Bells Hells as textposts 2/???

Hey btw, here's a piece of life advice:

If you know what you'd have to do to solve a problem, but you just don't want to do it, your main problem isn't the problem itself. Your problem is figuring out how to get yourself to do the solution.

If your problem is not eating enough vegetables, the problem you should be solving is "how do I make vegetables stop being yucky". If your problem is not getting enough exercise, the problem you should be solving is "how do I make exercise stop sucking ass". You're not supposed to just be doing things that are awful and suck all the time forever, you're supposed to figure out how to make it stop being so awful all the time.

I used to hate wearing sunscreen because it's sticky and slimy and disgusting and it feels bad and it smells bad, so I neglected to wear it even if I needed to. Then I found one that isn't like that, and doesn't smell and feel gross. Problem solved.

There is no correct way to live that's just supposed to suck and feel bad all the time. You're allowed to figure out how to make it not suck so bad.

the “bad guys” in hallmark movies end up always being the most respectful men ever.

because they will find out their girlfriend of 3 years (that they were about to propose to) went off to a random farm in minnesota, hours away from were the two of them built a life together, and she decided to just… stay there without even consulting him.

and then he decides to take a trip to make sure she’s okay, because this is generally alarming behavior, and then sees that she literally fell in love with her ex within one (1) week- and he wasn’t there, but you can TELL that they’ve made out a couple times.

and then she just strings him along for a few days, until fucking christmas eve, when she just breaks up with him and is like “i know we used to have the same values, but i’ve never loved you. mark makes me happier than you ever did. and you ONLY care about work, whereas i like christmas and fun, like a Good Person.”

and then, after finding out his entire relationship was a lie and he had his life turned upside down in a week and he got dumped on christmas, this guy’s just like “ok yeah that makes sense. i only wish you the best of happiness with mark. i hope you guys build a great life together in christmastreefarmville. thank you for everything.”

An AU where two Hallmark Christmas Bad Guys are both getting flights back to New York after being dumped by their respective Smalltown Blonde Girlfriends, and they bond over their shared experiences and fall in love in the departures lounge

I was just thinking it would be cool if someone wrote that, then I remembered I can just write it myself. :D Here you go:

---

Daniel Whitman was, as far as anyone would tell you, a perfectly pleasant man. He had been raised a gentleman, thank you very much, and a gentleman he would be.

Even now, in this situation, he still did his very best to stay as polite and pleasant as possible, despite wanting to do the exact opposite. Daniel wanted to rage, he wanted to cry, he wanted to shout at the world for the unfairness he had to experience.

How did it all end up like this?

He had thought he’d had it all figured out. A well-paying and fulfilling job, a nice apartment, enough money for all the designer clothing, fancy restaurant visits and luxurious holiday trips you could ever want. Or anything else you decided to spend money on. And then, of course, the girlfriend. That one had taken a bit to figure out, but he’d really thought she was the one. Clarisse was young, smart and ambitious. He’d done his best to give her everything she wanted. Of course, they’d sometimes clash, but what couple didn’t? They had been a good fit.  Or at least he’d thought they were. Clarisse, apparently, thought that her childhood friend Mark from the rundown town she used to live in as a child was a better man than him.

Now, don’t get him wrong. He could see how she would end their relationship because she thought they had no real emotional connection. In hindsight, he wondered when the last time she really smiled at him was. He couldn’t remember. But to abandon him in favour of that small-town guy she’d only reconnected with for a week? And then to tell him she’d move out via text? And then, when he had gone after her, to make sure nothing bad had happened to her because that was really concerning- she accused him of being controlling?

And then that sentence at the end there: “I know we used to have the same values, but I’ve never loved you. Mark makes me happier than you ever did. And you ONLY care about work.”

Call him crazy, but he really thought that was uncalled for. A deep emotional bond was something you built over time, something that deepened with trust and commitment. He had spent all the time he wasn’t at work with her. He had racked his brains on what gifts to buy her, what would make her happy. He had worked so hard at the company until he was in a position where he had a more than decent salary and enough freedom to take more time off when he wasn’t in the middle of the deal of the decade. And he had done it all so they would be comfortable.

Clarisse didn’t think the same way, apparently.

His best wasn’t good enough. But Mark the Christmas tree salesman, who didn’t even have an actual job outside of the winter season and could only (barely, at that) afford a place to live for himself because he lived in a town whose population had been dwindling for decades? Mark who hadn’t even tried to get into college despite his parents being able to afford it easily? (and how did the son of a comparatively well-to-do horse ranch end up without a decent job anyway?) Mark who had treated her like she was dirt underneath his boots when she had arrived? That man was better than him?

Daniel knew all about the rocky start because he had called Clarisse in between meetings to make sure she arrived safely and had promptly gotten an earful of her angry tirade. Mark who was apparently more attractive than him. And somehow, that turned into a romance string enough to trump the three years they had been living together?

Just how?

Daniel sighed tiredly as he sank into his plane seat. Economy. He usually booked better seats for longer flights such as this, but with it being the holidays and with no time to book in advance? No chance. So economy it was.

Just as he had gotten comfortable, or as comfortable as was possible in a seat like this, small as it was (hey, he was a bit taller than average. It wasn’t his fault he needed more leg room than the economy class usually afforded), his seat neighbour for the flight arrived. More like, was pushed into his seat as he was putting away his suitcase in the overhead compartment. The poor man stumbled and almost tripped into him before Daniel instinctively reached out to stabilise him.

“My apologies”, the man said and looked like he meant it. Not like he was actually the one who should be apologising instead of the rude woman who had shoved him on her way through the aisle, a bawling little kid dragged with her. Still, Daniel appreciated politeness. “It’s of no matter” he responded.

The man, now properly seated and buckling himself in, gifted him a smile at that. He looked exactly as Daniel felt: exhausted, both physically and mentally. It was a shame, he thought, because the man was otherwise quite a handsome fellow. Sharp features and dark hair and eyes. Quite the contrast to his own blonde and grey-eyed self. And, despite being a little bedraggled by the sudden jostling from earlier, the man also really knew how to dress well. Daniel appreciated well-cut clothing when he saw it.

It seemed the other man had done his own estimation of him, as he held out his hand and introduced himself as John Mettier. His hands were firm and warm. He gave excellent handshakes, in Daniel’s business-experienced opinion. Not too long, not too short, not too forceful, neither too weak.

 Daniel had had a pretty bad day. His girlfriend had broken up with him. He had spent an entirely useless two days in a hotel with questionable hygiene to make sure she was alright and she threw it in his face as if that was somehow morally unacceptable. Then he had to endure several hours back to new York in a seat too small that squished his legs in.

But, you know, at least his seat neighbour was pleasant. Daniel had always appreciated politeness.

  ........

“And then he made childish remarks about me not wanting to walk in the forest and she didn’t even say anything! She knows I’m allergic to pine! If I had gone in there it could have triggered an asthma attack. And she laughed when he said I just wanted to keep my shoes from getting dirty.”

“That is ridiculous. A valid health concern is nothing to made fun of. Frankly, you deserve better.” Daniel looked down. “They are very nice shoes though.”

“Thank you, they were a present from my brother.” Daniel was rather proud at having put that little smile on his companion’s face.

He wasn’t quite sure how they had ended up in this cocktail lounge this quickly. He usually did not go out privately with people he did not know. But somehow, it had all lead to this naturally.

It started when the passengers had collectively groaned at the announcement that their flight would be delayed a further hour because of the heavy snow. John and Daniel himself had both let out identical tired sighs at that and then looked at each other. From there, their conversation had quickly turned to the reason they were there in the first place.

To their surprise, they had the exact same reason. Their girlfriend had left them for a man she had only met weeks ago and they now returned home to New York alone while she decided to throw her life work away and stay in her hometown. It was a ridiculous coincidence.

Well, one thing lead to another and they went to get drinks together. Instead of drowning his sorrows in alcohol as he had originally planned for his return, Daniel instead found himself slowly sipping from a flute of some type of christmas special cocktail. It was pleasant, with a slightly chocolatey and minty aftertaste. That was another thing that Clarisse had accused him of, weirdly enough. Hating christmas. He didn’t hate christmas. He just didn’t particularly like all the overly pushy christmas ‘traditions’ that people loved so much. Why go through all that stress when you could just as well have a nice dinner, exchange meaningful gifts and then enjoy a day in?

He said so aloud and John agreed with him. Somehow, his ex had an even stranger opinion on the festivities than We-must-follow-traditions-to-a-T Clarisse. “Laura always said she hated christmas, what with all the extra stress and whatnot, but now she went and eloped with a man selling christmas decorations. Isn’t that funny?”

John was slurring his words a little bit at this point and Daniel also felt like he had enough to drink for the evening. It was a shame, it would have been nice to talk more. Not like this though.

They had exchanged business cards earlier in the day. Maybe they could manage to meet up again some other time? Daniel hoped so.

  ........

Returning to his empty apartment was… well. It felt a bit odd, without Clarisse here. The signs of her having lived here were still everywhere. He had always thought it was nice for the personal styles of two people living together to meld in a shared space, but it had never quite worked that well in their case.

He liked open, light spaces. Big, unobstructed windows showing a fantastic view of central park. An enormous sofa facing a ultra HD flatscreen TV. An open floor leaving the kitchen visible from the living room, their-no, his- bedroom with its floor length mirrors and king-sized bed in a separate room. His office was so big that one could easily divide it in two, but Clarisse always said she didn’t like the room. She had never given an actually reason for it.

He liked his apartment for the large amount of space and natural light.

Clarisse, on the other hand?

Clarisse wanted to have everything small and ‘cosy’ as she put it. She had put dividers behind the kitchen counters, cutting off most of the natural light. There were curtains in the bedroom, almost always closed because she didn’t like waking up to the sun shining in her face. The sofa had terribly mismatched cushions and (if he was being completely honest and he had no more reason not to be) uncomfortably scratchy woollen blankets all over it. There was a whole section of the bathroom dedicated to nothing but her cosmetics. He had a collection himself, but did she really have to leave everything disordered on the counter all the time?

He found, looking at it all now, that he didn’t really like any of it. He had never changed it because Clarisse liked it and he had wanted to make her happy. Clarisse wasn’t here anymore. He would call a cleaning crew to get everything cleaned up and sorted for it to be sent to her. …Tomorrow. He would do that tomorrow. For now, his bed called.

He fell asleep that night, most of his thoughts still occupied by her but with a little room for the memory of a gentle smile. He could swear he still tasted the minty note of his last drink. Maybe…

  ........

It took two weeks for them to get into contact again. Two weeks filled with clearing up all traces of Clarisse from his apartment. From his life.

It felt better when that was done. Like a new start.

John’s message came at the perfect time, really. It was an invitation to go eat together. A revenge dinner, of sorts. They had talked about that back on the plane, how John’s ex had always been the one to decide on where they went to eat out, because she liked none of John’s choices.

“She does like cooking herself”, John said while they were waiting for their starters at the seafood restaurant he had chosen. He seemed much more relaxed now. The topic of Laura had come up despite Daniel’s efforts, luckily it did not seem to affect him as badly anymore. “But she always cooked things that are way too sweet. I don’t mind if she likes that type of food, but it would have been nice to be able to enjoy anything of hers for once.” “Let me guess, she got mad if you suggested eating out or getting take-out?” He got a rueful smile in answer.

“I’m a terrible cook”, Daniel admitted. “And so is Clarisse. I never said that to her, I didn’t want to hurt her.” He ruminated “Maybe I should have. I think I should have said something about a lot of things. Maybe then it wouldn’t have ended like this.”

Their waiter arrived, carrying their entrees. The shrimp-salad set before him looked delicious.

“There’s not much gained from thinking about what-ifs”, John said while cutting into his own carpaccio. “I think what has happened shouldn’t hinder what is to come.”

And really, Daniel thought as he let the first burst of flavour fill his mouth, he might think the same.

 .......

 They met more often after that, when their schedules allowed them to.

Going to different restaurants, attending vernissages and fashion shows. It was always something interesting and pleasant.

Once, they even unexpectedly met at a dinner party. Considering the different fields they worked in- Daniel in the headquarters of one of the leading tech firms and John as the managing designer of a high-end formal wear brand- that was a very pleasant surprise. They spent the evening pretending to not know each other but slipping in little titbits of knowledge about the other to see who of the other attendees would figure out their game first. (it was John’s brother)

Over the next few months, they slowly became closer. Daniel couldn’t remember the last time he had been this relaxed in the presence of someone else. There was no need to pretend. No need to try to do anything he didn’t want to for the sake of the other. They could just…be. And it was enough.

One especially rainy day in late spring, they had just come out of the premiere of a new theatre piece (Daniel found he quite liked such events. He had never gone before John had invited him.) and it was raining so hard that Daniel’s umbrella gave out under the strain. They ended up seeking shelter in a quaint café nearby, deciding to wait out the worst of it. When the rain finally let up a bit, several hours and half a dozen coffees between them later, it was already quite late in the day.

Finding the thought of John hailing a taxi to take him across the city in the middle of the night strangely distasteful, Daniel invited him to simply stay over. It was no big deal, they were friends after all, weren’t they? So John ended up spending the night in his guest room. They went out to get breakfast together the next day, before parting.

It became a common occurrence for them to stay over at each other’s place. Before he really knew how it had happened, Daniel found himself using the toothbrush and extra skincare he had left at his friend’s place for this exact reason as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

He blinked at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. The reflection blinked back, just as struck with the sudden understanding that he rather liked it this way.

He liked spending time with John. He liked being here, sharing a space with this man.

He liked…John.

…

Oh.

   ......

Daniel didn’t really know what to do with his newfound knowledge, so he decided to simply do nothing. The current situation was quite nice, after all. Why change it? It was a bit early too, they had only known each other for a few months.

Daniel didn’t even know if John was interested in men romantically. He sure wasn’t aware of that possibility for himself. It had taken a lot of discreet research and some… experimenting by himself to decide that yes, he was very much not disinterested in men. In all aspects. But how would he know if John was even remotely alike him in that regard? For all he knew, his friend was as an arrow.

He didn’t want to destroy the relationship they already benefitted from by adding unnecessary expectations.

Or that’s what he had decided when, a mere few weeks after his sudden insight, John invited him over to his place. Not that that was all that unusual nowadays. But the candlelight dinner that greeted him when he arrived sure was.

“Oh? What’s all this then?” he chuckled, trying not to show his nervousness at what might be coming.

“Just… Well, I thought it might be easier like this.” John presented two plates of pasta with salads on the side. The wine was already on the table, decanted to let it breathe before consumption.

They sat down, silence falling between them as neither quite seemed to know what to say.

“I’m sorry this is so simple. I’m also not the best cook.” John awkwardly motioned to the dish. Daniel rather thought it tasted pretty good for something so simple. He said so, being rewarded with a bright smile shining through John’s nerves.

They ate in silence, enjoying the peace before the inevitable talk.

Before too long, the plates were empty and they still sat there, looking at each other.

“I don’t…” Daniel cleared his throat. “I don’t really know what to say now.”

God, it had been years since he had been this awkward. Not since he had been a junior assistant, certainly. Somehow, this was more nerve-wrecking than any business event back then had seemed.

“How about we talk about us?” John’s voice was hesitant at first but became stronger at Daniel’s encouraging nod. “I would like to be more than friends. The past few months have been… I really like what we do together. All of it. Even that awful evening at the cinema” Daniel had to prevent himself from chuckling at the memory of the crowd of rowdy teenagers that had nearly run them over and then made a hassle of themselves in the cinema’s foyer back then. They could even hear their unrelenting noise all through the movie.

But now was not the time for drifting in memories. “I also really like that. I… I really like you.” He felt like a teenager, unable to properly get his words out in a decent fashion. I like you. Geez. Could he get any more awkward?

John did not seem to mind too much, thank god, as he leaned over and brought their faces closer.

One second, two… Daniel closed the gap.

Their first kiss was chaste, careful. Testing each other’s reaction. The second was a bit more forceful, their lips moving together still gentle.

Daniel felt a warmth spreading in his stomach that had nothing to do with the Fussili they had earlier and everything with the man now cradling his face between warm hands.

 They never did get to drink the wine that evening.

 ........

 Half a year later, Daniel was lounging on his big couch.

He hummed along with the soft classical music playing in the background as he let his eyes wander around his apartment.

Quite a bit had changed here since John had moved in with him. The couch now had a set of red pillows, contrasting quite nicely against the dark leather along the matching soft blankets. The windows let in the light of a brilliant sunrise, spreading all over the apartment unobstructed. He could see the second desk they had put in the office, littered with sketches of new designs as usual.

Just as a new song started, Daniel heard soft footsteps thumping up behind him.

“Hey there, sleepyhead” he greeted while turning to face him. John looked cute with his hair still sleep tousled as he ambled over with two cups of coffee in his hands.

“Hmmm.” John stretched before sitting down, leaning his head against Daniel’s shoulder. “I think I’m allowed to have a lazy morning on christmas eve, don’t you think?” “Quite so.” Daniel hummed and took a sip of coffee.

As John gave him a kiss, Daniel could swear he tasted something like chocolate and mint instead of coffee.

 Before them, the morning light sparked like fire on the stones of two rings lying on their coffee table. ....

That's it. I'm making these guys in the sims! 😤

For the last time:

Plot is the series of events that happen in a story.

Themes are what the story is actually about. The big ideas, the stuff that makes the story feel like a story rather than a random string of events. (Note: stories may have more than one theme. They may be very broad or very specific)

Motifs are the small things (images, words, situations, character archetypes, etc) repeated throughout the story that show you what the themes of the story are.

An Example, based on my One Braincell:

In My Hero Academia

The plot is that a boy is given a superpower because he wants to become a hero and save people from villains who use their powers for evil. He enrolls in a high school for aspiring heroes and becomes entangled in a generations-old conflict between those who wield the power he was given and an ancient evil.

One of the themes is that love and community are essential to someone's ability to be whole.

Some of the motifs that point to this theme are: characters with similar situations having radically different lives based on the presence or absence of someone to care for them, reaching out to someone (literal or metaphorical), small acts of kindness leading to significant changes, characters refusing support and failing because of it, and being seen by others.

All the posts floating around about how young protagonists in adventure stories are really abused child-soldiers are starting to get on my nerves.

Look, it's not that I don't see the point of them. In the real world, the things that kids in fantasy books go through would be horrific and traumatizing. It's a fun deconstruction of a common trope to point that out, and to point out that the adults around these kids are massively failing in their responsibilities if they're letting children end up in these situations.

And yet.

Fantasy and science fiction, when at their best, serve as mirrors in which people can observe their own fears and struggles in a safe way. This is, in my opinion, an especially helpful form of literature for children, because it can break down the overwhelming concepts of the adult world into things that are objective and make sense. Complex, internal struggles can be externalized as monsters and evils that can be overcome. The massive darkness of the world is congealed into a Dark Lord or Evil Empire. And this can all be done without coming across as a preachy metaphor.

Some of the hardest things about being a kid are existing in a world that gives you very little autonomy, being surrounded by seemingly all-powerful adults who don't always listen to you or support you or care about your well-being. Adults may ignore you when you're in trouble. They might even be malicious. And their world is alien to you. You're supposed to be learning how to exist in it, and yet there is a gulf between you and them.

Kids also understand a lot more of adults than we give them credit for, even if they don't have the experience or context to fully understand our reasons for why we behave certain ways.

So there you are, small (literally and figuratively) in a world that is bigger and stronger (literally and figuratively) than you. What do you want out of that world? You want autonomy. You want to be taken seriously. You want the things that matter to you to matter to other people.

Stories about kids who get to be heroes and do things that, in reality, no kid should ever be doing, resonate on a deep level. They give you a vision of a world where you can deal with problems. They give you a world where adults may not be taking you seriously, but in the end it doesn't matter because you end up seizing control yourself and winning the day. They give you a world where the things you're trying to learn about society are broken down into ways that make some goddamn sense, and the protagonists learn to deal with those things.

As adults, we can look at the trope of the child hero and see a situation where we, as adults, would want to step in and protect a child from a terrible situation. And as adults, that's a fine lesson to learn. But also we should be looking at these stories and remembering that, in addition to care and protection, kids need the autonomy and independence that lets them overcome obstacles and grow.

When we read a story where a kid goes through harrowing situations and ends up saving the world (or at least the part of the world that matters to them), we should remember that, for a kid, that's important. Being a kid can be a harrowing experience all by itself. Maybe in the world of the story, the kid's life would be a lot easier and safer and better if the adults around them were to solve the problems, but what would be the point of that story? What's the point of a story that says, "You're just a kid. Let the grown ups handle everything and go play"?

One thing that kids learn at a very young age is that grown ups don't have everything under control. And yet they are constantly told to shut up and not do anything. Telling them that they can have power, and they can have autonomy, and here are the ways of wielding those that are moral and just seems like a pretty damn important thing to me.

Also hey btw

The term “masterpiece” originally and traditionally meant a piece of work that an apprentice or other aspiring craftsman created to show off to his master or the town’s guild. So naturally, it was intended to be the best fucking thing that you could make, demonstrating just how fucking good you are at what you’re making - 100% to flex your skills. And if it was approved, the applicant was accepted as a member of the guild and could now call himself a master, and work in this craft in this city.

So the next time you’re looking at The One Great Thing you made and think “this is it, my masterpiece, I have peaked, it’s all downhill from here”, consider looking it the other way: Making your masterpiece means you’re only getting started.

This applies to dissertations by the way! Your dissertation is your masterpiece. It shows that you’re ready to move from your apprenticeship (grad school) to being a full pro.

A masterpiece is the first master-level project you complete on your own.

— H. Jackson Brown Jr.

None of whom ever worked a twelve hour shift in food service.

Da Vinci and Michelangelo had patrons who paid all their expenses in exchange for art. Einstein and Pasteur had grant money and access to university education and resources. Jefferson had slaves to work for him so he could do whatever he wanted.

Everyone has the same number of hours in the day. Not everyone has the same freedom to use those hours. The idea that time management is all that separates people from greatness is hideously classist.

Related concept that’s done a lot of damage to me is “If you were a real artist, you’d be doing your craft at every possible opportunity, regardless of your situation.”

There are some people who can write or draw or whatever in the snatches of time around the edges, whose energy level is such that this is a viable possibility, who will keep working no matter what’s going on.

I’m not one of them, and it’s not because I’m lazy or don’t really care about my craft. It might have something to do with my neurodivergence or physical health issues, but I think even without those, most people just aren’t capable of taking the tiny amount of energy they have after work and the basics of sustaining life and using it to create.

Story idea when you try to actually write it:

Story idea when you first rewrite it:

Getting closer to what you saw in your head, eh? Keep at it!

Your story when somebody else sees it:

hhhhhHHHHHHH

(⚪д⚪)

This is a lovely post. It goes to show that when we percieve our own work, most of us have some type of insecurities about our own talents. 

Also possibly relevant is that probably when Van Gogh finished Starry Night, he jumped up and down in frustration for a while because it didn’t look as good as it had in his head.

Tolkien used to complain that he could never write anything as well as he could imagine it.  So you know, ‘good enough’ is definitely a thing.

A relative of mine is a professional author and every time someone asks him which of his books is his favorite one, he always says “The one in my head, because I haven’t messed it up yet.” He’s written more than thirty books and several of them have been on the Times bestseller list, and he still thinks this way. You’re always your own worst critic.

Okay, that last addition might be my favorite ever. I need a name so I can quote this genius

Writing is like growing a garden.

You start with a plan of what you want to grow, but that plan isn’t a perfect image of what the garden is going to look like. You might know exactly where you want each kind of plant, and you might have some particularly striking images in your head of what you want it to look like when you’re done, but it can’t possibly be a perfect image.

So you go and buy your seeds and till up the dirt and plant everything and now you have…. A bare plot of dirt. Your first draft. It looks nothing like a garden, even though it took so much fucking work to make.

Then you have to keep tending it, watering it, waiting for the seeds to sprout. And once they sprout you have to wait and see which seedlings are the healthiest and then thin them, and pull out weeds, and water them some more. And now it’s starting to look like a garden, but it still isn’t what you envisioned, because nothing is blooming or fruiting yet. And some things might change along the way… Maybe some seeds didn’t take, or one plant gets sick and dies, or something you thought was a weed turns out to be a flower you never heard of and decide to keep.

And it’s still so much fucking work, and you’re out there every other day in the heat pulling weeds and watering and pruning…

But if you stick with it eventually you’ll have a beautiful garden. Of course, it still won’t look exactly like it did in your head, because your plants all grew in their own ways so you couldn’t predict exactly what it’d look like, or maybe you knew your layout but really had no idea what it’d look like once everything was in bloom.

And yet, it’s a garden. It’s beautiful, and you made it, and when other people see it they gasp and smile.

I don’t mean to be rude; but I don’t think I’ve ever seen this, does anyone have any examples?

If we broaden it outside of television...I think Star Wars falls into this, at least the sequel trilogy. Maybe the MCU as well. And I can't help but think of every band that's ever complained that their fanbase is mostly women. 5 Seconds of Summer comes immediately to mind.

In general, most white male creators seem to have this massively entitled mindset where they want--and think they deserve--the time, attention, and enthusiasm that creative fandom (i.e. the side of fandom more dominated by women) is known for.

They want our eyes for ratings, our word-of-mouth for free publicity, our metas for social media buzz, and our spending power for merch and cons. But they don't want us. And they don't really want the responsibility of telling a story to a thoughtful, engaged audience, regardless of that audience's demographic makeup. They just want to be praised for whatever schlock they cough up.

And like any other spoiled brat, they will break their toys before they share them.

It goes all the way to the top for kids shows. Toy sales will crash a show. Makes sense, but if those toys are gendered for boys instead of the female viewers, they won't usually switch up the marketing and move them to the girl aisle. They cancel the show outright.

Mind you it is perfectly possible to make the switch in marketing, but execs would rather throw it all out than have something that doesn't perform well with male viewers. For example the Rey merch was not expected to be popular, for some reason, there had to be public outcry to get merch of one of the main 3 protagonists. A PROTAGONIST. The fact that she wasn't a huge part of the 1st launch says a lot already.

And what happened when female fans got too invested in the Sequel Trilogy? The entire writers room didn't necessarily lash out, but they sure forgot how to behave.

Young Justice

Paul Dini: Superhero cartoon execs don't want largely female audiences

#WhereIsRey (initial)

#WhereIsRey (ongoing)

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker was designed to be the opposite of The Last Jedi

You're all sitting on the hot take of the decade tbh

And yet when they fond out that boys were watching MLP:FIM in droves, they had NO PROBLEM with it.

#SONS OF ANARCHY!!!!!!!!!!!!!#LITERALLY SONS OF ANARCHY IS THE BIGGEST EXAMPLE OF THIS LIKE EVER#kurt sutter wrote that show for MEN and ended up with an overwhelmingly female audience#because he's actually a good writer and knows how to develop characters well and wrote excellent female characters#but once he realized that his audience was almost entirely women he literally took it out on tara and gemma in the show#but like tara specifically#he resented her character for being a huge draw for female viewers so he tore her development to shreds and killed her#in the most brutal gut wrenching way possible#kurt sutter you will pay for your crimes#i actually wrote a manifesto about this on one of my old blogs i should try to find it sldkjsldfjsdljf#long post (via@m-oonknight)

OMG YES. I LOVED Sons of Anarchy, especially the women and then I got to season 6 and it was like - everything was just tossed in the trash? And like, why did Sutter hate that Tara drew tons of attention? That should have been a good thing! He should have been like "Hey folks, this girl's getting us more viewers, let's put her in more scenes!" It just doesn't make sense to me. MEN don't make sense to me.

The 100 too. I'll never forget how Jason Rothenberg would attacked female fans on Twitter and mock them in interviews, and then post links to male fan discussions on Reddit to praise and thank them. In his goodbye letter to the show he SPECIFICALLY thanked Reddit and it was so disgusting.

Star Trek from TNG on was also a boy’s club, even though the TOS fans were mostly women. Women, in fact, who literally created modern fandom with their zines. But after TNG it was all, “Women don’t understand Star Trek, only smart men hur dur.”

That last sentiment re: Star Trek is probably at the root of this. Because if you take a step back and look at the way things actually marketed towards women are viewed and thought of, you'll see that, by and large, they're considered less deep, less nuanced, and less intelligent.

So if you write a show or film or you're a band, and you think you're writing this brilliant, cool thing for men, and then it turns out your fan base is mostly women, the assumption lots of people will make is that they've written something shallow, insipid, and frivolous.

And look at the things in that first list! Moffat very obviously thinks himself a great Artiste (personally I hate his writing most of the time). Supernatural was supposed to be dark, gritty, and cool. The fact that the Magicians was supposed to appeal to smug nihilists pretty well speaks for itself. These are exactly the kinds of writers who would be deeply offended at the idea that their Great Art was actually shallow and frivolous.

I'm trying to think whether there were any book series that pulled something similar, and can't off the top of my head, but there's also an assumption that women read more books than men (except for things like War Novels and certain kinds of Thrillers).

This is both amazing and profoundly irritating - the exact writing equivalent of that thing artists do - you know, how they’ll mess up anything that’s on expensive paper and planned in every single detail but get them doodling during a boring lesson and suddenly they’re Michel-bloody-angelo.

This has been sitting around in my drafts for ages because I wanted to talk about why this happens to some people.

Basically what it comes down to is that if you’re more worried about doing something The Right Way than about doing it at all, you’re probably gonna bungle it. You sit down to write, and suddenly your fourth grade English teacher is there next to you, scolding on and on about passive voice and semi-colons, and you just can’t put one damn word down. Or maybe it’s that lit prof from undergrad who could barely say the word “genre fiction” without sneering. You suddenly feel the need to get something perfect, before it’s even started.

But neither of them ever had anything to say about fridge poetry. And so you look at a pile of words, limited but completely free, and suddenly you can start building lovely sentences and little snatches of poetry. This is your brain being let off the chain and allowed to play. It’s a wonderful state to be in and anyone who does any kind of dedicated creative work needs to spend at least a bit of time here every day. This is where inspiration strikes.

The thing to learn is how to carry that sense of freedom from a low stakes activity like fridge poetry, to one your mind considers high stakes. I recommend therapy, or failing that, whiskey.

No seriously though. It can be hard. This is why seasoned artists and writers will all tell you to just keep making more stuff. For most of us, the only way we found to get through that was to just keep churning out material until we got past the fear and doubt.

the default way for things to taste is good. we know this because "tasty" means something tastes good. conversely, from the words "smelly" and "noisy" we can conclude that the default way for things to smell and sound is bad. interestingly there are no corresponding adjectives for the senses of sight and touch. the inescapable conclusion is that the most ordinary object possible is invisible and intangible, produces a hideous cacophony, smells terrible, but tastes delicious. and yet this description matches no object or phenomenon known to science or human experience. so what the fuck

this is what ancient greek philosophy is like

False! “Sightly” is a positive word, so the default way for things to work is good as well.

The true most ordinary object is beautiful, horrible sounding, very smelly, intangible, and delicious.

I still don’t think it matches anything in existence but to truly understand a thing one must know its true nature.

"touchy" is also a word! however it's mostly used for things that aren't objects, like subjects of conversation. it either means "oversensitive and irritable" or "requires careful handling/wording, delicate"

i think the second one works well for our hypothetical object. so we can use that.

therefore, the Default Object is:

and i still cannot think of anything that matches this

behold, the default object!

The 'write for yourself uwu' culture shift has done real damage to fic writers imo. I recently had a post on the importance of strategic commenting break containment and I'm surprised by how many strangers who rb it in agreement feel the need to reassure in the tags that they do write for themselves, but...

There is a kernel of truth in the heart of this sentiment--if you only chase stats, you are unlikely to find joy in your writing. At the same time, I think we've veered too far in the other direction.

It is only natural to want engagement and the write for yourself crowd often overlooks how communal an effort fic writing usually is. So many story ideas are born from casual discussions about h/c's and favourite scenes and what ifs and the comment box is a cornerstone of this process. Not only can the discussions in the comment box be a hub for idea generation on their own, but even when the said idea generation takes place in DMs or Discord chats, commenting is often the first/easiest way into befriending authors; it's where community building starts.

Further, the write for yourself crowd similarly overlooks that the things a writer can write for themselves are often vast and many at any given time, and relative engagement levels across fandoms/ships can play a large part in which of those ideas a writer chooses to pursue--or whether they choose to publish their finished work at all.

In sum, I don't think we need to be this apologetic as writers for wanting feedback and engagement for what we post -- writing is hard work and it's only human that we want something external out of it in turn, however rewarding the process might intrinsically be.

THIS. It's ok to want comments and engagement. It's ok to want to know what people think of your story and what parts they enjoyed the most. Readers have no idea how far a simple "this was amazing!" goes on a writer's comment section. It can motivate them to write the most beautiful, jaw dropping, 150k+ story they've ever written but people might not ever see it because they don't comment.

Screw comment culture. In particular screw that one person who said "I only comment if the author comments back. It goes both ways" no it does not. Do you only eat at restaurants if the cook comes out to ask how your meal was whenever you compliment the food? A lot of things in life go both ways but this isn't one of them. Compliment your writers but don't think for a SECOND they owe you anything back

Scream

"I completely changed the recipe and it turned bad. This means the recipe is bad. Two stars."

Please I'm begging you all to follow r/ididnthavetheeggs it's all just posts like this please

r/ididn'thaveeggs link for the interested:

Adding some more quality replies from the rbs so they're all in one chain

my personal favorite:

making egg tarts without eggs is....a choice. sometimes one just has to acknowledge that a banana isn't an egg, indeed.

[Tweet by Gillian Branstetter reads “If enforcing gender norms requires a constant state of surveillance and censorship then they probably aren’t as biological or innate as you think they are]

This post is now a work of political art that is just A+

MLK was a star trek fan