that way madness lies

[that way madness lies]

Apple Raisin Cider Teabread

[breelandwalker]

Ingredients:

• 8 oz self-rising flour
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1 level tsp mixed spice (apple pie spice or pumpkin spice will do)
• 4 oz butter
• 3 oz soft brown sugar
• 3 oz raisins, soaked in 2 tbsp cider
• 1 medium cooking apple, peeled, cored, and finely chopped
• 2 medium eggs
• Glaze: 2 oz soft brown sugar, 2 tbsp cider

Set oven to 350 F. Grease a 2 lb loaf tin.

Place the flour, salt, and spice into a bowl. Rub the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Stir in the sugar, apple, and raisin/cider mixture. Add the eggs and mix well.

Put the mixture into the loaf tin and bake for approximately one hour until golden and cooked through when tested with a skewer. Turn out to cool on a wire rack.

Boil the glaze ingredients together for 3 or 4 minutes and brush over the warm loaf. Serve sliced, plain or buttered.

- from Favourite Somerset Recipes (Salmon)

[that way madness lies]

mugsandpugs1 asked:

Sometimes I feel guilty because all of my books come from the library. Even books I really love, like yours. I just read so fast and so much that buying books isn't a good financial choice. Do authors receive any benefit from library readers?

seananmcguire answered:

Oh my gosh, honey*, no.  No no no.  Please, please don’t feel guilty for using the library, or for going to the used book store, or for borrowing from a friend.  All these things are built into the literary ecosystem, and publishers have had literally centuries to get used to them.

Do authors receive any benefit from library readers?  Absolutely.  We receive readers.  Maybe you will never personally buy a book in your life.  But.  You have friends who will.  You can leave reviews on places like Amazon and Goodreads.  You can make sure the world knows which books you enjoyed, and that our publishers know that you want to see more.

Libraries pay for the books they loan out.  With physical books, they pay for an object, which will stay in circulation for X number of loans before it gets purged due to wear and tear.  With electronic books, they pay for a license, which allows the book to be loaned a certain number of times before it needs to be licensed again.  Yes, this means a single sale can represent dozens of patrons, but there is still, at the root, a sale.

Piracy is a problem because there is no root sale; because the e-book “license” doesn’t exist and hence never expires, meaning our publishers have no way of measuring a book’s popularity; because it’s outside the feedback loop.  But the loop is large, and meant to accommodate those of us who can’t buy alongside those of us who can.  I promise.

(*We do not know each other and I am not trying to offend: this is just where my speech patterns go when I am worried I have hurt someone accidentally.  If you dislike “honey” from a parasocial acquaintance, please substitute the respectful term of your choice.  I suggest “High Inquisitor Sugarbat.”)

[aeliad]

As someone who has worked in a library, and not someone who ever worked in publishing, this is part  of why libraries don’t want you reshelving books, too. They log patron interactions with books. It helps them know what’s popular, which in turn helps them decide what to buy, etc. 

It’s all tracked. It’s all valuable. All of it ultimately ends up helping authors even if it’s not as direct as purchasing a book.

So when you pull a book off the shelf, even if you’re totally sure you know where it goes, put it on a reshelving cart anyway. And when you love a book by an author? Definitely talk to you branch librarian about it. They can help you out, which can end up helping out the author you like, too. 

Local libraries are wonderful things. I love mine so much. It got me through times when I was too broke to afford books, when I desperately needed books as ways to escape. My library is still a useful resource, if not as desperately needed, and I love using Link+ to get books that my branch doesn’t have.

[professorerudite]

If anyone wanted to know, libraries are the Holy Grail. Support your local library by donations if you can afford it and patronage regardless of financial situation.

[that way madness lies]

cthulhu-with-a-fez asked:

for the spotify meme, what about... mmmm, either 42 or 93 for ladynoir (or adrinette or ladrien or marichat), whichever one works best?

words-writ-in-starlight answered:

I actually gave a plot rundown of this AU in this epic post of Tam Lin AU’s, so here is a scene instead.

93: Long and Lost - Florence + The Machine

all those bridges (now old stone)

Marinette prides herself on being a hard worker, on being someone who can be relied on and trusted, on getting things done.

However.

It’s the last gasp of summer, the sky blue barely edged with grey clouds promising rain, and her embroidery isn’t holding her attention nearly as well as it usually does.  She’s finishing a dress for the lady of the castle, the very first one she’s made entirely on her own, and she’s hoping to have the paneled skirt and the delicate red coils done in enough time to do a final check of the sizing before Alya’s birthday.  It takes some doing, keeping a secret hidden from the nobility that commands Marinette’s home, but she has eighteen days left and her best friend remains oblivious–despite the twins’ best efforts to get it out of her.

The fourth time Marinette catches herself holding the needle halfway through a stitch, staring out the window instead of focusing, she huffs in disgust and tosses the whole affair down, needle and all.  Her window is open, to bring in the sweet smell of ripening crops and the first edge of fall, but right now, as she leans out the edge, all she can smell is the heavy perfume of the roses on Carterhaugh.

The flowers bloom twice a year, once at the start of summer in June, and once just as summer dies and the leaves start to turn, in late September.  The field would be perfect for real crops–so close to the castle that it would make an ideal vegetable garden, broad and sweeping, but no one touches the roses.  Marinette doesn’t remember how old she was the first time she was told not to go to Carterhaugh, not ever, because it presses up against the trees on its far side and the Folk might creep out and steal away pretty girls and boys for their revels.  Marinette is not, entirely, convinced that she believes in the Folk, but roses have thorns and she’s never felt the need to try her luck.

Today, though–today the sky is clear and the sun is warm for what will probably be the last time all year, the air buzzing gently with the rising activity of the harvest, and the scent of the roses makes her feel restless, as if her skin is suddenly ill-fitted around her bones.  Marinette wants to do something new.

Carterhaugh is new.

She tucks away Alya’s gift before she can think better of it, pins her kirtle up to keep it from catching too much on the roses, and walks in her sturdy boots all the way out to Carterhaugh.

Keep reading

[that way madness lies]

#RepresentationMatters

[dontwantthenextcommanderiwantyou]

Amandla Stenberg, Lesbian:“I’m grateful for how being gay has afforded me this ability to experience & understand love and sex, and therefore life, in an expansive and infinite way. The continual process of unlearning heteronormativity and internalized homophobia can be difficult, but one of the biggest blessings lies in the magic that comes from having to understand love outside the confines of learned heterosexual roles. Once I was able to rid myself of those parameters, I found myself in a deep well of unbounded and untouchable love free from the dominion of patriarchy. If I had more representation of black gay women growing up, I probably would’ve come to conclusions around my sexuality much earlier because I would’ve had more of a conception of what was possible and OK. Having more representations of black gay women now and seeing myself reflected in them has been a huge aid in seeing myself as whole, complete, and normal.”

Lena Waithe, Lesbian: “Tonight this cape is not imaginary, it’s rainbow-colored. And we got the black and brown stripes, you know. I’m reppin’ my community, and I want everybody to know that you can be whoever you are and be completely proud, so wear the damn cape.”

Janelle Monae, Pansexual: “Being a queer black woman in America, someone who has been in relationships with men and women I consider myself to be a free-ass motherfucker.”

Tessa Thompson, Bisexual: “In my family you can be anything you want to be. I’m attracted to men and also to women. If I bring a woman home, or a man, we don’t even have to have the discussion. I want everyone else to have that freedom and support that I have from my loved ones.”

#20Gayteen

[that way madness lies]

[benkling]

💚 Tumblr!!! You’ve been so kind to me! 💚

I’ve got 10 days left to raise funds for

DRYP - an app that helps you keep plants alive & happy!

This is a little ad I made for the app

out of frustration with the marketing of plants as lifestyle products for rich people with all-white apartments.

YOU TOO CAN HAVE A LOVELY GREEN HOME, I PROMISE! 💚🌱 IT’S NOT JUST FOR GWYNETH PALTROW!

Here again are the basic functions of the app:

And here again are some of the rewards for backing it!

Please signal boost to help me make this app a reality! Thank you! 🌱🌱🌱

[that way madness lies]

[joestrummin]

i didnt realise ao3 was started in response to lj deleting account relating to p//edophi|ia and they explicitly support the posting of such works yikes

[tomato-greens]

it wasn’t, like, ~~~we luv pedophilia, it was way more complicated than that!

although it’s true AO3 does allow all fannish content provided it’s properly warned for, there’s a long history there - of spaces being used by fans until the host decided whatever we were doing was too weird and distasteful and either kicking us off, banning certain content, or changing the nature of the site until it was no longer viable as a host.

you’re referring to the LJ Strikethrough of 2007, which, being an ancient crone, I lived through, and since I was hanging out in the last vestiges of SGA and in bandom, I saw some of the fallout. this was before LJ was sold to the Russians (which is a whole ‘nother story), when it was still owned by Six Apart; in an effort to clean up LJ’s act, Six Apart decided to delete all accounts using tags like underage, incest, rape, etc.

this was supposed to get rid of actual child porn on the site, and I hope it did, but it also targeted fan communities. this was a problem for a couple reasons; for one thing, not every story tagged with these words is in favor of them; for another, these things happen to real people and these personal posts were also potentially in danger of being attacked; for the last one, look, I ain’t into this kind of fic but people write about what people write about, and if it’s fictional and not explicitly banned in the TOS (correct me if I’m wrong; I don’t think written content about this stuff was banned?) then it’s not cool for a content host to just start deleting communities without warning.

but that’s what happened! these deletions were also primarily targeting slash communities, which smacked of some serious homophobia since things were deleted that had nothing to do with any of this kind of content.

eventually someone found out it was this super conservative religious group who’d sent a list of journal names to Six Apart, and who if I remember correctly targeted slash fic on purpose, even after it became clear that the fic was, well, totally fictional. after a while, Six Apart admitted they’d made a mistake and started to reinstate journals, but all of fandom was pretty shaken up.

THEN Boldthrough happened, which was essentially the same debacle several months later, at which point fandom began its long slow migration from LJ to GJ, IJ, and eventually AO3, Twitter, and tumblr.

AO3 was opened in 2008 in response to several incidents, of which Strikethrough was a really intense one. remember, also, that back in 2008 the stigma surrounding fandom was significantly greater and more shameful than it is today, so finding hosts willing to archive fic was difficult unless someone had the dough to pay for server space - often not an option. this was also back when fanfic.net’s HTML restrictions were so great that users couldn’t use any special characters or bold or italicize anything, and it didn’t allow R-rated content, so it was clearly not ideal. in addition, although cease & desist letters were much less common than they were in the early 2000s and before, DMCA takedowns were still a phantom on the horizon.

LONG STORY SHORT, even though pedophilia is reprehensible and I personally cannot stomach fanfic that involves that kind of content, AO3 was founded specially as a safe space for fandom communities that could not find homes elsewhere. it requires warnings precisely for that reason, and if you find a story that is not properly warned, you can alert the admins and get the story labeled appropriately.

IDK, maybe it’s just because I am, again, ancient, but I was in and around fandom before homosexuality was legal in all 50 states. so were most of the people who started AO3. for most of my formative life, being gay was associated with pedophilia, and so was writing about gay characters. just - it’s a lot more complicated than you might expect, and there’s a reason many older fans who have been involved in several generations of fandom were so grateful to have AO3 as an option.

[beatrice-otter]

I don’t read, for example, Hydra Trash Party fics.  They squick me, and I generally feel they are pretty gross.  But writing noncon body-horror is not the same as saying “yeah, I totally want to go out and rape and torture people for years while brainwashing them!” or even “yeah, I wouldn’t do it myself, but it would be totally okay if someone did!”  Nobody is hurt by it, and nobody is going to be hurt by it.  So should I have the right to go, that is gross, you don’t get to write or read that?  No.

In the same way, writing about underage teens getting it on–sometimes with each other, sometimes with adults, sometimes consensually, sometimes not–is not the same as child pornography, nor does reading a fic about Hermione and Snape getting it on while she was his student mean someone thinks that would be a good and/or healthy thing in real life.

Fiction affects reality, but fiction is not reality.  And writing about something does not mean you want to do it in real life, or believe that anyone should.

Let’s take a closer look at that “Ao3 supports pedophilia!” shall we?

1) The only fics I have ever come across that had actual pedophilia (i.e. someone having sex with a child), it was clearly and explicitly abuse.  It was not meant to titillate or arouse.  It was meant to horrify.  It was seldom explicit.

2) There’s a lot more incest, but it is usually portrayed either as explicitly mutually consensual (i.e. Sam/Dean) or as abusive.

3) I’ve been in fandom for a decade and a half.  When people start getting upset at “omg pedophilia, think of the children!” the fics they are usually objecting to aren’t actually pedophilia.  Usually, it is teenagers having sex, especially queer sex.  And people don’t like that, and use pedophilia as an excuse to shame people for writing/reading sex they don’t like.

Let’s look closer at Strikethrough, shall we?  I hope that, if there were any communities of actual pedophiles on LJ, they got taken down, too.  But here are some of the communities that got taken down that were not in any way supporting pedophilia and/or rape and/or incest that got taken down:

1) at least one support community for survivors of sexual abuse.

2) a literary book discussion group that was reading Lolita.

3) lots of slash fanfic communities, for things like Draco/Harry fic set in their fourth year (when both boys would have been 15).

Basically, this very conservative “family values” group hated porn, and they hated queer stuff even more, and used “but think of the children, it’s pedophilia!” to pressure LJ to get rid of huge swathes of things they didn’t like.  And one time taking down the worst of it wasn’t good enough for them.  No, this was step one on a moral crusade.  If you acceded to their demands, all that did was whet their appetite, and soon they would be back with a new list of demands.  This is why the 2007 strikethrough was not an isolated event, but rather one of a series of events, nor was LJ the only website thus targeted.  It starts with anything that can get labelled “pedophilia” or “incest” because that’s low-hanging fruit.  But they use that to go after anything relating to queer teen sexuality.  Then anything with teen sexuality.  Then once the community is already divided and diminished, they go after anything with non-con.  Then whatever is next on their list.  It doesn’t stop until they’ve won the point and nothing but suitably “family-friendly” fics that match their purity test are allowed.

Which is why AO3 has no morality content in their terms of service.  You can’t break copyright beyond fair use (and AO3 has an expansive view of “fair use” and a team of lawyers on call).  You can’t use AO3 for commercial advertising.  And you can’t post ACTUAL child pornography, i.e. the things that are legally prohibited, i.e. actual photographs or videos of actual children (not teens) in sexually explicit positions–you know, the stuff that actually hurts kids.  Other than that?  It’s fair game.  You can post anything you want, and the archive will not judge.  There is no handle for the Moral Majority Family-Friendly Thought Police to latch onto, no cracks they can exploit to divide and conquer.

We’ve been down that road.  It doesn’t lead anywhere good.

[wrangletangle]

Reblogging this for the excellent explanation of what exactly the moral crusaders did last time. They had an explicit agenda of anti-queerness, and they specifically targeted slash and femslash communities in particular, such that many ship communities became (or started as) deliberately members-only. You had to apply, and your personal blog had to look like a real person and a fan. You were vetted, a la 1990s private servers.

During this period, Dreamwidth was also targeted by attacking its payment processor. They had to get a new one. These “Warriors” (literally called themselves that!) were totally on board with destroying fandom as a side effect of destroying the parts of fandom they didn’t like.

If you’re carrying out harassment of people right now because they’re posting works with sexual elements you don’t agree with? (And it’s always sex, never non-sexual violence, how strange….) If you’re doing that, you’re also totally on board with destroying fandom as a side effect of destroying the parts of fandom you don’t like. Because your tactics are fandom-destroying, and so is your agenda.

[nwcostumer]

reblogging because this is important: strikethru and boldthru and all the various “purges” that fandom went thru about 10 years ago: this had to do with OUTSIDERS deciding that fandom in general and fanfiction in specific were evil and needed to be destroyed; unless we were writing and shipping good vanilla M/F married people. These were outsiders, going after fictional writing about fictional characters.

AO3 and OTW are HUGE, because now we have an organization, with very smart women and a lot of lawyers, that have our back. Fannish history is important, people! It has not always been this way.

This is so, so important: there’s that other post about AO3 and fanfiction floating around, about our history. People decry violent video games but no one is trying to force companies out of business. But people can and do attack fanfiction: an activity primarily written by women for women, about fictional characters. And often about sex. We have to constantly defend ourselves, protect ourselves, support each other against charges like “paeodophilia”.

[denaceleste]

^^^rebageling again for excellent commentary

[araceil]

Throwing this in because I was also present: This was during the American Government’s attempts to pass censorship laws on the internet. As MOST of those domains had their serves in America, they were beholden to those censorship laws. A great deal of fanfiction.net was removed because they happened to lose a goddamn courtcase. I’ve been on the site since 2002. They may not have ‘officially’ allowed NC-17 rated content (what it used to be listed as in the filters), it never did a damn thing to remove it. Ever. They had it listed as a rating option during ‘New Story’ uploading after all. It was i nthe search filters. After they lost the courtcase however, they legally had to start doing things about the mature content reports they got. The admins and mods were not actively looking for fic to remove, they were just responding to reports they had already received. 

[wrotemyown]

tl;dr - I know tumblr is all about black and white “you’re either all right or all wrong” thinking, but it’s important to understand what actually happened before going “ew ao3 was made to give pedophiles a safe place to post” because that is 110% not what happened.

[shidgephobe]

This is why so, so many of the comparatively older fannish folks on tumblr like me are so vehemently against stuff like the anti movement and “all ships are valid UNLESS”. It smacks of censorship and content policing - and we’ve been there. We got our shit deleted and our accounts banned because someone else thought what we were reading or writing or talking about needed to just… not exist. No warning. Literally overnight. We just woke up and stuff was gone.

And yeah, the group was legit called Warriors for Innocence (or maybe of). I knew several people that were members of survivor/support groups that lost their groups - and their main support network - when Strikethrough happened (ten years ago holy shit).

[sulphur-crested-cocktease]

You antis need to listen when us older fans tell you that the censorship you’re advocating for, when put into practice, is NOT a positive thing; it’s an extremely scary thing!

I can guarantee that you would be very, very upset if another event like LJ Strikethrough were to happen today because *you* are just as vulnerable as the rest of us! If you support the rights of marginalized groups of people, if you’re a slash or fem slash shipper, if you support gender identities that aren’t defined by biological sex, if you care about representation, if you support women, if you have any kind of kink, if you care about fandom in any capacity beyond its eradication, YOU DO NOT ACTUALLY WANT THE SORT OF CENSORSHIP YOU’RE ADVOCATING!!

[naamahdarling]

People were terrified during Strikethrough.  I was there.  Communities were being shut down, individual users were being shut down.  People were losing access to their own fics, their feedback, their comments – a LOT went on in comments on LJ.  Think more coherent reblogs, much more personal, very widespread.  Comments were also very important, and in terms of networking/communicating, were absolutely critical.  

LJ was, for many people, central.  

It was a fundamental part of the infrastructure of fandom at the time.  

Having it attacked, having parts of your fandom’s territory just deleted like that, was very very scary.  People didn’t know who was next.  Every day, the list of stricken journals grew.  And not all of them came back, not all of them recovered their content.  Some people even voluntarily deleted their content as a form of protest.  It was a bad time.

You do not have to interact with fic that grosses you out or makes you uncomfortable.  Tagging is a thing.  And even outside of tags, you are responsible for curating your own fandom experience.  It is not right to expect it to be curated for you.  And it is not right to lash out when someone refuses to do so and expects you to walk away from things that do not concern you.

I was gonna say “things that don’t harm anyone” but I realize you can argue that.  If you get triggered, that’s upsetting.  That could be considered harm.  And I have sympathy for that.  I do.

I have run across fic that triggered me.  I have pretty specific triggers, and people don’t always think to warn for them because they aren’t that big a deal for a lot of people.  Or it’s sort of bundled into kink and is presumed, that if you’re okay with certain kinds of kink, you’re okay with this.  So I’ve been blindsided by it before.  And it sucks for a couple of days while I get over it.

That was not the fault of the authors! You could argue that tagging should have been used, and maybe it should, but ultimately that’s not an ironclad obligation.  It’s a tool people provide out of courtesy.

That was not the fault of the site!  The site is there to give authors a way to make fiction available, not to judge each work and interrogate its validity and make sure everything is tagged so that nobody has to see anything bad, ever.

That was not even my fault!  It was my responsibility to try to curate my experience, and I tried, but it wasn’t my fault because I didn’t deliberately set out to trigger myself.

When I get triggered, unless it is by a deliberate act, it is actually the fault of the people who hurt me in the first place! And I refuse to let them off the hook and blame perfectly innocent people who just wanna write their fanfiction! I may hate that fanfiction, but that is irrelevant to the question of whether or not people should be allowed to post whatever they want.

Also, some people cope by writing about fucked-up shit.  My best friend in the whole wide world has shared her fic with me, and HOO BOY it is messed up. She wrote it during a time in her life when she was in and just coming out of a horrifically abusive relationship.  I mean, it was exactly the kind of relationship all of us here on Tumblr love to hate.  She was married to a shitty, abusive man who preyed on someone younger than he was and used his influence over her to treat her in a way that would be right at home in that Lundy Bancroft book Why Does He Do That?  He was a real rapist, a verified grade-A bad fuckin’ guy.  (She was lucky to escape.  I have immense respect for her.)  And she wrote some fucked up fic to deal with it, and she shared it, and people were invested in it.  And because this was early 2000′s, she had to host it on a foreign server and cover her tracks, because at that time no-place was safe to post it.

“Yeah, but if she’s writing it for therapy, she doesn’t have to post it where other people might have to see it!” I hear you say.

But like … what the hell??? “Shut up, don’t talk about it, it’s bad to talk about these things, because these things are bad!” is something used against folks with trauma.

“This isn’t good for me, I can’t talk about this, I can’t be your audience for this,” that’s fine, those are boundaries that people with trauma use to defend themselves.  You should learn to say those things!  It will help you!

But expecting other people to never create and share art about trauma is just so thunderously oppressive I lack the ability to fully articulate it.

And nobody should have to disclose their history of trauma to prove their motives are pure or virtuous enough for their speech to be protected.  I’ve only really been able to openly say “I was assaulted, it was traumatic, I am a little fucked up from it” for the past couple of years, tops.  I couldn’t talk about it before that.  Couldn’t!  And it was over 20 years ago!

I also believe, very firmly, that you don’t need a history of abuse to find writing really messed-up shit satisfying, or to find reading it cathartic.  I believe 100% in the freedom of creative expression, and the freedom to read whatever fucked up shit you want to read.

All y’all fandom youngsters can spit nails all you want over gross rape fic, incest fic, whatever.

Fine, I don’t like it either!

But that fucked up shit?  That fucked up shit helped carve out the spaces we have today.  You don’t have to like it, but campaigning to get it deleted, harassing content creators, calling people rapists and pedophiles who have never done and would never ever do such a thing, that is not the way to improve the world, it doesn’t keep actual kids or teens or assault/rape victims safe.  It wouldn’t have made me feel safe when I was 16 and did’t want what was going on.  It doesn’t make me feel safe now.  I can say with the perspective of someone 24 years away from that event, it doesn’t make the world safer for people like I was.  It actually makes it worse.

Learn to steer clear of the messed-up stuff you don’t like.  It’s a skill, you get better with practice.  Have someone else vet stuff for you if you need help doing it now.

Everything that is sketchy and gross is not criminal, and writing about a thing is not morally the same as doing it.  Please stop acting like writing about an adult and a teenager having really questionable, gross sex is as bad as the actual registered sex offender they caught hanging around an actual elementary school two neighborhoods over from mine, just trying to talk to the kids.  The former is, at most, in poor taste, and potentially triggering to abuse victims.  The second makes me want to vomit because even though he was just talking, that guy was gearing up to try something and create another abuse victim.  A g a i n.  

The first can be avoided because it is imaginary and you, an adult, have power over your back button so that you don’t have to witness harm to imaginary people.  The second, those very real kids had to rely on real adults and real law enforcement to keep them safe from very real assault.   (It worked!  The neighborhood rallied!  He was arrested for violating parole!)

Pretty sure Sleazebag McDongface didn’t read some gross NC-17 Draco/Lucius fic before deciding to harm an actual human being.  Pretty sure not having read it didn’t keep him from doing it. ‘Cause he fuckin’ did it.  And he would have done worse. But actual people stopped him.

I get wanting to protect victims when so many of us are victims ourselves, but man, going after fiction is not the way to do it.

An author is not a perpetrator.  Stop trying to make those things synonymous in the minds of other fans, and in the minds of other recovering victims.

[bonibaru]

I’m a crone who also lived through strikethrough, and all y'all young fans need to read this and understand it if you don’t want history to repeat itself someday.

[maleccrazedauthor]

Here’s the thing, also: it doesn’t stop with fic about objectionable stuff.

If you have a website with TOS that includes any kind of “objectionable content” rules, there will be parties who will use those rules to try to silence other people whom they want silenced.

Let’s look at the alt-right and MRA movements today, or GamerGate a few years ago. What is one of their primary weapons? They report black or feminist or really any leftist YouTube channels (or Twitter accounts, or whatever) whose message they don’t like and claim those channels are are violating TOS by posting hate speech or incitations to violence or whatever bullshit they can come up with, in an attempt to silence those channels.

When Anita Sarkeesian of Feminist Frequence came under fire for starting a crowdfunding endeavor to fund the production of her Tropes vs. Women in Video Games series of videos, male gamers tried to get her KickStarter and various social media accounts shut down by reporting her for for hate speech and promoting terrorism.

Luckily, that became a big enough story that the dudes failed and their efforts backfired. But a lot of times, these tactics work.

How do I know this? Because it happened to me. Not over major shit like the examples above, but over something completely petty.

Back in the mid-to-late 90s, before LiveJournal really became the place for fandom, before FF.net was really a thing, you had to create your own personal website on whatever free webhost you could find (GeoCities was popular, but there were others) if you wanted to host your fic somewhere.

And back then, TV studios and book authors were still sending their lawyers after people who wrote fanfic, issuing cease and desist letters to not only the authors, but also to their webhosts.

At the time, I was writing perfectly het Mulder/Scully fanfic. No rape, no pedophilia, no slash. Maybe a little BDSM. But largely it was unobjectionable.

Then the 8th season of X-Files started, David Duchovny decided he only wanted to be involved part-time, and the show decided to bring in another male character. The fandom lost their shit–as fandoms do–over the idea of “replacing” Mulder blah blah blah.

One of the most popular fanfic mailing lists–one that had previously had no restrictions on what characters or pairings could be posted–decided that if you wrote fanfic involving this character, you were no longer welcome. Well, this was the mailing list with all the readers. Sure, authors could go to other mailing lists, but they wouldn’t have exposure to the sort of readership this other list boasted.

I spoke out, saying that this change was unfair to fic authors and that the moderator of this list was behaving in a pretty vile way. The moderator and her friends took aim at me and began a campaign of harassment, and a few days later, suddenly my website with my XF fanfic was TOSed because someone had reported it. So was the next site I tried to create to host my fic, and the one after that.

Thanks to the way AO3s TOS are constructed, that sort of shit doesn’t happen now. I can speak up if I need to, and while I may receive harassment on my various social media accounts, there’s no chance they can have my fic taken down just because they have an agenda and don’t like me for reasons not relating to my fic.

So yeah, AO3′s rules protect fic a lot of us might find objectionable. But they also protect fic that is in no way objectionable from being targeted by unrelated harassment campaigns. And since any of us could find ourselves in the sights of those sort of campaigns at any time, we need to thank our lucky stars for that.

[olderthannetfic]

I like this last addition.

When I helped write the ToS for AO3, I wasn’t primarily thinking about strikethrough. I was primarily thinking of FFN, where so many people post things that are technically against the ToS but that the community tolerates. Any time someone gets pissed off, they can go on a grudge-reporting spree and target their enemy’s work. Often, that means guys targeting slash or Twilight fic because it’s “for girls” and thus sucks. Sometimes, it’s one ship vs. another. I was also thinking of Miss Scribe and all of that other Harry Potter fandom drama. (And if you think fans are above destroying an entire archive just to strike at one enemy, think again!)

We can’t force people to like each other. We can’t force people to be nice to each other. But we could take away fandom bullies’ favorite tools.

So we did.

[centaurianthropology]

Watching young (ostensibly liberal) bloggers and fans take up the deeply conservative rhetoric and moral crusading of the right wing and evangelical groups from the 90s has been both fascinating from an anthropological perspective, and fucking horrifying for someone who lived through this time period and the death of LJ.  

[naamahdarling]

This thread keeps getting better.

It galls me to think that those of us who went through all this shit might have to go through it again because people who were still in primary school at the time don’t see anything wrong with harassing us over

Like, I hate to pull this argument, but we are your fandom elders, we did what we did to preserve fandom for y'all, so y'all would have space to safely explore the sane things we did and still do. And in doing so we rightly realized that if we wanted to protect the comfortable, cuddly parts, we also needed to protect the dark parts.

You can hate non-con fic all you want, and I will always advocate for adequate tagging/warning (especially with franchises that are aimed at younger audiences, e.g. MLP:FIM and SU) so that you don’t have to see it because I sympathize, but I will never support people who want to make sure that it isn’t even there to be seen. I’ve been through that once. It didn’t help anyone. It didn’t fix anything.

Please, learn to curate your own online experience. You are responsible for not clicking, or clicking away. Don’t try to force others to do it for you. That’s not cool. You aren’t protecting children. You are asking fandom to treat everyone like a child. There is a massive difference.

[baratheon]

Also… maybe parents should do their job in monitoring kids’ content? When my parents found out I was looking at age inappropriate things when I was a minor, like they intervened.

[nanshe-of-nina]

Strikethrough 07 was such a well-conducted operation that communities dedicated to survivors of sexual abuse and fans of Lolita fashion were suspended, but the journal of the baby rapist, ohbutyouwillpet, stayed up. And it’s still up to this day, though it hasn’t been updated it over a decade as its owner is still in prison.

[sassbandit3000]

Whooo, I guess it’s my turn to take a shot at this.

I’m a nold. I’m in my 40s. When I came out as queer, in the early 90s, it was in the middle of what were called the “feminist sex wars”.  If you want a really good book to read about that period, which has a LOT of resonance with Strikethrought and with the current Tumblr discourse, I cannot recommend this highly enough:

Defending Pornography: Free Speech, Sex, and the Fight for Women’s Rights by Nadine Strossen

A preview is available on Google Books, or it should be readily available secondhand, or in academic libraries (though it’s not a very heavy academic read). I recommend Booko for finding cheap secondhand copies. Support independent bookstores!

I haven’t read “Defending Pornography” for a while – I actually last re-read it about a decade ago because of the impact that Warriors for Innocence were having on Dreamwidth’s payment providers at the time, subsequent to Strikethrough itself – but here’s a quick summary, as I remember it.

1. In the late 80s and early 90s there was a vocal group of radical feminists who believed that pornography inherently harms women, not just in its production but also in its consumption (i.e. watching/reading pornography caused people to develop attitudes that were harmful to women). All explicit content was considered to be harmful, from eg. girlie magazines to hardcore XXX videos to a book like “The Joy of Gay Sex”, no matter who made it, its purpose, its intended audience, or its context. (Yup, even m/m content was considered to be degrading to women for reasons that didn’t make a lot of sense tbh.)

2. These anti-pornography feminists teamed up with the religious right and managed to get anti-porn laws passed. In particular, a law was passed in Canada preventing the importation of “obscene” material. Canada, of course, imports a lot of material from the US. Stuff started getting seized at the border.

3. Guess what was seized first? “The Joy of Gay Sex” and the like. Guess what businesses started finding all their shipments seized or delayed – sexually explicit or not – to the point where they were being put out of business? Gay bookstores.  Guess what wasn’t seized at all? Mainstream porn made for straight men. 

Around this time, Little Sisters bookstore in Vancouver (a gay bookstore) found that huge amounts of merchandise was being seized at the border, regardless of the actual content. They were being discriminatorily targeted on the basis of their sexuality. The queerness of the material they were importing was seen as inherently obscene.

Remember that this is before there was much information available online for LGBTQ+ people, so if you were a young person maybe just coming out and trying to understand things, or wanting to learn about safe sex (and yes it was at the height of the AIDS crisis, too) you’d go to a bookstore like this. Which now had empty shelves. I remember endless fundraising and activism in the LGBTQ+ community to try and keep Little Sisters open. In the end they spent half a million dollars on court cases. Read more about their struggles.

(You know what businesses weren’t impacted and didn’t have to basically ask their friends and community for help to stay open or spend a decade in the courts to defend their right to run their businesses? The powerful companies making porn by and for straight men.)

The book goes into a large number of analogous situations. Time and time again, anti-pornography laws intended to protect women are disproportionately used against women themselves, against LGBTQ+ people, and against basically any marginalised or minority group, rather than against the mainstream male-oriented porn that would seem to be its primary target.

Here’s the key point: Strossen is a legal scholar who’s looked at a lot of attempts at censorship, and you know what she found happened every time? When you try to censor pornography, even in the interests of protecting vulnerable people, that censorship will be applied first, and hardest, against the people who are most vulnerable. They won’t come for actual abusers, they’ll come for the abused, and prevent them from accessing resources, education, talking to each other, creating art to express themselves, or organising against those who are actually causing harm.

Read the book. The stories it tells are from the early 90s but they perfectly mirror what happened a decade ago with Strikethrough and what’s happening now with all this Tumblr discourse.

This is old, old business, we’ve seen it more than once before, and it never goes the way the antis think it will. Censorship is a tool that gives power to abusers and lets them inflict more harm on those who are abused, vulnerable and discriminated against. Don’t fall for it.

[whetstonefires]

History they should have known: The Comstock laws in New York were this one dude (Comstock) who managed to get a mail regulation re-written to categorize anything related to contraceptives as pornography, which was already illegal to mail.

(Which is one reason for the pornographic playing cards etc, because the 19th century was almost as big on mail-order goods as the 21st, because getting to shops in person was hard for a huge subsection of Americans.)

Comstock built a non-profit with the support of the YMCA and oh shoot, some millionaire whose brand is still going strong, to enforce this law because the postal system didn’t have the personnel. They were granted the right to do so.

He and his posse of honorary mail inspectors with police powers (I kid you not) spent years engaging in endless skullduggery to prosecute people for selling contraceptives by mail. Which was how everyone got them in the 19th century, you couldn’t walk into a shop for a pack of condoms but mail-order packages were nicely anonymous. They dragged Margaret Sanger into court repeatedly. There was a huge cottage industry of contraceptives in NYC at the time, most of the manufacturers being female, Jewish, immigrants, or some combination of the above.

There was one woman whose name escapes me they kept trying to prosecute for selling contraceptive devices and the juries kept nullifying it because the average New Yorker in the 1890s were like ‘yeah no condoms are not a crime,’ but not everybody had her stage presence and resources.

You know who they never even tried to touch? The big rubber companies were were getting into mass production of condoms. Their big funder owned the company that produced Vaseline, and was claiming in ads at the time that it worked as a spermicide.

Only the poor and vulnerable felt the impact of the Honorary Postal Inspectors of righteousness.

[moon6shadow-main]

It’s been touched on a little before but really it’s hard to explain just how confusing and scary the crackdowns were. I was only a reader on FanFiction when the crackdown came but it felt like I was standing in a coal mine full of canaries. Canaries that were either silent or /screaming/.

Every where you looked, authors where posting warnings about how x stories were getting deleted. All of the warnings feeling rushing, panicked, most of them including notes about how they didn’t know how long they had before their warnings were taken down or they were deleted. It felt a bit like all the stars going out, everything just dying around you. Like a stampede of people had fled from some oncoming unnamed horror leaving silence in their wake. Finding AO3 later on was like finding a safe haven in a world gone mad.

Also FanFiction doesn’t really encourage socialisation aside from authors notes to readers on their chapters or homepage. Meanwhile all the warnings of the crackdown were really rushed and vague. So, as a not very sociable reader, I really didn’t have a clue what was going on at the time of the crack down and the confusion and uncertainty was almost the scariest part of the whole thing. (Not knowing if the authors should come back and if fanfics were gone for good was scarier.) It’s only years later, reading fanfic history posts that I’ve started to piece together what happened.

Also an interesting point was that during the crack down all I ever heard about was /gay/ stories being deleted. Perhaps this was just because I was reading gay stories but I didn’t even realise it was mature stories in general that was supposedly the aim of the crack down until much later.

[olderthannetfic]

Hot damn, this post just keeps going!

I very much second the rec about the feminist sex wars. Understand those, and you’ll understand why those of us over about 30 are so opposed to tumblr’s purity crusade.

[fierceawakening]

If you haven’t been TOSsed you really don’t get it, imo.

If you haven’t spent your time wondering if the thing that will get your content deleted is the dark stuff or the nipples, you really don’t get it, imo.

Hell, way way back in the day, I had moderator types private message me going “I really like your writing, but you need to be less obvious about it, or I will have no choice but to tos you.”

[prospectkiss]

A long reblog, but a worthy read. So much history and experience recounted here. If we don’t remember our past, remember why AO3 and many fandom spaces work the way they do now, we will be condemned to repeat it.

Please do not let us return to the dark ages of fear, censorship, and oppression in fandom.

[that way madness lies]

[that way madness lies]

[dollsome-does-tumblr]

i just read a washington post article on romcoms aging poorly due to the pushiness (and oft-stalkery conduct) of the male characters therein, and it got me thinking about pride and prejudice, and specifically darcy saying, “one word from you will silence me on this subject forever.”

because, like, that’s the seldom-portrayed romantic dream in the patriarchal hellscape that is our world, isn’t it?

a dude being willing to say, “i understand if you don’t feel the same way about me, and i’ll leave you alone forever about this if my attention is unwanted.”

so simple, yet so wonderful in its basic human decency

[adulthoodisokay]

and dudes to this day wonder why women still swoon over darcy

[karenhealey]

Note also: Elizabeth turns down Darcy’s first proposal, and in the process, accuses him of doing some stuff he did not do (and also some stuff he totally did).

The next day, he surprises her on her walk. He hands her a letter, asks that she read it, and then takes off.

When this happened to me after I had turned someone down IN REAL LIFE, the letter contained a passionate argument to the tune of “actually you’re wrong and you do like me and you should go out with me” and it was creepy af.

Darcy’s letter to Elizabeth starts with: “Be not alarmed, Madam, on receiving this letter, by the apprehension of its containing any repetition of those sentiments, or renewal of those offers, which were last night so disgusting to you”. He goes on to set the record straight about the stuff he didn’t do (as well as the stuff he did) which is *actually relevant* to Elizabeth. And he, as promised, doesn’t romance her further.

It’s totally bizarre that even now, this can be considered unusually great dude behaviour.

[pluckyredhead]

Darcy’s first proposal: “You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”

Darcy’s second proposal: “One word from you will silence me on this subject forever.”

His whole arc in the book is about learning to consider other people’s feelings and not just his own, but the fact that it’s expressed via who gets to talk and who is told to shut up is so, so telling. The first time around, he imposes his voice on her whether she wants it or not. The second time, he asks how she feels, and in exchange, offers her the gift of his silence.

And yeah, the fact that dudes still! have! not! learned! this! lesson! is exhausting.

[ghost-of-bambi]

How surprising is it that Pride and Prejudice was written by a woman, when many romantic comedies are produced and directed by men?

Answer: not at all

[smolsarcasticraspberry]

200 years later and the world is still full of guys who think they’re a Mr Darcy when they’re actually a Mr Collins.

[netflixnbirds]

That last comment

[that way madness lies]

The Signs as Raven Cycle Aesthetics

[mvsic-bxxks-stvdy]

Aries - Stone walls slick with condensation. The distant drip-drip-drip of water deep in the cave system. Light pouring in from the exit, promising the warmth and safety of the summer sun. The drop in temperature as you descend into the depths. The buzz of something just beyond your sight.

Libra - Parked under a tree at the back of the Aglionby lot, dusted with fresh pollen and half shaded from the sun. So orange it’s hard to look away. Leather seats burning against the back of your thighs. Air conditioning wheezing as the radio plays old favorites. 

Taurus - Dusty multi-paned windows, casting evening light through the old warehouse. Once-furled maps held open with ancient books, next to empty soda bottles and hastily written homework assignments. Bedsheets tangled by endless nights of insomnia. The lingering scent of mint. 

Scorpio - The constant smell of oregano and pizza sauce. Rowdy laughter mingled with the sound of chairs scraping on linoleum and the radio blasting. Non-slip shoes making weary trips from kitchen, to table, to kitchen. Hands slapping shoulders, playfully swatting others away from the last slice of pizza.

Gemini - The smoky tang of burning herbs, carried on the currents of many conversations. The bustle of bodies always in motion. Dog-eared cards spread on any flat surface, tipsy laughter turning to somber conversation. Candles flicker with the collective heartbeat of the home.  

Sagittarius - Footsteps muted by layers of leaf litter and moss underfoot. A brilliant ceiling of leaves stretches above, the trees whispering soft greetings as you walk below. The distant splash of running water. Your worries leave you on each exhale, replaced with a dream-like peace. 

Cancer - The scuff of expensive shoes on expensive floors, surrounded on all sides by opulence. Polite conversation, the clink of champagne flutes. People on all sides with polished smiles and thick wallets. High ceilings and even higher ambitions. 

Capricorn - The sleepy smell of old textbooks, spines cracking with age as they are opened and flipped idly through. Old wooden chairs groaning as students shift impatiently, most of their attention on the view beyond the window, less and less focused on the droning professor. Notes passed between desks, accompanied by subtle smirks. 

Leo - Fireflies flickering through the long grass, cast blue in the fading dusk. The distant lowing of cattle in the barns. The front steps, still warm from the day’s hot sun. The creak of a door opening and light pouring out of the house. The murmur of conversation inside, the patter of hooves on hardwood.

Aquarius - Beech bark as smooth as water under fingertips, cool in the shade and protected from the burning afternoon sun. Low hanging branches, perfect for a boost. A castle of leaves that surrounds you and protects you from the troubles of the day. You can spill your secrets freely, the tree will never tell them.

Virgo - Crisp white collars and practiced tie-knots. Elbows bumping in the halls, happy shouts of greeting and conversations that cannot wait till after school. Pens scratching on pages, driven by minds overflowing with knowledge and desire for success. 

Picses - The town of Henrietta laid out under the clear night sky. Lights glowing warmly from the houses and businesses, each one inviting and intimate. The dark silhouettes of mountains beyond the town. The cool night air, carrying the promise of adventure.

[that way madness lies]

[danbiaps-deactivated20151207]

hunting module

[mystuckyfeels]

#okay it’s incredibility fascinating to me to see the base of the winter soldier in bucky #and the reflection of bucky in the winter soldier #how do you carve the person out but leave the skills?

[just-tea-thanks]

Okay military meta time friends. I’ve been meaning to take this one on for a while but I’m in the field at 2337 after a crazy long day on my best behavior around high ranking brass because my CO/BFF sent me on a cherry assignment so I am warn out, and I’m gonna make this short.

When this gif set first came out it simply said predator mode engaged. Then it was changed to hunting module. I reblogged both because I love this fucking gif: both are prime examples of a nonfiring actor correctly emulating behavior of a firer. Seb has played a soldier before and he is good at correctly emulating the distinct way we move when constantly carrying a deadly weapon. Chris evans, btw, is baaaad at that.

However the more recent reblogs of this gif set come with the additional commentary about similarities between the way Bucky moves and the way Winter moves. And from a professional standpoint I can instinctually bit emphatically tell you that the similarities are few and the differences are astronomical. Other than basic weapons and tactical proficiency, Bucky and Winter could not move more differently if they tried.

For one, Bucky lacks the thousand mile stare, whereas that’s all Winter has. Bucky is very focused on the moment, the present, the target right in front of him—the one posing a threat. Its why he gets caught by surprise several times in close combat in that scene. Buck is a sniper. He devotes everything to one point of a focus at a time. He pivots as such. His face shows microreactions as he takes in details of his surroundings one by one. He’s still very situationlly aware, but not simultaneously.

Winter /hunts/. His eyea don’t flicker everywhere and his body language and firing posture doesn’t shift a hundred times minutely like Bucky’s does because rather than focus with a sniper’s POV he sees the whole picture. He’s taking everything in at once. Hence the rhousand mile stare. They could not be more different.

[fasole-dulce]

I kept seeing this on my dash today without @just-tea-thanks amazing comments. So I reblogged it with.

[just-tea-thanks]

Thank you, @fasole-dulce, you make my heart soar! <3

[that way madness lies]

[thestray]

Like… the intention is good, but I don’t know how I feel about the angle of “you shouldn’t bully someone because you may not know the whole story”. You shouldn’t bully because it’s fucked up.

That girl you called fat, maybe she’s NOT starving herself. Maybe she just likes to eat. You want to call her names because of that? Fuck you.

That girl you called a slut, maybe she’s not a virgin, maybe she’s had a lot of sex with different people, sex is fucking AWESOME! Your hang ups with women and sexuality is not her problem. You’re an asshole.

That boy you pushed down in the hall… maybe everything’s great at home for him, so the fuck what? Don’t put your hands on people you piece of shit.

That black girl you teased for her skin color… just, fuck you, period. Doesn’t matter what the fuck is going on in her life, you’re fucking garbage. Get the fuck out of here.

The old man with the scars… seriously? Like… if you’re making fun of an old man’s scars you’re too far gone, you’re some kind of amoral sociopath or something cause that’s just some fucked up shit.

That “gay boy” you made fun of? Go fuck yourself.

The man you made fun of for crying? He just watched the episode of the Office where Jim and Pam get married, so what? Who cares why he’s crying? People have emotions dipshit.

That poor boy? Oh you’re one of those assholes who makes fun of poor people? Go die in a fire.

How about just don’t bully people at all for any reason cause it’s a fucked up thing to do regardless of what you do or don’t know about them? Treat people the way you want to be treated, it’s that simple. We’re all human beings just trying to be happy, you make the world a worse place when you try to stand in the way of that.

[sinfullyselected]

I fixed it. :)

[danielsokolov]

Much better

[thegatemaster]

10/10 top quality edit

[wearemykingdom]

That fix is what we needed.

[that way madness lies]

[shieldposts]

Me: *shows basic human decency to cashier

Cashier: ??!?! Thank you! You’re the nicest person ever!

Me: are you ok

[bravadopinfire]

Reblog if politeness to retail and service workers is important to you.

[that-one-irish-idiot]

honestly 

[that way madness lies]

[mulletlove]

the idea that humans are a garbage species is so obnoxious no one talks about the peaceful parts of history and prehistory because they aren’t as exciting as us killing each other but um homo sapiens have been doing awesome things all over for a long time….we survived the fucking ice age…we made it through the sinai desert….we shared the savana with big cats before we ever made a weapon, we wove baskets from literal plants and halved blades from flint to handles we made, carved harpoons from bone and fought megafauna for our loved ones, cooked food and took care of the elderly and buried our dead, painted pictures and shared stories, built homes from clay and mud and straw, made instruments so we could dance and sing…it is so easy to focus on the negative and i get it ok we are in the middle of a mass extinction event that specific humans are at fault for but listen: they don’t want you to remember it hasn’t always been like this…we were and are so much more than evil

[that way madness lies]

Resources For Writing Deaf, Mute, or Blind Characters

[thecaffeinebookwarrior]

Despite the fact that I am not deaf, mute, or blind myself, one of the most common questions I receive is how to portray characters with these disabilities in fiction.

As such, I’ve compiled the resources I’ve accumulated (from real life deaf, mute, or blind people) into a handy masterlist.

Deaf Characters:

Deaf characters masterpost

Deaf dialogue thread

Dialogue with signing characters (also applies to mute characters.)

A deaf author’s advice on deaf characters

Dialogue between deaf characters

Mute Characters

Life as a Mute

My Silent Summer:  Life as a Mute

What It’s Like Being Mute

21 People Reveal What It’s Really Like To Be Mute

I am a 20 year old Mute, ask me anything at all!

Blind Characters:

The 33 Worst Mistakes Writers Make About Blind Characters.

@referenceforwriters masterpost of resources for writing/playing blind characters.

The youtube channel of the wonderful Tommy Edison, a man blind from birth with great insight into the depiction of blind people and their lives.

An Absolute Write thread on the depiction of blind characters, with lots of different viewpoints and some great tips.

And finally, this short, handy masterpost of resources for writing blind characters.

Characters Who Are Blind in One Eye

4 Ways Life Looks Shockingly Different With One Eye

Learning to Live With One Eye

Adapting to the Loss of an Eye

Adapting to Eye Loss and Monocular Vision

Monocular Depth Perception

Deaf-Blind Characters

What Is It Like To Be Deafblind?

Going Deaf and Blind in a City of Noise and Lights

Deaf and Blind by 30

Sarita is Blind, Deaf, and Employed (video)

Born Deaf and Blind, This Eritrean American Graduated Harvard Law School (video)

A Day of a Deaf Blind Person

Lesser Known Things About Being Deafblind

How the Deaf-Blind Communicate

Early Interactions With Children Who Are Deaf-Blind

Raising a DeafBlind Baby

If you have any more resources to add, let me know!  I’ll be adding to this post as I find more resources.

I hope this helps, and happy writing!  <3

[thecaffeinebookwarrior]

Updated with more resources, specifically for characters who are blind in one eye.

[that way madness lies]

guys, we need to talk about eowyn

[hacash]

So I get really narky when people pull the whole ‘oh Eowyn’s storyline came to such a sucky ending; she was really cool going around killing orcs and Witch-Kings and then she got shoved into a traditional girly role by marrying Faramir and becoming a healer’ thing, because no. No-no-no-no-no. Not only does that stray dangerously into the territory of ‘women only have worth if they’re doing traditionally blokey things’, but that misses almost the entire point of Lord of the Rings.

Tolkien was in the trenches in the first world war, right? He got all that ‘for death and glory’ shit shoved down his throat, that was the whole point about the war, it was when so many people came to see how awful and misleading all the propaganda about winning glory through violence and death was. And Tolkien’s work completely shows that: it’s why the hobbits, who’ve never craved power or battle the way men do, are the heroes of the book; it’s why strong men like Aragorn and Faramir are shown to be lovers of peace rather than war. It’s why the quote - but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory; I love only that which they defend – is so poignant and beautiful, when seen in the context of all Tolkien had gone through. He’d seen all but one of his closest friends die in an utterly pointless war; the prevalent message in his books is ‘if you’re going to have that many people die, let it be for something worth dying for.’ (Like defending your home from the lord of all darkness, for example.)

And Eowyn might be a fantastic female character, but she’s also got so much development to go through, and she’s by no means perfect. I find it really interesting that when Eowyn talks to Aragorn about wanting to go off and fight she never really actually mentions protecting her people, but speaks about wanting to ‘face peril and battle’, and to do ‘great deeds’. And it’s not that Eowyn doesn’t want to protect her people, because of course she does, but she’s also got such a driving motivation within her to do glorious and fell deeds simply for the sake of valour and renown. It’s one of her defining features, having an attitude that got so many young men killed in the war and which, obviously, Tolkien would have been very wary of.

(Also, I think, there’s so much in Eowyn that wants to prove herself to be more than ‘a mere woman’; because twice in that conversation she asserts that she’s no mere ‘dry-nurse’ or ‘serving-woman’, but a member of the house of Eorl and therefore capable of greater things. There’s almost this slight sense of Eowyn considering herself more than ‘just’ a domesticated woman that I sometimes get from her in the books? Which is very sad - the idea of Eowyn having less regard for others of her sex who do mind the house or raise the children - and why I so love that ‘I am no man’ moment in RotK. Eowyn’s no longer hiding herself, or dismissing fellow women as the weaker sex, but acknowledging and embracing the fact that women in all their forms can fuck you up.)

And then we reach the Houses of Healing, and Eowyn yearning for death in battle just like her Uncle Theoden, and basically buying into that whole world war one ethos that Tolkien would have considered so poisonous. Which is why her friendship and courtship with Faramir is so fricking beautiful. Remember that quote I wrote earlier? That’s from Faramir. He’s not backing down from conflict, he’s in no way less of a ‘real man’ than anyone else; he’s just saying there needs to be more to the fight than simply having a fight. There needs to be a reason; something worth fighting for. Eowyn recognises that Faramir is a good man in every sense of the word: he’s strong and valiant, but he doesn’t fight simply to prove himself or for the sake of winning glory, he fights for other people. And Faramir gently challenges Eowyn on her idolisation of battle-glory and encourages her not to scorn gentleness or peace, and he’s so freaking good for her.

(Seriously. Can we just stop for a moment and think about how wonderful Eowyn and Faramir are for each other: Faramir encouraging Eowyn to turn towards life and healing and openness while never denying her strength or courage, and Eowyn giving Faramir the validation and security he never got after so many years of an awful relationship with his father? I honestly don’t know why I don’t get all giddy about these two more often, because they make the very best otp.)

And the result of the departure of the Shadow and her friendship with Faramir is Eowyn’s decision that ‘I will be a shieldmaiden no longer, nor vie with the great Riders, nor take joy only in the songs of slaying. I will be a healer, and love all things that grow and are not barren.’

I think that last bit is so important because I’m certain that Tolkien doesn’t mean for Eowyn to immediately pack up her sword and shield and become a good girl sitting at home with her knitting and waiting for the men to return home after the fight – after all, she’s going to be the wife of the Steward of Gondor and there’s a lot of mess to clean up after the War of the Ring. Eowyn’s probably still going to find herself defending hearth and home from time to time. But the important thing is that she’s no longer defining herself simply by the doing of valiant deeds; she’ll no longer compare herself to the great warriors of her house and feel lacking simply because she hasn’t killed as many men. Most importantly, she’s not going to take joy only in the songs of the slaying, in destruction and death. Tolkien was all about healers symbolising life and rebirth, and Eowyn’s decision to become one – to aid in the preservation of life rather than the taking of it – is so beautiful. I don’t think Tolkien ever wrote Eowyn’s ending to make her reclaim her ‘lost femininity’; I think it’s a lovely way of adding to the ever-present theme in Lord of the Rings of hope and frailty and healing and friendship over glory and battle and strife.

[randomingoftherandomness]

Ah, fuck, you’re gonna catch me smiling and crying about this excellent and terrific piece of analysis you got here OP. Thank you for sharing this 💖

[apathetic-revenant]

thank you

the thing about Eowyn is that it’s very clear that her attitudes towards battle don’t come out of a healthy place. and I don’t just mean a place of “war is glorious” or “fighting is more worthy than ‘womanly’ things.” there’s some of that, yes (and who could blame her, really, growing up among the songs of great men and great deeds, while feeling an ill fit for the role in life she was forced into?) but there’s something else too. 

when Eowyn’s being tended to in the Houses of Healing Gandalf and Aragorn talk about how she’s been suffering for a long time. Aragorn says that there’s been a darkness over her since before the Witch King ever got to her. when Eomer is confused because he never noticed anything, Gandalf points out that Eomer at least could ride out and defend his country when it was under attack but Eowyn had to stay home and look after Theoden while Wormtongue corrupted him and abused her.

Eowyn went through hell. she was trapped in an awful, awful situation, watching her country crumble and her people suffer, war break out, her brother get exiled, her uncle who was like a father figure to her become ill and twisted by the machinations of this horrible man who was leching on her in his spare time, and there was nothing she could do about it. nothing but sit at home and tend to Theoden and watch.

the narrative and characters come about as close as they possibly can without using modern language to saying that Eowyn went through severe depression culminating in serious suicidal ideation. all of which fits into the ongoing themes in the book about how war can psychologically affect people. 

yes, Eowyn wanted glory in battle, but I think that largely came out of her desperate need to just do something when for so long she was effectively powerless. and even after killing the Witch King, which I think can be pretty much universally agreed to be about as good as it gets when it comes to glory in battle, she was trying to get back in the fight. she’s literally wandering around the Houses of Healing with a broken arm angry that she’s not being allowed to fight some more while the healer begs her to go lay down already. 

and that makes sense to me because at that point what Eowyn wanted wasn’t to do great deeds and be praised for them. she wanted to die in battle–gloriously, yes, but she wanted to die. and then she doesn’t. and she doesn’t know what to do afterwards. and the war is still on. and everyone’s gone to attack Mordor and she’s been left behind, again, and again she cannot do anything but wait. 

and then she meets Faramir, and Faramir understands her because he has been through the same things. he has watched his country come under attack from within and without and been able to do nearly nothing about it. he has been the unfavored one in the shadow of a sibling who was a great warrior. he has seen his father die. he has been hurt by the Nazgúl. we have both come under the same shadow, and the same hand drew us back. Faramir doesn’t magically step in and make Eowyn better because he’s a man. they help each other because they are two people who can relate to the hell they have been through and they hold hands and walk back into the light.

I don’t see Eowyn’s story climax as being a woman who goes “oh, I’ll stop being badass then and let the men do everything.” I never have. I see it as Eowyn choosing to live, and that to me is the most amazing, profound strength, to overcome everything she has been through, to fight through the hell in her own head and the darkness that has plagued her and to start moving forward.

deciding to live when you have spent so long only wanting to die is not an easy thing. it is an act of tremendous courage. it should not be mistaken for weakness simply because it coincides with putting down the tools of war.