u/Sleepy_Coffee_Day

So many people on the community just thrive on agenda and slander wars, and even though it does generate some interesting discussion, I also have a bit of bitterness towards it.

People in general just aren't incredibly literate or curious, and struggle a lot with basic reading comprehension, so making a hobby out of "saying misinformation for fun lol, it's okay because it's the agenda" is just kind of annoying to me.

There's joy in actual debate! It's actually kind of a guilty pleasure of mine to come on here and debate about my favorite series, even trivial elements of them, using actual facts.

I would love to see more ACTUAL debate to take the place of "slander," because a lot of people making it and seeing it simply don't question it and then that leads to even worse literacy within fandoms.

It also sabotages debates, because at any point the person can pull out, "I don't care, it's all about the agenda."

Anyway, it's just a tiny bit annoying as someone who finds debates using the actual source material to be way more fun! Curious what you all think.

For a lot of reasons, I'll probably never have biological children (I'm a lesbian, don't really want a relationship, don't want artificial insemination, to name a few). Most of all, instead of jumping through hoops to have biological children, I'd much rather parent a kid who's already out there and needs a home.

It will be at least a decade before I'm able to even start the process, but I do want to start thinking strongly about how I want to go about this now.

Adoption is generally a pretty messed up industry, and in some cases can be legally sanctioned human trafficking. That being said, kids in the industry still need homes, and are often in horrible situations while in state custody.

Plenty of adoptees were treated horribly or misunderstood by adoptive parents, and others were glad to have found adoptive families. And everything in between.

I'm looking into various ways to go about adoption to minimize a lot of common ethical issues, and I have a lot of research to do, but I figured I'd also ask on here just as a start:

Adoptees, what are some things you wish your parents had thought about, before or after adopting you? I want to hear from you!

Specifically I'm thinking about the Ashes of the Academy comic. Don't get me wrong, I like plenty about the comic, but I hate the fact that:

1. All "good" characters are suddenly devoid of the influence of propaganda. Ursa, Mai, Kiyi, and the Fire Nation kids have all been propagandized their whole lives, but they are Good, and therefore can immediately recognize that propaganda is untrue and Bad.

2. All "bad" characters believe and promote propaganda. They do this because they are Bad. They bully other people into promoting propaganda, because they are mean, and as soon as their influence is gone those characters immediately no longer believe propaganda because it is Bad.

What's the problem with this? Of course manipulative propaganda is bad, especially the malicious lies that Ozai and his predecessors were promoting.

But to teach young readers that only Bad people are susceptible to propaganda, because they are malicious, renders them unable to recognize when they too are falling victim to propaganda.

It's a betrayal of the OG series, where plenty of good people fully believed propaganda, including innocent kids, abuse victims, and beloved figures like Iroh himself.

It's just frustrating, because I feel like this kind of story is largely a vehicle for people to pat themselves on the back for not being among those propagandized, whereas it should be teaching the reader to think about how they might be being propagandized at this very moment.

I'm going to be traveling for the next few weeks, and my account will likely be in the low negatives during that time (though likely not anything worse than -100). Should I worry about my account being suspended or closed during that time?

Thanks!

It's fascinating to hear Japanese friends mention that their mom never said "I love you," since culturally in the US that would be considered very hurtful. But in Japan I've heard that acts of service are a more common way of expressing love.

I know volume 2 is coming out May 20, but do you think it'll be released as a single volume, too? If so, maybe the Eri one shot short could be bundled with that.

I'm just trying to figure out if and how it'll be released with home media. Some people are saying movie, but I just think that would be a bit unusual.

I've seen a lot of people saying that, relating to other shorts like "Piece of Cake" and "Departure," but it seems like those OVAs came out AFTER the respective movies.

If not a movie, do you think it'll get an official media release with a special bluray edition or something?

I know it comes out May 20th, so I'm wondering if it'll be a special feature on there!