rapidly unsheathes my katana and you immediately get a phone call from your wife asking for a divorce
I ONLY DO DIVORCES
-CALLIE MAAMLET, DIVORCE RONIN
me: sees a character who's quiet and mild mannered and generally dignified with not a lot of Big Feelings
me: hmmm wonder what it would take to have him curled up in a ball sobbing
One of my favorite genres of post
i gotta show yall a our discord classic
people discovering steven universe in 2023 are always like "this show is really good why the hell were yall so weird about it"
#LITERALLY ME#I could probably find the conversation with my friend where I was like#‘yeah I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop bc I heard all the Bad Show Propaganda and then uh. That shoe never dropped. Good show.’
As someone that was there and started blocking the SU Crit tag because of so many bad faith accusations, yeah I think I can say a bit of what happened. Might be a bit disjointed but these are the things that I remember happening.
First thing was the release schedule. The Steven Bombs. Releasing like five episodes in one week and then nothing for months. This was something that CartoonNetwork had control over and might have been something that they tried to use to get Steven Universe to stop being so popular because it was gestures pretty queer.
If Steven Universe was a show that every episode was a stand alone, this wouldn't have been an issue, but it was a linear story. So major developments could drop; major character reveals/fuck-ups could happen and then the fandom would just sit on those for months. Instead of getting the next part of the story that resolved whatever just happened the fandom could sit there and stew in theories and emotions. So characters messing up would be blown out of proration and the resolution wouldn't feel like it actually enough effort on the one that messed up end.
One example was Cry for Help. When Pearl tricked Garnet into fusing more often. If I remember right, we didn't get to Pearl and Garnet actually talking out what happened there until months after the fact. In story not much time had past but for the audience that was plenty of time for people to be offended on Garnet's behalf and distort what happened.
Anther issue was "Gem Harvest" dropped right around the 2016 election. You know when Trump became president. This was made long before the election, but there were people who took that timing as somehow Rebecca Sugar and the Crew saying stuff that they weren't. I would also say this was when the discourse really took off. If that episode had aired when the crew thought it would, probably a year or months before then, I don't think people would have misread it was much as they did. It was about communication and also Uncle Andy is the one that had to realize that the way he acted had caused him to be isolated from his family. This wasn't Steven had to "make his racist uncle no longer racist all on his own" but "Steven gave him encouragement that it wasn't too late to change". But the timing was terrible and the Crew had no control on that. The Steven Bombs made several seasons last for years when they should have been over in some months.
Second, studio interference that fandom blamed on Rebecca Sugar and the Crew. The scheduling, the ending of the show feeling rushed; those were things that parts of the fandom blamed on the crew not the network. There were people that I recall saying that the crew just needed to change how Steven Universe was written to fit with the bomb format better, when the bomb format wasn't something that the crew ever wanted. That wasn't the show style that they were telling. The show got axed because Rebecca Sugar and the Crew wouldn't drop the wedding. They wanted it there because it was important to have in a kid's show. But because they stuck to their guns the rest of the story had to be speed up, and people thought that the crew should have written the ending better; when that ending was planned to have at least another season, not a week long set of episodes. Steven Universe was set up to be a long term story. One that gave time to each character to unpack their mindset and issues. But they couldn't do that with the Diamonds.
Third, people not understanding the theme of the show. Steven Universe was about family, emotions, and open communication solving issues. Characters resolved their issues by talking about them. By being open about what the issues were. That was the reason Gem War happened; because open communication because Pink Diamond and the other Diamonds just couldn't happen. We see that Steven is at his worst when he bottles up his emotions or refuses to talk about an issue that he knows he has. But despite this theme by the time we got to Change Your Mind, people were cheering for the idea of Steven shattering the Diamonds. Which ignores the theme of the show; communication. There were people that wanted Steven to kill the Diamonds when this wasn't that type of show. Steven always hated when he couldn't talk to another character and had to bubble them. Why would this kid resort to killing? That goes against the themes of this show.
Fourth, the rushed ending. The events of Change Your Mind, was something that the crew wanted to be its own season. I imagine that if the crew had gotten what they wanted we would have spent more time on Homeworld with Steven getting to know the Diamonds and sorting out their issues. Blue Diamond would have been first since we had set up with her character first. We saw her living with the regrets of losing Pink Diamond and now not doing her duties as a Diamond. But because of how rushed the ending had to be at that point the audience didn't get that time that they had wanted. Think about how long Lars's arc was. That was several seasons long. If they had gotten a season with the Diamonds like they wanted people probably wouldn't have thought that the ending was rushed.
Fifth, bad faith criticism and very toxic fandom. As I said I blocked the SU Crit tag because after a certain point people would take anything and start shoving completely off the rails criticisms at the show and expect everyone to take them in good faith. Like people claiming that Sugar, a Jewish creator, was a Nazi Apologist because Steven didn't kill the Diamonds. People projected things onto elements of the story that weren't there. People would take a screen shot and call it lazy animation because a character was off model for a fraction of a second that wouldn't be noticed without slowing it down. There was a lot of bad faith criticism. Some of it was probably from people that didn't like how queer Steven Universe was and hid it as saying it wasn't progressive enough. There were probably people that thought that a kid's show was actually not progressive enough without looking at everything behind the scenes that the creators were dealing with. There were fans that drove one of the story-boarders/writers off the show because on her own Twitter account she posted shipping art of two of the characters (Lapis Lazuli and Peridot). It was just one member of the crew showing that she liked the dynamic between two characters that was not cannon and people started harassing them. There was a lot of entitlement from the fandom.
All of those things combined just made for a terrible time.
TL;DR: The show schedule being all over the place, studio interference, people not understanding the theme of the show, the rushed ending, and a toxic fandom with bad faith criticisms all led to the show having the worst reputation. I would say that the show schedule and studio interference played the biggest part of it since other parts stemmed issues that those created.
Agreed with all of this, but as a sort of continuation of point three:
The danger of adults watching a children's show because "It's so good it could be an adult's show!" is exactly this. Shows that are literally and explicitly for kids have much simpler messaging. One of my least favourite sentences in the world is when you remind someone who is whining about a piece of children's media for not doing what they wanted out of the story that it's aimed at kids and they say "But being for kids doesn't mean it can't still be good!"
Bitch it IS good. 'Good' doesn't mean 'Does the stuff adults want so it feels satisfying and fulfilling to adults'. It means 'Does the stuff the target audience wants and successfully conveys to that audience its message.' Adults are not the target audience. Get a grip and remember you're a guest. Your enjoyment is not the point. You cannot say "The Animaniacs sucked because there was no character development and they would suddenly sing educational songs - I wanted more world building about what these alien things were and how they got into the water tower and what that means for the fabric of American society" IT WAS A KID'S SHOW THAT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE FUNNY AND EDUCATIONAL. AND IT WAS. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU
In the case of Steven Universe, Rebecca Sugar once said the aim was to 'redefine masculinity' for children - the point of the show is that Steven is surrounded by powerful women without ever feeling emasculated, and is properly and healthily connected to his emotions. He's not afraid to cry. He's open with his fears. He goes through increasing trauma, and the moral of that is 'Dont bottle up, talk to your loved ones.'
And, crucially, his first and primary response to antagonism is "Let's talk about this" and not "Let's punch this."
It was adults who turned that into a "Talk to Nazis uwu" parable, and then got mad about it; children, the target audience, did not. Children are people who are very much still learning how to process their emotions and handle conflict on the playground. Young boys are learning that they aren't allowed to cry or have feelings other than anger. Young girls are learning that they aren't allowed power and strength. All children are being told that a family can only look one way, that love can only follow one path. SU provided clear role models to the contrary and was extremely valuable for that.
And then adults projected real world political allegories onto it because that's how adult fiction works, and decided that meant it was bad and that Rebecca Sugar, a queer Jewish enby, was actually a Nazi apologist. Just a trash fire of a fandom
every day i am percieved™️
There is a reason for this though!
The original tweet summarizes it pretty well. Fanfic tends to be popular among certain types of neurodivergent people (aka people most likely to read excessively as a child, and have burnout as an adult) for the same reasons that we tend to hyperfixate–neurochemical signaling (I hope I’m using that phrase correctly). What I mean is, for people who are really dependent on changes in dopamine/serotonin/neurotransmitter levels, who have low levels or wonky neural reward systems (perhaps the most common types of neurodivergence)…people like us rely on dependable external sources of those neurochemicals. In order to function, we spend a lot of our free time trying to level out our brain chemistry using things that can reliably bring us a steady stream of joyful moments (rewards) without costing too much of the mental effort that is already in short supply.
significantly: the investment of reading has to be balanced with a steady “return on investment”–and this return has to start fairly quickly. because again, we don’t have a lot of attention/energy to invest on tiring things. we have perpetual “low batteries” in that regard.
that doesn’t mean these stories are “simple,” or that they lack complexity or value–only that the reward has to come in short regular intervals, and it has to have a low “upfront cost.” these stories are only “easy” to read in the sense that the effort we put into them is rewarded in a timely manner. which is why fanfic stories are so perfectly formulated for neurodivergent readers–they are often beautifully written, but skip a lot of the upfront costs (of introducing new characters, of world-building, of getting the audience emotionally connected to the story elements).
the nature of fanfiction is that the reader has a pre-existing relationship with this world and these characters. that–combined with the shorter average length of fics–means that fan fics very quickly start rewarding the reader in a way that traditional fiction struggles to. that’s not a bad thing! and maybe it’s something more traditionally published writers should be paying attention to.
Fanfic, as a genre, has been uniquely helpful and accessible to many neurodivergent readers who would otherwise struggle to immerse themselves in stories. I’m glad so many of you have found a way to love and enjoy reading again! The important thing is that you are spending time inside stories you love–the way those stories are published or presented to the world is just one detail. The fact that you find joy in the process of reading (or listening!) to stories–that is what matters.
timeywimeywerewolf
I feel understood 🥰
a bunch of people have reblogged this with the default “i feel called out” reaction….and i know when we say that we mean it tongue-in-cheek….but this comment sorta blew my mind & shifted my perspective up and to the left a little thank you♥
LMAO the last one! The strongman’s immediately like “No. No, absolutely not. Nope.” and the bodybuilder looks around like “Are you kidding me? I’ll die. You know that, right? I’ll die?”
The Rogue, the Paladin, the Barbarian have a day to themselves and enjoy some friendly competition.
This is such a fun video to watch. Not only do you see 3 versions of masculine fitness and strength but with each movement you can almost see where their weight is distributed and where they place their control. Which makes it fun to think about body builds and fantasy characters.
“if no art makes you feel anything, make your own art and feel something” is too raw of a line to have come from a jenna marbles video of her painting a rainbow/polka dot seahorse saying “it’s seahorse time” on a denim jacket
Why do you people feel profound thought has to come from high places? The gutter looks at the stars too
not only did you prove your point, but you showed an example of it in the same sentence
funnytwittertweets
*adds a sprinkle of cornstarch to the plot and stirs*
PSA
If you happen to stumble upon an ad that looks like this, DO NOT SCROLL DOWN.
The rest of the ad is a very tall GIF of strobing red light that can potentially cause seizures. You cannot scroll past this ad quickly enough to avoid seeing it.
There seems to be no way to report the ad, so the next best thing is to use an adblocker (if you haven’t already) or even stay off the mobile app.
Please reblog to help spread awareness.
"well if you didn't want to have a seizure you should have paid us for ad-free" - literally the guy running this place a few weeks ago in that Q&A session
[Image: "Sponsored by WordAds: No Bleach Hair color #HairDye: Now it's possible to get a gorgeous hair color without bleach order on Etuide.com". Below the text is a blotchy fuchsia square. End ID.]
this was cute until i realized the fish is probably trying to not get eaten
killhitleragain
A fish trying not to get eaten wouldn’t slow down when the “predator” slows down. It also wouldn’t constantly swim in a circle near the edge of the tank; It’d try hiding. Also a fish in a tank in a a public place that is constantly filled with people is not likely to see people as predators.
Animals, I think people tend to forget, also enjoy playing.
yeah that fish is absolutely playing with that kid, if it really wanted to escape it would just dive into the reef in the center of the tank!
(Moorish Idols are reef fish and naturally will seek shelter in the nearest nook or cranny if they get scared.)
many people don’t realize this, but fish aren’t stupid animals! most of them are on par with mammals like mice and squirrels in terms of intelligence, and they absolutely do play.
I was at an aquarium a few years ago and decided to sketch a fish. It came up to me.
I decided to flip the book around and pressed it against the glass. Fish lost it
Swam away then came back with MORE FISH
to this day I love those little sketches and I really love how I got the fish to bring me it’s friends
Hi! Professional marine biologist and aquarist here- fish absolutely play, and not only that, can be trained.
I accidentally trained a fish once through playing.
Let me explain.
The small-time aquarium I worked at about 4 years ago had a decent sized female Sheephead. Sheephead are bright red with the males sporting a black head, and get big. I’m talking almost 1m long at full maturity (and may or may not transition from female to male depending on the number of males present). Point is, even though not fully matured, this Sheephead was a bit of a heavyweight in her kelp forest tank with a length of about 1ft making her the resident Biggest Dog In The Yard. And she absolutely knew it. She would bully her tankmates if she wanted to steal their food.
The thing about this Sheephead- let’s call her Red- is that she had one heck of a ‘tude. Red was known to splash aquarists whenever they fed the tank, and at almost a foot long with a wide tail, her splashes had quite a bit of heft and would soak you from the torso down. We were advised to bring a towel or two to protect ourselves from most of the drenching. When it was my go-around to feed Red’s tank, I was fairly new to the little facility, but I had been warned in advance of Red’s penchant for food thievery. I noticed she would follow my hand movements, so I slowly moved to drop her food in a far corner, and fed her tankmates directly from my hands or by tong if they were too deep. I always made sure Red had plenty to eat, but I didn’t want her to associate the food with bad behavior, so I treated her to a bit extra food whenever she didn’t steal food. One day, she made a beeline to the surface so fast that she did a small jump, her entire head breaching the water. She wasn’t bothering her tankmates or doing anything remotely dangerous- and full disclosure, it was cute seeing a fish jump for joy- so I laughed and gave her another piece of food.
Naturally, positive reinforcement led to her connecting the dots that jumping at the surface, even the tiny jumps she was doing, meant she got more food.
This started to become an everyday occurrence, whenever I was assigned to feed Red’s tank. She would jump, just enough for her head to pop out, then she’d wait patiently for me to give her the treat she CLEARLY earned. It even got to the point that she’d open her mouth and I’d drop the food right into those massive jaws- this was preferable to her Kenghis Khan-ing her way through a shower of chopped squid like the Tasmanian Devil, as there was less risk of her accidentally (or purposefully) biting a tankmate that got too close. Red became a polite eater for the first time.
It wasn’t until I noticed she followed me around outside of feeding time that I realized Red was playing with me.
I never got splashed by Red even once. My coworkers, however, received quite the dunking whenever it was their turn to feed the kelp tank.
There are many benefits to being a marine biologist
Listen to me. Listen to me. Listen to me. Listen to me.
I know there is a lot of discourse (tm) around this right now but listen to me
sometimes you do just have to lie to children.
If, when my toddler is, you know, toddling around saying “mama? Big ball?”
If I were lean down and say “unfortunately the big beach ball for some reason fills you with such an unadulterated rage that is beyond human comprehension that you scream until you pass out, so mama had to remove the beach ball from the premises until you can better regulate your emotions” she would simply stare at me like I had 3 heads full of equal betrayal.
So, for now, instead “big ball went night night!”
Please understand when I say “removed the ball from the premises” I mean I popped it in a fit of exhausted confusion. I murdered the beach ball.
See I’ve lied to you all too and it was better this way.
you can’t just leave this in the tags etc.
You can’t be funnier then me on my own posts, I’m in tears from laughter
I feel so bad for people who think cats don't love you. cats are such incredibly loving creatures and u have never felt the joy of being loved by a cat
you, reading this. you're a creature now. reblog to creature your followers
get creatured idiot
oh thank fuck i thought i was never gonna get creatured
God I'm a sucker for characters who are so utterly loyal to someone that they're completely unhinged. Characters who have no moral compass except their overwhelming devotion to whoever they've chosen to listen to. That's the good shit
Happy Halloween
^these are the additions I want on my posts. Take notes people
august is upon us which means it’s officially halloween time. please start posting your spooky cats again
Ok !!
Spooky kitten
