hold on tight and don't look back

Blake | 30+ |  xe/xem or he/him | aroace | blog content largely managed by queue

[riftclaw]

riftclaw's Ko-fi Commissions

Ko-fi Commissions Open! Click to see riftclaw's commission menu.

Going to be opening commissions a bit to pay for essentials; a few more options have been added this time.

Reshares super appreciated, thank you for looking!

[graff-aganda]

There's a bad moon on the rise.

[json-derulo]

having the Aviation Accident Investigations Autism™️ has actually done wonders for the way I process and respond to my own fuck-ups

[json-derulo]

And I don't just mean "oh, my little work mistake is actually nothing compared to a fiery crash that kills people," either. The reason commercial flight is so many orders of magnitude safer than any other form of transportation is because after every accident and incident, an independent regulatory body investigated it with the express goal of figuring out exactly what happened, why, and how to prevent the same thing from ever happening again—not to root out which person deserved the blame or the liability.

It's a simple, shockingly effective idea. It's also worlds away from how most people approach their own mistakes and the mistakes of others.

[json-derulo]

Because it’s never just one person’s fault. And even when it is, it still isn’t. 

The sharpest, best-trained pilots make worse decisions when they're tired or sick or stressed out, so there's two of them. The most dedicated and experienced air traffic controllers garble an instruction over the radio sometimes, so pilots are trained to always repeat clearances back to catch misunderstandings quickly. The best and brightest maintenance mechanic still overlooks a screw or misconnects a wire once or twice in her career, so aircraft systems are built with two or three or four layers of redundancy, and pilots are exhaustively trained to deal with failures safely. 

Everyone eventually has a bad day. Every component breaks down. Every computer gets a bad a Windows update and spirals into a reboot doom loop. If it’s possible for one person’s mistake to domino into a mushroom cloud of a fuckup, then that task is too critical to be one person's sole responsibility. The accident sequence starts with the design of the system—so how do you improve the system to keep it from happening again?

[json-derulo]

oh yeah. The “modern commercial aviation is the safest form of transport” thing only applies to planes, btw. A helicopter is a beautiful metal horse that wants to break its legs and die so so so badly

[thelawfulchaotic]

This is such a good example of systemic solutions to problems!! Putting it in my pocket for explaining problem-solving vs. blame and punishment in the future.

[starlitskvaderart]

Art Fight Attack on @riyamilea - Levinia!

[gojira007]

Oh the elegance with which you use the character's long slender shapes to draw us into the heart-shaped hands is so creative and so fun, following the spiraling loops inwards is so satisfying!  The way you use the brighter puffier jacket to better distinguish those layers is an especially fun choice, likewise the little energy crackle at the tip of the tail to emphasize the end of the trail.  REALLY great work with the shading on this one too, the way it lets all the different dark shades remain distinct while also flowing together is fantastic. 

[audliminal]

Thinking about the whole "there is no platonic explanation for this" thing and how it doesn't account for intense platonic situationships and anyways I think we should start saying "there is no casual explanation for this" bc really what we're talking about is the way the characters in question are Obsessed with each other

[ominous-signs]

[rankine-radians]

The ominous temperature in this post is 3.5315π Rrad

[ominous-signs]

[rookamell]

Writing isn't the hobby. Being insane about little fake people is the hobby. Writing is just the only outlet i have for that

[lovrboyx]

The Last Unicorn really said “There will be times when you can’t find other people like you and there will be times where you'll wonder if you're really the only person experiencing the world as you are and others will even try to take advantage of you through commodification and exploitation to the point where it starts to dilute your own sense of self and will make you question if you were ever you to begin with but it’s important for to resist the urge to assimilate and find community because there will always be people like you who will understand and have experienced these same things and the only way to combat a dark world who wants to smother your light is to FIGHT FIGHT RAGE AGAINST THE RED BULL DO NOT GO GENTLY INTO THAT OCEAN.”

And I just think there’s something beautifully and inextricably queer about that

[starlitskvaderart]

Art Fight Attack on @sege-h - Jules! (feat Piers)

[sege-h]

Quick artists rendition of events witnessed on vacation which were preceded by me overhearing this exchange Little girl: Thank you! Woman: But you Can't-- Little girl: Yes, thank you!! After which a little girl ran right past me with the local stray kitten dangling about like a ferret

[phantomdecibel]

got an hour left to kill

woe. unicorn!lottie be upon ye

[riftclaw]

(the other thread was getting too long lol)

lance: I would never! the fenced off areas are DANGEROUS i would never

clair: bullshit you would do this exact same thing. and we would have to fish you out of the death forest too. you would do this for FUN even

lance: this is slander–

speaking of how would gold react to his bf’s evil twin showing up out of nowhere? and being a psychic like he himself is? I’m sure the mischievous cat energy would be off the charts lmao

and she's not even wrong! lance is a chronic problem child he's just better at hiding it when the cameras are looking at him

and the entire situation would delight gold. as long as nobody's getting hurt this is just a hilarious situation that they'll probably be able to sort out somehow. that lottie is psychic too would be fascinating to him, though, gold would want to know everything about how that works for him. he's got the kind of mind that wants to learn as much as possible which is why he ends up working as a professor later in life

finding out lottie is a criminal of some calibre would also amuse him, bc let's be real. lance is too. gold goes along with him for raids on rocket facilities more than once, he knows.

also nonzero chance lottie gets called handsome at least once. gold is just kinda casually flirty like that (it doesn't mean anything most of the time but also i feel like lottie being another lance means it's going to happen even if he's trying to behave lol).

[phantomdecibel]

lmao amazing that gold’s reaction to ‘this guy tried to end humanity’ is ‘well I mean my lance would kill someone if it was necessary so I guess that tracks’. everything he does is chaotic as fuck (though im sure there’s a measure of. ‘if there’s a way to get lottie home then he’s Really not their problem. and if he’s just wandering The Forests rn then he’s probably not plotting murder yet.’ running through gold’s brain lol)

WHEEZE oh there are SO many different ways lottie could handle being (casually) flirted with and I can’t decide which one is funnier. this Did get stuck in my brain thanks lmao

bc on one hand he is Not Used to other people asides from the other elite 4 who were helping him try and end humanity (and clair). that’s four people totally he talks to and half of whom Would Not flirt with him Ever, but bruno and lorelei COULD be fair game, even if in jest

so it’s entirely possible that he’s never been flirted with before and would just. bluescreen lmfao, even if it doesn’t mean anything (a lance still isn’t gold’s lance)

BUT lotties also got mischievous cat vibes (stares HARD at ‘who are you??’ ‘:3 that’s my buisnesss >:3’)

he uses his words as weapons when he feels like it. so it’s not impossible that he would just. match the energy. BUT ITS ALSO NOT UNLIKELY that he would just go ?????, say the most out of pocket thing he could think of, and try to run lmao

there is Any Number of ways he could react. and that’s amazing haha. and would possibly just egg gold on if the way he reacts is amusing enough. idk I get the impression that gold does things for the Bit. he seems like a guy who likes to do things just bc it’s funny lmao

also lmfao im just imagining gold calling lottie handsome while geo!lance is like. babe im RIGHT here pls

[riftclaw]

gold is from the world where humanity almost ended thrice that's just kinda normal to him lmao. oh you're a world ending threat? neat i treat people who get infected by those!

but also the idea that he's never been flirted with before kills me lmao. gold genuinely just talks to people like this (like when he's calling crimson dragon au kamina handsome it's not like romantic intent or whatever it's just that. well. you compliment people they feel better sometimes). if lottie was genuinely uncomfortable he'd switch tracks bc empath but it is just kinda. casual and meaningless generally

and geo!lance knows exactly what gold is like. the most that's gonna happen is he keeps looking over at gold to see if he's the one being talked about or not. "me this time? no. ok"

[phantomdecibel]

pffffffffffft, spiders georg of people experiencing world ending threats–

adsffsfggdfs think about it tho. if we’re putting the ‘tried to end humanity’ no later then age 15 then lmao who’s gonna be flirting with him?? the only people he knows who either would and could get away with it without getting mauled are bruno and lorelei. if they’re around lottie’s age then I wouldn’t put it past them, they’ve both got their goofy moments, but like. they’re both absolutely BONKERS TGEY WOULDNT FLIRT LIKE NORMAL PPL LMAO. even just casually or as a joke between friends. bruno like exclusively fights on the backs of wild pokemon and lorelei likes to take people’s limbs off for fun and is like. SO persistent she was Did Not give up on finding that pikachu. they’d flirt by trying to kick lottie’s ass and by leaving him dismembered limbs like a cat. which is also what they do OUTSIDE of flirting. none of these kids were socialized properly lottie would look at gold calling him handsome and go what are you doing that’s not how ur supposed to show Affection for people. bring me a human finger wrapped in a bow like a normal person u weirdo–

pffffffffft okay but that’s just as funny lmfao. just looking over his shoulder every three minutes to make sure he’s still not part of this conversation while lottie just side eyes him for his taste in verbally affectionate men

[riftclaw]

gold's generation is like. it's like if the covid fallout was also fallout from a near-apocalypse lmao. they're not fazed by a whole lot

it's a fun contrast, too. you have lottie and co living in a world that's presumably FAR more "normal" in comparison to the geoverse and they're like that... meanwhile gold and geo!lance come from a world with so many things wrong w it that just barely survived a global apocalypse and despite their respective quirks they're. more socialised lol. and yet both of them are traumatised in wildly different ways so they probably have some concerning things in common w them anyway

geo!lance would find the side-eyeing funny, also. he thinks gold's habit is cute and also funny whenever it throws someone for a loop

[sapphling]

the sex binary is socially constructed and not actually descriptive of any biological truth. you know that, right? it's important to me that you know that

[sapphling]

i know people can be a little overzealous in describing political backslides ("this used to be the feminism website!!!" etc.) but it's disturbing to me how much incredulity i've gotten from other trans people as of late just for, like, saying that "biological woman" is neither a real category nor a phrase that should ever leave your mouth uncritically

[axolotluv]

Please give us your data 🥺🥺🥺🥺 For the children 😢‼️ all of your legal information 🙏🙏 yes 🥺 your home address? 🥺 Your government issued ID 😢❓social security number and credit card details 🤗 immigration status ❓ racial religious and gender identity 😁😢😢😢⁉️ please 🥺 did you get an abortion this year 🥺 please give us your personal information 🥺🥺🥺🥺 for the children‼️‼️

[fairycosmos]

t shirt that just says WHATEVER YOU’RE READING INTO MY FACIAL EXPRESSIONS AND BODY LANGUAGE YOU’RE MISINTERPRETING

[worst-roommates-ever]

i think americans should have to put a banner above their post that says U.S. CENTRIC ADVICE/INFORMATION. i think political posts should clarify that they are giving protest/societal/class information relevant only to the USA i think i would like to stop getting halfway through a post with really good information and then realising it is not widespread advice and is only applicable in the united states of america

[worst-roommates-ever]

for the love of GOD can we PLEASE stop treating us-centric advice as applicable to the whole entire world. Please. beyond anything else, i do not think you guys understand how difficult it makes it for young people to interact with and learn information relevant to them.

at a certain point, treating us-american advice as universally applicable borders on misinformation. i am not saying that it is done maliciously, but it is dangerous at worst. i do not want younger people going around assuming that certain laws do/do not apply to them and getting in trouble because of it. i worry about what 'fundamental/constitutional/labour rights' are only legally defensible in the USA. i worry about kids who do not know yet to wonder where the advice is for, and take it as fact because a post that reads "EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW THIS" begins with "EVERYONE".

[worst-roommates-ever]

okay yes all the tags are very very good points but i would like to point out the main reason i made this post, which is that

if you are non-american then it can be dangerous to hold beliefs about your rights that are only applicable in the US.

i am australian and i have seen young australians have completely us-american perceptions on the rights they hold (or do not hold) in regards to protest, police officers, self-defense, medical care, higher education, debt, and legal proceedings. i am not talking about "boooo americans" i am talking about the genuine danger it might present to have us-centric assumptions in high-stakes situations

(please do not chalk this up to 'if you don't do research then you are stupid'. i made this post with young people in mind. that being said i am willing to bet it also applies to others, ie those who are newer to non-local internet, older folks, or those escaping high-control environments.)

[dorothygale]

pop health science is so annoying bc it'll be like "did you know? eating strawberries will give you mega cancer" and you're like pfft whatever begone influencer. but sometimes then you'll see a reasonably credible article like "Study Shows Possible Link Between Strawberries and Mega Cancer" and you're not usually the type to follow that kind of thing religiously but idk maybe you should consider not eating strawberries? but then there's another article saying "Strawberry/Mega Cancer Study Debunked" and it turns out the original study had a sample size of 3 and was funded by Big Blueberry, and strawberries may have a small connection to mega cancer but only if you are genetically predisposed to mega cancer and eat 50 strawberries every day. so you return to your strawberry eating life. but whenever you eat strawberries in public someone tells you about the mega cancer.