Random Stuff IX: Rogue Admins

[Mistrunner]

I remember feeling the horror when my mom told me I had to stop reading at about book five of Harry Potter because the next few were too violent or something like that. After a while, I snuck them off the bookshelf and she gave up trying to stop me from reading anything.  Harry Potter might have been the first real series I read- I started it in first grade. I obsessed over it until I started reading Sanderson.

When I think of Harry Potter, I try to think of nights spent with a flashlight reading under the covers rather than the uncomfortable, somewhat disturbing stuff that's coming out now. It's getting harder and harder. I want to keep loving it. I want my childhood back, Rowling.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

6 minutes ago, Mistrunner said:

I remember feeling the horror when my mom told me I had to stop reading at about book five of Harry Potter because the next few were too violent or something like that. After a while, I snuck them off the bookshelf and she gave up trying to stop me from reading anything.  Harry Potter might have been the first real series I read- I started it in first grade. I obsessed over it until I started reading Sanderson.

When I think of Harry Potter, I try to think of nights spent with a flashlight reading under the covers rather than the uncomfortable, somewhat disturbing stuff that's coming out now. It's getting harder and harder. I want to keep loving it. I want my childhood back, Rowling.

I've decided to treat CC as a fanfic with the author's stamp of approval on it--that therefore has no impact on how I approach the original series. Join me, Mistrunner. Become an AU Fanficcer, and we can rule the galaxy as Sharders united in our dislike of shoddy time travel stories.

[Mistrunner]

4 minutes ago, TwiLyghtSansSparkles said:

I've decided to treat CC as a fanfic with the author's stamp of approval on it--that therefore has no impact on how I approach the original series. Join me, Mistrunner. Become an AU Fanficcer, and we can rule the galaxy as Sharders united in our dislike of shoddy time travel stories.

I've always wanted to join a cult...

[Zathoth]

1 minute ago, Mistrunner said:

I've always wanted to join a cult...

What a coincidence, I always wanted to start a cult.

[Delightful]

24 minutes ago, Mistrunner said:

I remember feeling the horror when my mom told me I had to stop reading at about book five of Harry Potter because the next few were too violent or something like that. After a while, I snuck them off the bookshelf and she gave up trying to stop me from reading anything.  Harry Potter might have been the first real series I read- I started it in first grade. I obsessed over it until I started reading Sanderson.

When I think of Harry Potter, I try to think of nights spent with a flashlight reading under the covers rather than the uncomfortable, somewhat disturbing stuff that's coming out now. It's getting harder and harder. I want to keep loving it. I want my childhood back, Rowling.

Reading way too late at night, talking about it with friends all the time and explaining the movies to friends who hadn't read the books  awesome times

10 minutes ago, Mistrunner said:

I've always wanted to join a cult...

The Shard isn't already one?

[Mashadar Mistborn he/him]

26 minutes ago, Delightful said:

 

The Shard isn't already one?

All hail Bruce! Worship his puginess! 

[The Honor Spren she/her]

Hey guys. I'm here, but I don't have anything meaningful to add to this conversation. 

Relatable:

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

4 hours ago, Delightful said:

Apply for jobs online first and see what you can find?

I have, all want prior experience >.>

[+Slowswift]

@TwiLyghtSansSparkles I'm curious as to what you think of this post? 

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

10 minutes ago, Slowswift said:

@TwiLyghtSansSparkles I'm curious as to what you think of this post? 

After the first few paragraphs, I thought it was going to go in a completely different direction than it did.  

Suffice it to say, I agree with the author. I grew up in a Christian bubble that feared secular music to the point that I didn't even hear a secular song in its entirety until I was in middle school. And I wish I'd been allowed to listen to secular music. More to the point, I wish I hadn't been brought up to fear it, and not only because I feel I missed out on a lot of great music that way. 

If you know me, you know I've battled depression. It was strongest when I was a teen, and ironically enough, that was about the same time the Moral Guardians were making a fuss about all of these "negative, whiny" bands like Simple Plan, "angry" bands like Chevelle, and "dark, death-focused bands" like Evanescence and My Chemical Romance. You should've heard them—it was like the apocalypse had come and chosen only to affect adorable orphans who happened to be near golden retriever puppies at the time. To hear them talk, you would've thought Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge was just Gerard Way repeating "Don't go to church….all hail Lord Satan….go ahead and break the rules….tucking in your shirt's for fools" for forty minutes. And I'm not exaggerating when I say that this joke wasn't too far from the truth, when it comes to how I saw bands like that at the time. I didn't just avoid them. I was afraid of them. 

Fast-forward ten years. After falling in love with "Famous Last Words," the fourth song from The Black Parade to catch my fancy, I decided to listen to the whole album. I watched the songs migrate onto my iTunes nervously, a shade of that same fear I'd felt as a teen. I shrugged it off and listened to the album. 

When it was over, I wanted to give my parents and those Moral Guardians a piece of my mind. 

Make no mistake: The Black Parade is a dark album. It tells a story—the last moments of a dying man in a decaying fantasy world who spent part of his life as a soldier. He regrets so many of his choices, and the only thing stronger than his despair is his self-loathing. There are multiple tearjerkers ("Cancer," "Mama," "Disenchanted") and just when you think "Dead!" is the darkest song you'll hear, wait a minute—you haven't heard "The Sharpest Lives" yet. It's the sort of story my parents wanted me to avoid as a teen, thinking I couldn't handle it, or that it would make me (not my depression—but that's another story) worse. 

And when I was sixteen, it's the exact story I needed to hear. 

I've heard The Black Parade described by the moral "It's okay to hurt." That's apt. The message of the album seems to be that some things in life suck, and it sucks that they suck, but those things are unavoidable. There's no ray of sunshine tacked on, nothing about how we all need to live life to the fullest because we never know when or how it's going to end. It's centered on the fact that some things are horrible, and some people die horribly, and it hurts like storms—and that's okay. It's okay to be in pain. It's okay to regret. It's okay to hurt.

If I had heard that message as a teen, it wouldn't have solved all my problems. I wouldn't have been able to flip some sort of magic switch in my brain, snapping me out of Depression Mode and into Regular Mode. But I would've had an entire album of songs reminding me that life hurts, and saying you're in pain doesn't make you weak. I think it would've helped me come to terms with all of the turmoil I was feeling. Even now, years after the fact, listening to The Black Parade broke my heart and healed it all at once. 

How much better would it have been if I'd had that happen in the throes of depression? How much more would I have understood that pain is unavoidable, instead of berating myself for feeling it? 

How much sooner would I have recovered, if I hadn't been taught to fear My Chemical Romance? 

It's impossible to know for sure, but I have my suspicions. And those suspicions do not reflect favorably on the Moral Guardians. 

 

[+Slowswift]

@TwiLyghtSansSparkles That... is way more of an in-depth response than I expected. Not a bad thing, though -- it was a great post. Thanks for your thoughts.  

[Oversleep]

Is there a way to dive into What Happened...? and not get lost?

[Jo and the Bush all/any]

Played the first session of my new DnD group. WE found a baby dragon, and our Groot-expy barbarian attacked it for no reason. The party slplit into those attacking the dragon. (5 people) those running/hiding (2 people) and those healing the dragon (me). The baby's mother arrived and promptly killed everyone but me. Yay True Neutrality.

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

1 hour ago, The Only Joe said:

Played the first session of my new DnD group. WE found a baby dragon, and our Groot-expy barbarian attacked it for no reason. The party slplit into those attacking the dragon. (5 people) those running/hiding (2 people) and those healing the dragon (me). The baby's mother arrived and promptly killed everyone but me. Yay True Neutrality.

Dragons are awesome, why would you attack a baby dragon 

[Delightful]

1 hour ago, AnanasSpren said:

Dragons are awesome, why would you attack a baby dragon 

Exactly. Clearly you look after it and it becomes your familiar and you go on awesome quests together. 

[Jo and the Bush all/any]

1 hour ago, AnanasSpren said:

Dragons are awesome, why would you attack a baby dragon 

Because, in the words of the Barbarian, "I've never tasted Dragon flesh before."

17 minutes ago, Delightful said:

Exactly. Clearly you look after it and it becomes your familiar and you go on awesome quests together. 

I think its mother would have objected to that.

EDIT: Why haven't we made a new thread yet?

Edited August 1, 2016 by The Only Joe

[Kaymyth she/her]

25 minutes ago, The Only Joe said:

Because, in the words of the Barbarian, "I've never tasted Dragon flesh before."

I think its mother would have objected to that.

EDIT: Why haven't we made a new thread yet?

'Cause no staffers have closed this one.  With the new forum design, they might not; I know the original pattern was to keep the database from slowing down/getting overloaded.  It's possible that the new site doesn't experience those problems, and closing threads is no longer necessary.

...or @Chaos just hasn't gotten around to it yet.

[Jo and the Bush all/any]

Can we do it anyway? I enjoy starting new threads every 100 pages. Plus it makes looking for certain conversations easier.

[Edgedancer he/him]

29 minutes ago, The Only Joe said:

Because, in the words of the Barbarian, "I've never tasted Dragon flesh before."

I think its mother would have objected to that.

EDIT: Why haven't we made a new thread yet?

Tell your babarian that eating dragon flesh causes your body to burn up from the inside and see how he likes it.

1 minute ago, The Only Joe said:

Can we do it anyway? I enjoy starting new threads every 100 pages. Plus it makes looking for certain conversations easier.

Honestly, I always thought that was the reason as well, which always made having more pages per topic when there's already more space on each page seem weird to me.

[The Honor Spren she/her]

It's 3:40 am and I'm still up, binge watching anime. I start school tomorrow. Why am I doing this to myself?? 

[Mestiv he/him]

10 minutes ago, The Honor Spren said:

It's 3:40 am and I'm still up, binge watching anime. I start school tomorrow. Why am I doing this to myself?? 

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger

[Edgedancer he/him]

3 minutes ago, Mestiv said:

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger

Or causes irreparable crippling damage. Is the anime at least worth it?

[The Honor Spren she/her]

13 minutes ago, Edgedancer said:

Or causes irreparable crippling damage. Is the anime at least worth it?

I feel like it's worth it now, but when I wake up I may beg to differ.

[Delightful]

4 minutes ago, The Honor Spren said:

I feel like it's worth it now, but when I wake up I may beg to differ.

I'm pretty sure we've all been there.

what are you watching?

[Mestiv he/him]

We didn't see any pugs in a while, so...

Spoiler