In other news...

German, aro/ace, a stack of useless trivia in a trench coat pretending at functionality.

[bedes-silliest-soldier]

Every BBC Historical Farm Series:

Alex, cuddling a lamb: “this is what farming is all about, you need to be connected to the land, it can be hard work but it’s worth it, it was how we lived for thousands of years…

Peter, knee deep in coal: “this is the orphan mangling machine — I need to be very careful as I shovel coal into it for the next 15 hours, but orphan mangling was such an important part of the British economy back then”

Ruth, vibrating with excitement: “women’s labor went unacknowledged but it was absolutely essential to running every household and business and nothing would have been able to run without it. Today we’re going to make strawberry jam, it’s going to be quite nice :) and it made up 2/3s of the actual monetary income of households in this period, while farming was for subsistence”

Professor Ronald Hutton, materializing out of thin air: “it’s spring, which means in this part of England — East Middle Shirelandiawalhamton — we have to tie sausages to our fingers and dance through the streets singing ‘tra-lee-la-lee-lay!’ Historically, this practice was accompanied by heavy drinking, and though it was banned by the Puritans, it never really went away.”

[poorquentyn]

It puzzles me when people cite LOTR as the standard of “simple” or “predictable” or “black and white” fantasy. Because in my copy, the hero fails. Frodo chooses the Ring, and it’s only Gollum’s own desperation for it that inadvertently saves the day. The fate of the world, this whole blood-soaked war, all the millennia-old machinations of elves and gods, comes down to two addicts squabbling over their Precious, and that is precisely and powerfully Tolkien’s point. 

And then the hero goes home, and finds home a smoking desolation, his neighbors turned on one another, that secondary villain no one finished off having destroyed Frodo’s last oasis not even out of evil so much as spite, and then that villain dies pointlessly, and then his killer dies pointlessly. The hero is left not with a cathartic homecoming, the story come full circle in another party; he is left to pick up the pieces of what was and what shall never be again. 

And it’s not enough. The hero cannot heal, and so departs for the fabled western shores in what remains a blunt and bracing metaphor for death (especially given his aged companions). When Sam tells his family, “Well, I’m back” at the very end, it is an earned triumph, but the very fact that someone making it back qualifies as a triumph tells you what kind of story this is: one that is too honest to allow its characters to claim a clean victory over entropy, let alone evil. 

“I can’t recall the taste of food, nor the sound of water, nor the touch of grass. I’m naked in the dark. There’s nothing–no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I can see him with my waking eyes.”

So where’s this silly shallow hippie fever-dream I’ve heard so much about? It sounds like a much lesser story than the one that actually exists.

[sophiamcdougall]

+1 You know how Frodo leaves Sam with the legacy of the quest - the job of bearing witness to what happened - and the duty to finish and protect his writings? Tolkien lost all but one of his friends in WW1. He was founder member of a literary club at school - the TCBS. There was a larger group and a core of four. They all stayed friends, they kept writing and sharing their work with each other. And they were almost all killed. One of them, Geoffrey Smith, wrote this to Tolkien in 1916. My chief consolation is that if I am scuppered tonight – I am off on duty in a few minutes – there will still be left a member of the great T.C.B.S. to voice what I dreamed and what we all agreed upon.  […] May God bless you my dear John Ronald and may you say things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them if such be my lot. And that was his last letter. There’s something eerie about the way he seems to have pegged Tolkien as an eventual survivor.  Sam’s survival (and his emergence as the true hero of the book) are beautiful because they’re suffused with loss, because they’re not the grand conquering heroic narrative that on some level was “supposed” to happen.

[vulgarweed]

Tolkien possibly only survived because he got trench fever - a particularly nasty disease carried by lice - and got sent home because he was desperately ill. Considering how the rest of his unit fared, it probably saved his life. Unpleasant and unglamorous, but if not for that, we wouldn’t have LOTR. I’m sure survivor’s guilt was a factor - as was a sickening sense of dread when “The War to End All Wars” didn’t, and his son went off to WWII.

TLOTR has some of the type of valorization of war that you find in the Old Norse and Anglo-Saxon literature that JRRT loved and studied and taught because he loved that style and it’s deeply fitting for cultures like the Rohirrim, but it’s also full of the slog of war, the waste and tragedy, and the irrevocable damage that even victorious survivors carry for the rest of their lives. Frodo’s symbolic “death” is also resonant for survivors of what was called “shell-shock” then and PTSD now.

I mean, it’s not Game of Thrones. It’s not gritty in the same way. But the protagonist of LOTR was minor gentry from a backwater nobody’d heard of, and the REAL hero who saved the world by saving him was his gardener. All the great kings and queens and lords and ladies in the story are background characters compared to the story of the little people. Literally little people, but symbolically too.

[gayharoldfinch]

“I mean, it’s not Game of Thrones. It’s not gritty in the same way”

well thank fuck for that

[feynites]

People are confused by the fact that the villains are unquestionably villainous.

What’s happened is that they’ve mistaken a specific brand of subversive storytelling for the only way to tell a morally complex story. The fact that subversion is relative to what you’re talking about has gotten muddied, because people have gone and labelled a certain plot type (which is actually a new fantasy staple in and of itself) as the ‘grey’ or ‘morally complex’ storyline.

This type of storyline is, of course, the one where the distinctions between heroes and villains are deliberately blurred. While there is definitely room to do things like ‘question the accuracy of the heroes’ perception of orcs’ in LotR, it’s also very clear that the canon narrative isn’t aiming for that. We know who the heroes are and we know who the villains are, and apart from some stray moments of self-reflection or betrayal, this is never really brought into question.

People have grown accustomed to seeing only one kind of thing as ‘complex’, which has, ironically, over-simplified a lot of narrative approaches in speculative fiction and fantasy. The prevailing attitude right now is that you can’t call your story nuanced if you know who your bad guys are. 

[frontseatpocket]

[juliairian]

My partner is British and this is probably his favourite moments in all of Buffy

[beardedmrbean]

[chronophobica]

what they DONT tell you about clarinets is that you have to fucking build the damn thing every single time. "what instrument do you play" fucking legos man idk

[alphabetizing-posts]

about build clarinets damn do DONT every fucking fucking have idk instrument is legos man play" single tell that the they thing time. to what "what you you you

[howverychaotic]

I really need to start reading the blog name because I thought I was having some sort of moment right there.

[juliairian]

I read that alphabetizing post in an increasingly unhinged, loud voice, no pause for breath, it was like listening to someone losing their mind while realising how much they hate assembling their clarinet in real time. It drew me in, like a crazy monologue...

Tell that the, they, thing... time!!

To what?

What, you... you... you...

Powerful shakespearean stuff, no notes

[andmaybegayer]

measure once cut also once, no prablem

[andmaybegayer]

#i know i already reblogged this but i need to like. cross stitch it or carve it into wood or quilt it or something

concept for a vcarving project

[theshitpostcalligrapher]

no i get you this was perfectly centered when i wrote it

[shaydh]

I have done the cross stitch

[poolboydivision]

in honor of all the times I've made this mistake irl

[makeitdewey]

702 Miscellany of fine and decorative arts

[scottbaiowulf-deactivated201805]

Male writers writing female characters:

“Cassandra woke up to the rays of the sun streaming through the slats on her blinds, cascading over her naked chest. She stretched, her breasts lifting with her arms as she greeted the sun. She rolled out of bed and put on a shirt, her nipples prominently showing through the thin fabric. She breasted boobily to the stairs, and titted downwards.”

[m1ssc0mmun1cat10n]

‘ She breasted boobily to the stairs, and titted downwards’ is the greatest fucking sentence I have ever read.

[silly-activites]

THE ORIGINAL??

[dduane]

(smh) Never thought I’d see it in the wild. Yet here it is. :)

[browniejeane]

always gotta reblog the ‘breasted boobily’ post

[tutt3rs]

under utilized comic gimmick is super big text bubble filled with very few words/just one word

[tutt3rs]

like this

[dragon-in-a-fez]

can someone turn the lights on in that jpeg

[aigeneratedfish-deactivated2026]

yea

[dragon-in-a-fez]

[whtbout2ndbrkfst]

What Asexual People Can Teach Us About Attraction

We’ve Been Measuring Attraction Wrong

"Asexual people are often assumed to “lack” attraction. But in reality, many report rich and varied forms of attraction that don’t map neatly onto sexual desire.

So instead of asking “how does attraction work?,” we asked:

What do people actually mean when they say they feel attracted to someone?" "Drawing on both qualitative and quantitative data, we identified and validates seven different forms of attraction:

intellectual

aesthetic

emotional

platonic

sensual

romantic

sexual

These aren’t just theoretical distinctions. Statistically, they show up as separate but related dimensions—meaning people really do experience attraction in multiple, distinguishable ways." "Our findings demonstrate that both asexual and non-asexual experience multifaceted forms of attraction.

Put differently, the seven forms of attraction our study identifies are not “ace-specific” categories—they’re general features of human attraction. But starting from an asexual lens helped us see those features more clearly."

"If you only measure sexual attraction, you miss a huge part of how people relate to each other. And that’s true whether you’re working with asexual people or not."

[puncertainty]

continuing traditions

[animatedamerican]

I love this so much and I decided I couldn't leave this in the comments: I am putting the above piece by Puncertainty up next to the below piece by WolfyTheWitch and rotating them in my mind.

continuing traditions. yeah.

[thebibliosphere]

I have food poisoning, I’m on my period, I have a migraine, my POTS is out of control, and I’m meant to get on a flight tomorrow to hopefully make it to my father’s death bed in time.

Emailing me a “review” of my book calling it cringe cannot hurt me. And if you claim you hoped to achieve anything else you’re either a liar or in denial about your own motives. You should reflect on that.

[thebibliosphere]

I made this non-rebloggable earlier because I didn’t want it to leave containment, but after discussing this with some other friends who primarily sell their work via booktok and Insta, this is apparently a thing right now where readers are going out of their way to message authors “honest and valuable feedback” because they believe authors need to be told how to improve.

Except they’re not giving actual valuable feedback, because being critical of something does not actually mean having constructive critical feedback.

Being able to offer constructive feedback is a skill. It doesn’t mean “having a negative opinion.”

You don’t need to be a professional writer or editor, but you do preferably need to have a basic understanding of technical writing skill, an understanding of the genre you are critiquing and a very basic grasp that just because you do not like something, does not make something objectively bad.

Messaging me to tell me you find something “cringe” isn’t valuable feedback. That’s you going out of your way to make sure a stranger knows you don’t like them.

Doubling down and emailing me back to tell me you “just wanted to help,” like help where? Where was the feedback?

What am I supposed to do with that except feel bad and stop writing?

You knew what you were doing and I will hold that mirror up. If the reflection you see makes you uncomfortable, that’s on you.

- -

Also, as a wider note: don’t do this in general, don’t tag or email authors in negative reviews.

Reviews are for other readers. They belong in reader spaces. If an author invades reader spaces and gets mad about what they see, that’s on them. But don’t go up to the author’s online door and demand they acknowledge your personal dislike. That’s weird. Why are you doing that? Rate the book one star for your own records and move on to the next one.

[officerhaughtstuff]

You’ve heard of the Roaring 20s........

now get ready for the Screaming 20s - coming to a decade near you in 2020

[heterokatedison]

is it too early or can we start screaming now

[heterokatedison]

in retrospect perhaps we should have started sooner

[jorolle]

this post is the equivalent of a newspaper from the day of the outbreak being blown past by the wind after you wake up in a post apocalyptic world

[worldheritagepostorganization]

World Heritage Post

[saanphoenix2]

"This is a blatant, 'In case of emergency, break glass'--"

Y'all are so depressing.

FFVII shit has been in the game for years. The goddamn DPS Limit Breaks use the Buster Sword, White Mage LB3 uses fucking Aerith's staff and pose. Fenrir has long been the chosen mode of transportation for new expansions because it offers a speed boost before you unlock faster mount speed. All the minions.

FFXIII, XV, and XVI all had crossover events.

NieR had a raid that was stupidly popular. Evangelion is going to be stupidly popular.

And now XIV is just promoting the Rebirth series because of timing, and they have the ability to make it a Raid that always exists instead of a once-in-a-blue-moon event with rewards.

Y'all really want the game to be doing SO POORLY that the ONLY reason they would include VII is that. Poor performance.

[autumnslance]

Don't forget a major character of Shadow of Mhach, Cait Sith, is most famously associated with FF7 as a party member.

"I prefer raids tied to the lore like Crystal Tower" which was lifted, along with many of the relevant NPCs (including ones simply named in the distant past) from FF3. Just like how Eden was heavily influenced by FF8, even if it neither were blatantly called a collaboration or crossover and were built to be part of the FF14 setting and story.

(I stopped entertaining speculation when pre-Endwalker was a lot of "because the moon is a major factor they're going to be repeating the plot of FF4" which was very untrue, though there's plenty of FF4 influence in earlier expacs, EW, and EW's void arc patch story.)

The collabs are hit or miss for sure (I still think NieR ended the story poorly; I have pals who loved Ivalice cuz of their affection for Tactics and/or FF12, while others couldn't stand its wordiness; I think Vana'diel's done a decent job of grounding the problem in 14's world while giving homages to 11), but 1 that's often subjective, and 2 the original raids are also hit or miss (Myths of the Realm had no real bite to it and skimmed past what potential it did have; I enjoyed the heck out of Arcadion's wrestling soap opera story).

FF14 is the theme park love letter to the rest of the series. It's got references galore, and like all other FFs, reuses character names, concepts, and other material that is in common with prior FFs. Sometimes they're just more blatant about it, like when it lets them work with another team who's sharing some of the development load.

This is about timing, and marketing for both games, and was frankly inevitable since the moment FF7 Remake was first announced, regardless of how well or badly internet armchair theorists think the game is doing.

Also, I really doubt the CEO would have been so easily convinced to give more budget and manpower to a poorly performing game, regardless of how much he himself loves it or likes Yoshida, as there's other people (board members, shareholders) to convince of the investment, too.

[followthebluebell]

I poked his leg and he turned into a ball about it.

[xonmybullshitx]

[hagiomoto]

The entire Europe conspired and cooperated to colonize North America.

Say this to Norwegians and Swedes, they'd get mad and act as if they have nothing to do with it

[loaexmachina]

This belief is tied to the misconception that colonization was undertaken by states, and thus that only countries whose states had colonies were involved. The importance of companies and venture capital in colonization is vastly unknown and frequently underestimated. When you look into it, you'll see that even some European countries without colonies had colonial companies. And even when that wasn't the case, the states themselves or large part of their capitalist class could own stakes in foreign colonial companies.

And even more indirectly, they could have stakes in trades that were fed by colonialism, like industry developing thanks to cheaper material from the colonies, which fueled the industrial revolution

[queeranarchism]

This belief also limits the slave trade to the actual act of kidnapping humans and shipping them across the globe. But none of that was possible without the industry that supported it.

In 'humans kidnapped and shipped' figures, Sweden was a small fish in the slave trade, but Sweden was the main supplier of iron chains used in the slave trade. The Swedish iron industry thrived and brought wealth to Sweden because stolen children were cuffed in child-sized Swedish chains.

[vampantheon]

on the topic of disabled characters, though, i think a LOT of artists give characters mobility aids that their character wouldn't actually benefit from using.

i'm sort of having a mild brain fog moment rn so i can't fully articulate what i'm on about, but i think a lot of able-bodied artists view things like canes and crutches as interchangeable. and they often don't know enough about the wide range of mobility aids to make an informed decision about what their character might actually use based on their disability

i also think that aids like walkers and rollators are sort of viewed as "cringe" on some level, and many people view them to be "just for old people," so many artists will opt for giving a character who has full-body pain and fatigue a cane (which, in many cases, can potentially WORSEN full-body pain) instead. and a lot of people don't realize that most wheelchair users are able to walk, so they don't consider it an option for characters with chronic pain

[vampantheon]

idk it's kind of frustrating. i've genuinely never, ever seen a character that uses a rollator before. not once. i cannot name a single one. i know of multiple ocs who are described to have full-body pain, dizziness, and fatigue that are drawn as cane users and are never shown with wheelchairs or walkers, though

[vampantheon]

it's also sort of sad? i've been diagnosed since i was twelve years old, and i only heard of rollators LAST YEAR. and that was only because i saw one irl and immediately asked what it was. i wonder how many disabled people out there don't even know it's an option solely because they're completely underrepresented online and in media

[vampantheon]

if you're a creative with a disabled oc, PLEASEEE check out this link. it's a very nice and detailed guide for telling which mobility aids suit someone's needs best. it's incredibly important to make the right choice for your character! mobility aids tell you a LOT about someone's lived experience. picking the right one will communicate to your audience #1 what your character goes through #2 that you UNDERSTAND what your character goes through!

[renthony]

When I was in college, I got my first tattoo. Not long after, a guy who sat behind me in one of my classes tapped me on the shoulder and told me that he'd seen my tattoo online, being made fun of as an example of "dumb shit fandom girls do." I'm not a girl, mind you (I'm nonbinary), but to a bunch of people online I was a "stupid girl who got a stupid tattoo for a dumb fandom."

Anyway, the guy from my class was really nice about it--he apologized for having to tell me bad news, and gave me the contact info for the guy who posted it so I could ask for it to be taken down.

Now, the tattoo in question? It's a bird. It's not actually a fandom tattoo, it just coincidentally looks vaguely like a bit of symbolism from a fandom that was popular at the time I got it. But it was enough to unleash a firestorm of "look at this stupid girl with her stupid cringe tattoo" comments.

(Even if it WAS a fandom tattoo...who gives a shit??? It's my body and my tattoo and I don't really give a shit what strangers think.)

The misogyny of my body being put online and circulated for mockery without my consent really fucked me up at the time. I felt awful. I was mortified. I was scared more people would recognize me from the post and give me shit. It sucked so bad.

So I just kinda think you're a fucking douchebag if you participate in tattoo shaming for anything that isn't, like, a blatant hate symbol. I don't really care if you think it's tasteless, or cringe, or badly done, or whatever other justification.

It's jackass behavior.