So I found this app called Scan Halal where you scan the bar code of your food and it tells you if its halal or not. It’s a free app too. Pass this on so others can see and worry a little less about their food/snack choices
It's not 1 AM, but would a person curious about whether or not piracy would *work* for a star trek au be welcome in your askbox?
ALWAYS.
Okay
so we’re going to talk AU where the Enterprise
crew goes rogue. Now, here’s the thing,
the Federation just kind of wants to make friends with everyone. They have a habit of going out, fighting
wars, and then making friends with their erstwhile mortal enemies—the Klingons,
the Romulans, the Cardassians, even the Borg (although admittedly only Seven of
Nine and the Borgettes), and that’s just what I can think of off the top of my
head. The Federation isn’t perfect, but fundamentally they just want to hold
hands with aliens and poke spatial anomalies with a big stick and build wildly
implausible and unsafe technology and hit big red buttons to see what
happens. That sort of thing…just doesn’t
really lend itself to piratical behavior within the Federation itself. You get smugglers, naturally, and space pirates
attacking the Federation, and even
your odd freedom fighter/rebel corps (I’m thinking the Maquis from Voyager, although, hell, they end up
part of a Starfleet crew too) but even in the AOS (and we’re doing AOS because
I just saw Beyond again), with Admiral Marcus kicking around, I can’t really
see the Enterprise crew going properly
pirate.
(I mean,
I guess they kind of do, several
times in TOS, but only in the ultra-technical Mark Watney-esque sense of space
piracy of “we’re taking the ship that’s not ours without permission.” And they always do it to save everybody and
let’s be real, it’s hard to punish the people who saved the Federation, it
would be a bit hypocritical to go “thanks for the save, glad not to be dead,
time for your court martial”.)
That
being said, obviously now the solution is to figure out under what circumstances
they WOULD go full pirate. And in the
AOS I’m going to say that the way that would happen would be if Admiral Marcus
had a little more success with the whole Section 31 thing.
So,
let’s suppose that he did, and Marcus might have died with the Vengeance but Section 31 sort of slowly
took over Starfleet, as these things tend to do, and the Enterprise is out on their five-year mission so they don’t realize
anything’s wrong because they’re pretty far out into uncharted space and even
subspace signals get weird after that kind of distance.
And
then the Enterprise comes home,
cruises into spacedock, and the crew is dropped into a Terran Starfleet
that…they don’t recognize anymore.
Things are stiff with protocol, there are massively lethal torpedoes
being integrated into the new ships, half the science complexes have been
annexed by weapons research, McCoy’s highly alarmed by the sort of questions
he’s being asked about the new species he has records of, and the Security
officers are being issued some very large phaser rifles. Let me tell you a thing: Jim and the bridge
crew ain’t pleased with this development.
Between
Spock, Jim, and Chekov, they hack into the ‘Fleet database and discover the
plans for the next mission of the starship Enterprise. And their response is “Nope.” The Enterprise crew is loyal unto death to
their captain—hell, he died for them already, they’re not in a rush to forget
that—so when he summons them quietly to an out-of-the-way location and tells
them that Starfleet is planning to start a war, they believe him. And when he asks “Please help me stop this”
they agree, readily and gladly.
And
then they steal a ship. They steal their ship, because when Captain James Tiberius
Kirk leads his own crew onto his own ship, no one thinks to stop them, until
Scotty’s dismantling the tracker they slipped into Engineering and Sulu’s
punching it and the Enterprise is
soaring away.
And
then…well. I suppose then they have a
war to stop and a Federation to evade and a Starfleet to fix. They refuse to take off their uniforms, even
after the fourth time they’re accosted by another ‘Fleet ship and barely escape
alive—they are Starfleet, the real
Starfleet, and they will prove it. They’re
wanted criminals, according to the Federation, run rampant under the command of
a lunatic captain. Every scrap of
incriminating information about Jim Kirk is dragged out of the mothballs and
splashed across every news source in the quadrant—did you know he was a repeat
offender in Iowa? Did you know he had a
record of violence and aggression? Did
you know he destroyed property? And once
the Enterprise is really getting to
be a problem, they crack open the classified files and there’s whole new surge
of questions. Did you know he was on
Tarsus IV? Did you know he admitted to
murdering guards there? Did you know
that his psych eval afterward said he’d never really recover? Did you know, did you know, did you
know?
The
Federation, the point is, is officially on the hunt.
Unofficially,
though…well. They’ve escaped an awful
lot of brigs and shiplocks—all though underhanded trickery and violence, their
ex-guards are always quick to point out.
See, they have the footage to prove it, look, the Enterprise crew is crafty and tricky and crazy and dangerous. And there were problems with the lock, with
the cuffs, with the shiplock, can’t the Federation keep their own people in
good quality tech? Naturally no one would help the Enterprise,
they’re wanted criminals, they’re dangerous, they’re pirates.
That
brig door has been broken for years.
They’re
pirates with a weird habit of helping stranded ships and going on strict
rations so they can share their food and figuring out ways to save whole
cultures from plagues and negotiating treaties, though. The worlds that are part of the Federation
territory learn to fear their own ships, but the Enterprise…she’s their savior.
The names of the crew are
whispered among the people on the ground, Kirk and Uhura and Spock and McCoy
and Chekov and Sulu and on and on and on.
She’s always oddly well-stocked for a pirate ship, never really risks
starvation. Her dilithium chambers are
always full—must be stealing from old wreckage and defeated enemies, of course.
The
Federation’s upper echelons hunt the Enterprise
down.
The
Federation’s people love her. They call
her the Silver Lady, or the Lady of Starlight, or Lady Luck.
And
everywhere she lands, her crew says “We will fix this. We will stop this. This is not what Starfleet should be, we are what Starfleet should be, and we will make this better.”
I am DONE WITH MY FREAKING INTERNSHIP. I am F R E E.
And I’m in the mood to celebrate, so I’m going to work my way through the prompts I have and I would LOVE to get some more, so hit me up. If you need ideas I’m going to reblog a couple prompt posts that I’ve been saving. You know my fandoms, there is a list, apply them. You can also ask about my original writing if you’re interested.
And he not making none of that out the jar shit, HE HAS TOMATOES AND ONIONS AND HES ACTUALLY GOING TO MAKE THE SPAGHETTI SAUCE FROM SCRATCH.
AND HE ASKED IF HE COULD BRING HIS FRIEND AND HIS FRIEND JUST CAME IN AND HE IS FROM FRANCE AND HIS ACCENT 😩 PLS LORD HELP ME IM JUST TRYING TO STUDY. I GOT FINALS TOMORROW. WHY YOU DO THIS TO ME?
HE CUTTING ONIONS LIFTING UP HIS SHIRT AND HIS ABS LIKE OMFG😩 THE DEVIL IS WORKING TONIGHT.
YALLLLLLLLL. HE IS SO FINE. I JUST GOT A LESSON IN HOW TO MAKE MEATBALLS. HE JUST TOUCHING MY HAND AND SHIT LIKE THIS ISN’T REAL LIFE.
AND I GO SIT DOWN HE TURN AROUND LIKE YOU’RE GOING TO BE MY LITTLE TASTE TESTER RIGHT? LIKE YAASSSSSSSSSSSS. WHATEVER YOU WANT ME TO TASTE I WILL TASTE.
SO HE LIKE OKAY COME TASTE THE SAUCE SO I COME OVER TO THE POT AND I HOLD OUT MY HAND AND HES LIKE NAH YOU GOTTA LICK THE SPOON LIKE ..AND HE DEMONSTRATES LIKE NIGGA YOU NOT SLICK YOU JUST TRYING TO SHOW WHAT THAT MOUTH DO. SO I LICK THE SPOON AND THIS SHIT IS GOOD AS FUCKKK. LIKE Y'ALL THIS THE BEST SAUCE I EVER HAD IN MY LIFE. MY TASTE BUDS WERE JUST SINGING. LIKE OMG. SO IM TRYING TO COLLECT MYSELF AFTER THIS GOOD ASS SAUCE AND HE TALKING ABOUT WE JUST HAD BORDERLINE SEX. BORDERLINE?? MY NIGGA JUST THROW ME ON THE COUNTER AND LETS GOOOOO.
so he make me a plate AND THIS SHIT IS GOOD AS FUCK LIKE OMG. THIS SHIT TASTE LIKE HEAVEN ON A PLATE. SO ANYWAY WE JUST CHILLING ON THE COUCH CHOPPING IT UP AND HE TOUCHES MY KNEE. Y'ALL MY SOUL JUST LEFT MY BODY AND IS LOOKING DOWN AT ME LIKE 👀. THIS NIGGAS HAND ARE SOFT AS FUCK LIKE WHAT DO HE BE USING ON HIS HANDS? I AINT NEVER FELT ANYTHING SO SOFT. GOD WHY DID YOU BLESS HIM WITH THESE SOFTER THAN A BABYS ASS HANDS? YOU KNOW I HAVE TO STUDY, YOU KNOW I GOT FINALS TOMORROW. YOU KNOW.
So we just talking and shit and then all of a sudden we kissing. YALL I AINT NEVER BEEN KISSED LIKE THIS BEFORE. EVER IN MY WHOLE ASS LIFE. HIS LIPS WERE SOFT AS SHIT AND HE KISSING ME ALL EXTRA SLOW AND ANY SOUL I HAD LEFT IS GONE. ITS LEFT MY BODY AND IS CACKLING IN THE CORNER WITH THE DEVIL. SO WE KISSING AND HE MOVES HIS HAND UP MY THIGH AND MY HEART START RACING FAST AF. IM LIKE OH SHIT ITS ABOUT TO GO DOWN. OUTTA NOWHERE HE STOP KISSING ME AND HE SAY SOMETHING BUT IM GONE AS FUCK. THIS NIGGA WAS DEAD ASS TALKING AND I DIDNT HEAR A WORD HE SAID,MY BRAIN WAS IN A PUDDLE IN MY PANTIES.
So I’m trying to recollect myself and I’m like what? and he say something about my roommate. So I’m like nah she said she not coming back until 12 so you’re good daddy 😉 AS SOON AS I SAY THAT MY DOOR OPEN AND IN HER COCKBLOCKING ASS COMES. I WAS SICK. IM JUST LOOKING AT HER LIKE BITCH!! YOU STILL GOT 2 HOURS 22 MINUTES AND 8 SECONDS BEFORE YOURE SUPPOSED TO BE HOME.. WHAT YOU DOIN? SO IM SENDING HER SPIDEY SIGNALS AND SHIT LIKE BITCH BE GONE AND WHAT DOES SHE DO? SHE SITS HER HAPPY ASS DOWN ON THE COUCH NEXT TO ME TALKING ABOUT “WHAT ARE Y'ALL UP TO?” BITCHHHHH WHAT DO YOU THINK? IM TRYING TO GET SOME ITALIAN SAUSAGE.
Eventually he started getting ready to go and I went to help him pack up his things. So my roommate go to the bathroom and he speaking shit in Italian. My soul is gone, my panties are destroyed and idk what else this man wants from me. So I ask him what he said and he talking about WE ARE NOT DONE ILL BE OVER EVERY SATURDAY TO COOK FOR YOU IS THAT COOL? COOL? MY NIGGA THATS ICE FUCKING COLD WORD TO OUTKAST. SO I ASCENDED TO HEAVEN TO HAVE A ONE ON ONE WITH GOD LIKE WHAT HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE THIS?? IF THIS IS A TEST GOD IM TELLING YOU RIGHT NOW I WILL FAIL REPEATEDLY SO PLS DONT TEST ME. MY ROOMMATE COMES BACK OUT AND HE LEAVES AND I TURN AROUND TO SMACK THIS GIRL AND SHE HAS THE NERVE TO SAY DID YOU NOTICE HE HAD A HARD ON THE WHOLE TIME. BITCHHHHH! I WOULDNT HAVE HAD TO NOTICE SHIT IF YOU HADNT CAME IN. I WOULDVE FELT THAT SHIT UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL. and that’s the story on how I murdered my roommate so when I go to jail i'ma need y'all to come bail me out.
alright,I know what y’all wanna hear: He came back over the next day and slanging that sausage left and right. I haven’t been on tumblr bc I been too busy getting sausaged down but NO BITCH, Y’ALL KNOW WHAT I BEEN DOING?? STUDYING. YES, STUDYING. I GOT MOTHERFUCKING FINALS.
2. You may not test theories on each other. Not even the senior officers. Especially not the senior officers.
3. Do not feed any tribbles.
4. DO NOT FEED ANY TRIBBLES.
5. Tribbles are no longer allowed on the ship.
5a. Edit: Dr. McCoy and First Officer Spock may use a tribble when absolutely necessary under dire circumstances only.
5b. Update: No crew member may ever have a tribble on the ship under any circumstances ever.
6. The ship is not sentient. The captain may not marry the ship, even if it’s only a joke. Neither may Mr. Scott.
7. We take it back. The ship is sentient. Respect her at all times.
8. Any non-standard maintenance (READ: modifications) to the ship MUST be approved by Starfleet and properly documented.
9. Even if the Captain would pretend not to notice them. Or wholeheartedly supports them. Or is the one doing them.
9a. STOP MODIFYING THE DAMN SHIP, JIM.
10. Captain, Doctor McCoy is wise in his advice. I suggest you follow it before there are any…unfavorable consequences from the admirals in Starfleet Command.
10a. Spock, did you just threaten me?
10b. Negative, Captain. I merely wish to remind you of the upcoming ship inspections, as the last time Admiral Benett had to deal with the reports he was very adamant that our crew is no longer trusted to do our own quarterly inspections. Apparently too many of crew relationships are founded on “mutual propensities for non-strictly-regulation shenanigans.”
11. The illegal still in Engineering is—however appreciated—still illegal. No stills in Engineering, or anywhere else on the ship.
12. Alcohol from said still may not be sold for profit, especially outside of this crew. News of its existence cannot, under any circumstances, reach the admirals or their underlings. Or the engineering staff of other ships. Or the captains of other ships!
12a. NO ONE MAY SPEAK OF THE STILL DOWN IN ENGINEERING, EVEN TO OTHERS ON THIS SHIP.
13. The first rule of moonshine stills: You do not speak about the moonshine stills. Just shut up and drink the alcohol.
13a. With pleasure, sir!
14. Lieutenant Uhura would like to inform whoever modified and reprogrammed the universal translators that she looks forward to personally ripping out their vocal cords and using them to repair the damage she’s been forced to spend the last 34 hours fixing.
15. The captain would like to remind Lieutenant Uhura that insults said in other languages are still insults, and still unacceptable.
16. Lieutenant Uhura would like to remind the Captain that insults are acceptable when sufficiently deserved by certain farm hicks and that if they are not understood by the enemy party then there’s no harm done.
17. The Captain would like to remind Lieutenant Uhura that he is, contrary to what she may believe, a genius who does know more languages than he usually lets on, and no sentient being would appreciate being called a [expletive removed, by authority of Lieutenant Commander Spock] under any circumstances.
18. Lieutenant Commander Uhura would like to politely remind the Captain—
19. Lieutenant Commander Spock, with the authority of First Officer, hereby orders this conversation to be dropped immediately. It is unbecoming of senior officers, and frankly, quite childish. If the two parties wish to continue, they may do so on their own time in private quarters.
20. On a related note to yesterday’s spat, no one is allowed to place bets pitting senior officers against each other. Especially not the other senior officers.
21. Karaoke night is hereby banned forever from the Enterprise.
22. The Captain is not allowed to declare laser tag wars in the Jeffries tubes. Even if everyone involved enjoyed it.
23. Pig Latin is not an official language of the Federation, nor an acceptable method of communication when working on shift.
26. The shipwide broadcast system is not for playing favorite music while at warp in to “set the mood.”
27. Regulations are not “more like guidelines, anyway.”
28. “What the admiralty doesn’t know…” is not a phrase that should precede any statement on this ship.
28a. Somehow, every time it’s said, the admiralty inevitably does find out. Senior Command is investigating the possibility of a jinx on the phrase.
29. The Captain is not allowed to name any newly-discovered dinosaurs by himself. We cannot have seven separate species of Kirkosaurus.
30. The marriages that various crewmembers have been forced into via alien rituals on away missions are notvalid. If you wish to be officially bound, you can do so the normal, legal way.
32. Starfleet has officially-established drill proceedures. They do not include laser tag, paintball, Mafia, or capture the flag.
33. The Captain is no longer allowed to eat, drink, touch flirt with, or look at any unknown substances on away missions.
34. It is a punishable offense to evade routine medical evaluations.
34a. This includes you, Jim.
34b. Any and all crewmembers found to be assisting the Captain in hiding from Doctor McCoy are subject to official reprimand and the immediate restriction of all deserts from their meal card.
35. No member of the crew may walk within five feet of Lieutenant Sulu’s plants. Some of them can move, and some of them are extremely…territorial.
36. Starfleet is not responsible for the consequences if you decide to play tag in the Jeffries Tubes, nor will you receive any sympathy for injuries sustained while doing so.
36a. Except maybe for Chekov.
37. There is no such thing as being “allergic to paperwork,” especially since paperwork is entirely digital and no longer on actual paper.
38. The captain may not declare Casual Fridays.
39. The Captain may not declare a “Space Pirate Day.”
40. Officer Spock may not mislead crew members into believing that he is still ignorant of common human idioms and expressions of speech.
41. However illogical the captain is being, when logic fails to persuade him, it is still not acceptable to pick him up and physically move him.
42. FOR THE LAST TIME, JEFFRIES TUBES ARE NOT FOR PLAYING IN.
43. Shipwide games of Murder are not an accepted method of “team bonding.” No matter how much you try to argue that a common enemy brings people together, it won’t change the fact that organized serial murders—even fake ones—are not acceptable behavior on a starship.
You walk in through your front door and find that every OC you’ve ever created has somehow come to life and is now waiting for you in your living room. And they’ve got a few words to say to you…
Facing a room full of people I’ve tormented, tortured, corrupted, and killed.
the fact that NASA is so underfunded just fuckign it fucki ng it just f ucking blows my mind fuck. it’s NASA. it’s fucking NASA. we’re talking about space and science and our understanding of the universe. we’re talking the study and search for planets and life outside Earth and trying to ensure the survival of our species by sending humans to Mars and generally just trying to find the meaning of life and you don’t think that’s the tightest shit you’ve ever even considered then you’re wrong
THERE’S A GUY SCALING THE TRUMP TOWER IN NYC WITH GIANT SUCTION CUPS LIKE A MISSION IMPOSSIBLE STUNT AND IM LAUGHING
UPDATE: OKAY SO police are all over and they
sent a window washer platform down from the top of the building but it was too
far above him so then sent it back up and police just shattered a window
slightly above him to try to get him and now he’s moving away from the hole in
the window and continuing up he’s been climbing for like an hour now and they
cant figure out how to get him down this is so incredible
UPDATE: LOOK AT HIM GO
UPDATE: they just inflated a giant inflatable on 56th street a third of nyc is in gridlock bc of this guy climbing the trump tower i cannOT BELIEVE
UPDATE: he’s on the 18th floor this so surreal
UPDATE: we’re approaching hour 2 of the climb and since the last update he’s made it up at least another 3 floors
UPDATE: SOMEONE TOOK A PICTURE OF HIM FROM INSIDE THE TOWER
A HERO
update: apparently his name is steve and he’s from virginia
ASCEND, STEVE
UPDATE: they just used suction cups to pull two panes of glass into the building a few floors above him
you know what they always say. you cant fight fire with fire, but you should always fight suction cups with suction cups
UPDATE: HE’S TRYING TO GET AWAY FROM THEM STILL IM CRYING WHAT THE ENTIRE FUCK IS 2016????
…seriously, can some American please explain to me please?
Friendly reminder to check you’re not holding tension in your body. Let your shoulders drop, unclench your hands and jaw. Take a deep breath. Much better.
white women are always like “more strong kickass female leads!” and when i say i want to see a black female love interest who is allowed to be girly and fall in love they give me weird looks and say that i’m supporting gender stereotypes and heteronormativity but what a lot of white women don’t get is that black women we’ve had hundreds of years of having our femininity ripped from us, of being deemed unworthy of male (especially non-black male) attention. black women in media are never allowed to be the “cute” ones or the love interest, we’ve always been the “strong kickass street smart woman” trope that white women want so badly. so basically if a black girl says she wants to see another black girl fulfill the role of “love interest” there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that and it isn’t a hindrance to feminism
Here’s your very LOUD AND NOT SOFT REMINDER that it is not okay to repost my work (or anyone’s work) here or on other websites without crediting the author/artist!!!!! And it should go without saying, but plagiarism is also not okay!!!!! Taking the entire concept of a poem and changing a few words is plagiarism!!!!! Using entire lines from my work (or anyone’s work) in your own writing is plagiarism!!! Don’t pass off other people’s work as your own!! Not only is it not chill and frowned on heavily in all writing/artistic communities everywhere, it’s friggin illegal, my dude!!!!! It’s a copyright violation!! I’ll fight you!!! I’ll fucking fight you, pal Fists Up let’s party let’s fucking go
let’s fucking go to Google and use the reverse image search or the regular freakin SEARCH BAR and type that shit in if you don’t know the author and you’re not intentionally trying to be A Huge Asshole
if you’re not trying to pass it off as your own work and you’re just trying to add content to your blog or your twitter, you still have to provide a source for content that doesn’t belong to you!!!
ALSO when you see writing/content stolen from artists you know, call people out! remember that you don’t have to be mean about it because not everyone is intending to be malicious!!!!!! just pointing out stolen work to the original content creator is good but it’s just not always enough and it’s often REALLY emotionally exhausting to have to fight with people on the internet every day and file copyright infringement claims. when you point it out to me, it just ends up on a list of twenty other posts I’m trying to get credited for or taken down so I really appreciate when other people have my back on this stuff!!! support the creators you like and admire!!!!!!!!!!!! support creators in general!!!
I know it doesn’t seem like a big deal because people post uncredited quotes from movies and songs and stuff all the time!! but it’s really disheartening for new and emerging writers to have their work not attributed to them (aka stolen)!! also again, it’s not legal and I’ll fight you
I work in a decent sized, local, indie bookstore. It’s a great job 99% of the time and a lot of our customers are pretty neat people. Any who, middle of the day this little old lady comes up. She’s lovably kooky. She effuses how much she loves the store and how she wishes she could spend more time in it but her husband is waiting in the car (OH! I BETTER BUY HIM SOME CHOCOLATE!), she piles a bunch of art supplies on the counter and then stops and tells me how my bangs are beautiful and remind her of the ocean (“Wooooosh” she says, making a wave gesture with her hand)
Ok. I think to myself. Awesomely happy, weird little old ladies are my favorite kind of customer. They’re thrilled about everything and they’re comfortably bananas. I can have a good time with this one. So we chat and it’s nice.
Then this kid, who’s been up my counter a few times to gather his school textbooks, comes up in line behind her (we’re connected to a major university in the city so we have a lot of harried students pass through). She turns around to him and, out of nowhere, demands that he put his textbooks on the counter. He’s confused but she explains that she’s going to buy his textbooks.
He goes sheetrock white. He refuses and adamantly insists that she can’t do that. It’s like, $400 worth of textbooks. She, this tiny old woman, bodily takes them out of her hands, throws them on the counter and turns to me with a intense stare and tells me to put them on her bill. The kid at this point is practically in tears. He’s confused and shocked and grateful. Then she turns to him and says “you need chocolate.” She starts grabbing handfuls of chocolates and putting them in her pile.
He keeps asking her “why are you doing this?” She responds “Do you like Harry Potter?“ and throws a copy of the new Cursed Child on the pile too.
Finally she’s done and I ring her up for a crazy amount of money. She pays and asks me to please give the kid a few bags for his stuff. While I’m bagging up her merchandise the kid hugs her. We’re both telling her how amazing she is and what an awesome thing she’s done. She turns to both of us and says probably one of the most profound, unscripted things I’ve ever had someone say:
“It’s important to be kind. You can’t know all the times that you’ve hurt people in tiny, significant ways. It’s easy to be cruel without meaning to be. There’s nothing you can do about that. But you can choose to be kind. Be kind.”
The kid thanks her again and leaves. I tell her again how awesome she is. She’s staring out the door after him and says to me: “My son is a homeless meth addict. I don’t know what I did. I see that boy and I see the man my son could have been if someone had chosen to be kind to him at just the right time.”
I’ve bagged up all her stuff and at this point am super awkward and feel like I should say something but I don’t know what. Then she turns to me and says: I wish I could have bangs like that but my darn hair is just too curly.“ And leaves.
And that is the story of the best customer I’ve ever had. Be kind to somebody today.
Rey- who is the hero that everyone loves and they never can?
Here’s the one thing you need to remember about Rey: she grew up alone and starving, lonely and unloved, desperate for companionship, hungry for family. She remembers catching sight of her reflection at eight or so: a collection of bones and skin with scabs at the corner of her mouth and dust clogging her hair and bruises on her hands and split-open red knuckles from beating up a thief who tried to make off with her haul (no haul, no food; you die if you don’t eat. She knows this better than anything, she’s seen it happen, she knows what it is to starve
Anyway: this is a girl who never had a childhood and the instant she meets a child, an actual honest-to-Force child, with big dark eyes and soft skin and chubby cheeks (why does she want to pinch them? is this a normal reaction) she is overcome by a surge of feral, ferocious protectiveness. She wasn’t protected as a child, not ever, and now she’s damned if she’s ever going to let another little one end up with red knuckles and skin stretched hard over the angles of their ribs.
She says to Leia: I was hurt when I was little, left on my own, left – and the word abandoned stutters against her teeth. And I don’t ever want anyone to suffer like that, not ever and Leia thinks that once there was a boy who felt unloved and alone and drew the absolute opposite conclusion (I am suffering; thus, everyone else must also suffer)
And, eventually, she learns of the tragic tale of Anakin Skywalker, he who became Darth Vader, and she feels pity for him, for the Force is a cruel mother, and her favour comes with a steep price. And Rey knows what it is to feel the pulse of the universe in your bones. She knows what it is to be so full of power you choke on it, she knows how addictive it is to see injustice and think if I ruled this place, I would be better.
She knows, that’s the point. And she pities him, and she understands, and then she has a spare evening and plunges into the data-records of the Old Republic and she reads about the massacre at the temple.
Little ones. Lonely ones. Little ones stolen from their families and given weapons to hold instead of hands, asking Master Skywalker there are too many of them and little ones who didn’t expect to be protected, little ones ready to fight, and did they have bruises on their knuckles as well? Rey understands that training is imperative, that children who are strong with the Force need guidance, but –
They were children. In his care. He killed them.
That’s the story, the whole story, and nothing before or after can justify the single evening in the temple. Did he hold his wife after, did he touch her pregnant belly, did he tell his twins he loved them?
Luke tries to speak of redemption. Rey spits on the floor, because she’s an ill-bred desert girl who would die ten thousand deaths before lifting her lightsabre to an innocent. And good is not always nice, and she tells Luke to his face that his father was a monster and ever shall be. Little broken bodies, she says. Her eyes flare. The Force, around her, crackles with anger: the shining heat of the desert.
That night, Luke dreams of his father. I’m sorry, he says. Your granddaughter hates you – but Anakin Skywalker smiles.
Think about this for a moment. Think about how hard it must have been for him to say those words.
‘He’s not your son.’
Like no no no, Molly, this is my Harry. My kid. James and Lily’s son from his appearance right down to the way he writes the alphabet and protects his enemies. I’ve known the kid literally since he was born. I know what James and Lily wanted for him. They’d want him to know what he’s getting into. They’d want him to know that we trust him. And Lily would skin me alive if I let her son face the “chosen one” scenario without knowing what it means. James and Lily Potter gave their lives as a result of this Prophecy and you’re telling me they would want to keep him in the dark? He is my godson, Molly. I would do anything to keep him safe. I’m the one Harry wrote to nearly every day for months and I know what he needs. I know what happened in the damned graveyard. I know what Harry’s been through and I know what his parents would want us to do. HE’S. NOT. YOUR. SON.
‘He’s not your son,’ said Sirius quietly.
Sirius is canonically the sort of person who’d get increasingly louder and angrier over the course of an argument. But no. Molly wants Harry to be a child. Her child. And all he can think of is Lily. Her grit. Her principles. The way she’d have laid the truth out before Harry and then taken him out to a Quidditch game or something.
He never gets to say any of that. There’s Molly’s below-the-belt Azkaban taunt and Sirius just retreats into his guilt about not actually being there for Harry… not being able to protect him last year… not keeping James and Lily safe.
um hi feel free to tell me to take a hike but. i really like your blog and your writing and i may or may not have gone 480 pages back in it and seen "In which angels are a thing that happened around 1947 and just kind of never left; also everyone is LGBT because fuck you I do what I want" and now i'm really curious--would you be willing to elaborate?
BABE I will never tell you to take a hike about my original writing, I have real shit to get done and a bunch of older asks to answer, but I’m gonna do this instead, sorry. I have many novels started and that’s one of the ones that gets an actual place where I’ll find it to work on, I love it very much. Okay, so, *clears throat* let’s do this.
So. First off, some backstory: an insane percentage of my stories are rooted in an original conversation with someone, somewhere, that goes “But it’s so stupid that this book/TV show/movie did this, because it would be so much better if they’d done that” (see also: Falls the Shadow, product of a Supernatural rage quit, Emrys Ascendant, product of a Merlin rage quit, and Polaris, product of a “please God I just want a F/F couple that lives” tirade). This one was the product of a half-dozen episodes of Dominion in very short order (which I have yet to rage-quit, by the by, and love very much in its capacity as a ridiculous lovely garbage pile) and me turning to @twistedangelsays and going “But it would be so much better if there were two angelic factions openly, one that thought humanity was past redemption and one that believed that they were still duty-bound to love and protect us.” And then I did kind of this weird magician trick and pulled a fully-formed universe and plot with main characters and ships out of thin air.
Let’s talk about the battle in the Department of Mysteries for a sec. So after the group gets split up, Harry, Hermione and Neville go one way and Ron, Ginny and Luna the other. The next time we see the latter group Ginny’s ankle is busted and Ron’s brain is addled. Luna says that the Death Eaters blew up a planet in the planetarium and hit Ron with some sort of hex.
Let’s take a moment to examine that. If the curse that hit the planet had hit any of the kids, they’d be dead. So the Death Eater probably missed, hit the planet ahead of them, injuring Ginny. But here’s the important part: the one who actually gets hit by the hex? Ron.
Why is this important? Because Ron is consistently described throughout the series as tall. Like, every time Harry sees him after the beginning of summer he’s described as having shot up. Again. On the other hand Ginny is described as “the small one” by Bellatrix Lestrange. But Ron is behind her. I don’t know if you know this but tall people can run really fast. I am not particularly fit but I am tall. And I can pour on the speed when my adrenaline’s up, which I have no doubt was the case for everyone in the Department of Mysteries. But he’s behind her.
Because he did that deliberately. He kept his body between the Death Eaters and the girls. He shielded them from their spells. Because those he cares about are more important to him than his own life.
I don’t know, I just think about this a lot.
Ron is a strategist, and has already shown a willingness to take the hit for the team and be left behind. In any group, I think that’s just his default position; take the hit, buy more time for others to escape. He’s well aware that realistically, someone is going to be hurt. In this case, Luna is creative and smart enough to come up with something out of left field to throw the enemy off. Ginny is small, but she’s an athletic powerhouse who can throw strong hexes. If it comes down to a crunch, Ron knows that the two of them can fight their way out, and he can increase their odds by at least holding off the wave behind them.
Honestly, this is such an important point.
Consistently throughout the series, Ron can be seen being taken out of the action somehow. AND IT IS NEVER BECAUSE HE IS WEAK.
Rather, it’s because Ron is a STRATEGIST, who CARES.
In Philosopher’s Stone, for example. Ron allows himself to be “taken” by the queen, because he knows that he is standing with the Boy-Who-Lived and the Brightest-Witch-Of-Her-Age and Voldy must be stopped and it’s SIMPLE to him. Ron is a strategist, like has been said. It’s a strategic decision - who cares if it puts himself in harm’s way?
In Prisoner of Azkaban, Ron and Harry are faced with the Grim, and what does Ron do? He pushes Harry out of Sirius’ path, in the process allowing the dog to latch onto his outstretched arm and pull him away, breaking his leg as they enter the Willow. This decision is simple too - it’s because Harry Potter means the world to Ron Weasley, and Ron would not hesitate for a moment in putting himself between Harry and danger.
RON IS A STRATEGIST, AND RON CARES.
And when it comes down to it, he never hesitates.
And don’t forget DH:
“Wait,” said Bellatrix sharply. "All except… except for the Mudblood.“
Greyback gave a grunt of pleasure. “No!” shouted Ron. “You can have me, keep me!”
“Right,” said Ron, squaring his shoulders. “So you can’t go, that’s what he wants, what he’s expecting. You stay here and look after Hermione, and I’ll go and get it —”
Where do people who claim Ron is a coward who hides behind his friends get their bullshit from?
French Friend: well, the total cost of me going to Med school is about 406 a year -
American Friend: THOUSAND?
French Friend: Um, no. 406 Euro. It sounds a little high but it covers the cost of my textbooks, extra classes and most of my housing. How much is it for you?
It just kills me when writers create franchises where like 95% of the speaking roles are male, then get morally offended that all of the popular ships are gay. It’s like, what did they expect?
I feel this is something that does often get overlooked in slash shipping, especially in articles that try to ‘explain’ the phenomena. No matter the show, movie or book, people are going to ship. When everyone is a dude and the well written relationships are all dudes, of course we’re gonna go for romance among the dudes because we have no other options.
Totally.
A lot of analyses propose that the overwhelming predominance of male/male ships over female/female and female/male ships in fandom reflects an unhealthy fetishisation of male homosexuality and a deep-seated self-hatred on the part of women in fandom. While it’s true that many fandoms certainly have issues gender-wise, that sort of analysis willfully overlooks a rather more obvious culprit.
Suppose, for the sake of argument, that we have a hypothetical media franchise with twelve recurring speaking roles, nine of which are male and three of which are female.
(Note that this is actually a bit better than average representaton-wise - female representation in popular media franchises is typicaly well below the 25% contemplated here.)
Assuming that any character can be shipped with any other without regard for age, gender, social position or prior relationship - and for simplicity excluding cloning, time travel and other “selfcest”-enabling scenarios - this yields the following (non-polyamorous) possibilities:
Possible F/F ships: 3 Possible F/M ships: 27 Possible M/M ships: 36
TOTAL POSSIBLE SHIPS: 66
Thus, assuming - again, for the sake of simplicity - that every possible ship is about equally likely to appeal to any given fan, we’d reasonably expect about (36/66) = 55% of all shipping-related media to feature M/M pairings. No particular prejudice in favour of male characters and/or against female characters is necessary for us to get there.
The point is this: before we can conclude that representation in shipping is being skewed by fan prejudice, we have to ask how skewed it would be even in the absence of any particular prejudice on the part of the fans. Or, to put it another way, we have to ask ourselves: are we criticising women in fandom - and let’s be honest here, this type of criticism is almost exclusively directed at women - for creating a representation problem, or are we merely criticising them for failing to correct an existing one?
YES YES YES HOLY SHIT YES FUCKING THANK YOU!
Also food for thought: the obvious correction to a lack of non-male representation in a story is to add more non-males. Female Original Characters are often decried as self-insertion or Mary Sues, particular if romance or sex is a primary focus.
I really appreciate when tumblr commentary is of the quality I might see at an academic conference. No joke.
This doesn’t even account for the disparity in the amount of screen time/dialogue male characters to get in comparison to female characters, and how much time other characters spend talking about male characters even when they aren’t onscreen. This all leads to male characters ending up more fully developed, and more nuanced than female characters. The more an audience feels like they know a character, the more likely an audience is to care about a character. More network television writers are men. Male writers tend to understand men better than women, statistically speaking. Female characters are more likely to be written by men who don’t understand women vary well.
But it’s easier to blame the collateral damage than solve the root problem.
Yay, mathy arguments. :)
This is certainly one large factor in the amount of M/M slash out there, and the first reason that occurred to me when I first got into fandom (I don’t think it’s the sole reason, but I think it’s a bigger one than some people in the Why So Much Slash debate give our credit for). And nice point about adding female OCs.
In some of my shipping-related stats, I found that shows with more major female characters lead to more femslash (also more het). (e.g. femslash in female-heavy media; femslash deep dive) I’ve never actually tried to do an analysis to pin down how much of fandom’s M/M preference is explained by the predominance of male characters in the source media, but I’m periodically tempted to try to do so.
Okay but - imagine Bones calling Jaylah sweetheart.
He’d try to take it back instantly, because he still flinches whenever he remembers the one (and only) time he called Uhura that. And he doesn’t want to be condescending, not at all - he’s a southern gentleman, dammit, and these terms of endearment just slip out sometimes.
But Jaylah stops him mid-apology, and goes “explain to me this word, Leonard Bones.”
He does - and from then on, not only does she insist he calls her sweetheart - she calls him that as well.
just a quick note in case i have any gross terfs following me
any post i make about how much i love girls or how much respect i have for girls or anything at all to do with girls - it absolutely always includes trans girls. there’s no reason why it wouldn’t. i don’t want my posts on your disgusting blogs so if you see the word ‘girls’ and don’t assume trans girls fit into that term, please get the fuck away from me and the entire earth. thanks.
one of my fav parts of stb is when the beastie boys are saving the federation and it’s badass af but then the music chills just a lil bit while Yorktown receives the jamming frequency and then the part in the song where it goes WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!! hits and the entire Yorktown shield LIGHTS THE FUCK UP WITH EXPLODING BEE SHIPS AND IT’S LIKE SOME NEXT LEVEL FUCK YEAH SHIT👌💯👌✔ LIKE YES FUCK THEM UP YES!! !! ! !!!!!!!!!
I love the les mis fandom okay? I love it so much I’m younger than most people in it and I still feel welcomed and coming from more toxic fandoms this one feels like i can just breathe i love it so much
to people who want to bernie or bust: you do not protest with votes
there is no “BUT HILARY THIS” or “THEY CHEATED BERNIE THAT”
yes, its true, hilary is far from perfect and bernie got fucked so hard
but you do NOT. PROTEST. WITH. VOTES.
why??? i got one word for you
brexit
near half of the people who voted in favour of brexit did so out of protest of the EU and how heavy they were going on laws for each member country. yeah that protest vote didnt go too well did it
look, i know what corrupt voting systems feel like, i mean england has the first past the post system whose shittyness is explained right here
but listen to me right now, and listen very carefully. you do not protest with your vote. the republican party doesnt have this split, yes you have people who dont like trump but he has such a dominant lead that he doesnt have to deal with this: hes lucky for that reason. by splitting the vote you split the proportion.
look, heres what you should do
first, you vote for hilary if youre a democrat (i know youre already angry at what im saying, but hear me out)
secondly, once hilary is elected, you protest for the DNC to be held accountable for what they did to bernie and you dont shut up until shit changes
secondly, you protest against the electoral system. yes it might not change in hilary’s 4-8 years, but listen to me and listen to me right now as someone who missed out on the brexit vote by 6 months
do not protest with your vote, protest with your voice
