Writer. Old dork. I ship whatever the fuck I want and don't bother people about their ships. Used to be ‘brokedownpanda.’ Pan/poly. Libra. Potential NSFW, 18+ material.
If you haven't heard, the em dash has been getting a lot of attention lately…
Because it was trained on pirated work—including freely accessible online writing (like fanfic, academic texts)—ChatGPT picked up patterns and quirks native to human writing.
Including (sigh) the em dash.
There are other victims here (RIP tapestry and delve 🫠), but the appropriation of the em dash—a punctuation mark beloved by writers everywhere—feels especially personal.
A kind of low-grade panic is ensuing. Writers who once memed their own em dash overuse—the greatest punctuation mark ever to grace the control-freak’s lexicon, frankly—are suddenly backing away to avoid accusations.
No. More. We have centuries of dash-abusing writers behind us. We will not sit quietly while AI repurposes our beloved stilted aside—or the just-one-more clarification the sentence demands—or the dramatic pause your comma could never—etc.
You don’t write like AI—AI writes like you.
Defend the em dash.
(Feel free to download/share/stick it where it matters!)
The code for the emdash is ALT+0151, which is how I write it on my desktop 90% of the time. It's super simple to remember and becomes muscle memory very fast, making it easy to reproduce anywhere if you're using a keyboard with a tenkey.
On most smartphones, a long-press on the hyphen key allows you to add an emdash:
It also lets you add an underscore (which has its own dedicated key elsewhere but this is probably more accessible for one-handed typing), an endash (ALT+0150, different from an emdash), and an interpunct (ALT+0183 I think). Again, all very simple and easy once you know the method.
"Garou...ya gotta be fucking with me. You did not actually think the song was about that."
Badd picks up a mug and stares at it, twisting it around in his hand like if he looks at it long enough and from enough angles it will tell him that it's a good gift to buy for this stupid Hero Association Secret Santa White Elephant Whatever the Hell. They've been in the department store for what feels like hour, and nothing has given him a strike of inspiration. Before the cup can impart its wisdom to him, Garou plucks it out of his hand and puts it back. "No one wants a mug. Ever. And how the hell else are you supposed to interpret the song? It's got like...three lines."
"It's longer than that. Anyway, the whole thing is that the kid sees his mom kissing Santa and he's all, 'Haha, I'm telling dad,' and it's funny because the dad is Santa."
"Okay, so now you're posing that the son is the half-blood offspring of Father Christmas--"
Grabbing a squishy round reindeer plushie, Badd considers screaming into it. "No! The dad's just dressed as Santa Claus, okay? Jesus!"
"That doesn't make any sense. Why would he be in a Santa costume when the kid's asleep? What’s the point--oh." A Grinch-ish smile creeps onto Garou's face. That is, if the Grinch was a pervert... "You're saying she's into that kind of thing, and the kid walked in on the foreplay. You know..." He raises his fingers into quotes. "'Tickling' Santa Claus?"
"What is actually wrong with you?" Badd growls through his teeth. "Ya read between the lines. It's cheeky. It ain't a 'Son of Santa' thing, it ain't a kink thing and it seriously ain't about mom cheatin' on dad with Santa. Period. End of story."
Garou pouts as Badd moves to another section with pre-made stockings. Nah, all of these look cheesy... "All I'm saying is that if you had Santa as a side piece, you could tell me. I might even be into it. Wouldn't you?"
As Badd narrowly avoids going down an aisle that smells like a nightmare of pine--for Garou's sensitive nose as much as his own--there's something about the way Garou asks that question that makes Badd stop dead in his tracks. He faces Garou and puts his hands on the collar of Garou's jeans jacket, fixing him with an expression he is trying to keep serious even as a laugh forms in his gut, threatening to explode any second. "Babe...is this about when I kissed ya in the living room last Christmas after that party at Zenko's school? When I dressed as Santa for the kids? Ya...ya know that was me, right?"
Garou stares back at him as a slow blossom of poinsettia red covers his cheeks. It only darkens as he pushes him off. "Pfft. Of course I knew it was you. What do you think, I'm stupid or something?"
Even though he's managed not to laugh right in his face, Badd can't help smiling. "Garou, ya can't actually--"
"That's not it, okay?! I mean, if I did, it was because I was really tired that night from eating all those cookies and shit, I had a sugar crash--!"
Badd can't even look at him for a few seconds as he tries to keep from losing all his composure. Finally, he takes Garou's slender, cool hand, squeezing it. "Listen, legs. If ya ever got the chance to make out with Santa Claus, ya have my blessing. Kiss him, tickle him, whatever. Go all the way to third base with him, I'm cool with it. 'Cause I know after Christmas, you're still mine, yeah?"
It's only after Badd finishes saying this that he feels several eyes on him, and he turns to see a small group of children and their parents watching his heartfelt moment of sincerity with Garou. Their faces display what can only be described as a mix of disgust, fascination and a dash of horror from the younger ones. And of course, the pickle for the shit sandwich: one of the kids is holding a Metal Bat action figure, eyes slowly moving from it to him and back again...
Badd snatches his now snickering boyfriend's arm and drags him towards the front of the store, his ears burning. "Screw this, I'm just bringing a damn gift card."
HELLO! It really has LOL it's wild, like I looked up and went, "Oh. Wow yeah, I don't even know where I've been, but it's just like 2025 right?" NOPE.
Let's see...five things that have been happening with Paper:
Changed jobs. Which is kind of one of those 'uh huh who cares' things but my job before that was draining me and keeping me really busy. This one is a lot better.
We got a new puppy earlier this year. A corgi. My evolution to True Millenial Weeb has been completed.
I'm working on a novel. It took a year to write the first draft, and so far it's taken a year to edit it, and I'm still working on it.
I miss fandom. Like, a lot. Only the good things though. I'm just generally not on social media the way I was because it was devouring my soul but I miss seeing fics and art and enjoying fun fandom things. January it's going to be 10 years since I came back to fandom with OPM and that's blowing my mind.
Recently I read "Goodnight Punpun" and I read it way too quickly and it has haunted me ever since.
I hope everybody is having a good time, whether it's in the "happy holidays" way or the "hey it's December" way.
I’m sure people are sick of me posting about this, but it’s the FINAL DAY to grab the Sickos Selection bundle! For $25 you can get BOTH of these books from me (My Pirate Yakuza Saejima/Majima book and my Tom of Finland Lifedrawings sketchbook) in ADDITION to 25+ other PDFs from other amazing creators!
Itchio also doesn’t have the weird stripe processing issues for buying bundles that contain NSFW material that it does for individual NSFW comics, so if you want to get these with a credit card without having to futz with PayPal, this could be your last chance to get on it!
HELLO! It really has LOL it's wild, like I looked up and went, "Oh. Wow yeah, I don't even know where I've been, but it's just like 2025 right?" NOPE.
Let's see...five things that have been happening with Paper:
Changed jobs. Which is kind of one of those 'uh huh who cares' things but my job before that was draining me and keeping me really busy. This one is a lot better.
We got a new puppy earlier this year. A corgi. My evolution to True Millenial Weeb has been completed.
I'm working on a novel. It took a year to write the first draft, and so far it's taken a year to edit it, and I'm still working on it.
I miss fandom. Like, a lot. Only the good things though. I'm just generally not on social media the way I was because it was devouring my soul but I miss seeing fics and art and enjoying fun fandom things. January it's going to be 10 years since I came back to fandom with OPM and that's blowing my mind.
Recently I read "Goodnight Punpun" and I read it way too quickly and it has haunted me ever since.
I hope everybody is having a good time, whether it's in the "happy holidays" way or the "hey it's December" way.
as much as I love your creative beautiful mind, it's okay to do something that doesn't involve creating. you can spend time without getting a tangible product out of it, you do not need to monetize your every action, or have physical proof that the time you spent was meaningful. Please do nothing every now and then, I promise it's okay
theartofmadeline
annaxmalina
titsay
jacobvanloon
dededos
tangentwithtanner
janainaart
