Stop What You're Doing Right Now And Look At Archaic Period Terracotta Fox Scratching Its Head

what if i loved you. what if it was easy. what if i didn’t have to think about it. what if I didn’t have to explain it or catalogue it or explore it. what if i just wanted to be near you and that was enough. what if it was simple. what if it was instinct. what if i was your pylades. your patroclus. your hephaestion. what if i was the second part of you always. always right next to you. what if that was enough. what if it was simple. What if it’s just me and you and that was all i ever needed.

(through gritted teeth) sometimes what's good for your mental health isn't another do nothing day or a little treat sometimes what's good for you is putting in some of the work. Not all of it at once but sometimes you have to finish that essay or at least take the next step or you have to clean your room or at least dust the shelves or you gotta do the laundry or at least put it all in the hamper and it's not fun and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks and it sucks but you have to because i read a post on the internet that told me that's what being nice to yourself is sometimes

unfortunately it appears that i'm some kind of insane person

“Those poor boys”

“She deserves to be punished too.”

“I’m not saying I support rape, but-”

“Sorry to say - she deserved it.”

“She put herself in harm’s way”

“But if she was fingered, then that’s not rape.”

“She ruined their lives.”

I sometimes find myself confused by how many weird concepts and phrases get used commonly on this site, especially ones that are either internet-specific or scholarly in origin, so I thought just for fun I'd try to draft up a cheat-sheet of some of those terms I've seen used here a lot and let other people help with what I've missed. I figured this may be good as a refresher or a way to learn new ones. Here we go!

Bechdel-Wallace Test (commonly called the Bechdel Test): a frequently-used "lowest bar" for representation of women in a work of fiction, where a passing work must include two woman characters that have a conversation that isn't about a man. Developed as a joke by Liz Wallace and Alison Bechdel as a criticism for the lack of lesbian representation in cinema

Bidoof's Law: states that the kinds of guys that make insane posts about moral degeneracy on social media are often "openly and shamelessly addicted to hentai". Named for infamous tumblr user 'bidoof', who hopefully won't find this post

Chekhov's Gun: literary trope that suggests that one should not draw attention to specific details unless those details will be important to the story; the original example was that a play featuring a gun on a mantle in the first act must have that gun fired by the final act. Named for Anton Chekhov, who is not the guy from Star Trek

dril: infamous Twitter user who has irrevocably helped shape internet vernacular; it's commonly said that "there's always a dril tweet" for any given situation. Real name is [REDACTED]

Enshittification: economic pattern where companies (particularly ones in the tech sector) provide an excellent service at a loss in order to gather a userbase, then gradually worsen their product to attempt to gain a profit, all while hoping the userbase will continue using the service out of familiarity; inevitably, this results in the service's abandonment and death. Coined by Cory Doctorow

Godwin's Law: joke theorem that suggests that the longer an internet argument goes on, the more likely someone will mention the Nazis. Internet tradition typically follows the belief that, should an heated debate result in someone comparing the other party to a Nazi, and the debate otherwise has absolutely nothing to do with Nazis/fascism, that person has lost the debate entirely. Coined by Mike Godwin

Hanlon's Razor: a variation on Occam's Razor (see below) that suggests that one should assume stupidity rather than malice as a driving force behind someone's actions. Named for Robert J. Hanlon, who was probably kidding

Milkshake duck: phrase used to indicate a person who achieved brief popularity on the internet only to turn out to hold bigoted opinions of some kind. Coined by Twitter user "pixelatedboat"

Murphy's Law: suggests that anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. Coined by Nathan A. Murphy Jr while working on a rocket sled project

Occam's Razor: the simplest solution to a problem is often the correct one. Named for William of Ockham

Pavlov's Bell: also called Pavlov's Dog, this is a reference to a classic experiment that involves linking rewards with an unrelated external stimuli, as a form of mental conditioning. Developed by Ivan Pavlov

Poe's Law: suggests that internet satire without clear intent is indistinguishable from sincere belief to an outside observer. Named for Nathan Poe

Prisoner's Dilemma: philosophical conundrum where two individuals that cannot communicate must choose to either betray one another or stay loyal: both staying loyal ensured minimal punishment, one betraying the other results in the traitor going unpunished and the loyalist receiving maximum punishment, and both betraying results in both receiving maximum punishment

Problematic fave: phrase originating on Tumblr that typically indicates a person who remains popular despite their unpleasant behavior

Rule 34: old internet saying that, if something exists, somebody somewhere has drawn pornographic content of it

Rule 63: old internet saying that, if a character exists, somebody has drawn a gender-bent version of them

Schrödinger's Cat: a reference to a thought experiment in quantum physics involving uncertainty of a situation that cannot be resolved without direct observation. Developed by Anton Schrödinger

Skitt's Law: an internet-specific variation of Muphry's Law (not a typo), which states that any post attempting to correct the grammar or spelling of a previous post will invariably include a grammatical or spelling mistake itself. Named for Usenet user "Skitt"

Trolley Problem: philosophical conundrum involving a binary choice between doing nothing and allowing multiple people to die, or to actively choose to allow a single different person to die

Wheaton's Law: a revisal of the classical Golden Rule for the internet age, which simply states "don't be a dick". Popularized by Wil Wheaton (yeah, he's pretty cool)

You guys should make more intersex ocs, I want to see the intersex flag on character refs. Can we get women who are bears and cis gay boys with boobs? Can we get intersex characters who aren't 'futas' and instead actually depict intersexuality in a non-fetishistic manner? In a way that represents us? What about an anthro doe with antlers, or chimera cats? What about reptilian species who's sex is determined by temperature ending up square in the middle? How about characters who don't know they are intersex? What about intersex animals, dragons, monsters, literally split down the middle, half male half female. Infertile characters, agenital characters, characters with 'wrong' sex characteristics. Men who can't stand to piss. Women without ovaries. People who look like me. Characters who exist in settings without a medical establishment telling them their body is wrong? Gandalf big naturals. Intersex flag. Write settings where Intersexuality is represented thematically accuratly, and is natural and normal.

Write more intersex characters

The people who were introduced to Les Misérables through the musicals and just started reading the novel for the first time be like:

"God, why is there so much lore about The Bishop?"

"Oh, so Fantine was actually blonde after all"

"Why do all of Fantine's friends seem to be complete jerks?"

"I HATE YOU, FÉLIX THOLOMYÈS"

"Geez, so Cosette spent five years with the Thénardiers. And the last time Fantine saw her she was just two-years-old"

"What do you mean Éponine has a younger sister? And was Gavroche her brother this whole time?"

"WHY IS THERE SO MUCH THINGS ABOUT WATERLOO?"

"WAIT, NOW THERE ARE FIVE THÉNARDIERS KIDS? AND THEY "RENTED" TWO OF THEM?"