Lambda Literary Foundation: We're changing our submission criteria. From now on our GLBT literary award will only be given to self-identified GLBT authors.

( This does not go over well. )

A Slytherfan terri_testing writes an essay The Wizarding World and the Otherworld, where she argues that Harry Potter books are horror, not fantasy and that Hogwarts is like the school where the Native American children were brainwashed:

( Read more )

The essay provokes a chorus of "I agree"s and complaints about JKR's treatment of Snape:

mary_j_59 (see "Good night, sweet prince, And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!")

This is brilliant, Terri! And absolutely consistent. You know, my sister and I went to hear Rowling, Irving and King in NYC, and we both liked John Irving (reading from Owen Meany) best. Now the reason is clear. Rowling is actually a horror writer, like King, and I do not like horror. Still less do I like horror disguised as a children's fantasy quest. Irving, on the other hand, was writing in the great tradition of picaresque novels - a tragicomedy with a moral core.

But what I still wonder is: did (and does) Rowling know that she has actually written a dystopion/horror story? Somehow I don't think she realizes this.

condwiramurs/00sevvie

I second the 'brilliant' comment. And I highly doubt Rowling is aware of what she has actually written. She is too utterly blind to the reasons we like Severus, for example, to have any clue that she may have written something different from what her perfect picture of her work in her head is. I'm sure she thinks we're just getting it 'wrong.'

oryx_leucoryx (see Cry the Beloved Slytherins)

So if Severus Snape actually survived Nagini's bite, returned to the Muggle world and became some kind of counselor to delinquent youth or someone who runs an anti-bullying program (by working both with victims and perpetrators) he would be a hero with a rather protracted but complete journey? Starting out as the victim of neighborhood bullies (I doubt Petunia was the only one who knew that the strangely dressed kid was the Snape boy from Spinner's End) who must have dreamed that magic would solve his problems, learned that magic simply gave bullies more dangerous/'interesting' ways to hurt people, played a key role in getting rid of the biggest bully in the magical playground and came home to use non-magical ways against bullies?
***
bohemian_spirit has some fics in that general direction - in her 'Light Between the Cracks' series Severus Snape of canon years was secretly married to a Muggle school teacher and while at his Muggle home watched over the neighborhood children. And in her 'Professor Grunge' Severus immigrates to the US instead of joining the Death Eaters. He studies at a wizarding university and becomes a teacher who fights bullying and uses music to assist in magical healing.

But the real fun starts when night_train_fm decides to argue with terri_testing and says, among other things:

'Hermione exiling her parents to Australia'
She did that because she was terrified (with good reason) of the DEs coming after them: Voldemort was taking over the government, had already ordered several public mass-Muggle-killings, and anyone remotely connected to Harry was a potential target. According to Jo, Hermione reversed the spell ASAP once the threat was over. For that matter, is it ever outright stated that she didn't sit down and discuss it with them first?

That doesn't go well.

( Hermione is teh ebil! )

(Be warned: long wank report is LONG. Continuation of this clairvoyantwank post. ETAs are under the third cut.)

This weekend, Torchwood fans flocked to Chicago for TorchSong, a John Barrowman-centric convention with a website that looks like it was modeled after a Geocities page circa 1997, a half-assed commercial that aired on BBC America, and some awfully expensive tickets.

When the con was first announced, the only guests were John, his sister Carole, and Mark Sheppard. When people started emailing the organizers about possible other guests, they were emphatically told while more guests would be coming, there would be no other Torchwood guests because it was a John Barrowman event, not a Torchwood event.

Ticket sales apparently convinced them this was not a good strategy, so over the following months they added Kai Owen, Tom Price, and Gareth David Lloyd. Fans squeed, and despite being not particularly impressed with the organizers' behavior, they willingly plonked down as much as $500 to see John and friends and to see John perform. (Later, 'special' auction packages went for up to $1,410.)

Then things start to go wrong.

On Wednesday, Kai Owen was forced to drop out due to a family emergency. Thursday, the day before the con began, they announced that John Barrowman had torn ligaments in his ankle and he would not be attending.

Aaaaand we're off.

( Act I: Pre-Con )

( Act II: The Convention )


( Act III: The Ongoing Aftermath )
ETA3: "UR JUST JELUS!!"

ETA4: Con-goers have now created their own special clubhouse: torch_tanic (torchsong_09 post announcing it. Commenters are not amused, but you'd never know it because she deleted all the wholly negative ones. Raise your hand if you've got a screencap.) (Thank you kaylamds for the heads-up.)

As those of you who haven't been living under a rock may know, a new Star Trek movie just came out. Over on fanficrants, roq is upset about this. Apparently, TEENAGERS are now WRITING in HER fandom! Quelle suprise!

She has some choice words to say about it.

( Wank long and prosper )

Over on ontd_olympics, brand-spankin'-new user kristixkupcakes (journal now deleted) posts a tl;dr entry (also now deleted) titled "MY SEXUAL ENCOUNTER WITH RYAN LOCHTE." Her long, sordid tale of a disappointing hookup with the US Olympic gold-medal swimmer includes the following highlights:

( I'm doing bodyshots off Ryan and everybody's in a deep drunken haze )

Again with the sympathy and the "omg, I totally knew he was a douchebag!" At least until kristixkupcakes posts again:

MY SEXUAL ENCOUNTER WITH RYAN LOCHTE -- MORE.

So I've been an avid watcher of this community and ONTD and I've finally joined here and noticed how everybody's gaga over the kid I slept with on my birthday and I think you guys should know what happened because your opinion of him will change.

And then, behind an lj-cut:

you just got punk'd.
- christopher ashton kutcher <3

USE A CONDOM!

The comments EXPLODE. Accusations of sockpuppetry and mod involvement abound, and there are calls for bannination, as well as the usual "OMG, you guys, have a sense of humor!" Again, this one's been bahleeted, but there are screencaps for downloading: before the post was unlocked and after it was unlocked.

Finally, like all good wanks, this one's wrapped up with a mod post claiming that the whole shenanigan was the result of a "chat that got too out of hand." Things seem to be settling down for now, but who knows? Maybe Nastia Liukin will eat someone's baby, or Usain Bolt will turn out to actually be a cyborg! IT COULD TOTALLY HAPPEN, PEOPLE.

trevelyanl85a2 posts in Girl Gamers that he is mad because he tried friending people on Xbox Live and they didn't give him enough play time.

In his words: Whenever I asked what was up, excuses were made saying "oh so and so of a friend wants to game with me, maybe some other time" or no response was given at all. When I asked later if they want to game, for those who said "maybe later", they gave the same excuse again.

Add in his claim of "mild Aspbergers" [edit: his spelling, not mine] and his wondering if no one wants to play with him because he's a guy and you have a good culture for growing some wank.

95 comments and counting.

ETA: We now have apology.

This is a tiny one sided wank, but it made me giggle. Of course that might be the bottle of knob creek I just finished.

Popwatch asks readers to share their desktop wallpaper. There are a lot of David Cook fans posting, which is fine unless you are Nihilistic:

David Cook is NOT HOT! He's a fat, pale, soulpatch-wearing, prematurely balding oaf and in six months you people are all going to be ashamed of yourselves. Mark my words. I never knew this board was made up of so many lemmings.

( C&P'ed since I can't link to individual comments in the thread )

Dearest, beloved, Fandom Wank.

I know you were looking forward to great excitement today. Some of you said words to me that indicated you anticipated fiery 'judgement' upon those who remained fresh and dewey white, those you call n00bs.

Anyway, you got today instead.

Stop anticipating things, we'll just break your hearts.

Sincerely,

Sepia P. Magpie, Esq.



PS: Use this post to reflect on how you could be better people. Or just fuck around in the comments.

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a LiveJournal user called _allecto_ who hated Joss Whedon and his so called feminist reputation, and was determined to expose him for what he was.

To that end, she posted a rant on her LiveJournal which, to be quite frank, has to be read to be believed.

Here.

Highlights:
Zoe calls Mal 'sir' (thereby proving that Joss hates women).

Mal threatens to duct-tape Kaylee's mouth and lock her in the hold (thereby proving that _allecto_ would not recognise humour if it bit her on the butt while wearing a Groucho Marx disguise...oh, and Joss hates women).

The best bit?

On the strength of Joss' work on Firefly and interviews she has seen, _allecto_ alleges that:

I feel awful for Joss Whedon's wife. From what I've read about him and the interviews I've watched, I'm fairly certain that he rapes his wife and abuses her in various other ways.

Because _allecto_ appears to be screening comments (can't imagine why) or deleting any she doesn't like (ditto), disagreeing comments can be found in another LJ:

here.

~~~

ETA: Whedonesque reacts.

Screencaps of Whedonesque before it's gone can be found here.

In the wake of recent boob wank and tentacle wank, I bring you a slightly stale...penis wank!

Christopher Butcher makes a post to his blog entitled Afraid of Cock concerning the recent reaction to a picture of Citizen Steel with a larger than comics-normal package.

Not me, of course, but take a trip around the internet lately and you’ll find that the poor, put-upon fanboy is being subjected to higher-than-normal ammounts of cock by the unfeeling bastards in charge of the comics industry. How’s that for the antithesis of the typical complaints about homosexuality and even male sexuality in comics?

He goes on to provide complaints from other sources and counterarguements to those complaints. People are nonplussed, even when Butcher posts pictures of men in underwear to show that with great genitals come great packages. Arguements continue on whether it's oversexualized or not, if Steel is having an erection, and if people are complaining too much or not.

And finally the Joker gives his opinion.