Ms Reason's Chill Place

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[trek-tracks]

Stop testing poison on yourself, Bones

[reasonschillplace]

Who said the poison pill was fatal? People ingest poison for entertainment purposes quite frequently.

[twunkish-cleric]

Because I'm curious, how often is your name mispronounced?

My first name is frequently mispronounced

My last name is frequently mispronounced

My full name is frequently mispronounced

I've never had my name be mispronounced

It's mispronounced occasionally, but most people get it right

I've basically never had someone say it correctly 😔

Voting ended onMar 7, 2023

Please include what language your name comes from, if you know. I'm very curious

As someone who's last name is Polish and Welsh, so like if Europe's two most unpronounceable languages had a baby, this is important to me 😂

[iamthetruenhaz]

Outside of my native country? Always. First name because no one knows where to put the stress. (I don't correct people because mispronounced or not, I hate my first name anyway) Last name because I can't even transliterate it properly into the Latin alphabet, you have no letter for Ъ so it's just U (nope) or A.

[dashaibo]

Everyone somehow writes my patronymic down wrong in Russia

[emeraldmercury]

My first name: Often mistaken for another similar sounding name in my own country, pronounced mostly right in the U.S except for one syllable.

Last Name: Often misspelled in the U.S, usually one letter off.

My middle name: ...do not go there.

[reasonschillplace]

I am almost certain my last name is an immigration error or someone bumming an English last name or smth but I literally cannot find any info on the name except that it's probably maybe English but my family has no English background.

It's one letter off from a much more common last name so people just pronounce it like that. There's an S that I'm not sure if it's "supposed" to be pronounced as a sharp s sound or more like a z sound so like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[reasonschillplace]

Just because I was scrolling back and have since done some massive family tree research: Last name is just currently spelled the “English” way, but it came from a Czech surname. The “s” and “z” thing… yeah, I think it was neither. I think it was Anglicized as “sz” (fr a “sh” sound) or might’ve been someone’s best guess thinking more along Polish lines than the š it more likely would’ve been.

Also on another side, my dad always talked about like it was obviously Scottish (Peal) as that side is where our Scottish background came from but Peal was originally Piel and turns out it’s German af.

The amount of Polish names in my background though… hoo boy…

[reasonschillplace]

Now after MORE research, I’ve learned that the way this name was spelled with the “sz” is the *SLOVAK* way of spelling it.

The son of the man who immigrated was adamant his father was Czech and I’ve also found out his mother is Slovak. However, this was also when Czechia and Slovakia were still part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. I’ve found most records available from that area and time period are Slovakian. Whenever I search the version of this name when they immigrated, it’s always Slovakian records.

So I think it’s safe to assume they immigrated out of somewhere Slovak speaking?

So now there’s both the American and Slovak layers to pull back to find wtf my family’s last name was. Been dreading having to slog through the Czechoslovak records, but at least I have more of a direction than before.

I kind of want to post some of the cute little things I’ve seen in a lot of records. Like one where they got two name wrong, cross crossed because the drew little arrows indicating they should be switched but then whoever drew them put little feathers on the back of the arrows so it looks like. shooting arrow.

So very unnecessary but so very fun.

[parakavka]

Love how this implies that after the downfall of humankind that doge is the species to supercede us

[fidelcostco]

[reasonschillplace]

Meanwhile in samurai Jack, they ran straight in to kill whatever was there.

[reasonschillplace]

This is Peter

Say hi to Peter.

[heathyr]

i saw a post on twitter by a european saying americans are fake for their random compliments to strangers and their general cheery demeanor and like no. no no no you don’t understand. if you get a random compliment from an american on the street about your outfit or whatever, that is 100% genuine. we mean it. we aren’t lying we are making a small but fleeting connection with you because our lives are shitty but the human condition is enduring. oh god i’m clutching my chest

[distractedbyshinyobjects]

If you get a compliment from a random American on the street, know that they tried their best to keep from saying a peep to you but they literally could not hold it in. They HAD to say something.

[fremedon]

The other day a tiny gay man in a hurry bumped me on the Metro escalator and said "Sorry, great dress by the way" and then he stopped at the top of the escalator and turned around and said "AND a great hat. THAT is how we do summer!" and SPRINTED for his bus and I coasted on that for the rest of the day.

[unreconstructedfangirl]

Love this post!

When I first moved to Prague I had a colleague who had such great style, and I always complimented her because I thought she was hot and cool. Years later when we were friends, she told me that she always suspected me of trying to manipulate her somehow because that is not how Czechs roll, and it was really inconceivable to her that I was simply complimenting her with no ulterior motive, but that's culturally normal to me?

Also, I am married to a British person, and his mother is an artist -- she's a collograph print-maker, and she told me that whenever she wants a pick me up, she sends photos of her latest prints to me, because I can be counted upon to say something nice. What can I say? I love her work? Her prints are beautiful, so...not faking?

Americans have a lot of blind spots and issues, but saying the nice thing in their brains to other people is fine? Like? A little more kindness and connection isn't hurting anyone?

[aprillikesthings]

There was a post on r/askanamerican just the other day, by a guy living in Eastern Europe who has a fun backpack (it looks like a reeses cup package with a bite taken out of it!) and said he constantly got compliments on it from American tourists

And he was like...are all of you like that? You say nice things to total strangers as if you're life-long friends??

And the entire comment section was like: Yup. Absolutely. This is 100% a thing we do.

And someone looked up a picture of the backpack and shared it and we were all like OMG THAT IS AN AMAZING BACKPACK yeah if I saw someone in any city on earth wearing that thing I would in fact say something.

Sometimes posts on that subreddit are a trash fire, but we were all so happy to talk about times we've told strangers compliments or been complimented by strangers.

And genuinely, it's one of the few things that makes me proud to be American. Like. We have a reputation for telling total strangers when we like something they're wearing/doing. And we mean it, every single time!

[reasonschillplace]

I saw a woman with the absolute cutest backpack that was shaped like an owl. Too amazing not to say something. I told her it was awesome and absolutely adorable and she lit up, thanked me and said she really needed that at that moment. I’m glad I got to be the random stranger that hav her that pick me up at the end of what sounded like a terrible day.

One of my favorite compliments I got was at work. I have a hoodie where the body is black but the sleeves and hood are rainbow striped. I work in an office where we do a lot of shipping so there’ll be all manner of drivers from sprinter vans to semis. So we’ll get those big tall trucker dudes walking through the office to the shop or to use the bathroom.

One stops while passing my desk on the way out and says he liked my hoodie. I thanked him but didn’t expect him to then ask where I got it because it looks like something his girlfriend would love. I was more than happy to tell him because that’s the sweetest shit I’ve ever heard when complimented. It made him think of his girlfriend and that she’d like one too and for some reason that makes it feel kinda special? I hope he got her one and she loved it.

I started tagging saying this but I think another aspect: A lot of us remember the things we’ve complimented just as much as the compliments we get.

Also hope that dude with the peanut butter cup backpack believed it was genuine when a picture is shown and a bunch of Americans proceed to freak out about how awesome it is. Like just imagining it in my head I’m like “I’d regret not telling someone that is a great choice.” I mean I know that stuff I been complimented on makes me happier when I wear it.

[twotriickhoofbea2t]

Homestuck 2's Queer Representation is Miserable

This was originally going to be one of my short quippy posts and explicitly just about Roxy, but the more i thought about it the more i felt i had to make a longer, more thorough post on the subject.

The Queer rep in Homestuck 2 is bad. Which is actually a bit of a surprise to me, the character writing in Homestuck (original) was always seen as one of its strong points, and the HS2 team has made the point several times that they themselves are a mostly queer team, this is in fact one of the Only positive traits about themselves they've ever been on record of saying. So how does it end up this bad, and what makes it so bad?

Well if you ask me (and this is my post so im not sure who else you'd be asking here) the defining problem with the queerness on display in Homestuck 2 is that it draws a significant degree of attention to itself. If a character IS queer in HS2, then that is not only the first, but also the most important part of that character's role you will get to know.

And with the prominence it has on the characters, that's where the exact issues start to come up once you notice how queer characters in this story act.

Dave and Karkat are Homestuck's premiere homosexual representation, nearly beloved by all. Their somewhat catty, often derogatory banter to each other is what cemented them into the fandom's collective brain, and what makes them so entertaining to watch. These two men clearly love each other, but display it through nearly always antagonistic wording, and that's great.

What's Not great is the way they get smoothed over in the epilogues and sequels, boiling down to a woobified "pure soft gay" couple who, in nearly every scene they're in together, exist solely to be the gay representation of the cast, and any scene Dave is acting like.. well, Dave. Karkat is not on screen. curious.

On the flipside from the Soft Gays, we have Rose and Kanaya who, in a BAFFLING turn of events, are painted as some kind of disaster marriage that's holding on by a thread? In both timelines (if you have not read Homestuck 2 and this is confusing you i am sorry and also wish i was you) They are split as a couple either by a case of marital infidelity that makes no sense and i will explain in a different post about why that plotline is a travesty it is so wrong, and in the Other they are divided by the machinations of a megalomaniac taking Rose to be his wife instead.

The central idea that Rose and Kanaya (the ONLY lesbian couple in the story, mind) cannot have a happy marriage and that this is entirely a fault of Rose and Kanaya as characters makes you wonder why on earth Homestuck put Rose and Kanaya into a relationship to begin with, when Hussie and their ghostwriters clearly don't like these two being an item.

The contrast of painting Dave and Karkat as some kind of soft boy romance while Rose and Kanaya are bickering wenches is also hmmmmmmmm, you know?

And as baffling as both of those are, those are the less torturously awful queer rep decisions because the three i saved for last are absolutely abysmal choices.

Calliope. just Calliope entirely. My own opinions of this little green stain on the narrative aside, Why. of the entire Homestuck cast, Why would you make your Only nonbinary they/them representation the Green Skull Alien who Lacks Defining Sexual Characteristics to begin with.

That was a hypothetical question, i know why, it's the same reason so many sci-fi settings make their only nonbinary rep the fucking robot. But STILL, this "amazing team of queer creators" apparently didn't sit down and go "hey is making the skeleton alien our only enby rep a bit fucked?" it just somehow never dawned on them this would be a bad idea, I guess.

And Then There's Roxy. The entire reason i thought to make this post, oh good lord, Roxy, what did they do to you?

For those out of the loop (and reading this post for some reason) Roxy Lalonde is a character defined very much in Homestuck by her comfortable femininity, Roxy is openly girly to an extreme degree and doesn't let it weigh on her as a negative trait, she is confident in her persona and a conflict of personal perception is never once brought up as part of Roxy's story.

Roxy is, I should stress, one of the Only Homestuck characters comfortable with who she is.

So when the decision came up to make a singular (yes singular) transgender representation in homestuck 2, they took Roxy, a character comfortable in her feminine lifestyle, and made That One into a male presenting transgender character? THAT one? You Sure?

Roxy is a character who resonates with transgender people strongly... with transgender... women. Roxy is a character popular with the transfem community, I'm not sure if the HS2 crowd knew this, I knew this, Roxy is about 1/15th of why I came out to begin with. Roxy is a lot of important things, but the one thing Roxy isn't is the kind of character i'd describe as "a little transmasc don't you think?" And this is ignoring that when it came time to make this ideal transmasc Roxy design, the team behind HS2 went and made him... Dave?

I don't even need to describe that part, go look up HS2 Roxy and you'll see what I mean, he's Literally Dave now.

But the thing that bothers me most about this is how retcon-heavy it is, because again, Roxy was never a character who gave off an inkling of gender dysphoria, So in Homestuck 2, in the universe where Roxy Doesn't come out as Davegender, The HS2 team tries to make sure you KNOW Roxy is a transmasc individual by having the other Roxy say the only reason she is a woman there is she... got... married to John. and being married to John made her abandon... gender goals?

I'm not insane here, right? This is not how transgender writing works, this isn't how.. a lot of things work, they are trying to retroactively force transmasc Roxy to work because they wanted this specific popular HS character to be their trans rep and didn't want to retcon the baby Roxy we see in the ectolab by making her transfem instead. This is the epitome of forced queer representation and the KICKER is that once he transitions Roxy stops DOING anything. He's just There! He just Tags Along! He has No Role in the story, effectively a piece of set dressing!

And this is STILL not the biggest blow to queer rep that HS2 has for us, the Single worst, most destructive thing that Homestuck 2 does for the queer representation scene...

It's Jade. It's Jade Harley, it's Jade with a Dog Penis, not even close.

Jade's depiction in the epilogues (and to an extent HS2) is disastrously tasteless and foul. The idea that Jade, now in possession of a dog's penis due to an event in Homestuck proper (via retcon) is now simply depicted as horny and down to fuck in a polygamous orgy at all times, to the point Dave and Karkat kicked her out of their threesomecule for being too lustful, and once she couldn't fuck with them she went on to knock up Rose for the aforementioned nonsense infidelity plot. Jade's Penis has effectively replaced her brain and leads all her actions in the story.

And like, I don't need to say why that hurts queer rep, right? Depicting a woman with a penis as a horny, unstoppable sex machine with no social boundaries? I don't need to say why that one is wrong, surely you can all see why that is wrong. Really.

So that's the rant, Homestuck 2 is a story where lesbians are insincere and fickle, gays are passive and sweet, the nonbinary character is a space alien, the transgender character is pointless, and the token girl with a dick is a sex engine who doesn't understand her friends' limits. The only way i could see it being worse is if our bisexual representation was a controlling megalomaniac who stole someone else's wife and brainwashed her, but i'm sure that'd never happen, right?

[cookingwithroxy]

Yes yes this.

[reasonschillplace]

There’s a certain shame with Roxy’s situation because it’s an interesting story to tell… but not the right character to do it with. I don’t know who would be.

It’s for the fact that whatever is going on in life could kick the can of thinking about your relationship with gender vs sex down the road. When she married John, that’s getting swept up in the ultimate girly fantasy of a wedding and family and kids and basically a life that was previously impossible for her to have in reality as one of the only two humans left on a flooded world. The only thing I can think of that would prompt her into thinking about it on the candy timeline is a pregnancy.

Like if there’s any dysphoria to be had, I think pregnancy would get the ball rolling (tho the lack of finding any stories from trans men realizing while pregnant still identifying as a woman makes me reconsider this might be a realization point). But then, it can be written off as the hormones and body change “when I recover, it won’t feel so weird, that’s it, just the hormones and physical stress…”

Then getting oneself busy with parenthood and then maybe throwing herself into the role of wife and mother to try to force the feelings something isn’t right down. But then your kid is approaching adulthood, you get divorced… wondering what you want with your life that hasn’t panned out the way you thought.

The underlying sense that something is wrong surfaces again and you decide now is the time to really unpack that. That seems to be where Candy Roxy was last time I checked and I’m like “okay good, they weren’t just saying she isn’t trans this timeline…” because tbh, I thought that was the most uncharitable interpretation and it was clearly written as what she was prioritizing in each timeline changed where she thought about her own gender identity.

That’s actually something you don’t see very much discussed about in why someone comes out or when they actually realize “oh. I’m trans, everything makes sense” rather than deciding across all timelines ever someone always realizes they’re trans and transitions at roughly the same point. It had a nice nuance to it and I’m someone who hated the epilogues and HS2 for a lot of the reasons you’ve described, the rep is abysmal.

Thing is, it’s interesting in concept and tbh maybe John was the better character for it (since they were also starting that direction in the Candy timeline). If there was a good way for this to work with Roxy though, they sure didn’t do it.

[cookingwithroxy]

Sorry I saw these tags and could NOT let them vanish into the void.

Because ultimately that's the issue with all the HS2 changes to characters. And it really can come back to the one (human) girl who hasn't been mentioned so far because she's not an element of queer representation.

What did they do to Jane? (The question is rhetorical, we ALL know what they did to Jane.)

[takashi0]

Considering how much Dave kept insisting on Karkat running for president against Jane, despite Karkat stating over and over and over again very explicitly that he DID NOT WANT TO DO THAT, I'm not particularly sure about OP's assertion about DaveKat being the Wholesome Chungus ship, even with my own lukewarm-at-best feelings on them as a couple.

Also no, John would not be a better Trans candidate because I read Homestuck canon like 8 times and there's virtually nothing that hints at any feelings of dysphoria. The only pieces of "Evidence" people use for it are a joke (that granted WOULD be funny in another world where June Egbert isn't the narrative equivalent of shoving a square peg into a round hole), and that narration near the start during the scene where he actually gets out of the house that says "You're thirteen years old and you feel as though there's something missing in your life" which is very obviously supposed to be about the usual hero stuff about being bored with your small town life and wanting something more and adventurous.

Like yes, I get why you prop those up, but this is two minor moments from an 8000 page comic with about as much text as The Bible that are very clearly Not About That, this is the strongest things I could find while giving the fairest shake I could for a Pro-June reading, and it's fucking weaksauce as all get out.

[burningabyss572]

#And don't get me fucking started on when HS^2 tried to imply#that John secretly wasn't able to live up to some standard Dad Egbert was trying to enforce#like no#fuck you#We are not slandering Dad Egbert in this house

Well they needed SOME way to let Hussie bring up their daddy issues again

I mean, cause the June stuff! Yeah...

[takashi0]

I swear Hussie was being a lazy mf with that bit because hey, you know who WOULD be motivated to transition by being alienated from masculine pursuits as a result of an abusive guardian?

FUCKING DAVE.

But oh no, we can't have one half of the fujo's favorite pairing be a WOMAN and make it a filthy STRAIGHT PAIRING now can we?

[siryouarebeingmocked]

I didn't even know/remember H2 existed, and not a single word in this post makes it seem appealing in the slightest.

[reasonschillplace]

For the record, I wasn’t saying John was a *good* candidate for having the trans story, I’m saying he might’ve been a smidge better than Roxy for the reasons described in the OP bout the problems with Roxy. While I think the StriLondes each hitting a letter of LGBT is funny in concept, it’s execution that really fucks it all up.

There is a good way to execute whatever they were trying to do, just like all ideas and concepts, but execution was not up to it.

[itsbenedict]

I feel like I have a pretty good handle on how most stuff in my day-to-day life works.

I know what's inside a computer. I broadly know how food gets grown, cooked, packaged, and shipped to Walmart. I understand how electricity is produced and supplied to my house. I basically know what kind of stuff affects the weather. I grok the basic hydrodynamics of my toilet.

But I don't know a goddamn thing about shampoo.

Like, this stuff is a weird high-tech chemical soup! You look at the ingredients on the back and you see shit like TEA-DODECYL-BENZENE-SULFONATE and GUAR HYDROXY-PROPYL-TRIMONIUM CHLORIDE, and while the Chem 101 I took in college equips me to basically guess what kind of molecules those are, I don't have the first clue what they're supposed to do to my hair.

Food, like, I can look at the nutrition facts. I know what protein and carbohydrates and sugar are and the kinds of effects they're going to have on my body when ingested. If I see a snack food with a big "ORGANIC" on the label, I know for a fact that is meaningless marketing-speak and I don't need to care about that.

But shampoo? That's a goo! That is a goo that's sort of like soap but is importantly distinct from soap in some way. Shampoo brands are locked in a technological arms race where they need to convince their consumers that they are knowledgeable scientists who know how to take care of your hair. It's scalp-safe! There's panthenol in it! It moisturizes and reinforces and turboencabulates! We've cooked up some future slime in a lab with our science powers, and you gotta trust that we've cracked the code on hair engoodening.

Remember: this type of shampoo will refresh your hair, and this competing type of shampoo will rejuvenate your hair, and I don't know the difference between those things except that I know that hair is dead cells and cannot possibly be rejuvenated. This is code for something, but no one has seen fit to tell me what, or how I'm supposed to evaluate them against each other.

I go to the store. I see a wall of goo cylinders. All the cylinders claim to be the ultimate goo cylinder, the one that'll bring world peace and give your hair super powers. Some of them- knowing how marketing departments work, surely most if not all of them- are lying, and they all contain roughly the same soap-goop that makes your hair not gross.

But how would I possibly know? I can't take that risk! I'm gonna grab the blue one that says MEN on it, because I don't know that the WOMEN one doesn't have some oxyl sulfo propylfuckery in it that'll react with the testosterone in my sweat and make me break out in horrible boils. I'm gonna grab the 2-in-1 stuff even though clearly there's enough benefit to applying shampoo and conditioner separately that separate bottles are still the standard, and I have no idea whether I'm making some horrible mistake that only shampoo rookies make. Who am I supposed to trust on this? The bottle? The bottle could tell me it'll grant me three genie wishes and I'd shrug and go "maybe, I guess".

I don't know why I'm so wound up about this. I'm bald.

[reasonschillplace]

All it has to do is get rid of the dandruff and I need not know more. Conditioner just needs to stop static in winter. You have to accept some level of witchcraft. Good thing bout hair hygiene tho is humans have ben working on that in several cultures independent from each other before and after shampoo so there are many methods with less and more witchcraft.

Wash twice is what I learned recently though, gets the scalp thoroughly clean. My shampoo that doesn’t advertise outside being for dandruff felt more refreshing than ever after that.

Blowout Professor on youtube came up randomly in my algo but he hasn’t failed me yet. I guess the answer on who I trust right now is the salon owning bald man.

[life-in-a-monospace-typeface]

The Shibari Game

At a conference/festival last year, there was a Shibari workshop on the schedule for some reason, although the topic of the event was prediction markets. This led to the following exchange (all names changed):

Adam (who at the time was basically a stranger to me): Hmm, "Shibari"... What is that, some kind of Jewish ritual?

Me: No, it's-

Barbara: EVERYONE SHUT UP! Ok. Nobody tell this man what shibari is.

Everyone: ...?

Barbara: We’re playing 20 questions.

Thus began what was by far the best game of 20 questions I have ever witnessed. There were... appreciably more than 20 questions.

[literally ten minutes of questions later]

Adam: Ok, so! Shibari... is a Japanese social export, it's an activity somebody does, it's in some way artistic, it does not involve drawing, it does not involve writing, it involves an inorganic object and an organic object, and... the organic object is a human, right?

Everyone: Right

Adam: And the inorganic object...

Barbara: Well...

Chris: The inanimate object

Adam: The inanimate object, which, oh, which is organic, which suggests that it's clothes... Is the inanimate object clothing?

Everyone: No

Me: To clarify, the inanimate object is always organic in terms of 'organic chemistry', but might or might not be, like, made from biological material

Adam: Ok. And so, you have an inanimate object, and you have a person... The person does not have to do anything during the... shibari activity. You are doing a manipulation to the inanimate object, with the person, for purposes that are fun... Is it for the entertainment of a group?

Barbara: Could be? ...

Adam: So it could be for the entertainment of a group, but it could be for the entertainment of the individuals?

Everyone: Right

Adam: Ok. The inanimate object - the equipment - right? It is not specialised, but is a common object, correct?

Everyone: yeah

AI

Adam: Does it have anything at all to do with AI?

Everyone: [laughter] No

Adam: I had to check. In this setting, everything turns back to AI at some point

Me: I would say no

Frank: Not yet!

Me: Right, not yet. But yeah, 'No' is definitely the answer to that one

George: I trust Rob Miles on this

Barbara: As an expert in shibari?

Frank: As an expert in AI Shibari. I think that's what it's called.

Chris: Oh, yeah it kind of is!

Can one shibari by accident?

Adam: Ok. Is it something that one might do without knowing that it is shibari?

Everyone: [cacophony of disagreement]

Me: Interesting question!

Frank: Very interesting question.

Barbara: It's totally plausible that someone would do something that would qualify as shibari without knowing the Japanese artform

Me: Yeah, and they might also have seen things about it but not know the name of it

Chatting during shibari

Adam: Does it involve talking?

Everyone: No, not necessarily

Adam: God Dammit. Agh, I thought it might be... talking using some prop or something

Barbara: For me it always involves talking, but it's...

Adam: One doesn't have to?

Barbara: It's just 'cause I don't stop talking

[laughter]

Adam: And it doesn't involve betting markets in any way?

Everyone: No

How technologically advanced is shibari equipment?

Adam: Ok. Is the object technologically difficult to make?

Everyone: No

One guy: Yes

Everyone: What? No it isn't!

Adam: Is it only available in an industrialised economy?

Everyone: No

That one guy again: Yes!

Everyone: NO!!!

The guy: No, you're right, I'm sorry... But it is difficult to make

George: Every object is difficult to make!

Barbara: Maybe you're confused about what shibari is

Ed: Yeah, you should be up there with Adam

Adam: Would it have been available before industrialisation?

Everyone: Yes!

Adam: Ok. Um... is it a stick?

Everyone: It's not a stick

No cheap tricks allowed

Adam: I feel like I'm gonna get close to covering everything...

Me: I feel like we were very close just now, when you were like "Well what could this object be?"

Adam: Ok so the object is important. It's... before industrialisation... Does it begin with a letter before-

Everyone: No, no, we're not doing that. N/A

Adam: Ok so it starts with an N and an A...

[laughter]

What is this dang object?

Adam: Ok... so... is the object artificially pigmented?

Everyone: Can be, but not necessarily

Adam: Is it commonly painted?

Everyone: No

Adam: Is it commonly dyed?

Everyone: Yes

Adam: Ok, is it something that it's very common to dye in other purposes?

Everyone: Yeah

Adam: Does it involve a vegetable, of some kind?

Everyone: ...No?

Adam: Does it involve a plant?

Everyone: [confusion about what 'involve' means]

George: The object can have... some relation to a plant

Me: eehhh, that's more confusing than helpful. We already said that it can be biologically derived

Adam: But it would have been available before industrialisation?

Everyone: Yeah

Adam: So it's got to be something that is... around. Is it something that requires human modification to make into the form we know and love?

Everyone: Yes

Adam: Uh.. does this processing require specialised skill?

Everyone: Yeah, some skill for sure

Adam: Would I be able to do it? Like, without training?

Everyone: Probably not

Ed: On a long enough time horizon you'd figure it out, but the answer is basically no

Adam: Like, you throw me in with the tools to make it and say "come out in an hour", could I...

Everyone: No, probably not

Adam: But other people would be able to make it in an hour?

Everyone: Yeah, with the right skills

It’s not a weapon

Adam: Does it involve a weapon of any kind?

Everyone: No.

George: How creative are you allowed to-

Everyone: The answer's no

What shape is the object?

[long pause]

Adam: Well... does anyone else have any questions?

Barbara: You're asking such good questions though!

Ed: Yeah you're doing a good job

Danielle: I think you should ask more questions about the shape of the object

Everyone: Oh, great suggestion

Adam: Ok, is it spherical?

Everyone: No

Adam: Is it cylindrical?

Everyone: Yyeeaahh, sort of, yeah.

Adam: So it's not a pure cylinder but it's cylindrical-ish?

Everyone: Yeah

Adam: Is it an ovaloid?

Everyone: No.

Adam: Is it an ellipsoid?

Everyone: No

Adam: Is it uh... hmm... But it's longer than it is wide?

Everyone: Yes!!!

[scattered applause, we're close now]

Adam: Is it a plank of wood?

Everyone: No!!!

Barbara: It still isn't that!

Frank: No, his previous guess was stick

Adam: Yeah, a plank of wood requires processing and I couldn't make it... like it fits a lot of the other questions

Barbara: No you're right, that's fair, I'm convinced. It is a plank of wood.

Where is the object?

Adam: Could I find it inside a building or outside a building?

Everyone: Yes...

Adam: Wait. I mean. Ok, can you find it in a bathroom?

Everyone: Not really

Adam: Can you find it in a kitchen?

Everyone: Probably not

Adam: Can you find it lying on the ground?

Everyone: Yeah possibly

Adam: Is it something that people commonly use?

Everyone: Yeah

Adam: Is it something that people would pick up if they saw it lying there?

Everyone: Nah

It’s really not a weapon

Adam: Is it something that is dangerous at all?

Everyone: Can be, but not especially

Adam: Is any part of it sharp?

Everyone: No

Adam: Can any part of it fragment?

Everyone: [???]

Adam: Like, is it brittle?

Everyone: No

Adam: So it's firm?

Everyone: No

Adam: Is it flexible?

Everyone: Yes!!

Adam: Ok! Is it a pool noodle?

Everyone: [laughter]

Adam: Which is cylindrical, flexible, and organic, dyed but not painted...

Everyone: No, we're so proud of you, you're doing great

Me: But we did say "pre-industrial"

Pinning down the object

Adam: Ok ok. Is it a solid?

Everyone: Yes

Adam: Is it any of the solid hybrids, like a colloid or a gel?

Everyone: No

Adam: Does it retain its shape after being bent?

Everyone: Uh... yes?

Adam: So it doesn't spring back with any force?

Everyone: No, it doesn't spring back

Adam: Ok... so... Is it Japanese in origin, or is it found around the world?

Everyone: [assorted contradictory statements]

Me: The origin of the practice is Japan, but the origin of the object is all over

Adam: Is the object put on a person?

Everyone: Yes!

Adam: Is the object... um... is the object rope?

Everyone: YES!!

[scattered applause]

Me: The object is rope!

Adam: Ok!

Me: Now bring it home

Bringing it home?

Adam: Are things hung upon the rope?

Everyone: Uuuuummmmmm. Ambiguous? No.

Adam: Is the rope itself... does the rope look good?

Everyone: Yes!

Adam: Ok! Is this putting-on... a mark of esteem?

Everyone: No?? ???

[laughter]

Adam: So the object is a rope, and you're putting the rope on somebody

Everyone: Yes!

Adam: You're... putting rope on somebody!

Everyone: Yeah!

Adam: Is that... is that not the practice?

Everyone: No, no, it is, it is!

[confused cheering. Are we done?]

We’re not done

Chris: But, no, come on, there's more to it!

Ed: You're missing something critical!

Chris: You're so close!

Adam: Ok. Do you... hang someone?

Everyone: [strongly conflicting opinions]

Barbara: Only if you're doing it extremely wrong

Adam: Ok. But you can tie knots?

Everyone: YES!

Adam: Ok! Do you tie... is it a bracelet of some-

Everyone: No!

Adam: So it's not an adornment of any kind...

Everyone: Well...

Where on the body?

Adam: Is it put on your neck?

Chris: No

Danielle: Well, can be...

Adam: On your head?

Everyone: Can be

Adam: On a limb?

Everyone: Yeah

Adam: It's on a limb

Me: Not exclusively

Adam: On an arm?

Everyone: Can be

Adam: On a leg?

Everyone: Can be

Adam: On... uh... I've run out of limbs...

What does it mean?

Adam: Ok, it's rope, you put it on somebody, it's Japanese in origin... does it... signify something?

Everyone: Not really

Adam: Hmm. Do you tie the rope in a loop?

Everyone: ...Yeah??

Adam: I'm wondering, is it the casting of ropes upon people, like uh...

Chris: It's not a lasso, no

Frank: I like the idea of shibari as, like, a carnival game...

Barbara: I'm unclear on what the win condition is here...

Ed: I feel like there is a really important component that we haven't got yet

Everyone: Yeah, when he gets that component, he’s won

Are people into shibari?

Adam: Hmm... Did you find yourself fired by enthusiasm to do it upon being told about it?

Several people: Yes

Me: Personally no, but...

[laughter]

Adam: So it has mixed appeal?

Barbara: That is absolutely correct

Can one shibari... too hard?

Adam: Is it um, does it involve the tying of knots?

Everyone: YES

Adam: Ok. Are there knots that are peculiar to shibari?

Everyone: yeah

Adam: Is the learning of knots, or the tying of knots upon other people the important part?

Everyone: Uh... yes?

Adam: Do you tie someone up and they attempt to escape?

Everyone: Uh, not necessarily, but like, often.

Me: Yes is closer than no, I think

Adam: Ok, you tie rope on someone. Do you have to use some sort of special rope for it? Can you use any rope?

Barbara: You can use any rope, but some are better than others

Adam: So you wouldn't want to use any rough ropes, or...

Danielle: No, you do, that's actually preferred

Adam: You prefer rough ropes?

Chris: Some do

Frank: It depends

Danielle: Natural fibers tend to be rougher

Adam: Does it chafe?

Danielle: It can, but ideally not

Adam: Would you do it even if you were injured in the process of doing it?

Frank: No

Barbara: You would not want that to happen generally

Adam: Uh... Does it look cool?

Everyone: Yes!!

Origami?

Adam: So you're tying knots that look cool... is it like an origami for knots?

Everyone: [confused disagreement]

Ed: It's not about the knots

Chris: It's totally about the knots!

Frank: It's all about the cones...

Adam: Like, in origami you fold paper in ways that look cool, maybe you tie knots in ways that look cool?

Everyone: [loud disagreement]

Diagnosing the problem

[long long pause]

Chris: Ask the question in your heart!

Adam: ...Neckties?

Everyone: No?

Barbara: I keep thinking "But, he already has it", and then he asks a question that makes me say "No, he doesn't have it at all"

Frank: I think there's a question you want to ask, but you're not...

Everyone: Yeah

Chris: Yeah, ask the question that you don't want to ask

Danielle: I don't think he has the question...

Adam: Would it cause any gratification in someone?

Everyone: Yes!

Adam: Would it... Would it cause sexual gratification?

Everyone: Yes!!

Adam: Is it a practice... under the category of kink?

Everyone: Yes!!!

Adam: Is it tying somebody up for bondage purposes?

Everyone: YEAH!!! [Pandemonium, hollering, applause, Adam is lifted above the cheering crowd]

After the hearty congratulations were done, I wandered off, elated from the experience, and I bumped into a group of friends.

"Friends!" I said, "I just had the funniest experience. This guy didn't know what 'shibari' was, so we-"

"Shibari?" a friend interjected, "What is that, like, a Jewish building?"

"OK EVERYONE SHUT UP" I said.

[brazenautomaton]

That's way more than 20 questions

[reasonschillplace]

Akinator coded

[twotriickhoofbea2t]

Homestuck 2's Queer Representation is Miserable

This was originally going to be one of my short quippy posts and explicitly just about Roxy, but the more i thought about it the more i felt i had to make a longer, more thorough post on the subject.

The Queer rep in Homestuck 2 is bad. Which is actually a bit of a surprise to me, the character writing in Homestuck (original) was always seen as one of its strong points, and the HS2 team has made the point several times that they themselves are a mostly queer team, this is in fact one of the Only positive traits about themselves they've ever been on record of saying. So how does it end up this bad, and what makes it so bad?

Well if you ask me (and this is my post so im not sure who else you'd be asking here) the defining problem with the queerness on display in Homestuck 2 is that it draws a significant degree of attention to itself. If a character IS queer in HS2, then that is not only the first, but also the most important part of that character's role you will get to know.

And with the prominence it has on the characters, that's where the exact issues start to come up once you notice how queer characters in this story act.

Dave and Karkat are Homestuck's premiere homosexual representation, nearly beloved by all. Their somewhat catty, often derogatory banter to each other is what cemented them into the fandom's collective brain, and what makes them so entertaining to watch. These two men clearly love each other, but display it through nearly always antagonistic wording, and that's great.

What's Not great is the way they get smoothed over in the epilogues and sequels, boiling down to a woobified "pure soft gay" couple who, in nearly every scene they're in together, exist solely to be the gay representation of the cast, and any scene Dave is acting like.. well, Dave. Karkat is not on screen. curious.

On the flipside from the Soft Gays, we have Rose and Kanaya who, in a BAFFLING turn of events, are painted as some kind of disaster marriage that's holding on by a thread? In both timelines (if you have not read Homestuck 2 and this is confusing you i am sorry and also wish i was you) They are split as a couple either by a case of marital infidelity that makes no sense and i will explain in a different post about why that plotline is a travesty it is so wrong, and in the Other they are divided by the machinations of a megalomaniac taking Rose to be his wife instead.

The central idea that Rose and Kanaya (the ONLY lesbian couple in the story, mind) cannot have a happy marriage and that this is entirely a fault of Rose and Kanaya as characters makes you wonder why on earth Homestuck put Rose and Kanaya into a relationship to begin with, when Hussie and their ghostwriters clearly don't like these two being an item.

The contrast of painting Dave and Karkat as some kind of soft boy romance while Rose and Kanaya are bickering wenches is also hmmmmmmmm, you know?

And as baffling as both of those are, those are the less torturously awful queer rep decisions because the three i saved for last are absolutely abysmal choices.

Calliope. just Calliope entirely. My own opinions of this little green stain on the narrative aside, Why. of the entire Homestuck cast, Why would you make your Only nonbinary they/them representation the Green Skull Alien who Lacks Defining Sexual Characteristics to begin with.

That was a hypothetical question, i know why, it's the same reason so many sci-fi settings make their only nonbinary rep the fucking robot. But STILL, this "amazing team of queer creators" apparently didn't sit down and go "hey is making the skeleton alien our only enby rep a bit fucked?" it just somehow never dawned on them this would be a bad idea, I guess.

And Then There's Roxy. The entire reason i thought to make this post, oh good lord, Roxy, what did they do to you?

For those out of the loop (and reading this post for some reason) Roxy Lalonde is a character defined very much in Homestuck by her comfortable femininity, Roxy is openly girly to an extreme degree and doesn't let it weigh on her as a negative trait, she is confident in her persona and a conflict of personal perception is never once brought up as part of Roxy's story.

Roxy is, I should stress, one of the Only Homestuck characters comfortable with who she is.

So when the decision came up to make a singular (yes singular) transgender representation in homestuck 2, they took Roxy, a character comfortable in her feminine lifestyle, and made That One into a male presenting transgender character? THAT one? You Sure?

Roxy is a character who resonates with transgender people strongly... with transgender... women. Roxy is a character popular with the transfem community, I'm not sure if the HS2 crowd knew this, I knew this, Roxy is about 1/15th of why I came out to begin with. Roxy is a lot of important things, but the one thing Roxy isn't is the kind of character i'd describe as "a little transmasc don't you think?" And this is ignoring that when it came time to make this ideal transmasc Roxy design, the team behind HS2 went and made him... Dave?

I don't even need to describe that part, go look up HS2 Roxy and you'll see what I mean, he's Literally Dave now.

But the thing that bothers me most about this is how retcon-heavy it is, because again, Roxy was never a character who gave off an inkling of gender dysphoria, So in Homestuck 2, in the universe where Roxy Doesn't come out as Davegender, The HS2 team tries to make sure you KNOW Roxy is a transmasc individual by having the other Roxy say the only reason she is a woman there is she... got... married to John. and being married to John made her abandon... gender goals?

I'm not insane here, right? This is not how transgender writing works, this isn't how.. a lot of things work, they are trying to retroactively force transmasc Roxy to work because they wanted this specific popular HS character to be their trans rep and didn't want to retcon the baby Roxy we see in the ectolab by making her transfem instead. This is the epitome of forced queer representation and the KICKER is that once he transitions Roxy stops DOING anything. He's just There! He just Tags Along! He has No Role in the story, effectively a piece of set dressing!

And this is STILL not the biggest blow to queer rep that HS2 has for us, the Single worst, most destructive thing that Homestuck 2 does for the queer representation scene...

It's Jade. It's Jade Harley, it's Jade with a Dog Penis, not even close.

Jade's depiction in the epilogues (and to an extent HS2) is disastrously tasteless and foul. The idea that Jade, now in possession of a dog's penis due to an event in Homestuck proper (via retcon) is now simply depicted as horny and down to fuck in a polygamous orgy at all times, to the point Dave and Karkat kicked her out of their threesomecule for being too lustful, and once she couldn't fuck with them she went on to knock up Rose for the aforementioned nonsense infidelity plot. Jade's Penis has effectively replaced her brain and leads all her actions in the story.

And like, I don't need to say why that hurts queer rep, right? Depicting a woman with a penis as a horny, unstoppable sex machine with no social boundaries? I don't need to say why that one is wrong, surely you can all see why that is wrong. Really.

So that's the rant, Homestuck 2 is a story where lesbians are insincere and fickle, gays are passive and sweet, the nonbinary character is a space alien, the transgender character is pointless, and the token girl with a dick is a sex engine who doesn't understand her friends' limits. The only way i could see it being worse is if our bisexual representation was a controlling megalomaniac who stole someone else's wife and brainwashed her, but i'm sure that'd never happen, right?

[cookingwithroxy]

Yes yes this.

[reasonschillplace]

There’s a certain shame with Roxy’s situation because it’s an interesting story to tell… but not the right character to do it with. I don’t know who would be.

It’s for the fact that whatever is going on in life could kick the can of thinking about your relationship with gender vs sex down the road. When she married John, that’s getting swept up in the ultimate girly fantasy of a wedding and family and kids and basically a life that was previously impossible for her to have in reality as one of the only two humans left on a flooded world. The only thing I can think of that would prompt her into thinking about it on the candy timeline is a pregnancy.

Like if there’s any dysphoria to be had, I think pregnancy would get the ball rolling (tho the lack of finding any stories from trans men realizing while pregnant still identifying as a woman makes me reconsider this might be a realization point). But then, it can be written off as the hormones and body change “when I recover, it won’t feel so weird, that’s it, just the hormones and physical stress…”

Then getting oneself busy with parenthood and then maybe throwing herself into the role of wife and mother to try to force the feelings something isn’t right down. But then your kid is approaching adulthood, you get divorced… wondering what you want with your life that hasn’t panned out the way you thought.

The underlying sense that something is wrong surfaces again and you decide now is the time to really unpack that. That seems to be where Candy Roxy was last time I checked and I’m like “okay good, they weren’t just saying she isn’t trans this timeline…” because tbh, I thought that was the most uncharitable interpretation and it was clearly written as what she was prioritizing in each timeline changed where she thought about her own gender identity.

That’s actually something you don’t see very much discussed about in why someone comes out or when they actually realize “oh. I’m trans, everything makes sense” rather than deciding across all timelines ever someone always realizes they’re trans and transitions at roughly the same point. It had a nice nuance to it and I’m someone who hated the epilogues and HS2 for a lot of the reasons you’ve described, the rep is abysmal.

Thing is, it’s interesting in concept and tbh maybe John was the better character for it (since they were also starting that direction in the Candy timeline). If there was a good way for this to work with Roxy though, they sure didn’t do it.

[reasonschillplace]

Rewatching AtLA and realizing when the Earth King is looking at this group of kids hearing one is the Avatar, it 100% makes sense he assumes it’s Sokka.

He wouldn’t know about the Air Nomad genocide, so any air Avatar would be over 100. So if any of these kids are the Avatar, it’s got to be or of the Water Tribe kids and Long Feng says “the Avatar and *his* friends.”

I’m kind of wondering what alternate history of the Avatars he’s been taught.

[reasonschillplace]

Nothing like your kitchen faucet leaking water from every crevice all over the counter and having to shut off the water to it for a week to make you find a simple joy in washing dishes. 🙃

[cheshireinthemiddle]

I have 2 Filipino ladies who work at the restaurant with me and although they speak english, they prefer tagalog (which is fine). And I just ignore them when they talk to each other because it's not for me to hear. But I learned today that when I'm around, they intentionally speak gibberish to each other.

I guess they thought I knew enough tagalog to (jokingly) call them out on it, but sadly I do not.

They've been doing this for THREE MONTHS, waiting for me to catch on. I was too ignorant and too respectful to consider it could have just been made up words and thry were just playing a joke on me.

[reasonschillplace]

Question, was it random gibberish or Tagalog sounding gibberish?

Like along the lies of this song that’s English sounding gibberish.

[ladycatsa]

[pearlo]

OH GOD I LOVE THIS MOMENT SO MUCH

[cacchieressa]

FAVORITE SCENE OF THE SERIES.

[bunwritten-words-deactivated201]

Zuko really has one of the greatest character development ever.

[seedsandforests]

It’s amazing how many people are touched by this moment and don’t realize this is how their Heavenly Father would be with them if they repented. 

[wrenchinator-central]

Same picture

[chaotic-theatrical-weaver]

I don’t even go here, but yes.

[reasonschillplace]

It’s The Storm where we really see the difference between Ozai and Iroh and how Zuko trusts and feels so much more love from Iroh. We see how he got his scar, speaking out of turn but saying something completely true about how the soldiers they were openly planning to sacrifice were there because they love their country. We see him facing his father, getting on his knees, refusing to fight, apologizing profusely, saying what he understands he did wrong, crying, and for it, he’s scarred for life, banished, and told that in refusing to fight and begging for forgiveness for his mistake was shameful weakness and he would only learn anything from suffering.

We see in the way he interacts with the crew that he internalized this and that making threats and his willingness to fight over any perceived slight is how you keep people in line. That what decisions he makes as a leader should go unquestioned by those whose place it isn’t to question. But it’s all talk, his actions in being the first to save the helmsman and to get to safety despite seeing Appa fly overhead and his entire crew knowing what it meant to Zuko. His outburst earlier about how the safety of any single member of the crew didn’t matter in pursuit of his goal, but in the end, he won’t let them be hurt if he can help it.

Iroh had warned him and he blew him off. It’s after seeing the consequences of going against his advice he’s learned better and corrected his mistake. When they’re safe in the eye of the storm, he says he’s sorry and, unlike his father who rejected and burned him for something of no real consequence, Iroh puts a hand on his shoulder and says “apology accepted.”

With Iroh, Zuko is allowed to learn that even mistakes with real consequences can be forgiven if he can sincerely learn from it and do the right thing in spite of his pride. Zuko is allowed to learn to humble himself and have it recognized. Zuko learned that with Iroh, saying and being sorry really does mean something and that something isn’t shameful weakness.

[malibuklaus]

[buskellunge]

[cheshireinthemiddle]

[reasonschillplace]

[twunkish-cleric]

Because I'm curious, how often is your name mispronounced?

My first name is frequently mispronounced

My last name is frequently mispronounced

My full name is frequently mispronounced

I've never had my name be mispronounced

It's mispronounced occasionally, but most people get it right

I've basically never had someone say it correctly 😔

Voting ended onMar 7, 2023

Please include what language your name comes from, if you know. I'm very curious

As someone who's last name is Polish and Welsh, so like if Europe's two most unpronounceable languages had a baby, this is important to me 😂

[iamthetruenhaz]

Outside of my native country? Always. First name because no one knows where to put the stress. (I don't correct people because mispronounced or not, I hate my first name anyway) Last name because I can't even transliterate it properly into the Latin alphabet, you have no letter for Ъ so it's just U (nope) or A.

[dashaibo]

Everyone somehow writes my patronymic down wrong in Russia

[emeraldmercury]

My first name: Often mistaken for another similar sounding name in my own country, pronounced mostly right in the U.S except for one syllable.

Last Name: Often misspelled in the U.S, usually one letter off.

My middle name: ...do not go there.

[reasonschillplace]

I am almost certain my last name is an immigration error or someone bumming an English last name or smth but I literally cannot find any info on the name except that it's probably maybe English but my family has no English background.

It's one letter off from a much more common last name so people just pronounce it like that. There's an S that I'm not sure if it's "supposed" to be pronounced as a sharp s sound or more like a z sound so like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[reasonschillplace]

Just because I was scrolling back and have since done some massive family tree research: Last name is just currently spelled the “English” way, but it came from a Czech surname. The “s” and “z” thing… yeah, I think it was neither. I think it was Anglicized as “sz” (fr a “sh” sound) or might’ve been someone’s best guess thinking more along Polish lines than the š it more likely would’ve been.

Also on another side, my dad always talked about like it was obviously Scottish (Peal) as that side is where our Scottish background came from but Peal was originally Piel and turns out it’s German af.

The amount of Polish names in my background though… hoo boy…

[mapsontheweb]

States in the US that allow cousin marriage

[generallemarc]

It’s actually a criminal offense in Texas for first cousins to marry(aka the kind of cousin marriage that’s most at risk for incest issues), but sure, publish total lies.

[cookingwithroxy]

Context matters, like: The exception in Illinois? You have to be incapable of having children (specifically, both are over fifty or one has certified as infertile by a doctor) in order to marry as first cousins. And as first cousins is the only thing that matters, that’s all that matters.

[reasonschillplace]

Hmm… gonna have to question the validity of this map because either NJ got an interesting story or that’s the map maker that cut NJ in half and labeled the lower half Delaware.

[pallettown]

genuinely so scary that you can't access the page on the ssc website that guides you through changing your sex designation. so so fucking scary. they are already making our lives harder. they are already taking what little resources we have.

[pallettown]

update on this, if people want to reblog this to spread information to any trans person who is getting their gender marker changed with social security after the executive order:

today i went and was able to change my gender marker along with my name with social security. even though the page that guides you has been taken down you are STILL ABLE to do so. here is a link to the way back machine for the page and here is a link to the form you will need and here is another source that can help you prepare for federal crackdowns

don't be deterred by the removal of the page. there is still time, but possibly not a lot of it. if you can do this fast, do it.

it's worth noting that it's FREE to change your gender marker with social security. when you change your gender marker with social security, what you change it to does NOT have to match your other current IDs.

double check your state policies, and what you will personally need, but the overall message of this post is that there is STILL TIME despite the executive order. don't give up hope.