I feel like too often people frame Nie Mingjue's issues as ignorance borne from safety. Like, they think that because of his privilege as a sect leader he doesn't know what it's like to be in danger and forced to make hard choices to survive. And I disagree. Strongly.

First of all, Nie Mingjue is very familiar with death not only from war but from. You know. Actively dying since the age of fourteen. Let us not forget Nie Mingjue is dead! Super dead! And maybe he didn't die the exact way he expected to but he did, absolutely, know he was going to die. To act like Nie Mingjue is unfamiliar with the scenario of "do something you find morally reprehensible or die" is to ignore that he has been living that exact scenario and chose death.

Nie Mingjue knows death is a risk for someone like Jin guangyao, in fact he explicitly acknowledges it even in his worst moments like the stairs in chapter 49. Had his issue been ignorance, then he would've responded to Jin Guangyao saying that he's in danger and has to sacrifice others for his own safety with "No you aren't you'll be fine." But he doesn't. He accepts the fact that jgy is in danger with no qualms and says: then you should die.

That's not him betraying his values, those are his values. He is, essentially, pro-suicide. Jgy is like hey I have a moral dilemma what should I do and nmj straight up goes "Kill yourself" and earlier that same chapter when he was faced with a moral dilemma he went "I'm gonna kill myself." He believes the solution to moral dilemmas is suicide! He is extremely consistent about this! When it's pointed out to him that it would have been dangerous for Wen Qing to oppose Wen Ruohan it doesn't phase him because he thinks putting yourself at risk to do the right thing is the only moral choice. The idea that he can only hold this belief because he is himself somehow not in danger, again, requires you to ignore that he is dying the whole time. And it doesn't deter him. He is the idea of self-sacrifice as a moral good taken to its absolute logical extreme. Someone who is ready to die and demands the same from everyone else.

It makes him a very fun case study for fandom, because a lot of fandom spaces also tend to revere self-sacrifice as the ultimate good, and yet we get very uncomfortable when someone starts demanding it of characters we love. Like woah, hold on, that's a bit too far isn't it? Only we the audience get to do that!

#mdzs#mdzs meta#nie mingjue#i got a bit spicy at the end there#one wonders of there is perhaps a theme around sacrifice the story is working with here#what with several of the most relevant and major character relationships centering around sacrifice.#anyway I wonder what nmj thought of Wen Qing (and Wen Ning though the jin kept him alive) sacrificing herself at nightless#I have to imagine he approved. despite disagreeing with her he also approved of mianmian giving up her clan position for wwx+ the wens#so he'd think this was her 'finally doing the right thing'#his approval would've been kinda worthless. As a person who is NOT pro-suicide I think that's fucked up! the sacrifice didn't even work!#but it's diabolical to think of the Wen siblings turning themselves in and nmj being there and *praising* them for it.#unhinged behavior. I need this missing scene stat.#this is just kind of a rephrasing of my 'stop calling nmj a hypocrite' post but with a bit more focus on what exactly his values are#and how his problems stem not from him being inconsistent with those values but the fact that they are pretty fucked up!#and that those fucked up values are not a result of a lack danger but the opposite. the *inevitability* of death#he's going to die so he *has* to believe that's the right thing to do.

op's tags

3 transphobic arguments to be aware of (so you don't go down the alt right pipeline)

source

Easily one of the most important videos I've seen since the election.

GET TO KNOW ME ↳ ten pairings  [6/10] → jack o’neill & samantha carter (stargate sg-1)

Follower Recs

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I’d like to submit a Follower Rec. ~Anon

the soft animal of your body

by howodd5ever

M, 21k, Wangxian

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(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

the secret to writing good smut that doesn't feel like you're just repeating the same words for junk and fucking over and over is to spend your effort writing about everything happening around the sex and everything happening inside the heads of the people having sex and before you know it you have four paragraphs of introspection and two paragraphs describing the space and it's okay to use the word cock again

A sex scene is like a dialogue scene.

In a dialogue scene, characters have things they want to say or have said to them. They feel a certain way when they say/hear those things, and they want the person/people they are addressing to react a certain way to what they say. At the end of the interaction the reader should have a greater understanding of each character's perspective on the subject that was just discussed, and a greater understanding of the relationship between the characters.

If you want the dialogue scene to move the plot forward, then the way the characters feel about each other needs to change over the course of the conversation. They need to have learned something during the interaction, about each other and/or themselves, that potentially changes their relationship dynamic.

In a sex scene, characters have physical acts they want to do or have done to them. They feel a certain way when they do/experience those things, and they want the person/people they are doing those things with to react a certain way to what they do. At the end of the interaction the reader should have a greater understanding of each character's perspective on the the sex that was had, and a greater understanding of the relationship between the characters.

If you want the sex scene to move the plot forward, then the way the characters feel about each other needs change over the course of the sex. They need to have learned something during the interaction, about each other and/or themselves, that potentially changes their relationship dynamic.

Sex is a form of communication.

You are writing a communication scene.

Follower Recs

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I’d like to submit a Follower Rec. ~Anon

Practical Mythology

by metisket (@metisket)

T, 17k, Wangxian

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(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

[ao3 link]

anyway sound off. at what stage do ppl think Han figured out the Force was real. the boring answer is after seeing Obi-wan vanish but i think he could rationalise that away as his eyes playing tricks on him. what do we think.

Let me demonstrate my answer for you:

That's it. That's my answer. Endor.

Please just take a look at Han's face right after witnessing 3po float. The man just had his entire worldview blown to smithereens.

that's so funny. that means he accepted Vader deflecting a blaster bolt with his hand as just something freaky government cyborgs can do, and stuck by Luke for multiple years as he tried to figure this Force stuff out, and just treated it like your friend getting really really into neopaganism to cope with a loss.

like yeah kid good job with the witching. i'm certain it will be more useful against your enemies than your sharpshooting. no i do not think your witchcraft is supplementing your aim but i'm not gonna argue about it.

yeah Luke was like 'I heard Ben Kenobi's voice in my head telling me how to blow up the Death Star :)' and Han was like 'kind of an unusual coping mechanism but I'm not gonna argue with him'

thanks to carbonite han not only misses learning about luke's training montage on dagobah, he's also half-blind during their whole escape on tatooine. luke's out there force-kicking henchmen with his gucci boots and doing flips and shit and han can't see a goddamn thing. now on endor luke's yeeting threepio with the power of his mind and han's just like 'the last time we hung out i had to stuff him in a tauntaun sleeping bag'.

I NEED IT

Graham crackers were invented by followers of Sylvester Graham, as part of a dietary regime intended to remove all sinful pleasure from the act of eating. I like to think that the mere existence of B. Dylan Hollis, Baking Twink, would make them cry.

in my house, we refer to him solely as Shouty Dylan. I love him and his little twig arms SO MUCH.

His cookbook is amazing, BTW. Really great recipe organization, very clear and thorough instructions.

And it does manage to keep the manic charm of his videos

"leave it to the americans to make bread using anything but ingredients for bread"

Anyway.

Hand on my heart. Hand on my stupid heart.

THE MUMMY (1999) dir. Stephen Sommers

So there are a couple of chapters left to go on the MDZS Big Bang fic Tether by @annerbhp but all the art I've done for it is now revealed, so ROUND UP POST

This was a genuine delight to work on, so many great scenes that it was difficult to only pick these few. It's a great (and huge) story, go read it if you haven't.

Most recent art earns the (temporary) character death tag so if you want to stay fully spoiler-and-angst-free I've popped it below the readmore:

Here's the compilation of all the artworks the amazing @alightbuthappypen created for my Big Bang fic! I just can't get over how amazing they all are and I feel like the most spoiled writer of all time.

Join something.

Doesn’t matter what it is. Doesn’t need to be political, but it can be.

Just join something. Join a book club. Join a knitting group. Join a kickball league, or a gardening club, or a climate action group. Just join something.

Fascists want you isolated, disconnected and despondent. Your main goal in life for the next 4 years (and possibly beyond) is to do the opposite of what fascists want you to do.

They are better prepared than they were last time but so are we. We know who they are and what they want to do. We can prepare ourselves and our communities for it, but only if we actually have communities.

If you do want to get engaged in politics, do it at the local level.

If you live in a blue area, you need to fight to keep it that way. Talk to your local representatives and make sure they are doing everything in their power to enact protections against Project 2025.

If you live in a red area, fight to change that. Work on city council campaigns, and state congressional campaigns. Keep an eye on local legislation and bring attention to all the universally unpopular policies republicans are going to push through.

Fascism only wins if we do nothing. Fascism wins if we throw up our hands and throw in the towel. Fascism win if we make it easy for them to win.

Don’t make it easy.

not to be insensitive but some of the salem witch trials were so funny bitches like “i saw her at the devils sacrament!!!” girl… what were YOU doing at the devils sacrament 👀

If ANYTHING is a heritage post it’s this.