#songwritting

2. AU-inspired song belonging to the hijack fic Dress us in Blue and Silver: Requiem of Jack's Lake. (Spoilers ahead!)

Thank you for taking the time to read my post and for sharing your thoughts. This is actually something I had been reflecting on for quite a long time.

For months, I kept asking myself the same question: why does there seem to be such a disproportionate level of hostility toward Sombr online? Not ordinary criticism—which every artist receives and which is both inevitable and healthy—but a particular eagerness to ridicule him at every opportunity, despite the fact that he has never been involved in any major scandal or behavior that would normally justify such sustained animosity.

I genuinely struggled to understand it.

Then I saw the reactions to the preview of his upcoming song.

I watched thousands of people mocking lyrics that, to me, seemed remarkably straightforward. They describe a person caught between desire and insecurity, longing and self-doubt, intimacy and fear. Anyone who has ever struggled with body image issues, self-esteem, dysmorphia, emotional dependency, anxiety, or fear of vulnerability could immediately recognize the emotional reality being expressed.

And that is when something clicked.

I found myself thinking: "Wait a moment. These are the exact same emotional themes that people celebrate in countless other artists."

Artists like Conan Gray, Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish have built entire bodies of work around vulnerability, longing, insecurity, heartbreak, self-doubt, and emotional transparency. And rightly so. People connect with them precisely because they dare to articulate emotions many others struggle to put into words.

So why did this feel different?

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that vulnerability is often judged differently depending on who expresses it.

When women openly discuss their insecurities, many people praise their honesty.

When queer artists write about longing, sensitivity, and emotional complexity, many people celebrate the courage and authenticity of their self-expression.

But when a young man who is generally perceived as heterosexual and cisgender expresses those same emotions, there are corners of the internet that suddenly treat those feelings as embarrassing, laughable, or worthy of ridicule.

Not because the emotions themselves have changed.

Not because the songwriting has fundamentally changed.

But because the messenger has.

And I think that is what troubles me most.

As someone who has spent years identifying with progressive values, feminism, and LGBTQ+ advocacy, I believe these movements are at their best when they challenge restrictive ideas about how human beings are "supposed" to feel or behave. One of the most important conversations of the last few decades has been the recognition that boys and men are often taught to suppress vulnerability, to hide pain, to confuse emotional silence with strength.

Yet sometimes I look online and wonder whether some people have unconsciously reproduced the very standards they claim to oppose.

Because if we ask men to become more emotionally aware, more vulnerable, more communicative, and more honest about their insecurities, then we cannot turn around and mock them the moment they actually do it.

That is not progress.

That is simply the old script wearing a new costume.

And unfortunately, this is not the first time I have witnessed this contradiction. Even artists like Lana Del Rey spent years being dismissed, mocked, or misunderstood because their art explored forms of femininity, vulnerability, dependency, or romantic longing that did not fit the narratives many people preferred. History repeatedly shows that people often celebrate vulnerability in theory while feeling uncomfortable when confronted with it in practice.

Perhaps that is because vulnerability acts like a mirror.

And mirrors rarely reveal only the person standing in front of them.

What do you say my reddish, should I write a song on these words?