Ok so first of all reading Shen Qingqiu's description about without a cure's cure and how it was discovered by the protagonist and it's really interesting how it matches up with Bingqiu's relationship and Maigu Ridge
First off all I find it interesting that at this point we don't get told this incident is Luo Binghe's first time or Qin Wanyue's name. Those come later.
Second let's go through the timeline with Shen Qingqiu of the PIDW event
1.
in order to save the male lead —whom she's known for less than two hours — that graceful little shimei let herself be hit by a demon's underhanded trick, and the poison contaminated her body. Luo Binghe felt an absolute obligation to save her
SVSSS Vol 1 Pg 142
First of all, how Qin Wanyue originally was poisoned is mirrored by how Shen Qingqiu got poisoned. Yes Shen Qingqiu had been in in this universe for longer then 2 hours but how much of that time had actually been near or around Binghe? He barely knows Binghe as a person at this point. He still had him locked into the role of a Character!
2.
It just so happened that, deep within the mountains where the Immortal Alliance Confrence was being held, there grew a mythical thousand-year-old flower...
...
Luo Binghe was sure this legendary flower would cure the poison
SVSSS Vol 1 Pg 142-143
This foreshadows the argument about the flower during the actual Immortal Alliance Confrence between Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu.
Also minor note: Binghe and Qin Wanyue look for the flower for 3 days while fighting monsters at the conference. But when we experience the conference it happens so quickly
That's just food for thought
3.
The girl thought, "Since I'm about to die, I must leave behind some memories to ensure my life won't have been in vain. I don't have many days left after all, so I won't suppress my feelings anymore."
SVSSS Vol 1 Pg 143 (bold for emphasis by me)
Shen Qingqiu displays this attitude twice.
Once when he self detonated, he let himself honestly reach out to Binghe in both comfort and apology for what happened at the conference. For all that it was a real death in order to swap to a new body he was, I felt, honest in that last moment in giving the comfort he always wants to give Binghe.
Second was at Maigu Ridge. He again wants to reach out to Binghe with comfort and love and affectio. I don't think the moment they have sex is that moment for him, even though he sees it coming and accepts it. It's when he gives Binghe the fake jade pedant and says his piece about what he would do if he was pregnant with Binghe (that's such a weird sentence)
As awful and violent as that sex in that scene is that moment Shen Qingqiu is just feeling and being with Binghe. He's loving him the way he wants to. And that includes the violence. He is accepting both Binghe's violent and possessive side and his tears and wish to care and be cared for in return.
4. This is where it gets ugly
(cut for discussions of rape in the narrative)
she pushed Luo Binghe down.
Luo Binghe put up a brief show of resistance before telling himself "She did it all for my sake. I don't have the heart to reject her final wish." He yielded, still half-reluctant, and went along with it..."
...
After the down and dirty scene, the girls poison was naturally cured!
SVSSS VOL 1 Pg 143 (emphasis mine)
Ok here we get into it.
Shen Qingqiu goes on to call this cliche and ridiculous but also satisfying
But it's rape.
It's rape by coercion and emotional manipulation but it's rape.
Now I have been guilty of saying Maigu Ridge isn't rape of Shen Qingqiu. And to an extent it's arguably not. Shen Qingqiu is the most coherent in that moment and does agree and even help it happen to an extent. But it's because he's trying to save Binghe from Xin Mo.
In actuality the more I think of it it's rape on both sides.
Luo Binghe cannot consent in that moment. But it's also a rape of coercion via emotional manipulation for Shen Qingqiu but not by Luo Binghe. Luo isn't coercing him into the act for all that it can seem like that (and probably haunts Luo Binghe as)
No it's worse then that.
Shen Qingqiu is raped by the narrative
These types of books demand a sex scene usually and Shen Qingqiu himself expects to be raped based of his sister's danmei
And usually consent doesn't matter if it's satisfying to the reader
Scum Villian's Self Saving System is a critique of both the genre conventions of harem novels and it's readers but also of danmei
That's why the fact that PIDW Luo Binghe was coerced into sex for his first time was seen as immensely satisfying by readers of PIDW
Shen Qingqiu, once he realises he's in a Danmei, expects his consent to not matter in providing a satisfying story
Which is why Maigu Ridge is not a sexy scene. It's not a satisfying scene. It's deeply sad and upsetting. Shen Qingqiu just finds it a painful and traumatising duty to save the person he loves
Luo Binghe finds it horrifying and psychologically scarring
Neither of them enjoys what we forced on them in the end.
It is a rape scene. They are both being raped by the narrative because it's the ingredients if a satisfying story. And then the narrative looks at us as says "well? Aren't you satisfied? Isn't this what you wanted?"
The swords kissed and sprang apart and kissed again [...] steel rang, steel sang, steel screamed and sparked and scraped [...] A red flower blossomed [...] "Come on, come on, my sweetling, the music’s still playing. Might I have this dance, my lady?”
Y'all for real please do these. Even if you're certain your posture doesn't suck. One day you will wake up with impinged shoulder pain like I did and let me tell you it fucking HURTS. Do these exercises even just once a week and it will make such a difference. Especially my fellow creatives out there, stop shrimping over your work and go do these right now. RIGHT NOW.
Also, if you’re even a little concerned about getting a hump or having trouble standing fully upright in your old age, this is how you prevent that. If you want to be up and about when you’re old you have to start when you’re younger. And keep in mind there is no bad time to start and it’s never too late. Starting today is way better than never starting at all.
Links to my free sewing patterns!
- big manta ray
- smaller manta ray
- monster friend (those monsters with horns I’ve been making lately, but without horns)
- pie slice
- Fred, the Fish of Minimal Effort
- tiny cat (aka Jiji)
- mini mothman
- whale shark/donut whale shark
- juggling frog/toad (aka my smallest, simplest frog pattern of the three I’ve made)
- large frog
- tiny hedgehog
- minecraft bee
- minecraft zombie
- blorbo
- Strawberry Hearts quilt pattern
- starfish
- little octopus
- canvas tote (wider than it is tall)
- canvas tote (taller than it is wide, more of a grocery bag)
- basic bat and ghost
- mini mushroom friends
- whale
- hammerhead shark
- simple seal
- cartoon flea (the one from Emperor’s New Groove)
Tutorials:
- flannel baby blanket tutorial
- onigiri bag tutorial
- tomato pattern design walkthrough (how I design the pattern, not a link to the pattern itself)
- giant worm tutorial (I don’t know why it’s marked mature? it’s a worm)
Emperor’s New Groove flea pattern is added! I also added a link to the worm tutorial, which is not new but apparently never added to this post?
As always, if the timestamp on this reblog is a while ago, it’s worth clicking through to the original post, I update it every time I share another pattern on tumblr
Also, zero obligation, my patterns are free and will remain free, but I promised my mom I’d include a link to my ko-fi next time I shared my pattern post because she wants me to find a lottery winner who wants to support the arts. I told her I don’t think that’s likely, but she made me promise, so there’s the link lol
Not being able to understand all the languages of the world fucks me up. There's so much art by people and while translations are available (sometimes), the contours of the original text will forever be alien to me. Sad.
I'm probably never going to find it again, but there was a response to one of those "artworks we think we can make" posts that was like "Okay, go for it." Like, dead serious.
Are you going to come out of it with a Klein-level work? No. Dude was bonkers skilled. But I am here to tell you that if you've ever gone to Home Depot and shuffled through paint chips and been like "God, this is such a gorgeous color, I fucking love this color" and then immediately been like "...but I can't imagine painting a wall with it." and bought a can of soul-killing eggshell off-white or what the fuck ever, you absolutely can go pick up a $10 canvas from a craftstore and a $5 sample of that color and just hang 6 square feet of it on a wall and enjoy the fuck out of it.
For real, buds. If you see an artwork and you're like "Shit, I could have made that," that is a reminder that god can't stop you and probably neither can science.
The Trump administration is cynically exploiting calls for stricter AI regulation to pass broad censorship measures at the federal level.
So, in terrible news, Trump's trying to pull some strings to pass this massive internet censorship bill, featuring all the kinds of internet censorship we're terrified of, including mandatory ID for accessing basically any website, specifically to crush state regulation of AI, because apparently this man will always see the moral bottom of the barrel and start digging.
So, if you live in the US and hate censorship and AI you know what to do, contact your congresspeople and tell them do not fucking dare let this through or so help us god...
hello fellow artists. google has fallen. pinterest/duckduckgo AI filters don't work. do not despair; here is a list i made of places to find reference images without having to sift through piles of worthless garbage. (for future editing convenience i am just linking my blog post on dreamwidth.)
✨ good places to find art reference that are not full of AI trash 🌈
amandla
kianamaiart
germansingergirl
dailybridgerton
