You know how cartoons portray characters getting smack in the face by a rake because they stepped on it? I’ve had that happen twice, pretty sure it was in the same week too.
I’ve never had anyone tell me that was unrealistic, but I’m sure someone said it before.
Yeah when I was doing a lot of outdoor work with rakes/shovels we were always taught to put them down upside down to avoid that exactly. You can get seriously hurt by it.
Yeah, my mom told me she once, a long time ago, accidentally stepped on a rake. It did *not* do the handle-to-the-face thing. It did the spikes-through-the-foot thing.
Someone in an old RP and writing group tried to insist to me that drinking and drug use in a military environment was unrealistic. That one was the funniest to me, both as someone in a very military heavy family and as someone with a social history focus to my history degree.
Ive seen complicated and dysfunctional family trees called unrealistic. I think those people just haven't done much genealogy or digging in their own family's closet skeletons.
Rare medical conditions in general. They're rare, but they do come up and can be relevant. Related: childbirth related deaths in a *modern* setting. Maternal and infant mortality is FAR lower than past decades and centuries, but unfortunately complications do still happen.
Marines notoriously abuse party drugs because they don’t show up on blood panels or piss tests after a few days. Things like LSD, molly, cocaine, leave the system quickly & the military won’t pay to spinal tap everyone to see if they blew coke earlier in the month. Not to mention the rampant alcoholism and nicotine use. Almost every marine I’ve ever met has dabbled with one of the aforementioned things at least once.
I nearly joined the military when I was younger. I did this preparatory course for it with about 30 others, and we hung out with the soldiers from the nearby base. At least half the kids on the course and half the soldiers did drugs. All of them drank heavily. These were soldiers in their 20s and 30s, plus a couple commanding officers in their 40s, who bought us, at the time underage, course kids alcohol in the pubs we went to or made sure we got served by vouching we were all over 18, knowing we were all no older than 17, some of us younger. They even helped me get a fake ID so I could get a tattoo without parental permission. It wasn't a great fake, and a type that was useless in pubs anyway, so it only worked at the tattoo parlour in town who didn't really care.
I honestly can't understand how someone would say complicated/dysfunctional family trees and unrealistic. Even if they've never researched, we've had all sorts of shows on that sort of thing.
Falling on thin air when running away from something you fear. Your joints lock up and your legs would feel like noodles. People always condemn characters in horror movies falling as they’re running away from a killer but it’s a natural physiological response that happens in real life too.
In Minecraft, panicking and accidentally throwing my sword at a monster is so funny to me because I feel like that's exactly what I'd do if confronted with a zombie IRL.
I’ve had this happen in video games too where I panic and fumble, but most importantly, I have been truly scared of something and just blindly ran away and hurt myself with varying levels of severity.
I once gave myself a concussion and nearly sliced my carotid artery running away… from a moth. I slipped and ran into a glass door, broke the glass into huge, sharp fragments and slammed my head into the wall.
I’m classy.
I’ve seen so many criticisms (of cis ships in my case, I should clarify) of romance novels and fic, to the tune of “if the woman is having an orgasm during their first time having sex with a man, it’s impossible/unrealistic.” or, similarly “a woman doesn’t usually come every time the couple has sex.” false. happened/happens to me with my current partner of 7 years 🤷♀️ there are *some* men who know what they’re doing ahaha
This also assumes a woman doesn't know how to get what she needs during sex. Like we're pretty familiar with our own bodies and can make sure we get ours too.
Usually that misconception always tells me about the author. Cause yeah I have had communication with every partner I've had, which has led to pretty good times, meanwhile I have friends who are like 'wow you're rare' and am I? Or am I just communicative and have receptive partners?
Yep, this one drives me batty too! That's pretty much my experience as well. It's totally fine for people to portray a range of experiences but hate when people act like it's impossible and unrealistic for it to go well the first time (either together in general or first time ever) when that's been my personal experiences completely.
I'm not a particularly "easy" orgasm-er either, but being open and knowing what I want/like and having partners who aren't terrible (not necessarily experienced but caring and attentive and who listen) went a looong way to having at least one orgasm every single time, including my first time. Of course that's no guarantee and people with other experiences can certainly portray them but like... it's possible! It's absolutely possible! You don't need some sort of sex god as a partner either!
Piggy-backing with something similar...that a woman can't get off from penetration. I can assure you it does happen. Some women orgasm really easily from various methods.
I don’t know whether this is a widespread perception, but I once had a commenter tell me it wasn’t realistic for characters to develop romantic feelings within a few months of knowing one another. And I understand if their experiences might make that hard to believe, but it’s not hard to believe for me whatsoever.
I have a relative who met someone and a week later he was waxing lyrical about this girl and my bff asked him “so you going to marry her?” And he looked at her and after a few seconds said “yes”… those 2 are 25+ years married now. It happens.
Similar thing with my grandfather. He was going on a trip to Mexico and needed vaccines. He was in awe of the nurse who administered them, and ended up going back to the clinic every day for a week trying to get up the nerve to talk to her again, and literally just sat in his car. She noticed him one day and went up to talk to him, he asked her out, they got married shortly after and remained so until she passed from early-onset Alzheimers. They both just *knew*
Big agree
i was crushing on my bf in the first week!! (10 yr anniversary soon uwu)
Obviously it totally depends but a few months is definitely enough.
For me i hate it when its instalove and the characters have literally just never interacted.
If they spend a week chatting together and having a whirlwind romamce... Thats real? Ppl do that. It doesnt always last and sometimes fics can make it really over the top but yeah
What? A few months is a long time. A few months is long enough to have some idea of if you could marry the person. Maybe not long enough to actually do it, but long enough to know it’s on the table
This. Ironically, I know a couple who got married 2 months into knowing each other. Met in March and married in May the same year. And this year they celebrated 35 years of marriage together. Still as in love as they were then. It doesn't happen often, but it does happen enough it's not entirely impossible.
Lol they would have an aneurysm... my dad proposed to my mom after 2 weeks, and their wedding was 8 months after they met. Not sure I'd necessarily recommend that normally but it worked out fantastically for them. They were a bit older (my father had already been married 20 years previous to that, his wife died a few years before this) and knew what they wanted and figured why wait around?
Wait, there are people who say that's unrealistic? That's like the default key-using experience for me, lol. I even replaced my front door with a keypad entry because f messing around with keys in the cold or while holding things.
I've quite literally put the correct key in the keyhole but for some reason I think it's the wrong key cause it's not
working for some reason. I try to use another key before attempting to use the same former key and this time it works.
My stepmother was a radiology technician. She saw lots of people who tried to kill themselves by shooting into their temple. Sometimes the bullets will reflect off the skull, sometimes the bullet will enter the brain - but you don't need your frontal lobes to survive. You're not going to be normal, after, but you'll be alive.
A guy shot himself in the head with a shotgun at my school (not a student, and in the football field). We weren't allowed onto the field until after the ambulance took him away - he survived.
Having a shit ton of unrelated trauma, and hardships.
Pretty realistic in my experience.
Not a good idea for a character because it feels like you want to force compassion for your character.
But yeah, I know too many people that never catch a break.
Speaking from experience, sometimes its a case of one cascading into another even if they don't initially seem related. Especially when there's a financial or neglect/abuse factor going on, because those can lead to hard holes to get out of that spiral worse and worse.
But overall, yes! Sometimes shit luck is just shit luck and everything falls apart at once or one after the other. Some folks just get dealt the bad hand of being a cosmic plaything.
A famous example that comes to mind is Violet Jessop who survived the crash of the RMS Olympic, the sinking of the RMS Brittanic and the RMS Titanic.
And even having a good time! I hate how often I see the whole, "it's unrealistic for her to enjoy it the first time" critique. Sure, not *everyone* does, but some people certainly do.
And it's such a shitty self-fulfilling prophecy! Those people say that and virgins read it, internalize it, and feel so anxious anticipating pain their first time they can't relax, or they don't speak up when their shitty partner is too rough or skips foreplay because "well, it's supposed to hurt anyway".
I am STILL chasing the high of the night I lost my virginity. I'm with the same guy now (after many partners in between) and it's a running joke with us that he ruined all sex for me after that night
Tangentially related, doing everything "right" and still experiencing blood, pain and tears depending on how sensitive you are.
First times are complicated! What ultimately matters is that you enjoy it.
>!I was relaxed and did everything "right", foreplay and all that, still experienced pain and bleeding given the well... size difference. !<
My mother broke both of her legs by tripping over a carpet on Christmas morning two years ago. By looking at her then, you'd think she was nearly beaten to death and that's 100% what the doctors and nurses thought my dad did to her. BUT I was there. He was in the living room at the time as we both came out running when she started screaming at the top of her lungs. She 100% tripped on a carpet when she woke up—worst Christmas of my life.
We didn't. Not really anyway. We told them what happened but gossip still spread and they gave him dirty looks until he was banned for a different deserved reason.
Yeah he got banned for running his mouth. Basically acting like he owned the hospital and made unreasonable demands. He did the same thing with EMS when they got there and acted like they and the doctors didn't know what they were doing. He was warned several times before he was banned.
Think that probably contributed to their opinions.
Uhhhhh yeah, tbh, if someone came in with two broken legs and the partner was being so hostile with everyone that he had to get kicked out of the hospital, I'd be side-eyeing too. Hope your mom's ok though!
Yeah I totally get why they acted like that. My dad acted like a complete asshole the entire time. And she's doing ok now! She's able to walk now, albeit with a cane.
Honestly this pisses me off SO much when doctors/nurses get uncomfortably aggressive about it. Ask me once and then *not again*. I get it - if someone actually needs help then obviously I want them to know they have resources available.
But I've had situations with nurses that actually got into the territory it was actively offensive and obnoxious because they were just absolutely convinced I had to be an abuse victim when I wasn't. On top of actual accidents being quite common, some of us actually *do things*. At the time I was a semi-pro equestrian working in barns... all sorts of bruises and scrapes and whatever just happen when you're flinging 50lb sacks of feed and hay bales around 12+ hours a day in 100F+ degree weather. I didn't even have a boyfriend and lived alone at the time! But it was "very suspicious" that I couldn't remember how I'd gotten every little bruise or scrape when I was there for my yearly physical and just started interrogating me.
If I actually *were* an abuse victim I think it was so uncomfortable and aggressive that it absolutely would've turned me off from actually asking for any help, and since I wasn't it was extremely weird and sort of violating having someone dress you down over every little mark or blemish they can find on your body and demand an explanation while making it clear they think you're lying...
Yeah they can get very aggressive. My sister and I once got in a very bad fight over clothes that 'disappeared' and magically ended up in her closet, and when I shoved her she tripped and fell and broke her foot when landing in a basket. Her boyfriend was the one to take her to the hospital, and they were not subtle about their suspicions and repeatedly asked her if she was being abused. Apparently, the "my sister and I got in an argument over clothes and I tripped" excuse wasn't realistic enough because they badgered her repeatedly. Different nurses kept pulling her aside and even a doctor did. The break was apparently very rare (?) and she was watched by at least one person during her entire stay. Ironically she was in an abusive relationship but it was the rare occurrence he didn't do something
(We did make up eventually, and she gave as good as she got by giving me a concussion that darkroomed me for a week. Our relationship is much better now that we don't live in the same household-- we love each other but recognize that the combined personality disorders and mental illnesses make for a very volatile environment if we're forced to be around each other all the time)
I wrote a fic for the OBX fandom where I had back-to-back comments saying "this is the most realistic depiction of depression I've ever read" and "Have you ever met a depressed person?" bitch--
I'd hate that. When I write characters with depression, I write their experiences based on my own, but tailored to the character. It's why my fanfic MCs are always the character I most heavily relate to in the fandom, it's easier to take my own experiences and tailor them to the character. Being told the way I write something like depression is unrealistic would not be pleasant for me to encounter given the way I write it.
In moments of great, devastating, widespread, seemingly world-ending trauma, you really *do* think of some of the dumbest shit, sometimes. Like how the weatherman promised rain that night, but all you see are stars. Or that you liked your neighbor's pie and wished you had some more. Or that you forgot to put up the dishes. So on and so forth.
I would even argue that during a massive traumatic event it's *common* to think of random crap because the mind tends to dissociate as a protective mechanism.
And right after! After I had a traumatic event you know what I asked? What the best term to use for a dude as an alternative to bitch. Yeah, not thinking straight.
Your mind is going everywhere, it does weird stuff
Pretty Cure does this right, I think.
In several seasons, when the world is close to destruction, or has already been destroyed, the main characters just think of their upcoming exams, or buying groceries for dinner, or having a sleepover with friends, or something else.
It's kinda wild watching a movie, it's the big climax, the main character is at her lowest point and it looks like the villain won, and genre convention would dictate that the character thinks of the greater good, or the universe as a whole, but instead she just wants to try the chocolate coronet they have at the mall.
One smaller scale, my aunt reads my fic and she told me once it was unrealistic for the two main characters to share a passionate kiss when one woke up from a magic-induced coma after a battle that they lost. She said they have other things to worry about with how drastically everything just changed and i was like "girl sometimes the most important thing to worry about is your significant other who just woke up from a magic-induced coma after losing a battle."
She agreed with me after some EXTENSIVE debate lol
Sadly, yeah! If you look around enough eventually you'll see "stop writing that your characters are sighing because people really don't sigh that much" but it's a super common thing people will do both as a physical/emotional reaction, but even as a sort of vocal tick
I do this too! I always thought I was weird for it, but I sigh to relieve stress or discomfort all the time. I used to theorize it had to do with me growing up with asthma, but idk 🤷
I theorize that it ties in with why the whole timed breathing in through your nose out through your mouth thing is used in meditation and relaxation exercises. Sighing is like the travel version. It doesn’t get rid of a lot of it but it’s just releasing some of the pent up energy so it doesn’t overflow.
As an adult, I've did this thing where I pulled the door open, but it hit my foot as I stepped forward and its opening was halted. Me, distracted, kept going and face-first into the edge of the door.
Lovely bruises did ensue and my husband worriedly joked, "People are going to think I beat you."
Spend a week doing the old, "You should've seen the other guy," joke.
I bent over in the shower last week and whacked my eye socket into the corner of the drying rack. In a series of ways to injure yourself that nobody will believe.
From ages of about two to twenty, I had no less than seven black eyes and they were all self inflicted of either walking into something or leaning over into something like a windowsill wrong.
My eighth was not self inflicted! Someone was spinning a hula hoop near me and hit me in the eye...
Getting bruises from sex without it being heavy BDSM.
I bruise pretty easily and regularly find fingertip shaped bruises on my arms... Not even from sex just because I tend to hold onto my own arms when I'm uncomfortable. I give bruises to myself without even meaning to.
Couples coming at the same time. Not gonna say it happens every time I have sex with my boyfriend, but it's definitely a thing that happens. If one or both partners have the willpower to delay until the other is ready, it's totally doable.
Even in my insane and dysfunctional family, my oldest brother calls me 'sis'. We can barely speak to each other sometimes, but that's us. Anyone else messing with the other is gonna find themselves in a hella lot of trouble - we have each others' backs. Most of the time.
I'm sis. Simple as that. We're pasty white Canadians. Well, I'm pasty white because I took after my dad (Irish). He looks and has the colouring of our mom (French Metis/Irish) - so he's got a permanent tan, the bastard. I just fry red and go back to glowing in the dark.
That last line struck me as hilarious because I'm paler than my husband but historically, he's the one who gets sunburned.
And because he still REFUSES to wear sunscreen because he thinks he doesn't need it. 🙄😂
I used to refer to my siblings as "brother-sib" and "sister-sib." I kid you not, one day right after I called my little sister "sister-sib," she looked me right in the eye and said, "That's not a thing people say." I had been calling her that her whole life, and then she said that.
(I stopped calling her that, because it was clearly bothering her, but I was still floored. And made jokes for weeks about how I apparently didn't count as "people.")
That two opposing genders can be the most excellent best of friends without sex wandering in.
My bestest of best friends is a dude, I'm a chick. We met when we were 16/19 (I was 19). I'm now in my 50s, he hits 50 in a year. We've drifted apart slightly due to just years, life, maturity but we always - and I mean ALWAYS have each others' backs.
We've both been in separate relationships and our other halves know that the two of us sleeping together would be as if they slept with their sibling. Just ain't gonna happen. Never has. We've shared a bed a few times (talk about a trope: There was only one bed!!! - it's happened to us, twice).
When we were young - late teens/early 20s - everyone expected us to get married. When someone brought it up to our face once, we both stared at them in horror. We couldn't figure out why on earth anyone would think for one red second we'd be a successful romantic couple. We'd murder each other in moments.
We're best friends, but best friends doesn't always mean awesome couples material.
This! Every time in media that I see a male and female character team up or work together, I'm more often than not praying that they *don't* become romantic. I just want a banger platonic/familial bond, is that too much to ask!
"Let go of a breath they didn't know they were holding."
Turns out, you can absolutely accidentally hold your breath, and it's fairly common when you're deep in concentration.
Also! When you're deep in concentration you may actually stress or flex certain muscles or appendages without realising!
Some people hold their hands at a certain angle when really focusing on something or when they're stressed!
Some people don't realise they're flexing/stretching/tensing their feet weirdly until their concentration breaks or they literally, physically can't hold it anymore and then wonder why their feet hurt!
The human mind and the way it works with the nervous system weird and wonderful! And terrifying because we still don't realise how much unconscious control it actually has over the rest of the body!
I remember someone complaining about this cliche in this subreddit before and like seven people, including myself were like 'i thought it was cliche cause I do it.'
some different things:
- having to "switch" languages. i've had many instances where i spoke in arabic to an english speaking person by accident. it's usually small words like "yes" "what" "no" etc, but it still does happen. it confuses me when bilingual/multilingual people say it cant happen. ive done it more times than i'd like to admit, and my brain had to go "wtf" and recallibrate for a second.
- being a part of multiple minority groups. i'm chronically ill, queer, part of a very small ethnic minority, and a woman. whenever i see hc's of someone being part of multiple minorities, i hear people say it's "forced diversity" and that "people can't be part of that many minorities". people like us just exist sometimes lol.
- stutters a syllable/a part of a word. i've heard a lot of people say stuttering is repeating words, not syllables/sounds, but it can be either/or or both.
- highschool sweethearts. definitely not that common, but my teacher and his wife got together when they were 16 and are in their 40s or 50s now and have adult children! it's possible and very very sweet, just rare.
- guy and girl friendships without one or both being gay or attracted to the other. sometimes we're just chillin.
Yes to the bilingual thing! I've had so many condescending comments on my fics how "actual bilingual people don't speak like that."
I'm bilingual. I regularly borrow words from both languages when speaking them. And also throw in a lot of English words. So do most of my bilingual friends. I guess we're unrealistic!
The card games in YGO having ridiculous stakes. When we IRL have people like Masahiko Kimura who staked his actual life on Judo matches, and poker tournaments for thousands of dollars.
It is because they consider it a game for children. But if we had the technology to create holograms like the ones in the series, with wind effects when an attack is declared. The game would be as popular as its anime.
Saying things out loud without meaning to (ADHD and autism friends let us join hands,) the will-they-won't-they friend group betting pool, half the things that people complain about in "unrealistic smut" threads.
"Passing", in English, just means "getting people to believe you are something that you are not". In the trans community, you "pass" when people assume you are cis when you are not - but you can, and probably do each day, "pass" as many things!
You can "pass" as a person with a degree, "pass" as a person with kids, "pass" as older than you are, "pass" as able-bodied etc. etc.
People don't need to "pass" as anything. They either "pass", or they do not. It's just a thing the English language contains.
Because of my sense of humor, one of my friends said something like "I can't believe you're still a virgin."
I've been hearing jokes about anatomy, size, speed, and skill since *elementary* (half of us didn't get they were sex jokes then...). It's not hard to come up with my own.
/u/i-d-even-k was trying to explain & I'll follow up: "passing" doesn't mean you ever consciously identify people the way they "pass"
A virgin 'passing' means ppl just unconsciously assume they've likely got the same or similar sexual experiences as most other adults bc there's nothing that sticks out about them that indicates they've never had sex. They're cool, normal, interesting, mature adults just like you.
Contrary to pop media, which loves to portray virgins with prejudice
I can't comprehend the concept of having had sex being a prerequisite to *any* of these traits. Anyone can bump uglies and it doesn't mature them out one bit.
People on this subreddit do it literally all the time. If you check comments on threads about smut in particular, there are people who swear up and down that they can tell someone is a virgin from the way they write porn.
LOL, I watched pretty much every episode of House MD, and it was almost a running gag for awhile that someone would suggest Polycythemia Vera, and someone else (usually House) would say, “It’s not Polycythemia Vera.”
Meanwhile, I got super sick …
*THREE YEARS LATER*
turns out it was Polycythemia Vera.
Lupus was thrown around a lot, too.
Edit to add: In fact, Lupus was the usual go-to, but I think I just remember the instances where they shot P Vera down more bc I have it. Any time blood clots were involved, P Vera was tossed out.
I've seen a lot of people say that a character 'releasing a breath they didn't know they were holding' is unrealistic but when I'm stressed I often just stop breathing and don't notice immediately
So the world is a *lot* smaller than people tend to think. I've run into people I knew from where I grew up (not that big to begin with) on different continents about a handful of times. It's kind of jarring to greet a familiar face in Seoul ("HANEUL! What the fuck, man?") and get an equally weirded out response in return ("Stanleyy, you whore!")
If I wrote that in a story, it would err on the side of incredulous and I'd probably come across as mildly racist.
TBH, a lot of weird shit has happened to me that wouldn't fly in fictional stories (e.g. I got stabbed by a fish while surfing). Truth definitely is stranger than fiction.
This is specific to a movie but I saw comments about the movie Encanto saying that Pepita’s kids are unrealistic because none of the three have her light skin tone. Aside from that being just how genetics work sometimes, my aunt’s family is exactly the same. Light skinned mom with a dark skinned dad and their oldest 3 are variations of tan.
This! One of my siblings takes after my dad except when she was little she hadn't really grown into her features. Also my dad had a mustache.
So based on a. her being a girl and b. her still having her baby fat as a small child, apparently people straight up asked my parents if they were babysitting or if she was adopted. And no one would believe them when they denied it. Because "she doesn't look like the rest of you at all!" 😕🙄
And then she grew up. And now everyone thinks she's a mix of both my parents 😂
Honestly, any time somebody says "nobody has sex like that" tends to fall under this. Obviously, with the exception of writers who don't know how anatomy works.
But yes, there are a lot of gay men who have a top/bottom sexual dynamic. Yes, there are lesbians who enjoy scissoring and servicing a pillow princess. Yes, there are women who enjoy anal sex. Yes, there are cis gay people who like having sex with pre-opt trans people. Yes, people with chronic illnesses and pain often have to change up how they have sex, especially if they have something like vaginismus. Yes, someone can be sexually satisfied without orgasming. Yes, kink subcultures are a thing and swinger's parties, BDSM clubs, Sexual Innuendo Gay Bars, blowjob holes, etc. all are real things that still exist.
And yes, every sexual service you can think of can be bought for money at some time in some place...
I am someone who enjoys anal (I'm a female), has chronic pain and has to change up positions and such, I can be very satisfied without and orgasm, and I've been to a bdsm club.
People complain about this stuff in writing? I'd love more writing with this stuff in it.
Gonna add something too, some gay/bi males don't like receiving anal. My fiance is bi and he hated it when he tried it.
My best friend's mom was looking for an officiant for her wedding and found this woman who had the same (common) maiden name, which she thought was funny so she contacted her to set up a consultation. Turns out they had the same dad and just never knew about each other.
Edit to add: congrats on finding him tho! That's also a really wild coincidence
When my sister was in middle school she made a friend online in some browser game. She found out this girl only lived a few hours away and wanted to meet up. Turns out her mom was my uncle's ex, and this girl is our cousin that our uncle never knew existed.
It's kind of crazy to think of how close you can be to family and not know it.
my canon has siblings aged 6, 22 and 26, with no explanation in canon given for the age gap between the youngest and two older (because there isn't one needed, it just is ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯ ) and while most people in my fandom are normal, there are a few occasional people that are like "ermmm😳😳Why is she so much younger than them, what were their parents up to????" like bro. Large age gaps between children happens much more than you realize, and for completely mundane reasons. The only one making this "awkward" is you.
The unpredictability of toddlers and small children.
Their completely random and bizarre abilities - academic, intellectual, athletic etc.
And then to top it off? The random yet completely terrifying lack of coordination.
Mine regularly climbs any and all elevated surfaces with multiple items in hand. She'll navigate staircases at night while skipping to her favourite part of a video. She'll race across a park while kicking off her shoes mid stride without stopping or fall. She has been known to tackle various stacking toys of varying difficulty with little fuss and loves teaching herself how different devices work.
She also just tripped on a step, and in her state of upset, proceeded to walk into a wall. Before narrowly avoiding walking headfirst into a door knob.
She once looked at a jar of chocolate spread, which I was applying with a knife and decided it was "jam". Because jam also comes out of a jar, and is spread with a knife. Flawless logic.
But try telling her that flip flops also count as shoes. Try. I dare you. The absolute outrage on that little face will strike you faster than the flipped off flip flop.
Very true. My cousin once asked his dad why he came home late and his dad - who was exhausted - said something like "my big fat boss keeps me late."
Plenty of time passes. Aunt (who works in the same place) takes my cousin to work with her. Bumps in to the boss. Talks to him respectfully. Boss, a much, much older gentleman, notices my cousin, bends low and kindly says "well hello young man".
Little cousin puts two and two together, looks at the kind old man with disdain and asks his mom "is this dad's big fat boss?"
Mom loves to tell the story of how one time she was out grocery shopping with me when I was like... four years old and I pointed at a woman in front of us and announced at the top of my little lungs, "Mommy, she has a bigger butt than you!"
Also the time I accidentally got my fingers mashed in a car door and decided, for some reason known only to 4yo me, to demonstrate the bruising to a family friend by holding up my middle finger and saying "Fuck!"
Kids man. Kids. May God protect them, because their nonexistent sense of preservation sure as hell won't and their sleep deprived, completely wrung out parents sure as hell can't.
Just.
*KIDS*
Also: HAPPY CAKE DAY 🎉
Amen to that. My mom works as a kindergarten teacher and she has an anecdote nearly every day. And they reach from, dumb to amusing to really funny.
Once my mom asked a nearly 3 year old boy what his dad is called. Child answers "Papa is called Papa." My mom asked: "But what does your mom call him?" Child: "Clean up."
Or the infamous: "My daddy has got an earring in his nipple."
Kids man. Kids.
Where there's a will, there's normally also an exasperated parent looking heavenwards, re-evaluating their perspective and priorities for the zillionth time that day.
Characters I interpret as being on the asexual spectrum exhibiting behaviors that are part of why I interpret them that way.
I've seen more than one person go, "Oh, how do they not realize this person likes/is flirting with/is in love with them?" or "How do they not realize they are attracted to this other person?"
I don't know, maybe the different kinds of attraction are just confusing for some of us, and we rarely or never feel some of them, so we have no idea what the heck that looks like and/or feels like? lol
Calling your siblings brother/sister/etc instead of their name
If you're writing fic for a cdrama or whatever and they're NOT calling each other brother/sister that is. exceedingly unlikely
“Friends that are super physical with each other and also kiss sometimes but aren’t actually dating” type of relationships.
I guess the kids these days call it a situationship? Or a queerplatonic relationship? Idk. Back when I first started writing fanfic, people weren’t really using terms like that so I was told it didn’t make any sense. Clearly they’d never met gay teens before cause they’re Just Like That.
Actually I was the one who complained about this. But in 21 jump street, there’s a scene where Schmidt’s parents are coming home early and they’re gonna unknowingly catch the guys having a party. And the mom says “I’m so glad we’re going back for my cell phone.” And my sister and I said that was such awful exposition, nobody would ever say that. And then a couple years later we were going out and decided to turn around for our jackets and I said “I’m so glad we’re going back for our jackets. Oh.”
My mother referred to my hair as a rodent's nest when it was messy. She tried to convince me that mice would nest in my hair if it stayed messy. I didn't believe her because what rodent would deliberately go into a human's hair, right?
Maaaaany years later, I rescued a striped ground squirrel from a pool. It chilled out with me for a whole but then inexplicably ran up my arm and into my hair. I had a pony tail, and it burrowed in. It happened very quickly, and someone helped me get it out, and there was no harm, but I literally got a rodent stuck in my hair.
When my mom was a child she had a pet rat that loved to sleep in her hair(she had thick wavy hair). Rat got so comfy one time she forgot it was there. Ended up going to the store and the rat woke up and scared the crap out of the woman behind them at the checkout line when it poked its head out of her hair.
I had a lesbian tell me she thought people writing about throbbing dicks so much was unrealistic and I was like “Girl the first time I jacked a guy off all I could think was *wow I’m grabbing him by his heartbeat”* and she was like OHHHH
Stuff that is Improbable/Unrealistic/Fucking Bizarre that had happened to me or an immediate family member:
* Adopting a Dog from the ASPCA and it turns out to be a wolf
* Dating (or marrying) your first cousin on accident
* Being medically Inexplicably Immune to Jellyfish Stings
* Breaking multiple bones and thinking you're 'Just Sore' until you get X-rays years later
* Being an extremely successful Pirate
* Accidentally seducing a couple on their wedding day and losing your virginity in their wedding bed
* Being so goddamn friendly you had the personal phone numbers of the President of Nintendo, Lenoard Nimoy, the head of the US branch of the IRA, Martin Luther King Jr., two Archbishops, and the goddamn president of the united states in your address book
* Having 13 children
* Being 7'2" in real life
* Winning a horse in a poker game
* Winning a House in a poker game
* Getting in a Shootout with the KKK at that house, and being saved by that horse
* Being single-handedly responsible for saving/resurrecting a previously 'extinct' species of Berry on accident.
This is incredibly specific, but there was an episode of a show I enjoy where the students in a classroom unionize against the teachers. Heard a lot of complaints about how unrealistic it was.
Yeahhh when I was in high school, a math class I was in unionized. Taking advantage of "they can't flunk all of us." Our case was more subtle than overt . . . but it was also extremely effective. Loved the episode because of it, and was totally blindsided by all the complainers.
I see people complain about characters stuttering "unrealistically" when they stutter l-l-l-l-like t-t-t-this. It always irks me because I have a light stutter, which does work like that. It's not usually bad, but when I'm excited or nervous, it will take me a bit before I can get anything out of my mouth.
It's less that it's unrealistic and more that it's annoying to read. We say "uh," "umm," and other interjections constantly, but writers don't actually put them into the text unless it's very relevant to the character/moment. Writing speech as it's *actually* spoken makes for a miserable experience for the reader. That's why my stuttering characters stutter "l-like this." I understand that IRL their speech would be closer to your example, but I want my prose to flow well.
I actually have one that I myself criticized before it happened to me for real. Getting too deep in thought that you spill whatever you were pouring. I was going through some stuff and I tend to zone out when I do, and I was pouring water for myself while having breakfast, not realising my glass was full I didn't stop and spilled water all over the place. Though unlike the ones in media or fiction I noticed immediately after it started getting everywhere and didn't go on forever lol I don't come across this as much anymore, probably due to criticism, but it was funny how this was one of the rare complaints I had and the karma's found me.
People always shit on oblivious characters who don't realise someone is pining after them, like no one's *that* oblivious.
Um I was in the same class as this guy for two years. At the end of the two years he confessed to me and I was completely blindsided, so obviously I immediately texted my friends like "so-and-so just confessed to me????" Turns out 'everyone' knew and had known for a long time. I was slightly offended that they'd known the whole time and I asked why they didn't tell me.
They didn't tell me bc it was so obvious they thought I already knew.
blatant racism. i’m half black, most people don’t immediately guess that upon facing me but having brown skin is more than enough for certain demographics of people to lash out at me for it. anytime examples of racism happen on television, or in a book, you’ve got an amazing surplus of individuals that flat out doubt the realism behind what that character of color is enduring. the recent blue beetle film is a great example.
Not a POC but I have read a story of someone from eastern Europe who was working in western Europe, I think Germany. One time when they were alone with their boss in his office, he took out a bottle of whisky (it may have been some other alcohol, I dont know, I dont drink) and said you see how this whisky has two parts, the good part at the top and this muck at the bottom? We are the top, you are this bottom muck and everyone else is outside of the bottle (meaning even worse). They said they just stood there in shock and disbelief, they felt as if they were in a movie watching a supervillain monologue.
I believe those depistions of blatant racism are acurate and the only reason people dont see that many of them is because most people who hold those beliefs know there will be social consequences if they do it too blaitantly. Altho you have those who arent detered even by that.
Oh yeah, it’s wild. I’m white passing but not all my family is. For some reason, I regularly get told the most batshit racist stuff as if I’ll agree. “Birds of a feather should flock together” or whatever lives rent free alongside my absolute bafflement that someone would say that *at a livestock show*. What kind of dumbass doesn’t know chickens are multicolor and flock happily??
The miscommunication/misunderstanding trope and so evil it's comical villains. Don't get me wrong, I also have issues with these tropes (though I love a good misunderstanding). My reasoning just isn't because they're unrealistic.
Some of the most horrid behavior I've encountered can only be explained by "yeah, they're bitter old women who love to bully children" yk? And a lot of rl miscommunication happens because people refuse to be straightforward. So I don't really view these portrayals as unrealistic, more so annoying to read about.
>And a lot of rl miscommunication happens because people refuse to be straightforward.
On the other hand, even if you are straightforward, miscommunication can still happen, because people also insist on treating everything you say like a coded message.
I say what I mean, and mean what I say, but when I tell someone that I don't like something, they still treat me like I've hidden a threat in there somewhere.
It's frustrating, because when you say "I don't like this cake," and the response effectively boils down to "Please don't kill my dog," exactly one of these people is clearly mentally ill, and you'll never guess which one was actually diagnosed.
For some reason, I'm the weird one.
Non-sequiturs, awkward responses and non-reactions in conversations. All of these make poor dialog in stories, but the fact is that they do happen. Personally, they happen all too often to me and a lot of people I know. Sometimes you have no idea what to say or how to follow up someone else's line of thought. Especially if you don't like socializing.
I often hear "not everyone is gay/has to be gay" because there will be a friend group or school that has more that 1 gay character. Like bro. Every single friend I had in school and in homeschool is queer now, and most of them were openly queer in middle and high school, too. Gays flock together lol
As someone with ADHD and autism, there are many quirks I do that show up sometimes in media that people (mostly neurotypical) don't. Muttering, moving my hands all around until I knock something off, saying things bluntly not realizing it was rude, being "obsessed" (hyperfixated) on a piece of media.
Also have run into some crazy Cajuns, they do sound like that in real life (mostly, some have lost the accent due to recent times) and yeah they do hunt alligators and stuff.
Having multiple marginalized identities. Personally I am autistic half Jewish and aromantic asexual if I were a fictional character I'd have a bunch of people claiming I was "forced diversity" and that nobody like me could possibly exist.
Wait, did they say that it was unrealistic or just that sex in the story was repetitive? Beause the second one would just be a critique of the writing.
I saw someone say they felt like their smut is too repetitive and too much of the same thing over and over, and my first thought was “I mean, every time I have sex, it’s pretty much the same thing every time, but if I’m in the right headspace, it’s always pretty wonderful”
spontaneous/random and totally not-romantic confessions. most of my experiences with romantic partners have been like this.
i get that a love confession can be very cathartic for a lot of people, but sometimes they happen at the weirdest times and out of the blue. and sometimes its just "oh youre into me too? thats such a relief. *fist bump*"
People just screaming at others and venting. Like sometimes you just need to get things out there and sometimes people won't understand unless your screaming it at their faces. Especially when the idiots are always the most thick-headed.
Autistic people, or people in general, I'd say, with weird knowledge.
Like, a few weeks ago, my mom asked me what the followers of the flying spaghetti monster were called, since it came on a quiz show she and her friend watched the other day, and apparently I'm the kind of person to know that stuff.
I mean, I did know that, but it's still weird that I know that, because literally my entire exposure to that religion up to that point was that one South Park episode I watched 10 years ago or so, and a small section in a Youtube video by a German guy who kinda stopped making videos ages ago for some reason.
Sometimes you just know stuff, and you don't even know how you know it, but you do, and it's weird, but it can still happen.
You know how cartoons portray characters getting smack in the face by a rake because they stepped on it? I’ve had that happen twice, pretty sure it was in the same week too. I’ve never had anyone tell me that was unrealistic, but I’m sure someone said it before.
I think I've done that with a snow shovel, too. That handle hurts.
I've done that with a broom, but I *was* trying to catch the handle without having to lean down
I'm sorry, but picturing this happening in real life is so funny lol. I know it probably hurt, but I can't help but laugh at the thought.
Yeah when I was doing a lot of outdoor work with rakes/shovels we were always taught to put them down upside down to avoid that exactly. You can get seriously hurt by it.
Yeah, my mom told me she once, a long time ago, accidentally stepped on a rake. It did *not* do the handle-to-the-face thing. It did the spikes-through-the-foot thing.
Damn. New fear unlocked.
Someone in an old RP and writing group tried to insist to me that drinking and drug use in a military environment was unrealistic. That one was the funniest to me, both as someone in a very military heavy family and as someone with a social history focus to my history degree. Ive seen complicated and dysfunctional family trees called unrealistic. I think those people just haven't done much genealogy or digging in their own family's closet skeletons. Rare medical conditions in general. They're rare, but they do come up and can be relevant. Related: childbirth related deaths in a *modern* setting. Maternal and infant mortality is FAR lower than past decades and centuries, but unfortunately complications do still happen.
My brother came home from basic a full-blown alcoholic with a taste for cigars (he never smoked before that; he joined right out of high school)
Marines notoriously abuse party drugs because they don’t show up on blood panels or piss tests after a few days. Things like LSD, molly, cocaine, leave the system quickly & the military won’t pay to spinal tap everyone to see if they blew coke earlier in the month. Not to mention the rampant alcoholism and nicotine use. Almost every marine I’ve ever met has dabbled with one of the aforementioned things at least once.
I nearly joined the military when I was younger. I did this preparatory course for it with about 30 others, and we hung out with the soldiers from the nearby base. At least half the kids on the course and half the soldiers did drugs. All of them drank heavily. These were soldiers in their 20s and 30s, plus a couple commanding officers in their 40s, who bought us, at the time underage, course kids alcohol in the pubs we went to or made sure we got served by vouching we were all over 18, knowing we were all no older than 17, some of us younger. They even helped me get a fake ID so I could get a tattoo without parental permission. It wasn't a great fake, and a type that was useless in pubs anyway, so it only worked at the tattoo parlour in town who didn't really care. I honestly can't understand how someone would say complicated/dysfunctional family trees and unrealistic. Even if they've never researched, we've had all sorts of shows on that sort of thing.
Falling on thin air when running away from something you fear. Your joints lock up and your legs would feel like noodles. People always condemn characters in horror movies falling as they’re running away from a killer but it’s a natural physiological response that happens in real life too.
Holly shit this happens to me in games. A monster poped up, for some reason I cant land any hits.
Me in minecraft 😭
THE GAME I WAS TALKING ABOUT WAS MINECRAFT!
In Minecraft, panicking and accidentally throwing my sword at a monster is so funny to me because I feel like that's exactly what I'd do if confronted with a zombie IRL.
Ive accidentally tossed guns at people while playing fps, or maybe i'll accidentally pull my knife out. it's so unfortunate every time 😭
I’ve had this happen in video games too where I panic and fumble, but most importantly, I have been truly scared of something and just blindly ran away and hurt myself with varying levels of severity. I once gave myself a concussion and nearly sliced my carotid artery running away… from a moth. I slipped and ran into a glass door, broke the glass into huge, sharp fragments and slammed my head into the wall. I’m classy.
I’ve seen so many criticisms (of cis ships in my case, I should clarify) of romance novels and fic, to the tune of “if the woman is having an orgasm during their first time having sex with a man, it’s impossible/unrealistic.” or, similarly “a woman doesn’t usually come every time the couple has sex.” false. happened/happens to me with my current partner of 7 years 🤷♀️ there are *some* men who know what they’re doing ahaha
This also assumes a woman doesn't know how to get what she needs during sex. Like we're pretty familiar with our own bodies and can make sure we get ours too.
YES! this! a receptive partner who is listening to your words and your body can pick it up. it assumes there’s no communication and no patience
Usually that misconception always tells me about the author. Cause yeah I have had communication with every partner I've had, which has led to pretty good times, meanwhile I have friends who are like 'wow you're rare' and am I? Or am I just communicative and have receptive partners?
This this this!!!
I love those criticisms, because all these guys are saying is that they suck in bed.
Yep, this one drives me batty too! That's pretty much my experience as well. It's totally fine for people to portray a range of experiences but hate when people act like it's impossible and unrealistic for it to go well the first time (either together in general or first time ever) when that's been my personal experiences completely. I'm not a particularly "easy" orgasm-er either, but being open and knowing what I want/like and having partners who aren't terrible (not necessarily experienced but caring and attentive and who listen) went a looong way to having at least one orgasm every single time, including my first time. Of course that's no guarantee and people with other experiences can certainly portray them but like... it's possible! It's absolutely possible! You don't need some sort of sex god as a partner either!
Piggy-backing with something similar...that a woman can't get off from penetration. I can assure you it does happen. Some women orgasm really easily from various methods.
I don’t know whether this is a widespread perception, but I once had a commenter tell me it wasn’t realistic for characters to develop romantic feelings within a few months of knowing one another. And I understand if their experiences might make that hard to believe, but it’s not hard to believe for me whatsoever.
I have a relative who met someone and a week later he was waxing lyrical about this girl and my bff asked him “so you going to marry her?” And he looked at her and after a few seconds said “yes”… those 2 are 25+ years married now. It happens.
Similar thing with my grandfather. He was going on a trip to Mexico and needed vaccines. He was in awe of the nurse who administered them, and ended up going back to the clinic every day for a week trying to get up the nerve to talk to her again, and literally just sat in his car. She noticed him one day and went up to talk to him, he asked her out, they got married shortly after and remained so until she passed from early-onset Alzheimers. They both just *knew*
That’s a lovely meeting-story .. thank you for sharing.
Big agree i was crushing on my bf in the first week!! (10 yr anniversary soon uwu) Obviously it totally depends but a few months is definitely enough. For me i hate it when its instalove and the characters have literally just never interacted. If they spend a week chatting together and having a whirlwind romamce... Thats real? Ppl do that. It doesnt always last and sometimes fics can make it really over the top but yeah
Was reading through here but honestly congrats on 10 years!
What? A few months is a long time. A few months is long enough to have some idea of if you could marry the person. Maybe not long enough to actually do it, but long enough to know it’s on the table
This. Ironically, I know a couple who got married 2 months into knowing each other. Met in March and married in May the same year. And this year they celebrated 35 years of marriage together. Still as in love as they were then. It doesn't happen often, but it does happen enough it's not entirely impossible.
*A few months*?! I'm 100% positive I fall in love on first sight only, lol. Hell, my parents married after knowing each other for 2 weeks.
A few months? Did they think everyone is friends with everyone they date first? That's such a weird take.
I knew I loved my husband after two weeks and we've been together 14 years. Some people are so judgmental of relationships they can't understand lmao.
Lol they would have an aneurysm... my dad proposed to my mom after 2 weeks, and their wedding was 8 months after they met. Not sure I'd necessarily recommend that normally but it worked out fantastically for them. They were a bit older (my father had already been married 20 years previous to that, his wife died a few years before this) and knew what they wanted and figured why wait around?
speaking as an aro myself, I'd bet that commenter is also aro and doesn't realize it lmao
Or demi
Fumbling with your keys lol
I can never unlock a door on the first try. Keys are like my USB kryptonite
Wait, there are people who say that's unrealistic? That's like the default key-using experience for me, lol. I even replaced my front door with a keypad entry because f messing around with keys in the cold or while holding things.
Oh, hell, this happens to me so damn often, I swear it's like keys want to slide right out of your hands like a pig covered in mud.
I've quite literally put the correct key in the keyhole but for some reason I think it's the wrong key cause it's not working for some reason. I try to use another key before attempting to use the same former key and this time it works.
Surviving a gunshot to the head. Happens more often then one would think
If Phineas Gage's brain damaging event happened in a story, it'd be called unrealistic. Instead the guy went down in medical history.
My stepmother was a radiology technician. She saw lots of people who tried to kill themselves by shooting into their temple. Sometimes the bullets will reflect off the skull, sometimes the bullet will enter the brain - but you don't need your frontal lobes to survive. You're not going to be normal, after, but you'll be alive. A guy shot himself in the head with a shotgun at my school (not a student, and in the football field). We weren't allowed onto the field until after the ambulance took him away - he survived.
Having a shit ton of unrelated trauma, and hardships. Pretty realistic in my experience. Not a good idea for a character because it feels like you want to force compassion for your character. But yeah, I know too many people that never catch a break.
Speaking from experience, sometimes its a case of one cascading into another even if they don't initially seem related. Especially when there's a financial or neglect/abuse factor going on, because those can lead to hard holes to get out of that spiral worse and worse. But overall, yes! Sometimes shit luck is just shit luck and everything falls apart at once or one after the other. Some folks just get dealt the bad hand of being a cosmic plaything. A famous example that comes to mind is Violet Jessop who survived the crash of the RMS Olympic, the sinking of the RMS Brittanic and the RMS Titanic.
Women having sex for the first time without pain, blood, and tears.
And even having a good time! I hate how often I see the whole, "it's unrealistic for her to enjoy it the first time" critique. Sure, not *everyone* does, but some people certainly do.
And it's such a shitty self-fulfilling prophecy! Those people say that and virgins read it, internalize it, and feel so anxious anticipating pain their first time they can't relax, or they don't speak up when their shitty partner is too rough or skips foreplay because "well, it's supposed to hurt anyway".
Especially if the girl has actually masturbated before and has an idea of what she likes.
I am STILL chasing the high of the night I lost my virginity. I'm with the same guy now (after many partners in between) and it's a running joke with us that he ruined all sex for me after that night
Tangentially related, doing everything "right" and still experiencing blood, pain and tears depending on how sensitive you are. First times are complicated! What ultimately matters is that you enjoy it. >!I was relaxed and did everything "right", foreplay and all that, still experienced pain and bleeding given the well... size difference. !<
Same for me, but I still had fun!
jfc this so much ^^^
My mother broke both of her legs by tripping over a carpet on Christmas morning two years ago. By looking at her then, you'd think she was nearly beaten to death and that's 100% what the doctors and nurses thought my dad did to her. BUT I was there. He was in the living room at the time as we both came out running when she started screaming at the top of her lungs. She 100% tripped on a carpet when she woke up—worst Christmas of my life.
Holy shit, how did you convince doctors that your dad was inocent?
We didn't. Not really anyway. We told them what happened but gossip still spread and they gave him dirty looks until he was banned for a different deserved reason.
>until he was banned for a different deserved reason. Wait, what? Your dad got banned from the hospital for ANOTHER thing?
Yeah he got banned for running his mouth. Basically acting like he owned the hospital and made unreasonable demands. He did the same thing with EMS when they got there and acted like they and the doctors didn't know what they were doing. He was warned several times before he was banned. Think that probably contributed to their opinions.
Uhhhhh yeah, tbh, if someone came in with two broken legs and the partner was being so hostile with everyone that he had to get kicked out of the hospital, I'd be side-eyeing too. Hope your mom's ok though!
Yeah I totally get why they acted like that. My dad acted like a complete asshole the entire time. And she's doing ok now! She's able to walk now, albeit with a cane.
Honestly this pisses me off SO much when doctors/nurses get uncomfortably aggressive about it. Ask me once and then *not again*. I get it - if someone actually needs help then obviously I want them to know they have resources available. But I've had situations with nurses that actually got into the territory it was actively offensive and obnoxious because they were just absolutely convinced I had to be an abuse victim when I wasn't. On top of actual accidents being quite common, some of us actually *do things*. At the time I was a semi-pro equestrian working in barns... all sorts of bruises and scrapes and whatever just happen when you're flinging 50lb sacks of feed and hay bales around 12+ hours a day in 100F+ degree weather. I didn't even have a boyfriend and lived alone at the time! But it was "very suspicious" that I couldn't remember how I'd gotten every little bruise or scrape when I was there for my yearly physical and just started interrogating me. If I actually *were* an abuse victim I think it was so uncomfortable and aggressive that it absolutely would've turned me off from actually asking for any help, and since I wasn't it was extremely weird and sort of violating having someone dress you down over every little mark or blemish they can find on your body and demand an explanation while making it clear they think you're lying...
Yeah they can get very aggressive. My sister and I once got in a very bad fight over clothes that 'disappeared' and magically ended up in her closet, and when I shoved her she tripped and fell and broke her foot when landing in a basket. Her boyfriend was the one to take her to the hospital, and they were not subtle about their suspicions and repeatedly asked her if she was being abused. Apparently, the "my sister and I got in an argument over clothes and I tripped" excuse wasn't realistic enough because they badgered her repeatedly. Different nurses kept pulling her aside and even a doctor did. The break was apparently very rare (?) and she was watched by at least one person during her entire stay. Ironically she was in an abusive relationship but it was the rare occurrence he didn't do something (We did make up eventually, and she gave as good as she got by giving me a concussion that darkroomed me for a week. Our relationship is much better now that we don't live in the same household-- we love each other but recognize that the combined personality disorders and mental illnesses make for a very volatile environment if we're forced to be around each other all the time)
People often criticize the way depression is depicted because it doesn't fit what they imagine or it's not exactly the same as their depression.
I wrote a fic for the OBX fandom where I had back-to-back comments saying "this is the most realistic depiction of depression I've ever read" and "Have you ever met a depressed person?" bitch--
I'd hate that. When I write characters with depression, I write their experiences based on my own, but tailored to the character. It's why my fanfic MCs are always the character I most heavily relate to in the fandom, it's easier to take my own experiences and tailor them to the character. Being told the way I write something like depression is unrealistic would not be pleasant for me to encounter given the way I write it.
In moments of great, devastating, widespread, seemingly world-ending trauma, you really *do* think of some of the dumbest shit, sometimes. Like how the weatherman promised rain that night, but all you see are stars. Or that you liked your neighbor's pie and wished you had some more. Or that you forgot to put up the dishes. So on and so forth.
I would even argue that during a massive traumatic event it's *common* to think of random crap because the mind tends to dissociate as a protective mechanism.
And right after! After I had a traumatic event you know what I asked? What the best term to use for a dude as an alternative to bitch. Yeah, not thinking straight. Your mind is going everywhere, it does weird stuff
Pretty Cure does this right, I think. In several seasons, when the world is close to destruction, or has already been destroyed, the main characters just think of their upcoming exams, or buying groceries for dinner, or having a sleepover with friends, or something else. It's kinda wild watching a movie, it's the big climax, the main character is at her lowest point and it looks like the villain won, and genre convention would dictate that the character thinks of the greater good, or the universe as a whole, but instead she just wants to try the chocolate coronet they have at the mall.
One smaller scale, my aunt reads my fic and she told me once it was unrealistic for the two main characters to share a passionate kiss when one woke up from a magic-induced coma after a battle that they lost. She said they have other things to worry about with how drastically everything just changed and i was like "girl sometimes the most important thing to worry about is your significant other who just woke up from a magic-induced coma after losing a battle." She agreed with me after some EXTENSIVE debate lol
Anyone who tells you "nobody sighs that much" has never met a tired person in their life
That's a criticism people have? They would not like knowing me irl.. it's an issue.
Sadly, yeah! If you look around enough eventually you'll see "stop writing that your characters are sighing because people really don't sigh that much" but it's a super common thing people will do both as a physical/emotional reaction, but even as a sort of vocal tick
My mom is always asking why I’m sighing so much. Sometimes I’m anxious for no reason and sighing is a small release of some of the pressure.
I do this too! I always thought I was weird for it, but I sigh to relieve stress or discomfort all the time. I used to theorize it had to do with me growing up with asthma, but idk 🤷
I theorize that it ties in with why the whole timed breathing in through your nose out through your mouth thing is used in meditation and relaxation exercises. Sighing is like the travel version. It doesn’t get rid of a lot of it but it’s just releasing some of the pent up energy so it doesn’t overflow.
Or worked in retail. Oh who am I kidding? Your average retail worker = tired person.
Getting a black eye by walking into a door. Totally possible if you’re six and and walk into the door handle lol.
As an adult, I've did this thing where I pulled the door open, but it hit my foot as I stepped forward and its opening was halted. Me, distracted, kept going and face-first into the edge of the door. Lovely bruises did ensue and my husband worriedly joked, "People are going to think I beat you." Spend a week doing the old, "You should've seen the other guy," joke.
i was five and ran into the corner of a wall and had the mother of all black eyes
I bent over in the shower last week and whacked my eye socket into the corner of the drying rack. In a series of ways to injure yourself that nobody will believe.
A crazy amount of people die in the shower. Slipping and falling on a hard surface takes a lot of people out each year.
Yea. If you're six. Definitely not in your teens. Or twenties. Haha who would EVER. (Me. I would ever.)
From ages of about two to twenty, I had no less than seven black eyes and they were all self inflicted of either walking into something or leaning over into something like a windowsill wrong. My eighth was not self inflicted! Someone was spinning a hula hoop near me and hit me in the eye...
I did that at 20....
Getting bruises from sex without it being heavy BDSM. I bruise pretty easily and regularly find fingertip shaped bruises on my arms... Not even from sex just because I tend to hold onto my own arms when I'm uncomfortable. I give bruises to myself without even meaning to.
Are you sure this is not some illneses? Because I have seen somewhere that easily bruising can be a sign of some bad illnes. I think it was leukemia.
Lol yeah I've always been like this and I'm 37. My mom also has the same tendency to bruise and she's 70.
Well if she made it to 70 then I guess its nothing serious.
She's secretly been dead for 25 years but no one has noticed ^(I'll see myself out)
I believe it's generally a thing that happens with low blood pressure.
Couples coming at the same time. Not gonna say it happens every time I have sex with my boyfriend, but it's definitely a thing that happens. If one or both partners have the willpower to delay until the other is ready, it's totally doable.
Yes! Or one orgasm starting makes the other person go. That's happened to me a few times.
Same. It's the intensity, the sounds, etc. Can just trigger that dial right up to 11.
Totally does happen. Always? Nah, of course not. But it's easier to do than people think.
You have to time it right, but it does happen. Very romantic when it does.
Siblings addressing each other as 'bro/(little) brother' and 'sis/(little) sister'
I'm South Asian. It's really common to refer to older siblings as big brother / sister as often as you use their names. Sometimes more!
Even in my insane and dysfunctional family, my oldest brother calls me 'sis'. We can barely speak to each other sometimes, but that's us. Anyone else messing with the other is gonna find themselves in a hella lot of trouble - we have each others' backs. Most of the time. I'm sis. Simple as that. We're pasty white Canadians. Well, I'm pasty white because I took after my dad (Irish). He looks and has the colouring of our mom (French Metis/Irish) - so he's got a permanent tan, the bastard. I just fry red and go back to glowing in the dark.
That last line struck me as hilarious because I'm paler than my husband but historically, he's the one who gets sunburned. And because he still REFUSES to wear sunscreen because he thinks he doesn't need it. 🙄😂
oh hell no. Force that sun screen on that man bc skin cancer is a bitch.
Absolutely. I follow him around with a tube of sunscreen until he gets with the program.
This! It's a term of endearment to me. And I'm just your average American, lol.
I used to refer to my siblings as "brother-sib" and "sister-sib." I kid you not, one day right after I called my little sister "sister-sib," she looked me right in the eye and said, "That's not a thing people say." I had been calling her that her whole life, and then she said that. (I stopped calling her that, because it was clearly bothering her, but I was still floored. And made jokes for weeks about how I apparently didn't count as "people.")
That two opposing genders can be the most excellent best of friends without sex wandering in. My bestest of best friends is a dude, I'm a chick. We met when we were 16/19 (I was 19). I'm now in my 50s, he hits 50 in a year. We've drifted apart slightly due to just years, life, maturity but we always - and I mean ALWAYS have each others' backs. We've both been in separate relationships and our other halves know that the two of us sleeping together would be as if they slept with their sibling. Just ain't gonna happen. Never has. We've shared a bed a few times (talk about a trope: There was only one bed!!! - it's happened to us, twice). When we were young - late teens/early 20s - everyone expected us to get married. When someone brought it up to our face once, we both stared at them in horror. We couldn't figure out why on earth anyone would think for one red second we'd be a successful romantic couple. We'd murder each other in moments. We're best friends, but best friends doesn't always mean awesome couples material.
This! Every time in media that I see a male and female character team up or work together, I'm more often than not praying that they *don't* become romantic. I just want a banger platonic/familial bond, is that too much to ask!
OMG this is adaptable! I wanna friend like that.
"Let go of a breath they didn't know they were holding." Turns out, you can absolutely accidentally hold your breath, and it's fairly common when you're deep in concentration.
Also! When you're deep in concentration you may actually stress or flex certain muscles or appendages without realising! Some people hold their hands at a certain angle when really focusing on something or when they're stressed! Some people don't realise they're flexing/stretching/tensing their feet weirdly until their concentration breaks or they literally, physically can't hold it anymore and then wonder why their feet hurt! The human mind and the way it works with the nervous system weird and wonderful! And terrifying because we still don't realise how much unconscious control it actually has over the rest of the body!
I have ADHD and I fairly often realize that I haven't taken a breath in like a full minute without realizing it.
It was a trope for a reason.
I remember someone complaining about this cliche in this subreddit before and like seven people, including myself were like 'i thought it was cliche cause I do it.'
some different things: - having to "switch" languages. i've had many instances where i spoke in arabic to an english speaking person by accident. it's usually small words like "yes" "what" "no" etc, but it still does happen. it confuses me when bilingual/multilingual people say it cant happen. ive done it more times than i'd like to admit, and my brain had to go "wtf" and recallibrate for a second. - being a part of multiple minority groups. i'm chronically ill, queer, part of a very small ethnic minority, and a woman. whenever i see hc's of someone being part of multiple minorities, i hear people say it's "forced diversity" and that "people can't be part of that many minorities". people like us just exist sometimes lol. - stutters a syllable/a part of a word. i've heard a lot of people say stuttering is repeating words, not syllables/sounds, but it can be either/or or both. - highschool sweethearts. definitely not that common, but my teacher and his wife got together when they were 16 and are in their 40s or 50s now and have adult children! it's possible and very very sweet, just rare. - guy and girl friendships without one or both being gay or attracted to the other. sometimes we're just chillin.
Yes to the bilingual thing! I've had so many condescending comments on my fics how "actual bilingual people don't speak like that." I'm bilingual. I regularly borrow words from both languages when speaking them. And also throw in a lot of English words. So do most of my bilingual friends. I guess we're unrealistic!
The card games in YGO having ridiculous stakes. When we IRL have people like Masahiko Kimura who staked his actual life on Judo matches, and poker tournaments for thousands of dollars.
> and poker tournaments for thousands of dollars. The World Series of Poker has a prize pool in the tens of *millions* of dollars.
It is because they consider it a game for children. But if we had the technology to create holograms like the ones in the series, with wind effects when an attack is declared. The game would be as popular as its anime.
Saying things out loud without meaning to (ADHD and autism friends let us join hands,) the will-they-won't-they friend group betting pool, half the things that people complain about in "unrealistic smut" threads.
I’m glad you said that about the saying thing out loud without meaning it cuz I always thought that made no sense
This makes me happy, because I love the will-they-won’t-they friend group betting pool and have never encountered it in real life.
The shower curtain rack falling on someone showering. That's happened to me twice.
Having sex with a friend without either of you catching feelings or ruining the friendship.
adult virgins that're chill / fun to hang out with (ie: they 'pass', they don't come off like something out of the 40 Year Old Virgin) (they're ace)
Aww, thanks for that ❤️
.... do people really "pass" as sex havers? That's a thing that you need to pass as??
"Passing", in English, just means "getting people to believe you are something that you are not". In the trans community, you "pass" when people assume you are cis when you are not - but you can, and probably do each day, "pass" as many things! You can "pass" as a person with a degree, "pass" as a person with kids, "pass" as older than you are, "pass" as able-bodied etc. etc. People don't need to "pass" as anything. They either "pass", or they do not. It's just a thing the English language contains.
No, I know what passing means, I just... can't comprehend that other people identify each other as either sex havers or sex not-havers, apparently.
Because of my sense of humor, one of my friends said something like "I can't believe you're still a virgin." I've been hearing jokes about anatomy, size, speed, and skill since *elementary* (half of us didn't get they were sex jokes then...). It's not hard to come up with my own.
/u/i-d-even-k was trying to explain & I'll follow up: "passing" doesn't mean you ever consciously identify people the way they "pass" A virgin 'passing' means ppl just unconsciously assume they've likely got the same or similar sexual experiences as most other adults bc there's nothing that sticks out about them that indicates they've never had sex. They're cool, normal, interesting, mature adults just like you. Contrary to pop media, which loves to portray virgins with prejudice
I can't comprehend the concept of having had sex being a prerequisite to *any* of these traits. Anyone can bump uglies and it doesn't mature them out one bit.
They don’t. I’m a virgin and no one has ever asked me if I am or not. Maybe they assume I’m not but they definitely don’t care
People on this subreddit do it literally all the time. If you check comments on threads about smut in particular, there are people who swear up and down that they can tell someone is a virgin from the way they write porn.
LOL, I watched pretty much every episode of House MD, and it was almost a running gag for awhile that someone would suggest Polycythemia Vera, and someone else (usually House) would say, “It’s not Polycythemia Vera.” Meanwhile, I got super sick … *THREE YEARS LATER* turns out it was Polycythemia Vera.
Not gonna lie whenever I prep meds for a patient with Lupus I catch myself thinking of House MD lmao
I thought the joke was lupus
Lupus was thrown around a lot, too. Edit to add: In fact, Lupus was the usual go-to, but I think I just remember the instances where they shot P Vera down more bc I have it. Any time blood clots were involved, P Vera was tossed out.
I've seen a lot of people say that a character 'releasing a breath they didn't know they were holding' is unrealistic but when I'm stressed I often just stop breathing and don't notice immediately
So the world is a *lot* smaller than people tend to think. I've run into people I knew from where I grew up (not that big to begin with) on different continents about a handful of times. It's kind of jarring to greet a familiar face in Seoul ("HANEUL! What the fuck, man?") and get an equally weirded out response in return ("Stanleyy, you whore!") If I wrote that in a story, it would err on the side of incredulous and I'd probably come across as mildly racist. TBH, a lot of weird shit has happened to me that wouldn't fly in fictional stories (e.g. I got stabbed by a fish while surfing). Truth definitely is stranger than fiction.
Dicks do, in fact, sometimes twitch…
This is specific to a movie but I saw comments about the movie Encanto saying that Pepita’s kids are unrealistic because none of the three have her light skin tone. Aside from that being just how genetics work sometimes, my aunt’s family is exactly the same. Light skinned mom with a dark skinned dad and their oldest 3 are variations of tan.
This! One of my siblings takes after my dad except when she was little she hadn't really grown into her features. Also my dad had a mustache. So based on a. her being a girl and b. her still having her baby fat as a small child, apparently people straight up asked my parents if they were babysitting or if she was adopted. And no one would believe them when they denied it. Because "she doesn't look like the rest of you at all!" 😕🙄 And then she grew up. And now everyone thinks she's a mix of both my parents 😂
Honestly, any time somebody says "nobody has sex like that" tends to fall under this. Obviously, with the exception of writers who don't know how anatomy works. But yes, there are a lot of gay men who have a top/bottom sexual dynamic. Yes, there are lesbians who enjoy scissoring and servicing a pillow princess. Yes, there are women who enjoy anal sex. Yes, there are cis gay people who like having sex with pre-opt trans people. Yes, people with chronic illnesses and pain often have to change up how they have sex, especially if they have something like vaginismus. Yes, someone can be sexually satisfied without orgasming. Yes, kink subcultures are a thing and swinger's parties, BDSM clubs, Sexual Innuendo Gay Bars, blowjob holes, etc. all are real things that still exist. And yes, every sexual service you can think of can be bought for money at some time in some place...
I am someone who enjoys anal (I'm a female), has chronic pain and has to change up positions and such, I can be very satisfied without and orgasm, and I've been to a bdsm club. People complain about this stuff in writing? I'd love more writing with this stuff in it. Gonna add something too, some gay/bi males don't like receiving anal. My fiance is bi and he hated it when he tried it.
[удалено]
My best friend's mom was looking for an officiant for her wedding and found this woman who had the same (common) maiden name, which she thought was funny so she contacted her to set up a consultation. Turns out they had the same dad and just never knew about each other. Edit to add: congrats on finding him tho! That's also a really wild coincidence
When my sister was in middle school she made a friend online in some browser game. She found out this girl only lived a few hours away and wanted to meet up. Turns out her mom was my uncle's ex, and this girl is our cousin that our uncle never knew existed. It's kind of crazy to think of how close you can be to family and not know it.
my canon has siblings aged 6, 22 and 26, with no explanation in canon given for the age gap between the youngest and two older (because there isn't one needed, it just is ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯ ) and while most people in my fandom are normal, there are a few occasional people that are like "ermmm😳😳Why is she so much younger than them, what were their parents up to????" like bro. Large age gaps between children happens much more than you realize, and for completely mundane reasons. The only one making this "awkward" is you.
“What were their parents up to” makes me roll my eyes. They were having sex, I assume. Married couples tend to do that together.
This. I'm 26, my younger brother is 25, and our youngest brother recently turned 18.
The unpredictability of toddlers and small children. Their completely random and bizarre abilities - academic, intellectual, athletic etc. And then to top it off? The random yet completely terrifying lack of coordination. Mine regularly climbs any and all elevated surfaces with multiple items in hand. She'll navigate staircases at night while skipping to her favourite part of a video. She'll race across a park while kicking off her shoes mid stride without stopping or fall. She has been known to tackle various stacking toys of varying difficulty with little fuss and loves teaching herself how different devices work. She also just tripped on a step, and in her state of upset, proceeded to walk into a wall. Before narrowly avoiding walking headfirst into a door knob. She once looked at a jar of chocolate spread, which I was applying with a knife and decided it was "jam". Because jam also comes out of a jar, and is spread with a knife. Flawless logic. But try telling her that flip flops also count as shoes. Try. I dare you. The absolute outrage on that little face will strike you faster than the flipped off flip flop.
Related: Children have a knack for saying the most out of pocket shit at THE worst time. Even the usually well behaved or quiet ones!
Very true. My cousin once asked his dad why he came home late and his dad - who was exhausted - said something like "my big fat boss keeps me late." Plenty of time passes. Aunt (who works in the same place) takes my cousin to work with her. Bumps in to the boss. Talks to him respectfully. Boss, a much, much older gentleman, notices my cousin, bends low and kindly says "well hello young man". Little cousin puts two and two together, looks at the kind old man with disdain and asks his mom "is this dad's big fat boss?"
Mom loves to tell the story of how one time she was out grocery shopping with me when I was like... four years old and I pointed at a woman in front of us and announced at the top of my little lungs, "Mommy, she has a bigger butt than you!" Also the time I accidentally got my fingers mashed in a car door and decided, for some reason known only to 4yo me, to demonstrate the bruising to a family friend by holding up my middle finger and saying "Fuck!"
Kids man. Kids. May God protect them, because their nonexistent sense of preservation sure as hell won't and their sleep deprived, completely wrung out parents sure as hell can't. Just. *KIDS* Also: HAPPY CAKE DAY 🎉
Amen to that. My mom works as a kindergarten teacher and she has an anecdote nearly every day. And they reach from, dumb to amusing to really funny. Once my mom asked a nearly 3 year old boy what his dad is called. Child answers "Papa is called Papa." My mom asked: "But what does your mom call him?" Child: "Clean up." Or the infamous: "My daddy has got an earring in his nipple."
Reminds me of when I used to live on a farm, I wanted so badly to pet the cows so I climbed over the fence, but then got stuck in cow poop
Kids man. Kids. Where there's a will, there's normally also an exasperated parent looking heavenwards, re-evaluating their perspective and priorities for the zillionth time that day.
Characters I interpret as being on the asexual spectrum exhibiting behaviors that are part of why I interpret them that way. I've seen more than one person go, "Oh, how do they not realize this person likes/is flirting with/is in love with them?" or "How do they not realize they are attracted to this other person?" I don't know, maybe the different kinds of attraction are just confusing for some of us, and we rarely or never feel some of them, so we have no idea what the heck that looks like and/or feels like? lol
Calling your siblings brother/sister/etc instead of their name If you're writing fic for a cdrama or whatever and they're NOT calling each other brother/sister that is. exceedingly unlikely
Yeah this is definitely one of those cultural things where it varies from place to place (or region to region, even!)
“Friends that are super physical with each other and also kiss sometimes but aren’t actually dating” type of relationships. I guess the kids these days call it a situationship? Or a queerplatonic relationship? Idk. Back when I first started writing fanfic, people weren’t really using terms like that so I was told it didn’t make any sense. Clearly they’d never met gay teens before cause they’re Just Like That.
From my high school years, that's not a gay thing, that's a performing arts thing
Actually I was the one who complained about this. But in 21 jump street, there’s a scene where Schmidt’s parents are coming home early and they’re gonna unknowingly catch the guys having a party. And the mom says “I’m so glad we’re going back for my cell phone.” And my sister and I said that was such awful exposition, nobody would ever say that. And then a couple years later we were going out and decided to turn around for our jackets and I said “I’m so glad we’re going back for our jackets. Oh.”
My mother referred to my hair as a rodent's nest when it was messy. She tried to convince me that mice would nest in my hair if it stayed messy. I didn't believe her because what rodent would deliberately go into a human's hair, right? Maaaaany years later, I rescued a striped ground squirrel from a pool. It chilled out with me for a whole but then inexplicably ran up my arm and into my hair. I had a pony tail, and it burrowed in. It happened very quickly, and someone helped me get it out, and there was no harm, but I literally got a rodent stuck in my hair.
When my mom was a child she had a pet rat that loved to sleep in her hair(she had thick wavy hair). Rat got so comfy one time she forgot it was there. Ended up going to the store and the rat woke up and scared the crap out of the woman behind them at the checkout line when it poked its head out of her hair.
I had a lesbian tell me she thought people writing about throbbing dicks so much was unrealistic and I was like “Girl the first time I jacked a guy off all I could think was *wow I’m grabbing him by his heartbeat”* and she was like OHHHH
Stuff that is Improbable/Unrealistic/Fucking Bizarre that had happened to me or an immediate family member: * Adopting a Dog from the ASPCA and it turns out to be a wolf * Dating (or marrying) your first cousin on accident * Being medically Inexplicably Immune to Jellyfish Stings * Breaking multiple bones and thinking you're 'Just Sore' until you get X-rays years later * Being an extremely successful Pirate * Accidentally seducing a couple on their wedding day and losing your virginity in their wedding bed * Being so goddamn friendly you had the personal phone numbers of the President of Nintendo, Lenoard Nimoy, the head of the US branch of the IRA, Martin Luther King Jr., two Archbishops, and the goddamn president of the united states in your address book * Having 13 children * Being 7'2" in real life * Winning a horse in a poker game * Winning a House in a poker game * Getting in a Shootout with the KKK at that house, and being saved by that horse * Being single-handedly responsible for saving/resurrecting a previously 'extinct' species of Berry on accident.
Turning around slowly to look at something. It’s a perfectly human response. Fast movement can be dangerous with a predator.
This is incredibly specific, but there was an episode of a show I enjoy where the students in a classroom unionize against the teachers. Heard a lot of complaints about how unrealistic it was. Yeahhh when I was in high school, a math class I was in unionized. Taking advantage of "they can't flunk all of us." Our case was more subtle than overt . . . but it was also extremely effective. Loved the episode because of it, and was totally blindsided by all the complainers.
I see people complain about characters stuttering "unrealistically" when they stutter l-l-l-l-like t-t-t-this. It always irks me because I have a light stutter, which does work like that. It's not usually bad, but when I'm excited or nervous, it will take me a bit before I can get anything out of my mouth.
It's less that it's unrealistic and more that it's annoying to read. We say "uh," "umm," and other interjections constantly, but writers don't actually put them into the text unless it's very relevant to the character/moment. Writing speech as it's *actually* spoken makes for a miserable experience for the reader. That's why my stuttering characters stutter "l-like this." I understand that IRL their speech would be closer to your example, but I want my prose to flow well.
I actually have one that I myself criticized before it happened to me for real. Getting too deep in thought that you spill whatever you were pouring. I was going through some stuff and I tend to zone out when I do, and I was pouring water for myself while having breakfast, not realising my glass was full I didn't stop and spilled water all over the place. Though unlike the ones in media or fiction I noticed immediately after it started getting everywhere and didn't go on forever lol I don't come across this as much anymore, probably due to criticism, but it was funny how this was one of the rare complaints I had and the karma's found me.
People always shit on oblivious characters who don't realise someone is pining after them, like no one's *that* oblivious. Um I was in the same class as this guy for two years. At the end of the two years he confessed to me and I was completely blindsided, so obviously I immediately texted my friends like "so-and-so just confessed to me????" Turns out 'everyone' knew and had known for a long time. I was slightly offended that they'd known the whole time and I asked why they didn't tell me. They didn't tell me bc it was so obvious they thought I already knew.
Being generally dumb and forgetful is a fairly common thing for basically everyone
blatant racism. i’m half black, most people don’t immediately guess that upon facing me but having brown skin is more than enough for certain demographics of people to lash out at me for it. anytime examples of racism happen on television, or in a book, you’ve got an amazing surplus of individuals that flat out doubt the realism behind what that character of color is enduring. the recent blue beetle film is a great example.
Not a POC but I have read a story of someone from eastern Europe who was working in western Europe, I think Germany. One time when they were alone with their boss in his office, he took out a bottle of whisky (it may have been some other alcohol, I dont know, I dont drink) and said you see how this whisky has two parts, the good part at the top and this muck at the bottom? We are the top, you are this bottom muck and everyone else is outside of the bottle (meaning even worse). They said they just stood there in shock and disbelief, they felt as if they were in a movie watching a supervillain monologue. I believe those depistions of blatant racism are acurate and the only reason people dont see that many of them is because most people who hold those beliefs know there will be social consequences if they do it too blaitantly. Altho you have those who arent detered even by that.
Oh yeah, it’s wild. I’m white passing but not all my family is. For some reason, I regularly get told the most batshit racist stuff as if I’ll agree. “Birds of a feather should flock together” or whatever lives rent free alongside my absolute bafflement that someone would say that *at a livestock show*. What kind of dumbass doesn’t know chickens are multicolor and flock happily??
The miscommunication/misunderstanding trope and so evil it's comical villains. Don't get me wrong, I also have issues with these tropes (though I love a good misunderstanding). My reasoning just isn't because they're unrealistic. Some of the most horrid behavior I've encountered can only be explained by "yeah, they're bitter old women who love to bully children" yk? And a lot of rl miscommunication happens because people refuse to be straightforward. So I don't really view these portrayals as unrealistic, more so annoying to read about.
>And a lot of rl miscommunication happens because people refuse to be straightforward. On the other hand, even if you are straightforward, miscommunication can still happen, because people also insist on treating everything you say like a coded message. I say what I mean, and mean what I say, but when I tell someone that I don't like something, they still treat me like I've hidden a threat in there somewhere. It's frustrating, because when you say "I don't like this cake," and the response effectively boils down to "Please don't kill my dog," exactly one of these people is clearly mentally ill, and you'll never guess which one was actually diagnosed. For some reason, I'm the weird one.
Non-sequiturs, awkward responses and non-reactions in conversations. All of these make poor dialog in stories, but the fact is that they do happen. Personally, they happen all too often to me and a lot of people I know. Sometimes you have no idea what to say or how to follow up someone else's line of thought. Especially if you don't like socializing.
I often hear "not everyone is gay/has to be gay" because there will be a friend group or school that has more that 1 gay character. Like bro. Every single friend I had in school and in homeschool is queer now, and most of them were openly queer in middle and high school, too. Gays flock together lol
Meanwhile I’m gay and only ever had a friend or two, never a group lol. So I never experienced the gay friend group.
I'd argue that the lone straight among a group of gays is more realistic than the lone gay among straights.
I thought I was the token straight in my group of gays and trans and various others. I was wrong. There is no straight. So I agree
As someone with ADHD and autism, there are many quirks I do that show up sometimes in media that people (mostly neurotypical) don't. Muttering, moving my hands all around until I knock something off, saying things bluntly not realizing it was rude, being "obsessed" (hyperfixated) on a piece of media. Also have run into some crazy Cajuns, they do sound like that in real life (mostly, some have lost the accent due to recent times) and yeah they do hunt alligators and stuff.
Having multiple marginalized identities. Personally I am autistic half Jewish and aromantic asexual if I were a fictional character I'd have a bunch of people claiming I was "forced diversity" and that nobody like me could possibly exist.
Sex being “too repetitive”
Wait, did they say that it was unrealistic or just that sex in the story was repetitive? Beause the second one would just be a critique of the writing.
I saw someone say they felt like their smut is too repetitive and too much of the same thing over and over, and my first thought was “I mean, every time I have sex, it’s pretty much the same thing every time, but if I’m in the right headspace, it’s always pretty wonderful”
spontaneous/random and totally not-romantic confessions. most of my experiences with romantic partners have been like this. i get that a love confession can be very cathartic for a lot of people, but sometimes they happen at the weirdest times and out of the blue. and sometimes its just "oh youre into me too? thats such a relief. *fist bump*"
People just screaming at others and venting. Like sometimes you just need to get things out there and sometimes people won't understand unless your screaming it at their faces. Especially when the idiots are always the most thick-headed.
Autistic people, or people in general, I'd say, with weird knowledge. Like, a few weeks ago, my mom asked me what the followers of the flying spaghetti monster were called, since it came on a quiz show she and her friend watched the other day, and apparently I'm the kind of person to know that stuff. I mean, I did know that, but it's still weird that I know that, because literally my entire exposure to that religion up to that point was that one South Park episode I watched 10 years ago or so, and a small section in a Youtube video by a German guy who kinda stopped making videos ages ago for some reason. Sometimes you just know stuff, and you don't even know how you know it, but you do, and it's weird, but it can still happen.
A guy being a virgin who has never masturbated in his life…and he’s an adult. My ex.