important kind of scary because i usually have to ignore my fears to function in society. it will happen again. watch out.
prguitarman
titsay
origamiaround
andulkaphoto
tangentwithtanner
turnnoffyourmind
