I Know What I’m Doing I Promise

An American born Chinese with Australian citizenship. Books and media analysis and politics and memes and stuff. Ruining things I enjoy for your amusement

[rueluxprince]

A Comprehensive List of Jin Ling’s Many Uncles

- an indulgent headcanon extrapolated from canon. It’s fiction but we’re still doing some media analysis.

- Jin Ling’s POV

- Canon-compliant

- accidentally deleted the original post, so reposting again

Mo Xuanyu: crazy queer uncle. You’re disgusted and confused by him and you also want to protect him. He bows too low to you.

Wei Wuxian: that other crazy queer uncle. Life coach. Believes wholeheartedly in learning via Direct Experiences. Will be disappointed in you to hear you didn’t get into a fight in boarding school. Somehow imparting a lesson on how to be a good person while stealing peaches with you at midnight. You’re sure enough of his love that you know you’re not gonna die when he tosses you head first into a hoard of angry ghosts.

Jiang Cheng: crazy angry uncle. Dad. High expectations. Really wants you to do well in swordsmanship. Got you a tutor to teach you how to shoot when you’ve turned out to obviously be better at that. Loud murder thunder on the outside, soft loving rain platter on the side. You’re sure enough of his love that you can scream back just as loudly when you two argue about what future path to take.

Jin Guangyao: crazy evil uncle. Mom. No expenses spared since you obviously deserve the best. Gave you a puppy you didn’t think you needed. Smells soft and nice and likes it very much when you hug him out of the blue. Tucks you behind him and plays the calm placater when your other uncle come storming in demanding how you’ve managed to blew up some horror death tomb the other day. You’re sure enough of his love that the possibility your lord-uncle may dispose his heir-nephew never even crossed your mind.

Lan Wangji: uncle by marriage. Apparently. You have no idea how to interact with him except to sit next to him in silent support as Wei Wuxian flounces around in dramatics around you at a bunch of low level resentful spirits. He gives you a silver nugget when he gets up.

Lan Xichen: uncle by... Not marriage apparently. For some reason you’re more scared of him than your Jiujiu. You tone down your voice by 50% when he’s around. Recommended some really good tutors to homeschool you. Always passes you an extra sweet when xiao-Shushu pretends he’s not looking. Taught you breathing exercises and the language of flowers. He’s always at your house and you don’t know how to feel about that.

Wen Ning: uncle by... friend osmosis? Idk you hang out with Lan Sizhui too much and apparently mi uncle es su uncle. You’re still very conflicted about him but he once rescued you and four other juniors from a lightning snake monster by running four miles really fast and carrying all of you in his arms. Apparently it was nothing. You are now marginally less conflicted. You suspect it’s the osmosis thing again.

Nie Mingjue: uncle by sworn brotherhood? Once gave you a really rough head pat when you were a baby. He had really large and warm hands. You don’t remember much else.

Nie Huaisang: uncle by sworn brotherhood’s brotherhood? You avoid him when you’re a child because you’re a bit vain and you don’t like his type of frivolity. He sends you presents on your birthday. You avoid him when you’re a young adult because if you ever see him you will probably rip his face off with your bare hands. He sends you inter-sect business letters.

[imkeepinit]

Judith Butler, philosopher: ‘If you sacrifice a minority like trans people, you are operating within a fascist logic’

[directactionforhope]

Feels like a good time to remind certain people that this is coming from Judith Butler, who is not just a leading feminist philosopher, but also THE COFOUNDER OF QUEER THEORY

The literal cofounder of queer theory as an academic field says that abandoning trans people is fascist logic.

The voices in our community trying to exclude us may be loud, but they are not right, and they do not speak for the community as a whole or our history or anything at all.

Trans people belong here. We always have, and we always will.

[mawofthemagnetar]

What do you mean “chat” is now referring to ChatGPT and not twitch chat? What? What? What the fuck? No?

When I address chat I am speaking to a presumed Greek chorus of real human people shitposting on their lunch break, not a machine that devours lakes to covert electricity into slop.

[willgrahamscock]

ai could never outdo my beautiful perverted mutuals

[willgrahamscock]

this is because they write with their mind penis and have terrible childhoods and horrible luck, which seems to be the key factor in writing shakespeare level smut

[willgrahamscock]

and english is their 4th language

[itsgonnabeoak]

is this anything

[bumblebeebats]

The crazy thing is, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, if you asked me on any given day "Would like to see a picture of some genitals?" my answer would be "😰 No, that's... No, thank you. I'm okay, actually." I have nothing but the utmost respect for people who do engage with the penis side of the internet, but personally, I've spent the better part of two decades doing all I can NOT to have pictures of dick and balls or sexy bikini babe buttcheeks blasted onto my retinas constantly. And yet... to be denied the penis? To have a jumped up pile of javascript tell me, a grown adult with an air fryer and an outstanding council tax bill, that I cannot be trusted to withstand the sight of a bare nipple unless I let it scan my drivers' license? I will move heaven and earth to see that fucking nipple, friend. I will walk a thousand miles barefoot on hot coals before I give you big brother bitches my passport number. A thousand miles through the desert with five VPNs just to press my face up against the glass and see the last uncensored picture of two My Little Pony Characters sixty-nining each other, and I don't even want! to look at it! But I will! I must! for the sake of our fucking democracy!

[essaimart]

☝️ one

[enki2]

[asynca]

I watched an insane amount of TikTok and other short form videos for the story I'm writing right now. I gotta say, afterwards, I found myself picking up my phone and opening the apps, almost unconsciously. I was walking and I thought about watching some vids at the same time. I was on hold to the ATO... maybe some videos.

I also happen to specialise in gambling addiction (although I'm not practicing in that area right now), and all I could fucking think about was how these fucking apps were conditioning me in the same fucking way gambling apps do. To be constantly plugged in, consuming. To not even think about just picking it up and having a look. To feel bored when I wasn't watching them, to think about watching them when I wasn't watching them....

That shit is fucking evil.

I deleted it. I'm not exposing myself to that.

That shit will fry your dopamine/reward system so fucking bad you will never read a book or watching a movie again without it.

Love yourself and your potential enough to put that fucking shit away. Watch longer form things that require focus and engagement. Listen to podcasts and audiobooks. Read books. DO ANYTHING BUT CONSUME SHORT FORM CONTENT IN AN UNSTRUCTURED WAY.

If you MUST consume it (I'm sure people will be like 'but my classmates' or 'but my own channel'.... etc), do it in a siloed and structured way. 30 minutes between x time and x time on x day. Focus on it. Don't eat and do it. Watch each short form video to completion. Engage critically with the content. ANd never watch them first thing in the morning or last thing at night.

PLEASE. From a gambling professional, short form videos ping your SAME circuitry and you will fuck up your life and your brain so badly if you don't put up guardrails for yourself.

[amsonia-najma]

Please God , take away Chappell Roan’s pain, double it and give it to mrbeast.

[penandinkprincess]

really one of the things i hate most about the ai fuckening we're currently in is that it positions me as the person wearing a tinfoil hat when i try to suggest that maybe handing over biometric and personal data to tech companies is bad, actually.

like maybe perhaps perchance we don't want it scanning our children's faces to do age verification because we don't know what it's going to do with those scans down the line. maybe we shouldn't be using it like a therapy machine and telling it our deepest, most painful things. maybe we shouldn't be giving it a dossier of our detailed medical information, especially in a world (in the us) where things like not being able to hold pre-existing conditions against someone for insurance is increasingly threatened. perhaps we shouldn't be scanning our faces for funny little short videos into something that can also generate porn on demand with all of the data it's collected.

maybe, stay with me and please stop building the tinfoil hat i can see you putting on my head coworker/friend/casual acquaintance, ai ISN'T a miracle to solve humanity's problems and is instead just more tech churned out by tech bros who have not historically been super great when it comes to morals.

[fictionadventurer]

One of my biggest literary pet peeves is when historical or history-inspired fiction pretends that "courting" is a synonym for "dating". Usually it's just a one-to-one word swap--in a modern context, these characters would be dating, but this is olden times, so they call it courting instead. Sometimes they'll pretend there's a shade of difference, and that courting is a more serious exploration of marriage or something. But I read a lot of fiction that was actually written during these historical eras, and the word "courting" is never used like that.

Two people do not decide that they are "courting". One person decides to "court" someone else. It's an action, not a stage in the relationship. A man decides to court a woman because he wants to encourage her to have romantic interest in him. He's trying to win her favor. It's not an exclusive relationship--a woman could be courted by multiple men at once. She'll spend time getting to know the guy who's interested in her, but they won't officially define their relationship as one where they only show romantic interest in each other. If they reach a point where they want it to be exclusive, that's when you propose.

There's no middle ground--either you're getting to know each other, or you're committed to marrying each other. This idea of a period where you kind of commit to each other until you decide you definitely want to get married is a modern one, and it occurs in eras where they use the word "dating" to describe it. The closest equivalent I can think of are times and places where they'd talk about a couple "stepping out together", but they're still not calling it "courting". Words have meaning, and the word "courting" has never meant that, so stop using it that way!

[starfieldcanvas]

the other mild historical disjoint i run into is when people talk about dating in the fifties like it automatically meant exclusivity. the whole reason we have the expression "going steady" is because the default was to or "go around with" or "go out with" multiple people. not in the sense of being in a stable polyamorous vee, but in the sense that archie is actively "seeing" both betty and veronica during the entire time the two girls are competing for his attention and they're both seeing other guys to make him jealous, and nobody involved considers this "cheating."

bizarrely, America has in many ways gotten more conservative about dating since World War II.

[ph-cutie]

sheepish is a really funny word. fuck im so nervous (turns into this)

[krazys-ass-emporium]

[normalmammal]

I’m so pro abortion I feel insane hearing any other take on it

[normalmammal]

Even lefties I know will eventually concede to some situation where they think it’s right to force someone to carry a child against their will as if that’s not one of the most inhumane and cruel situations to put someone in regardless of any other factors

[pog-mo-bhlog]

So many "I was born too late" takes are actually "I was born poor" like I'm sure you WOULD have loved whatever historical quirk you're talking about, but sadly you would not have been allowed to do that. You would have died in a coal mine aged 13.

[pog-mo-bhlog]

Being afab will not protect you from dying young in a coal mine. They put wee lassies down there all the time and sometimes they died, just as the boys did. Your understanding of historical gender roles is filtered through the gender roles of the mid 20th century. Yes you would also have faced other gender based violence on top of this probably, but that doesn't make you exempt from death via coal mine.

Also thank you to every single person of colour in the notes pointing out how white the take I'm critiquing is. You are 100% right.

[buttpoems]