It's me. Wicked Wazlib.

there should be a term for characters you personally don't care about but you defend them anyways because the way people treat them is really uncomfortable. like ok this is a very middle-of-the-road character for me but the fandom's either been super misogynistic, racist, etc. about them or harassed innocent people who try to genuinely explore that character warts and all, and i find that more annoying than the actual character.

the term should by 'my client', like you're a lawyer defending your client that you are completely indifferent to but you are obligated by your job (or your morals) to defend

Late 2010s and 2020s horror movies will be remembered as hot women going insane and often terrorising, maiming and/or killing men (often their boyfriend / love interest); and i can't pretend i haven't enjoyed this genre, but also it's sort of interesting that it's happening meanwhile we're hearing all this noise about "male loneliness epidemic", men panicking that women are stealing their jobs and taking up their place in society, men generally feeling like women don't want or need them, etc etc. Especially since i'm still not seeing much of these horror pics actually being written or directed by women. Like it's a fascinating phenomenon but i don't know if it really is all that feminist at the end of the day.

I also notice that so far this seems to be a genre exclusively reserved to white male directors (and white actors of both sexes). Non white prestige horror has very little focus on misogyny, that i've seen anyway. Take all the male characters in Jordan Peele's movies, they are perhaps flawed but still sympathetic and heroic. Whereas in films like Ex Machina, Midsomar, Companion, Obsession, Pearl, etc., the men are consistently punished for their own insufficiency: they're not serial killers, they're weak, impotent, ordinary men, at worst casually cruel, at best kinda dumb and disappointing, whose selfishness has catastrophic consequences for everyone around them, starting with their girlfriend or love interest. So we have a phenomenon where men, specifically white men, are portraying white men - themselves - very harshly, focusing on male inadequacy and humiliation. Meanwhile a) non-white men are NOT doing that, b) other white men are outraged by and blaming women for this trend, when actually c) female directors are putting out there films like Raw, Titane, or the Substance, where men are not portrayed like this at all and in fact barely focused on. So it's in that sense that i don't see this trend as feminist, although it's not strictly anti-feminist either, it's just intensely (white) male-focused.

Kinda feeling like i'm having a conversation with myself at this point lmao but another thought about this has occured! A different reason i don't see these films as really feminist is that at least a few of them don't seem to be particularly criticising male power, but male weakness. Christian in Midsommar isn't physically abusive to Dani, he hurts her by being conflict avoidant, lazy (he also doesn't know what he wants to do with his life in general). Caleb in Ex Machina is naive and deluded. Bear in Obsession ends up causing a horrible sequence of events because he didn't dare confessing his feelings to Nikki. It would be a stretch to say those films endorse traditional masculinity, but they're not exactly endorsing the "modern sensitive man" either, and in that sense they can be read as a bit reactionary.

Late 2010s and 2020s horror movies will be remembered as hot women going insane and often terrorising, maiming and/or killing men (often their boyfriend / love interest); and i can't pretend i haven't enjoyed this genre, but also it's sort of interesting that it's happening meanwhile we're hearing all this noise about "male loneliness epidemic", men panicking that women are stealing their jobs and taking up their place in society, men generally feeling like women don't want or need them, etc etc. Especially since i'm still not seeing much of these horror pics actually being written or directed by women. Like it's a fascinating phenomenon but i don't know if it really is all that feminist at the end of the day.

I also notice that so far this seems to be a genre exclusively reserved to white male directors (and white actors of both sexes). Non white prestige horror has very little focus on misogyny, that i've seen anyway. Take all the male characters in Jordan Peele's movies, they are perhaps flawed but still sympathetic and heroic. Whereas in films like Ex Machina, Midsomar, Companion, Obsession, Pearl, etc., the men are consistently punished for their own insufficiency: they're not serial killers, they're weak, impotent, ordinary men, at worst casually cruel, at best kinda dumb and disappointing, whose selfishness has catastrophic consequences for everyone around them, starting with their girlfriend or love interest. So we have a phenomenon where men, specifically white men, are portraying white men - themselves - very harshly, focusing on male inadequacy and humiliation. Meanwhile a) non-white men are NOT doing that, b) other white men are outraged by and blaming women for this trend, when actually c) female directors are putting out there films like Raw, Titane, or the Substance, where men are not portrayed like this at all and in fact barely focused on. So it's in that sense that i don't see this trend as feminist, although it's not strictly anti-feminist either, it's just intensely (white) male-focused.

TRAs using ancient hermaphrodite gods as ‘proof’ trans people have always existed feels not that much different to if furries used ancient animal headed gods as proof furries have always existed tbh

Daily reminder that JK Rowling is awesome :)

Which of the four houses are you is OUT, tell me which of the four humors you are