By @skeedelvee on AO3 (E)

I just loved this fic so much, this is my way to show it and to invite you to read if you haven’t because is endearingly amazing!

When your dad can overlook your vampirism, but being queer is going TOO FAR

trying to figure out the birth year of the Simon Snow Series characters . i hate this! <3

so far here are my thoughts (keep it in mind that i hate maths and this could be very wrong LOL)

for Simon and Baz, it's done. 21 June and 24 February 1997. Agatha is their age, so 3 October, 1997 1996! (thanks again @ martsonmars)

Penny is probably from 1998, since she's from January and was sent to Watford early. Shepard was 22 in AWTWB/2017, so May 18, 1995.

now, as for the side characters

Lucy must be from around 1975: she was also sent to Watford a year early, probably graduated around 1993, ran off when she was ~20, and was ~22 when Simon was born. "would only be in her 40s" in AWTWB/2017.

Mitali went to her class, so she is probably from around 1973, about 25 years older than Penny. I'd guess Martin is as old as them, and Davy is also about that age. Agatha's mum is about 5 or 6 years older than them, so late 60s (1968 or 1969)

Fiona was also a easy one. She's 37 in 2015/CO, so 1977. This also means she 18/19 when Baz was born, which tracks, because she was in her final year when Natasha was pregnant. Since they're classmates, Ebb is probably also from 1977, as well as Nicodemus (in AWTWB Nico "must be nearly 40")

For Jamie, i'm fairly sure he's from 1978, since around 39 in AWTWB (Lady Ruth showed a picture of his 38th birthday last year)

Now, thanks to this post (bless u @martsonmars) there's a pretty clear timeline for Baz's siblings: Mordelia was born in 2008 (7 in CO/December 2015, 8 in AWTWB/June 2017), Sophie & Petra were born in 2011 (at least 5 ½ in AWTWB, will turn 6 in July-December 2017, were 4 in CO) or 2012 (turned 5 in January-June 2017, were 3 ½ in CO), and Swithin was born around July 2015 (nearly 2 years old in AWTWB, roughly 5/6 months old in CO)

And finally: i feel like Natasha is a tricky one, but probably mid 1960s (EDIT: since apparently rainbow's said she's 9 years older than Lucy, 1965/1966 or something). Malcolm is from around 1963; or at least i think so. apparently he was 46 when Mordelia was born, 8 years before AWTWB, and that would make him ~54 in June 2017. it's also stated that Daphne is still in her 30s, so she's from the 80s (i'd guess early 80s)

i hate numbers :D

Friendly reminder that LGBTQ+, Queer, and LGBT+ are the preferred terms for the community (x).

Friendly reminder that Queer is approved by 72.9% of the people, and the groups who don’t prefer it’s use as an umbrella term are straight people, exclusionists, transmeds, truscums, sex-negative people, and sex work critical people (x).

Friendly reminder that aros and aces are excluded only 9.2% / 8.1% of the time respectively while being included  78.9% / 81.2% of the time (x)

Friendly reminder that exclusionists are in the minority and aro/ace people are included in the LGBTQ+ community by the people within the community.

Also, i checked out the survey the second claim sources a while back: this is not OP choosing the words truscum, exclusionist, etc. These are labels that the survey gave people the option to self-identify as. It’s self-proclaimed exclusionists who dont like the word queer, not random accusations

yeah that’s super important. 

This one gets reblogged on main. The reclassification of ‘queer’ as an inexcusable slur is a recent development which stems in part from exclusionist rhetoric. We reclaimed it decades ago. Learn our history. You are not immune to TERF propaganda, but you can absolutely choose to educate yourself to spite it.

Be kind. 💜

“Authors should not be ALLOWED to write about–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“This book should be taken off of shelves for featuring–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“Schools shouldn’t teach this book in class because–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“Nobody actually likes or wants to read classics because they’re–” you are an anti-intellectual and an idiot

“I only read YA fantasy books because every classic novel or work of literary fiction is problematic and features–” you are an anti-intellectual and you are robbing yourself of the full richness of the human experience.

"you are functionally a conservative" is such a good and clarifying insult

Literally right after I saw this post, I saw another post in a discord chat for BOOK EDITORS in which an outspokenly liberal editor talked about how Nabokov should have never been published because he wrote about p*dophiles and described women's bodies in ways that made her uncomfortable. She described his writing as "objectively terrible" and said she wanted to burn his books. And other editors were bringing up classics they didn't like and talking about how they wanted to throw them in the trash. This wasn't like a light "unpopular opinion!" conversation. This was actual book editors talking about how books should be destroyed and censored.

There is something so scary and toxic in global culture right now. The revival of fascism is influencing everyone's mindset and approach to art, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum.

I see far more books being censored today than when I was a kid. Librarians handed me The Catcher in the Rye, The Sexual Politics of Meat, and Animal Farm when I was literally 8-11. My mom would never have taken a book away from me. I read everything from the Tao Te Ching to the Qur'an to atheist texts under my desk at school. Teachers thought nothing of it or encouraged it. Books seemed universally acknowledged as sacrosanct to me.

Now I can't find any adults who don't hesitate or want to make exceptions when it comes to censorship. Even the most liberal social activist librarians I know go, "well except for book X..."

Functionally conservative. It's so important to have the language to express that.

Thank you for this addition!

And, following up on the previous post …

“This makes me uncomfortable” is NOT a valid reason for censorship

These fucking book editors should remove themselves from the profession ASAP 😡

The only reason a book should be removed, the ONLY reason, is “we are keeping it in the restricted section for research because its only intended function is to cause harm.”

And to be clear, when I say this, I’m talking about shit like To Train Up A Child and The Protocols of Zion. One is a text responsible for the deaths of multiple children because it’s an abuse how-to, and the other is entirely fabricated “protocols” from a group that never actually existed but is claimed to represent all Jews, and it’s basically one long antisemitic screed.

And even these should be available. Just. Not where they’re gonna be used to start a white supremacist cult.

This is applicable for movies too!! Like especially in India. There has been a couple of movies released that was banned in many places for a variety of different issues ( The Kerala story and Adipurush). And i don't like both these movies in a political and in a cinematic sense. But i don't support banning them. Fascism is on the rise in India and i fear this is just the beginning

“Authors should not be ALLOWED to write about–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“This book should be taken off of shelves for featuring–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“Schools shouldn’t teach this book in class because–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“Nobody actually likes or wants to read classics because they’re–” you are an anti-intellectual and an idiot

“I only read YA fantasy books because every classic novel or work of literary fiction is problematic and features–” you are an anti-intellectual and you are robbing yourself of the full richness of the human experience.

"you are functionally a conservative" is such a good and clarifying insult

Literally right after I saw this post, I saw another post in a discord chat for BOOK EDITORS in which an outspokenly liberal editor talked about how Nabokov should have never been published because he wrote about p*dophiles and described women's bodies in ways that made her uncomfortable. She described his writing as "objectively terrible" and said she wanted to burn his books. And other editors were bringing up classics they didn't like and talking about how they wanted to throw them in the trash. This wasn't like a light "unpopular opinion!" conversation. This was actual book editors talking about how books should be destroyed and censored.

There is something so scary and toxic in global culture right now. The revival of fascism is influencing everyone's mindset and approach to art, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum.

I see far more books being censored today than when I was a kid. Librarians handed me The Catcher in the Rye, The Sexual Politics of Meat, and Animal Farm when I was literally 8-11. My mom would never have taken a book away from me. I read everything from the Tao Te Ching to the Qur'an to atheist texts under my desk at school. Teachers thought nothing of it or encouraged it. Books seemed universally acknowledged as sacrosanct to me.

Now I can't find any adults who don't hesitate or want to make exceptions when it comes to censorship. Even the most liberal social activist librarians I know go, "well except for book X..."

Functionally conservative. It's so important to have the language to express that.

Thank you for this addition!

And, following up on the previous post …

“This makes me uncomfortable” is NOT a valid reason for censorship

These fucking book editors should remove themselves from the profession ASAP 😡

The only reason a book should be removed, the ONLY reason, is “we are keeping it in the restricted section for research because its only intended function is to cause harm.”

And to be clear, when I say this, I’m talking about shit like To Train Up A Child and The Protocols of Zion. One is a text responsible for the deaths of multiple children because it’s an abuse how-to, and the other is entirely fabricated “protocols” from a group that never actually existed but is claimed to represent all Jews, and it’s basically one long antisemitic screed.

And even these should be available. Just. Not where they’re gonna be used to start a white supremacist cult.

The Elitism of Language in the World of Mages

Mitali Bunce doesn't like it that her kid uses yeet as a spell.

From the first time I read Any Way the Wind Blows, this grabbed my attention. It's a fact that speaks to a background tension within the World of Mages: the language that is used to draw upon magic has to be the "correct" language, or the words won't contain power. There are classes at Watford dedicated not only to the performance of magic spells (such as Magic Words and Elocution), but classes that also immerse students in the collective pool of knowledge on which to draw from for spells. We know, for example, that Shakespeare is a good source for spells, due to the cultural endurance of the Bard's plays. But we also know the complications of using Shakespeare: when Baz casts "On love's light wings" in Carry On, he explains that this spell only works effectively if 1.) you are hopelessly in love, and 2.) if you understand the Great Vowel Shift, a phenomenon that occurred while Shakespeare was writing his plays, and why the dialogue as spoken sometimes sounds stilted to today's ears - the pronunciation of words is different.

Nursery rhymes are effective spells. Poetry, such as William Blake's The Tyger, is a body of work with a wealth of spell potential. Idioms work. Songs are a bit trickier and depend more on cultural context to work. Penny can cast "Work It" by Missy Elliot (I put my thang down, flip it and reverse it) more effectively in the U.S. in Wayward Son because the song presumably has more cultural power there than in England. Also in Wayward Son, Penny and Baz sing "Amazing Grace" to recover their lost objects, a song with Anglican roots in England that also works in the U.S. because of its popularization as a hymn during the Second Great Awakening. The Mage casts part of "Bohemian Rhapsody" in Carry On, and I don't think I need to explain how popular Queen and "Bohemian Rhapsody" are on a worldwide scale. By contrast, when Penny and Simon are testing spells with chess pieces in Carry On, Penny casts "The game is on!", a phrase popularized at the time by BBC Sherlock, and it's ineffective.

Overall, we see a pattern of what constitutes an effective spell. The words have to be specific. The words have to be spoken with intent, in the correct order, and with proper pronunciation. Cultural context plays a significant role as well: in Wayward Son, Penny and Baz are at a loss initially because some of their customary English spells don't have the same cultural impact in the U.S.

So how does yeet fit into this?

JUNO KEEPS REFERRING TO NUREYEV AS "MY THEIF" AND "MY MAN" AND I AM GOING TO START EATING DRYWALL ABOUT IT

Tragedy! You set out to read a negative review of a piece of media you dislike, only to find that the critic is being completely unfair to it and making a bunch of bad, unsupportable arguments.

#yeah. this is actually the worst#because if someone likes something for the wrong reasons and you like it too you can just sort of shrug off their opinion#but if they dislike it in a way that's unfair it's actually infuriating because now you've been put in the position#of defending this absolute dogshit piece of media - even if only in your own head - against their unreasonable complaints#it's the exact opposite of catharsis

Me: “Disney live action remakes are soulless cash grabs that deny the original writers and artists the credit they deserve” Some fucking chud: “Exactly! They never should have started wokeifying all their movies” Me:

“Baz’s eyes are usually the kind of grey that happen when you mix dark blue and dark green together. Deep-water grey.”

“There’s nothing remarkable about Snow’s eyes. They’re a standard size and shape. A little pouchy. And his eyelashes are stubby and dark brown. His eyes aren’t even a remarkable colour. Just blue.”

Maurice girlies (gender-neutral) it's my duty to inform you that a Vietnamese LGBT movie channel have made a fan reconstruction of the 1987 movie, by adding all deleted scenes (which include establishing wayyyy earlier that Alec works at Durham's, establishing Alec's bisexuality, Maurice's beautiful ending monologue to Clive, and many more) resulting in a movie that's almost 3 hours long, and uploaded it to youtube (with English subtitles!) here!

idk what traumatized or mentally ill person needs to hear this but dreams (especially the really disturbing ones you dont want to talk about to anybody) arent some deep peek into your psyche or a sign of your True Desires or whatever theyre quite literally your brain making fruit salad with whatever it can find on the shelf. just putting all that shit in a blender and hitting obliterate. its fine, youre fine, youre not a weirdo for it

there's a part of my brain that really wonders how simon snow would feel if he knew how many people just unironically celebrated his birthday, on a meta level. not because it's like a chosen-one national holiday and he's the protagonist, but because they love him as a person and want to see him succeed, prophecy be damned.

ID text–

Post by “Mike I Guess” @‌mike_i_guess:

“The men in white are the surviving members of the Original San Francisco Gay Men’s Choir. Those in black represent the members lost to AIDs. Remember this when people say the gay community survived the epidemic. We had to start over because we lost a whole generation.” (original post)

also the past was a very different world re: identity and openness

there may be plenty of LGBT boomers (and older people still) who grew up with a “don’t ask; don’t tell” mindset and thus aren’t OutTM to be recognized

Having lost my partner and many friends to this dreaded disease, I carry anger and depression in my heart for the years we were ignored.

Born in the late 40′s. It was dangerous to be anything but what people expected. You never came out. Then starting in the 70′s and 80′s, the devastating disaster of HIV, made slow, painful death and funerals all there was to life. No one cared. We are out here. Not really feeling that the danger has passed.

snowbaz fandom im actually begging you to be more active on ao3 what happened to like 20 new fics a day where the hell are you guys i just want a good old fashion 8th year spell gone wrong fic is that really too much to ask

June 20, 2023 - Congratulations Estonia on legalizing same-sex marriage!

pavitr my friend pavitr