#space-australians

[smashwolfen]

Aliens huh?

I’m the verge of being awake for nearly 20 hours and I had a thought since I’ve been reading those awesome aliens and human interaction stories. Apologies if I ramble.

What if

Aliens in general, they evolved as their cultures grew with or without technology far more advanced than ours could ever be, they have amazing feats in engineering and maybe they had no wars or they are the most violent beings in the world, but I suggest to you

What if they could draw, but they would stick to this specific style, like for example, we humans would exclusively only draw in the ancient Egyptian style and literally NOTHING else? That’s just the way it was for them for their entire species existence? Diversity in art wasn’t a thing since what they were drawing wasn’t advancing since it didn’t need to for them and never had a thought to change it up.

So when Humans eventually get their little creative butts off our small planetoid of a space pebble and begin to mingle with all these fascinating aliens and celestial beings, some artsy people begin to board on all these fleets and space ships and tankers and take their sketch books and pencils and whatnot with them because hey, a long space boat ride some wheres gonna be boring sooner or later so might as well get that cool idea i have out on paper before i loose my urge to do it! Then a few passing by alien folks of different origins spot this little human doodling away and are intrigued at the fact that they can draw too, let’s see what they do for art. Maybe its similar to Xe’s or Xer’s planets artisans.

Then they get friendly with the arty human and after these alien folk show some of their home worlds artistic feats, they slowly get the shy human to show more of their work they have stashed away for references and such (because how many of you art folks show most if any of your book to people without getting friendly enough with them, I’ll rip someones arm off before they even touch my books gawd XD) And as they see all the art the human has, they’re stunned to the core with how they can do so many different types of art! Its like this human managed to replicate another planets cultural abilities without hesitation!

Naturally there curious and how this small being from such a lower technological class can do so much? Did the human get these difference pieces from their other human sub classes that specialize in this preferred style?

And the little human just blushes shyly and says, “No no no, I’ve just been experimenting with some realism lately, this is better now since i started to lay off with the anime works and looked more into stippling, impressionism, some animation on the side, and don’t get me started with exaggerated proportions! It’s so fun-”

“Wait, human Fran, you.... you did all these with your own hand? And how in the galaxies did you make the pictures move???”

“Well, yes, how else would you learn and build up your own way of drawing things? I draw usually what fits my mood and have fun experimenting”

Next thing you see in years to come is a artistic explosion from sooooooo many planets as all these single styled alien cultures go through renaissances and eureka moments with their art.

Then the alien anime becomes the biggest mistake in the galaxies

Not sure if you had this come your way or not @space-australians but how would this play out in your head if the scenario happened? :3

I happily blame you and your blog for even generating this idea in my head, love all the space stuff you reblog for everyone to read and imagine~!

[captainskipjack]

HEY OKAY SO

Maybe I’m being alarmist, but I tried to reblog this thread a few hours back and I was scrolling through my dashboard and recent posts and was surprised to find that it wasn’t in my posts. Now normally I just hit the alt key so things reblog automatically and don’t bother with the screen where it goes so you can add your own comment for expediency, so I thought maybe that just bugged out... but no

I tried clicking reblog normally and I got a post that said “this post can’t be reblogged.” And I thought ‘that’s weird’ but I gave tumblr the benefit of the doubt and went directly to @askfirestarterspitfire‘s post.

No dice. It gave me the same “this post can’t be reblogged” message

so I went to @askmovieslate‘s post. Same. And the same went for @yourplayersaidwhat. I was physically incapable of reblogging this post.

I didn’t go back any further than that because I would have started to lose the actual content of the thread if I went back any further, and besides, it was clear what was happening. Again, maybe I’m being alarmist but tumblr was KEEPING ME FROM SPREADING THE WORD ABOUT WHAT THEIR SHITTY NEW POLICIES ARE DOING. They actually don’t want their shitty practices being spread around, so they’re locking the post.

Now again, I could be reading this situation really wrong. There could be some legit reason that I can’t reblog this post I suppose. But the weird thing is, I’ve never ONCE come upon a post I couldn’t reblog on this site before... and it seems REALLY SUSPICIOUS to me that this post... the post calling tumblr out for its stupid bullshit new practices... is the one that I suddenly can’t reblog.

Maybe I’m an alarmist that’s gotten overly jumpy in this increasingly censorious world... and maybe I’m a conspiracy theorist for thinking the media is trying to control our opinions by using algorithms and shit to fine tune what we’re exposed to... but I’m just saying that this shit is making me suspicious, the word still needs to be spread about tumblr’s shitty practices and if tumblr is REALLY putting a lock on posts that call out their bullshit...

...well that just speaks to how fucking sinister they’re willing to be... And how much they don’t give a shit about our criticism...

Also I have no intention of deleting my account or changing my name so everybody watch to see if I get my account deactivated for this... or if suddenly you can’t reblog THIS post.

[rychillacases]

Humans are Strange - Fantasy Take

I've been reading a few 'Humans are the Strange Ones'/'Earth is Space-Australia' posts over the last couple of days, and that got me thinking.  Although my stories are fantasty and set in a completely different world, one of the main species involved in them is humans.  As such, I wanted to see if some of the ideas in them could be applied to my stories.

Before I begin, I'll just give a little background on the world I'm writing in.  There are three main species, human, fairy and Breal.  The latter are a race of avian humanoids.  Within each species are different races.  For humans, there are the Rychillans (who come from the Kingdom of Rychilla), the Druhlac (who live in the Druhlesh Mountains) and the Raroners (from the Raron Desert).  Most of the stories take place amongst the Rychillans.

Fairies are more or less the one race, but there are some who live in the forest and some who live in the towns, amongst the humans.  Their society is generally organised around villages and for the forest fairies, the section of the forest they look after.  My main character is a forest fairy, and the first book is narrated from his perspective.  As such, I need to differentiate his perspective from that of humans, which has brought me to this exercise.

Before reading the 'Space-Australians' posts on Tumblr, I'd already come up with a few human traits that are baffling to fairies:

Affectionate teasing - fairies don't get this.  Although some of them do tend towards the 'trickster' type of fairy, they don't understand taking the mickey out of someone as a sign of affection.

The Rychillan social class system is based on trust.  The highest class are those whose words can be taken as spoken truth, and those of the lowest class are considered completely untrustworthy.  Fairies can't see the reason for this, as it's expected that you'd be able to trust those who live in your own village.

There were quite a few ideas on the other tumblr posts as to ways humans would seem strange to non-humans.  Most of the ones relating to body language couldn't be used, as the fairies are essentially miniature humans (1/6th the size) with wings.  Below are the ones that I could adapt, and how they fit into the fairy/Rychillan dynamic.  The names in brackets are the tumblr users whose posts inspired that point:

Spicy food (@mikhailvladimirovich) - Spicy plants such as chili originally evolved it as a defense mechanism.  Hence, it does work on fairies - spicy food, depending on the intensity, can be fatal to them.  Rychillans use spicy plants to season their food.

Intoxication/Alcohol ( @moniquill, @beka-tiddalik ) - While not unknown to fairies, it is uncommon amongst them.  This is partly due to the lower alcohol tolerance of fairies.  As they've got smaller bodies, alcohol takes effect quicker.  Forest fairies are of the opinion that being in a state of intoxication could interfere with their sacred duty to tend to the forest.  Town fairies do partake a lot more often, but only when they know they'll have time to recover.  However, there's one fairy character who has a drinking problem.  As such, they've developed an alcohol tolerance that rivals that of a human.  As a result of this, they're considered strange and a bit of an outcast by the other fairies.

No Biological/Fixed Caste/Role ( @therobotmonster ) - Fairies train for one job/role in life from early on, and that's their job for life.  It's only under exceptional circumstances that they'd change role, as there's a bit of divine influence in the taking of the role in the first place.  It does happen, it's just quite rare.  Humans, on the other hand, can change role at the drop of a hat.  Farmers can take up arms to defend themselves, soldiers can harvest and farm food if needed (e.g. if stranded), etc.

Variety in Aliens ( @galaxa-13 ) - As well as the town fairies/forest fairies thing, there's also different dialects of the Fairy language, in the way that UK English, US English and Australian English differs.  There's also different human languages, for instance Rychillan and Druhleshi.

Birthday Celebrations ( @frowningfoxbones ) - Humans celebrate their birthdays, fairies don't.  They record them, so they know how old they are, but they don't see the need to celebrate them.

Crazy Experiments & Trying Stuff 'for Science' ( @racke7, @fir-trees-unite ) - This was how Rychillan technology advanced.  While the magic in the world (elemental - fire, water, etc.) is useful, humans started experimenting with it.  From this they discovered runes, which allow spells to be 'programmed'.  This in turn led to the development of the steam engine, with water magic and fire magic combining to generate the steam for the pistons.

Jury-Rigging ( @thegrimlich ) - Given that Rychillan technology runs on steampunk magitek, there's scope for technology such as steam cars, airships, etc. to go wrong and need to be fixed.  This is mostly a necessity thing.  Given that the fairies don't use the steampunk technology themselves, they've never needed to jury-rig it.  They get the why, just not the how.

Pampering ( @the-smartass-under-the-mountain ) - Fairies only trim their hair when it's long enough to get inconvenient.  They don't get the concept of 'hairstyles' or using that to alter one's appearance.

Phobias ( @space-australians, @human-aliens-collection) - Fairies have fears, but they're rational - fear of bats at night, for instance.  Some humans do have phobias, and fairies can't really understand the

Natural Competitiveness ( @syorein, @what-are-even-humans ) - The need to outdo each other is present in fairies, but is seen as wasteful.  They do what's needed without expending the limited resources they have.  But they can see how it's driven human technological advancement.  There's also the 'he said you couldn't do it' reverse-psychology trick - again, alien to fairies.

Domesticated animals ( @siderealsandman ) - Given that Rychilla is mostly agricultural, farmers have domesticated wolves and foxes to help defend their farms from pests and so on.

[turtle-in-the-mums]

Fattening Up: Earth Is Space Australia/Humans Are Weird

I just had lunch, and was considering having a cookie or three, and the thought occurred--what if other species didn’t have a built-in nutrition-storage system? Suppose their bodies have just so much of a reserve of energy, and if they don’t have food stockpiled when lean times arrive, well...

Then they discover Earth, and the concept of “fat”. An automatic system that in times of plenty, stockpiles fuel right inside the body, placing it in predesignated locations. And not only is it a hedge against lean times, the “fat” provides padding, insulation, AND it’s a natural flotation aid! What miraculous stuff! What an ingenious system! What an elegant solution to the threat of starvation posed by the Death World’s constant environmental fluctuations!

Then the aliens learn about the Western world’s obsessions and phobias and general social neuroses about fat. No matter how hard they try, they can’t make sense of it. To them, the fat-storage system is a miracle of biology. Yet another wonderfully bizarre element of life on Earth. Which is a planet that seems to go out of its way to find creative ways to kill its inhabitants. Earth is home to the Geology of Mass Destruction, the Climates That Want You Dead, the Diseases From Hell, and All the Murder Beasts. Yet instead of addressing any of those threats, humans decide to devote massive amounts of time, money, and the efforts of thousands of our brilliant, creative, fantastically adaptable minds to...defeating one of our own survival mechanisms.

Does Not Compute!

[turtle-in-the-mums]

“It’s a Human Thing...” (Humans Are Weird/Earth is Space Australia)

It just occurred to me that sometime after first contact, as humanity learned just how weird we are among intelligent species, someone would start printing T-shirts with pictures of all the weird stuff humans do--bond to everything, throw things, eat capsaicin, make things that shouldn’t work work, breathe oxygen, live in places no alien would dream of even visiting, pursuit predation/endurance running, artificial limbs, body art, extreme sports, (whatever I’m forgetting)--with the words, “It’s a human thing. You wouldn’t understand.”