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Yes, it is fine to be uncomfortable with sex. But if depictions or discussions of sex make you so uncomfortable that you don't think they should exist in public or without warning, you have to do the work of asking yourself why sex makes you uncomfortable, and to what degree that discomfort is helping or harming you or others

You are being actively pressured by large societal forces to be uncomfortable discussing sex and uncomfortable with seeing it. There are people arguing that gay people are deviant and need to be kept from public spaces because what makes them different is sexual preference, and that makes pride pins allusions to sex that could traumatize unconsenting people. This is people using their discomfort with sex to harm others.

There are laws being passed around the world right now predicated on the idea that seeing sex or discussions of sex are traumatizing or harmful for children, and this is not true. This is people using your discomfort with sex to get you to allow mass surveillance and the heightened control of minors.

Is the "movies shouldn't have sex scenes" discussion the biggest problem in the world? No. But it is part of a larger cultural trend toward isolating sex (a normal, natural thing the majority of humans do or want) from the rest of the human experience, and using that distance to other and target marginalized people by painting them as perverts.

We’re presented with two theories in Sharlayan: one where the soul is cleansed of memories, and one where souls are melted down and blended (iirc). But the game doesn’t say in explicit terms which one is correct. Is reincarnation a thing in the FFXIV world?

So, disclaimer, I haven't thoroughly combed through canon, I'm probably missing pieces here, and I invite other folks to chime in with additional lore. Frankly, I'm not sure I can claim that canon itself is entirely consistent upon certain points. But here's a few things I can say with some confidence.

I don't think it is ever confirmed, but I think it is very likely that the Minfilias of the First, the young girls who were born carrying Minfilia's soul and died fighting the sin eaters, were all the same soul. Not that of the Source's Minfilia, but of her shard in the First. By my theory, as an Echo Bearer Minfilia would be a direct descendent of an ancient shard, and have corresponding shards in each reflection. Having spent the power Hydaelyn granted her in stopping the Flood of Light, she was able to latch onto the rebirth of her shard's soul, similar to the way an Ascian would take control of a mortal's body (as Minfilia herself says that she is now like an Ascian, already having shed her mortal flesh when she became Hydaelyn's emissary). As Minfilia did not want to directly possess these girls, however, she did not try to control them, and acted as more of a passenger. She might have known all along that eventually she would need to fully join with one of them, or she might only have devised that plan later--but the fact that she was able to do it at all strongly suggests a link between their souls as sister shards. As the stronger of two, being seven times rejoined as the Warrior of Light is, she would have been able to overpower Ryne's soul should Ryne have desired that, but when Ryne chose to live, Minfilia willingly subsumed her own soul, leaving Ryne with her powers and even a lingering sense of her presence ("And even though she's gone, I can still feel her… warm and calm and gentle") but with her own personality intact.

smol catgirl stronk.

the wife approves.

like i just dk how i’m supposed to live with the fact that he is the only character in “road to hell” who sings upon being introduced!!!!

or how in “come home with me” orpheus not only sings his lines while eurydice’s lines are spoken but his voice is ALSO twined through with these ethereal harmonies, like that’s just what happens when he gets excited?? like don’t you wish an unseen chorus started harmonizing with YOU when you were trying to impress your crush,,,,,,

OR how when he does speak his voice often sounds kind of whispy and thin, like he’s not used to it, or like instead of being nervous about singing in front of other people, the way most people are, he’s more nervous about speaking in front of them??? and even when he is speaking in that little voice of his there’s usually still kind of a musical little uptick to it???

or the innocent pride he takes in his Magical Musical Accomplishments, like he’s a little kid who’s discovered he has a knack for something and not a literal touched-by-the-gods son of a muse who can alter reality with his voice, because this is just how his life is???

“it isn’t finished, yet, but when it’s done, and when i sing it, spring will come again :)”

“i sang a song so beautiful the stones wept, and they let me in :)”

speaking of the stones weeping and letting him in, remember how in “wait for me” the stones sing back to him when he sings That Melody and you get “i hear the walls repeating / the the falling of my feet and / it sounds like drumming / and i am not alone / i hear the rocks and stones / echoing my song” but then in “doubt comes in” NOBODY sings That Melody back to him when he tries it out and it’s just orpheus and his voice and the distant taunting of the fates and you want to lie DOWN on the ground!!!!!!

like just in general the way the world around him responds to his singing is so fascinating to me and it brings me endless joy: there’s the aforementioned part of “wait for me,” and there’s also the part of “wedding song” where he sings That Melody for eurydice and you can hear the world around him opening up, there’s “IF IT’S TRUE” and the “is it true?” part of “chant (reprise)” where he’s basically shaking the denizens of the underworld from an amnesiatic TRANCE like i’m

I’m coming, wait for me!

Sailor Moon fanart <3

to start off with, this is the canon Encyclopedia Eorzea explanation:

but i refuse to take the "fade and are replaced" part literally. that would mean you're incapable of learning new languages because you physically can't hear them. and that not only raises a ton of practical issues, but also sounds like a curse as much as a gift.

so i prefer to think that instead, when you're talking to someone with the Echo, your brain just tends to gloss over the incongruity between what you're physically hearing and what you're understanding, especially if you're not paying attention. you just assume the other person is speaking your language, because you can understand them. but then maybe you hear a pun, or a song — something that doesn't work in your language — and suddenly you're like "wait, that doesn't rhyme... wait, what did they actually say?"

and maybe it's easier to notice that incongruity the more attuned you are to aether. that would go a long way towards ensuring that every rando NPC you talk to (who would have no reason to know what the Echo is) doesn't freak out about it. i am also working off the assumption that not everyone you meet everywhere you go speaks Eorzean, because why would they?

so really, the Echo would make it easier to learn new languages because you hear a new word and can instantly understand what the other person means by it.

and it is so interesting that it's explicitly about understanding their intentions and not what they actually say. it makes sense, given that ultimately what the Echo does is allow you to "transcend the boundaries of the soul."

but man, there's so much potential there. if someone's having trouble explaining themselves, no worries, you know what they mean. if you're having trouble explaining yourself, they know what you mean! you can listen to someone reciting poetry and understand how they personally interpret the poem... hell, having the Echo means being able to understand Urianger.

i think it would be neat for something like this to become a plot device in canon, even a small one, but it would probably be too confusing to depict. i don't think this is exactly what the writers had in mind anyway; i'm sure they just wanted a way to handwave in-game language barriers. but with the complexity of how language works, it CAN'T be that simple. i really do think that all this is the most logical interpretation of what we're given.

bonus headcanons about ehriyu specifically!!!!!!!

so much of this came about because she's a) Meracydian and didn't speak Eorzean before ARR, and b) a bard.

she relied on the Echo a lot after first coming to Eorzea, but was also hesitant to use it to speak too much, because she didn't know how people would react if they noticed. that's how she got the canon reputation for being silent (insert nod here), even though she's naturally a very loud person.

she loves chatting with people and mildly dislikes reading, because she can't cheat get that extra layer of understanding from the written word. hearing someone tell a story, or recite a poem, gives it so much more life than just seeing ink on a page! that really fueled her love of song that led her to becoming a bard in the first place.

also: she gets literal headaches when people start talking about things she doesn't understand, like advanced academic concepts. because the Echo is trying to make her understand when she doesn't. they're much less acute headaches than the ones that come with visions, but she still has to sit down and have a serious talk with Mikoto about it at one point — like to tell her "you CANNOT keep doing this to me" LMFAO

and as you can see she says you can 'know a man's mind even if you cannot comprehend his words' but nothing to the opposite effect.

Also, I'm almost certain it's more in relation to the vision aspect, but her last sentence is kinda funny to think about with language translation. Like the echo just picks and chooses what to translate lmao.

With learning new languages as well, my thought was that you'd really have to focus passed the auto-translate aspect to actually hear the words said if you wanted to learn to speak the language. Which would make learning a new language a pain in the ass (and head probably).

What would be your thoughts on, for example, standing in a room with a bunch of people speaking an unknown language? Would the echo translate everything that you hear for you? Or would it just be whoever you're actually focusing on at the time?

If it's everything I reckon the WoL would be prone to headaches like you mention with your technical talk translation above. We certainly see a lot of pain/wincing whenever the visions happen so I imagine you'd end up with some sort of migraine with the constant use of the echo to translate.

But if it's whoever you're focusing on, would it pick up on someone not in the current conversation yelling something to you across the room?

Actually, another interesting thing to think about with the way the echo works (translating intention in this case) is also how would it work with code or lying? Like WoL would be able to understand the rogues pretty easy even if they aren't a part of the guild, no?

and i'd never thought about whether you'd have to focus on someone to hear both the words and the meaning!!! i'd kind of just assumed you wouldn't, but i could see it going either way... EE does say "immediately understood by all" though...

i do definitely think the migraines are plausible. maybe that's an incentive to learn languages for yourself, so that the Echo doesn't have to do as much work for you and it makes the headaches less common LOL.

as far as lying, since intent is the key, i think you wouldn't know it if they didn't want you do... but code is tricky. 🤔 disclaimer i've never done the rogue quests, but like if their intent is to find out whether you understand them... ultimately, the premise is that you're "transcending the boundaries of the soul," so maybe it would come down to the subconscious desire of whether the code-user wants you to understand. but i'm not sure!

tbh i can't remember any audio for the ascian's in arr, i know they had a different text box though. maybe the ascian's arr language could be from the amaurotin language meshing with the sundered council's pre-awakening language over the millenia? like i assume the unsundered got to them after they're adults in most cases so they already know the language of that time period.

for the rogue's code it's based off irl thieves cant i'm pretty sure. mostly in game they just use a lot of different words for things. some are easy or obvious eg darkmans/lightmans is night/day, mort is lady, stabber is knife. some are weirder eg dew beaters is feet, mill is fight, snilch is check. so it's kinda a case of knowing the lingo.

but if someone with the echo were to walk by such a convo presumably they'd just understand plainly what they were talking about.

my WoL was involved with the rogues guild from a young age (his mute viera bestie joined after they rescued them both from slavers :D) so it's kinda funny to think that after his echo was awakened he just bypasses the code bit lmao. oh it'd work the other way too wouldn't it! hahaha, he'd never be able to speak in code again because the intention would just auto translate. god that would suck for a rogue xD

i usually just retcon it out of my head, but yeah that's a neat way to keep it in i think, that it's mixed in with languages from over the ages. as long as we just ignore how y'shtola mentions that the languages spoken in the first and the void are mutually intelligible with ours after 12,000 years because they share a common ancestor. but there are just. so many reasons to just throw that explanation out the window; it makes no sense;;;;

and yeah i think that sounds right about rogue's code, the way you explain it... that really would suck for a rogue lmfao.

i think it would be fun if the ancients had more control over it, being easily able to turn it off or alter their intent, but with our dumbass sundered peoples it's just like. trying to walk a misbehaving dog that's too big for you; the power just goes wherever it goes and drags you behind it. XD

When she first moved there, she already spoke French. But what she was doing was translating all the French she heard and saw to English in her head, and said by the end of the day she felt exhausted and had a headache. Overtime, however, she began to *think* in French. And that adjustment was related to her understanding of the language.