Frog butt seeking wisdom

"They're putting magic in the water that makes the freaking brushbugs gay"

There's the obvious parallel between magic and the arts that quite obvious but its magic system also has similarities with math and programming which I personally find interesting. Many people have pointed this out (including references to other stem subjects as well but I digress) and while the hard magic system itself is not particularly revolutionary or anything (a variety of video games have executed this similarly with extensive detail), the way its themes about learning and teaching is unique.

There are so many shows about school, and yet this is one of the few that have actually managed to capture what learning as a kid can be like or frankly what learning can and should be like for anyone. Just like how the manga remembers that these girls are twelve, its also remembers that they are students and them learning is the actual driving force to the story. At no point is it a backdrop to the "adventure", the learning is the point.

You are constantly shown how much effort these girls put. How regardless of the fact its a hard magic system that requires extensive theory, studying and rote memorizations; there's ample space for creativity and self expression. All the girls have styles and preferences to the way they problem solve. (Richeh preferring small intricate spells linked together and it reflects in all her work etc)

Even when its outside the "schooling" environment and actual issues arise, Coco's problem solving ends up coming back to whatever she learnt most recently. Her main one being time reversal spells because that was her most recent lesson before silver eve arc, ("Learn, remember, apply" as Qifrey points out) Of course that what's she's going to think about. She just learned this cool as fuck spell and now that's all she's going to be thinking about for the next 2 weeks. (its so relatable, yeah ofc we're going to fixate on this, why wouldn't we)

And even then, its not all sunshine, it does a great job at covering how difficult all of this can be, learning is hard and you will burn out if you try to overdo it. magic is complicated and sometime unintuitive.

Nothing will make me forget that the girl who was able to verbally forgive herself for not being able to be a prodigy at magic in the beginning of the story slowly turn into the current Coco who broke down crying because she couldn't draw. She couldn't come up with anything, a blank paper filled only with the desperation to keep going. She becomes so focused on the utility of magic, she forgets what its like to just do magic for fun, to learn for yourself.

I also love that the magic is a metaphor for skills in a way. that Qifrey says that Coco's tailoring, that skill and effort she put as a girl is magical in its own right.

Like. mild manga spoilers but. imagine you have grown up with very Specific expectations about ways to be Good And Useful. You love magic, which is good and expected of you, but every time you draw something that feels like Yours, an Actual Expression Of Self, no one (Ririphin excepted) else sees the value in it. (no one sees the value in You, it feels.) The only things others seem to care about is your ability to meet some arbitrary standard of doing Other People's Magic.

And the more you give into that, the less room there is for Your Magic. The less room there is for You, Richeh, the person.

And even after it seems like you've finally found an adult who will let you actually exist as yourself without punishing you about it, even he starts pushing you to cast Other People's Magic. Of course it's going to feel like a betrayal.

Even though we know it's because other magic isn't actually a contamination like Richeh fears, it's SO real to have her struggle with the tension of, 'no one's valued my way of doing things before, if I don't hold fast to it I'll lose the ability to Actually Express Myself so I HAVE to dig in'

the key being that Qifrey does value her way of doing things, and wants to push her to realize that other people's magic doesn't have to be a threat -- that it can be building blocks to incorporate into her own magic, exactly as much or as little as she chooses. That it's useful, to see how others do things

Whereas an adult who didn't value her way of doing things would push her to use the 'correct' spells for the situation, and stamp out variation.

The whole point is that we learn from that variation. Regardless of whether you're starting from a 'standard' position or an outside one, it's useful and good to be able to look at different ways of Doing A Thing, understanding how and why they work, and incorporating that understanding into how you do things.

But somewhere along the line they just… Disappeared. My mom says they’re not being paid and they’re not in collections. It’s almost as if someone out there did…exactly what Parker did.

Did I know where all the ruffles were going? Not really but I figured it out.

I wouldn't worry too much about the ominous glow in the back. I'm sure that's not a problem.

I do it too, I’m not going to pretend I don’t make jokes about the hets, or the down with cis bus, or whatever

But I recently befriended a cis, straight dude and I have watched him be dismissed, degraded, and unambiguously insulted for the perceived “crime” of being straight — all in queer environments where he is allegedly “completely welcome” and surrounded by “friends”

This guy is not a toxic person! But I have seen him be made to feel so small and like his comfort and safety in those spaces are conditional on his silence and acceptance of being treated like a human dunk zone, and I think that some of y’all have had so much shit from straight/cis people that the second you feel like you’ve got an inch, you want to luxuriate in the perceived catharsis of bullying someone who— actually —doesn’t deserve it

And until he very, very carefully mentioned to me in private that it makes him feel bad, I didn’t even clock that I was involved in doing that, that it had become so instinctive for me to make casual jokes like that, and that— well meaning or otherwise —I had been contributing to an environment that made someone I really really like feel like shit

I’m gonna say this point blank— you’re a tar pit if you think this way

Your suffering does not make you special, you are not granted brand new permissions to be belligerent and cruel because you have been treated poorly, straight people aren’t an oppressed class, no, but they’re people who are entitled to the same amount of basic decency that you, yourself, are entitled to

Sketch under the cut for bw tattoos.