#interesting implications for the future..

[tourmei]

from timetagger while i wait for photoshop to run

chat noir, watching bunnix fight timetagger: she doesn’t have to detransform after using her power?

ladybug: no, because she’s an adult.

[screambirdscreaming]

Perhaps the most peeving thing here is the way people keep jumping up to say, "you dont understand! I just want comforting narratives where people like me are embraced by society, as a break from reading stuff where I have to think about implications - you just don't understand the appeal of reading cozy mindless things to relax!"

And I'm like. Actually I really do! I often enjoy stories that are comforting and not emotionally challenging! I just dont find narratives of assimilation comforting. I don't find it reassuring or mindless to be shown a world where certain people have been moved from the "marginalized" box to the "normalized" box, and proceed to have a totally standard normal-guy low-stakes narrative from the lap of societal acceptance! I dont find it at all a balm or comfort to the struggles of marginalization. I find it grating and exhausting, and it makes me feel *more* aware of the forces of oppression and how they exist as the necessary inverse process of the forces of normalization.

There's a lot of political baggage here, obviously. Without digging too deep into that: if the type of story that gives you the least cognitive dissonance is one where you are - without changing in any way - allowed back into realms of "socially normal", what that means is basically that you consider your expulsion from normalcy an aberration, rather than a sign of deep flaws in the concept of social acceptance. You have not integrated your own experience of marginalization into a perspective on what marginalization says about society. You have not sought solidarity with other perspectives on marginalization, or if you have, it's still with the back-pocket loophole that you think you might, personally, be allowed back in. And that you're not sure you wouldn't take it, if you were.

And I get that for queer people right now, a lot of this is hazy. Maybe you would be allowed back in! Maybe you are! There's been a big swing in social acceptance, even if it's really unstable. Maybe the idea of a world where you, personally, can go back to being unmarginalized is a possibility that feels genuinely comforting.

But if you, or your friends, are a little farther out of reach of that edge. If the nature of society is so fundamentally hostile to you that simply being "accepted back in" would not meaningfully alleviate what hurts you about society - if the bare minimum for a world that isn't hostile to you requires deeper than a surface-level change - than playing pretend with that surface level change provides no comfort. If anything, it makes the cognitive dissonance worse - and makes you feel like your supposed allies are fairweather friends who would ditch you in the struggle if they were offered a bargain of acceptance. Which is very lonely and upsetting.

Or, regardless of how personal it is to you, if you've read and thought deeply enough into history or social theory to see how arbitrarily constructed the whole concept of social acceptance is - if you're a bit aware of the implications and underpinnings of things like family structures and divisions of labor and the like - the kinds of slight-of-hand shortcuts that are used to put those problems out of sight become very frustrating. Again it's a matter of cognitive dissonance: whether the typical fiction/fantasy "stock answers" to various concerns reassure your sense of how things normally work, or whether they raise red flags of horrors shoved out of sight.

Some people will act like you're "overthinking everything" and "actively looking for problems" if you talk about your emotional reaction to those red flags. But no: it's as direct and thoughtless as the reaction of finding them a comforting reassurance of business going on as usual. (You could say, the curtains are red at home. Comfort is a matter of perspective!)

Anyway, it comes back to a baseline of: what ways of conceptualizing the world feel easy, comfortable, and thoughtless to you? They may not be the same as the concepts you would consciously acknowledge, or agree with on a cognitive level! There are a lot of layers to integrating ideas into your worldview. It can take a lot of time and reflection for things to reach deeply, to the level of your intuitive reactions.

When people say, "I know it doesn't really hold up to scrutiny, but it's just really mindless and relaxing" - what that indicates, I think, is a certain particular position on that curve of conceptual integration. Where your deep emotional relationship to the idea of normalcy and assimilation is in a different place than the concept you consciously hold. And I can see where people get really upset when you push on this, because it feels like you're invalidating the things they truly and actively believe, by pointing out that the things they emotionally resonate with are in fundamental contradiction to those beliefs.

But it's also really annoying when people insist that you "just don't understand the appeal of mindless comfort fiction", when what you are actually trying to say is that you think it would be nice if people wrote more fiction that was comforting to people who find the idea of assimilation uncomfortable.

[kusanagihaku]

you’re puzzling over the guest list and turn around to see these four wdyd

[bramblepaws]

I wanted to make this. Because I'm obsessed with this video and this comic.

Every reference in Killer Tune, by timestamp:

0:08 - Sandy/Mike backstory

0:28 - Sandy leaves

0:39 - Bonsai origins

0:45 - December

0:52 - Mike gets a phone

0:54 - Mike ignores Lucy on her birthday

1:01 - Sandy on the runway

1:21 - "I think... I like... someone else."

1:23 - Top of the ferris wheel

1:38 - More than a makeout session

1:45 - Why you gotta glare at me like that?

1:46 - Building resentment

1:47 - "I hate you."

1:50 - To the rooftop

1:58 - "I'm sorry."

2:04 "You're so... unpleasant now."

2:06 - Daisy yells at Kermit

2:09 - James dodges a bullet

2:12 - Why don't you just grow up?

2:18 - Near-drowning

2:28 - Mike loses his temper again

2:35 - The play

2:45 - "I chose it thinking about your eyes."

2:55 - Confrontation / Lucy's nightmares

3:00 - "Ah, so you WERE in private school."

3:11 - More specific aspects of the nightmares

3:17 - Comfort in the aftermath

3:20 - Post-Confrontation kiss

3:35 - Post-attempt injury.

[thothirai]

hindsight being 20/20 really fucks me up because when i say i doubted myself about fran and mich being the leads for season 5 despite the foreshadowing being so obvious. like eloise and penelope setting fran up to state that she would never get married again, but eloise is down to attend more weddings??? instead people got angry at pen for implying a second marriage “too soon after john” even though fran’s actual story is just that, after mourning, she does eventually try to marry again.

BUT the real punch in the face for me was realizing michaela’s carriage scene is the first moment the show frames her from her own perspective instead of solely through francesca. they did not have to show michaela leaving. they could’ve kept all the emotional weight on fran, being devastated that she left without notice. fran not even noticing the maid leaving because she’s so confused. instead, however, the show deliberately centers the fact that fran is completely shattered by michaela leaving after promising she would stay. the parallel of fran’s shock and michaela’s guilt showing them both emotionally affected set up what’s to come. with the emotional twist of fran losing both john and then immediately michaela too, she may not have died, but she left a void where she should be. the show makes a point of michaela choosing to leave anyway, despite knowing what she means to fran. (that’s gonna set up the best kind of angst for fran worrying that mich won’t always be there, which isn’t true, but it’s a fear nonetheless)

yes, i know the reason is connected to fran. obviously. she’s in love with her. but that’s different from how the show had previously used her character. before this, michaela mostly existed within fran’s emotional orbit. even scenes like her crying in the hallway or reacting to fran screaming after finding john are still framed through francesca’s arc. the carriage scene shifts that. for the first time, the narrative pauses to follow what michaela is choosing to do with her grief and feelings, not just how fran experiences them. and honestly, that tracks with how bridgerton structures future leads. kate and sophie only have their seasons to be seen and then become a unit with their bridgerton spouse later on. penelope is the exception because lady whistledown gave her that space, plus she’s eloise’s best friend and the yearning for colin had to be set up. so, until the romance actually begins, michaela is still “john’s cousin” within the story structure right now, even if she’s fran’s endgame. but, come s5, she’ll be sharing the spotlight.

so when i see comments about the show giving michaela scenes that function for her own arc and from her own POV rather than solely fran’s perspective, it reminded me that that was her first scene without francesca involved, hinting at the start of her personal narrative.

it really was all right there.

[ganondoodle]

i think here is where the monkey paw saying comes into play

bc i was one of those people that complained about age of calamity not being canon, but the reason i did was bc they advertised it as canon when it wasnt, THAT was my complaint, the false advertising, trying to capitalize on my care for botw claiming things that just werent true to get me to buy something i wouldnt otherwise, not that i ever wanted a warriors game to be canon, even if there is enough material to build on, a warriors type game is not the way i would want to experience a serious zelda story even if it was decently written bc in the end it is a spin off with a wildly different kind of gameplay and .. way of storytelling i cant engage with and i really REALLY dread the trend that seems to form here, which, honestly, should be a way bigger talking point (make a narratively weak 3d zelda title, and then a warriors game based on it priced the same to sell it on the premise that it will deliver what narrative the 3d title was missing nevermind that this type of game and the way they are made is a really ill fitting choice to begin with- not that there would be a correct one anyway, given its still trying to sell you gameplay and story seperately for full price)

[goldensunset]

i’ve been imagining what pmd explorers would be like if you weren’t required to input a name for hero (as in if the game gave you the species name as the suggested default like it did for partner. but you could theoretically type that in manually if you wanted) and what the story implications of simply going by your pokémon’s name would be

option one is imagine if the amnesia involved losing your own name as well. as if losing your humanity wasn’t enough now you don’t have a clue to your identity at all. grovyle might never be able to recognize you. dusknoir might put two and two together if you still remember you used to be a human and you still have the dimensional scream ability and you tell him this but. it might never be made known for certain who you once were. so you simply go by the name of the pokémon you were turned into against your will and accept your fate that this is all you are now. nameless and indistinct like everyone else in this world.

option two is imagine how funny it would be if hero just had a pokémon’s name to begin with even as a human. arceus takes one look at you and goes ‘ain’t no wayyy your name is torchic LOL you know what let’s just skip the personality quiz’

[mask131]

Speaking of racism in horror movies... After the debate of whether it is good or bad, now an entire "racial implication" debate is starting around the Backrooms. Which was to be expected given the character we are talking about.

I have absolutely nothing to say about it, or rather the few things I could potentially say were already said - because people have finally reached the level of "let's go deep in a few seconds once the movie is done" where they end up laying out neatly and entirely the conondrum they place themselves into thinking of specific issues. (Or specific things, such as this movie).

I saw several Youtube comments that went down the exact thought-process I did when I heard people talk about the "racist implications" of the Backrooms movie, but also went even beyond and yeah... The result is one of those "No matter where we go it is racist" paradox.

Because people take issue with Clark, the character as written, being played by a Black actor as the way the character behaves echoes and ignites a WHOLE lot of old racist subtexts and stereotypes by the matter of the actor being Black. As a result people think that the role should have been played by a White person... YET! Yet when they say that they also openly admit that this would make it an all-white movie, and would just be erasure and racism too...

So they start thinking about where to put the "Black actor", but given all of the others are victims of Clark's behavior, to have Black actors playing tormented slain victims to a crazy White man is deemed just as unpleasant and unsatisfying as the situation we have. So the obvious solution would be to make everybody Black - but THEN people also point out that it would not have felt right because of how the creator of the movie and its artistic face is a young White man, which would make people raise eyebrows at (I quote some comments here) such a use of "Black-on-Black violence".

So... no matter what option you choose, all are unpleasant, all bear their own flavor of racism, and nobody will ever be satisfied with it.

Resulting in the Internet raising a "problematic issue" which, in the same breath, they recognize has no actual issue or solution, unless the story is rewritten. I had not seen widespread Internet discourse have such a self-awareness in... well I never saw it I think? Which results in people being much more calm and reasonable when talking about the problem and its inherent complexity. Very refreshing.