I participated in Yuletide this year for the first time in a few years, and it was a really lovely experience. I ended up writing We Wear Each Other's Heads Like Hats for just_katarin. I was tempted by some of her other prompts, but in the end I wrote Community fic, because Troy and Abed are amazing and wonderful and I 'ship them harder than I've 'shipped any pairing since Merlin and Arthur a couple years ago.

I was quite lucky this year and received two different stories, both in the Losers fandom: Sweet Dreams Are Made Of These by Kittydesade, and Bad Cop by likeadeuce. "Sweet Dreams Are Made of These" is a sweet and funny look at the relationship between Jensen and Aisha. Jensen's dream sequence and inner monologue felt so spot on to me. "Bad Cop" is Clay/Roque, and it gave me the #1 thing I wanted post-movie, which was a deeper look at Roque's characterization, the choices he makes and his relationship with Clay. I love the way she's made sense of his character: you can still see him making the choices he does in the film, but it's also clear why he remained loyal to Clay for so long. I loved the way she wrote the two of them fighting with each other and supporting each other, too.

I saw Sherlock Holmes! I totally loved it!! SOMEONE TELL ME THERE'S FIC OMG.

Hey internet! So! This is a totally a silly and petty request, but if you're sitting around bored on a Sunday night, trying to think of something to do, you could go to this poll hosted by the Salt Lake Tribune, and take five seconds and vote for Jon Huntsman, Jr. Or hey, vote for another Utahn on the list, just--vote for anyone but Tim DeChristopher. This is all I ask. Okay, awesome, thanks!

I'm trying to stay away from the remains of the warnings wank, but this one thing is just bugging the shit out of me, and I have no idea if this is a coherent post about it but I just need to vent. A few people have been implying or claiming that white women shouldn't be using language that has been primarily used for anti-racist work to talk about sexism, ablism and sexual abuse.

I think that maintaining some skepticism with regards to white people using language that originated with anti-racists is probably a good thing. However, I had really hoped that fandom might have grasped the basic concept of intersectionality by now. Being gay doesn't negate having white privilege, being a woman doesn't negate having straight privilege, being a PoC doesn't negate having abled privilege, etc etc. Fucking duh, right? This is like Anti-Oppression 101.

In this particular context, being able to read any kind of fic without getting triggered is a privilege that I have that many survivors don't have. When we use language that came out of Racefail, that is not meant as a comparison between racism and ablism in fandom--NO ONE is saying that this issue is as bad or worse as racism. The entire point of intersectionality is that this kind of stuff is not "either/or," it's "both/and." Anti-racists don't have some kind of copyright on language--it is oppressive and frankly moronic to say that you only want us to fight this way for your particular issues, because all of these isms intersect and affect each other anyway. Claiming that we can only use particular tools to fight for you and no one else pits groups against each other and hurts everybody.

Sometimes I write stories that have twists, and sometimes I don't want to give those twists away, and often I'm extremely reluctant to post spoilery summaries of anything I write. That might make me pretentious by fandom standards, but whatever, I'm okay with that.

But I would never want any story that I write to cause someone to relive a traumatic experience. Some of the comments I've been reading claim that how can we be expected to warn for triggery stuff if there's no consensus as to what can be triggery, but I think there is consensus--or at least, I feel that it's been made very clear to me that I should specifically warn for anything involving dubious consent. Beyond that, if I write something that includes violence or dark themes or whatever, I warn for content that may be disturbing or whatever. If anyone were to comment to ask me to warn for something triggery that I hadn't warn for, then it doesn't seem like it would be all that difficult for me to edit the original entry and type a few words in order to keep someone else from reliving trauma.

I don't have anything to add to this debate beyond adding to the chorus, really, I just. Don't understand how this is even an issue. It's not about my reluctance to spoil my story where Merlin cheats on Arthur with Gaius, it's about us as a community doing what we can not to contribute to rape culture.

Dude, so--how many of you follow Questionable Content? Can we talk about how much the current storyline is making me flail and bite my nails? Because ( flailing that's kinda spoilery )UGH IF ANYONE WANTED TO WRITE REALLY SCHMOOPY FIX-IT FIC THAT WOULD BE PRETTY AWESOME.

What do you care about? What do you want the new administration and our new Democratic congress to focus on? What do you want to happen differently, now that the Bush administration is out the door? Do you want your voice to be heard?

This year, I am planning on writing one letter a week to my elected officials--to my representative, to my senator, to my state legislators or to my president. One letter or one call, once a week, for a whole year.

And I want you to speak out with me. One letter from one person isn't much, but 52 letters is something, and 52 multiplied by however many people do this with me might even be a significant something. This is something that anyone can do, the most basic way beyond voting to participate in our democracy.

Because not very many constituents bother to write or call their representatives, letters and calls to your elected officials really do make a difference. I am so excited for Obama and for a Democratic majority in congress, but I still think that we need to put as much pressure on our people as possible to act on the issues that we care about, because the stakes right now are too high to just hope for the best.

All I'm asking is twenty minutes out of your week to write a letter (or less time than that, to make a call) on whatever you're most concerned about that week. November 4, 2008 already showed us that we have the power to change things--as President Obama said, the ground has shifted beneath us, and now it's time for the real work of encouraging it to shift together. And while for me this project is geared towards influencing American politicians, I encourage anyone anywhere to take part--every country in the world could use a little more civic engagement. Please write a letter with me, make a call with me, raise your voice with me.

You can contact your representative over here, you can contact your senators over here, and you can contact the president over here.

Please join 52letters with me and write or call your elected officials, and please feel free to pimp this project far and wide.

Oh man. zimshan made a vid chronicling the Obama movement, and it's--yeah. Whatever, it totally made me cry, and I can't believe that he's going to be our president tomorrow and that we really did this. Wow.

All These Things That I've Done by zimshan. Watch it.

The Falcon Cannot Hear The Falconer
By Zee

Summary: This is how Merlin is trapped. Futurefic, gen, PG. 2,622 words.
Notes: Warning for sadness. Thanks to tricksterquinn and miss_saigon for audiencing and betaing.

( Merlin had thought this through. )