“How can I teach her
some way of being human
that won’t destroy her? I would like to tell her, Love
is enough, I would like to say,
Find shelter in another skin.”
— Selected Poems II: 1976 - 1986, ‘Solstice Poem’ by Margaret Atwood
yall. PLEASE. NO SIBLINGS EVER HAVE CALLED EACH OTHER “sissy”, “sis”, OR “bro”.
I DON’T CARE HOW CLOSE THEY ARE. ANY AND EVER SIBLING PAIR HAS FOUGHT. and TWINS?? no twins are as close as you think they are. i know like 3 pairs of twins and usually they are TEARING EACH OTHER’S THROATS OUT.
me and my brother???? we have our nice moments where hes like “hey adele look at this thing i drew, do you like it? i don’t think i did a good job but–”
“i think it’s really cool”
but most of the time???????? he calls me bitch and i insult him TO THE MAX.
PLEASE EVEN IF THE SIBLING PAIR YOU ARE WRITING ABOUT IS CLOSE, THERE IS NO POSSIBLE WAY THEY ARE AS CLOSE AS YOU THINK THEY ARE.
younger siblings do things they would never, ever do with anybody else solely for the purpose of annoying their older sibling. older siblings, at times, will go into homicidal rage.
ALTERNATE GREETINGS:
“what’s up?” “go away” “no”
*silence*
“hey” “hi” *separate ways*
“heyfull name other doesn’t usually use” “I literally hate you so much”
older: “NAMEEEEEEE! mom/dad/other wants you!” younger: “fuck off” older: “i’m going to break your nose” younger: “with mom/dad/other standing right there? yeah sure”
younger: “why are you here” older: “cause it’s my room, fuck nugget, get out”
older: “WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU IN MY ROOM” younger: “oof someone had a bad day” older: “IM GOING TO KILL YOU”
“i hate your face” “cool, i have food” “give me some”
“NAMMMMMMEEEEEEE! dinner’s ready!” “yeah yeah okay give me a second i’ll be right down”
“why did you have to come here?” “this is,,,, our house,,,,, that i too live in” “yeah but i was hoping you’d get run over by a bus” “why thank you, i was too”
MORE ABOUT TWINS
i dont care if you want your siblings to be close or whatever, do you know how INFURIATING it is to have a twin????? especially an IDENTICAL ONE???
if you have identical twins, they are going to hate each other’s guts for 3/4s (or more) of the time. having somebody who looks just like you, living in the same house as you, probably going to the same school as you, who has the same birthday as you, and most likely sleeps in/super close to the room you sleep in? actual hell. especially if they have a lot of the same interests/friends as you do. this experience is horror in it’s rawest form. nobody wants this. they want the “close, happy twins who do EVERYTHING together and have since they were born!!!”
IMAGINE A SIBLING RELATIONSHIP, BUT THEY LOOK J U S T L I K E Y O U AND ARE A L W A Y S W I T H Y O U.
remember what i said about hell?
(possibility: if the one identical twin is better at something or more liked than the other, it fuckin sucks. imagine this experience in the school halls: “eva???? what are you wearing???? oh my god, did your mom mix up your clothes with jasmine’s again? i feel sooo bad for you!!”
“actually this is… jasmine. eva has spanish right now.”
“oh. whatever.”
sucks, right?)
forcing that kind of relationship on your fictional twins is both unrealistic and tbh kind of scary.
now, twins who don’t look the same. everything i just said, but minus the appearance. yeah. i can see the shitshow now!
THE YOUNGER SIBLING DILEMMA
coming from an older sibling, younger siblings are satan.
they will:
annoy the older sibling at all costs
never do anything the older sibling says
“why does SHE/HE/THEY get to be in charge!!!!” whines the sibling who is literally four years younger and still can’t spell phone without replacing the “ph” with “f”
snitchin little bitches
older sibling: *flicks younger lightly on arm* younger sibling, tears of lies and deceit running down their face while they grin, knowing they will be believed: MOOOOOOOM NAME PUNCHED MEEEEEEEEEE
eat all the sweets
then they will blame it on the older sibling
literally, they will blame anything on the older sibling
watches an r-rated move -> name said it was alright!!!! (i most certainly DID NOT)
“MOOOOOOOOOOM NAME ISNT LETTING ME HANG OUT WITH HER FRIEEEEEENDDDDDDSSS” “YOU HAVE COME WITH US 16 TIMES THIS WEEK”
admittedly, they can be cool 1/324532 of the time. make sure to include these cool moments once in a blue moon bc sadly they do happen
POSSIBLY will feel like older gets more attention sometimes
DEFFINETLY feels like the older gets more freedom
OLDER SIBLINGS
i, as an older sibling, am biased. ill do my best tho
insults the younger sibling (SOMETIMES unfairly actually a lot unfairly)
ill add this to younger in a moment but on the flipside the younger sibling probably feels like the OLDER sibling gets more attention instead
takes out problems on sibling/family (to be fair when younger grows up they do this too)
“pshhhhhhhh, TRUST me, you do NOT want a sibling”
*to friend* “i literally hate him/her/them/other so much. i would kill him/her/them/other if i had the chance” “no you wouldn’t” “are you sure”
“nah man, you can’t talk shit about him/her/them/other, only I can talk shit about my sibling” *immediate fist fight/verbal decimation*
if a younger child is talking shit, they will be BLACKLISTED AND DESTROYED. probably more than is fair.
probably has hurt the younger sibling pretty badly at some point, most likely by accident but if it doesnt fit you storyline,,,, i have done despicable things
underestimates their strength when dealing with younger sibling
“WHY WONT YOU JUST FUCKING LISTEN TO ME” “YOURE NOT MOM” “YEAH BUT MOM PUT ME IN CHARGE DIPSHIT”
“i am not his/her/their/other parent, why do i have to do this”
younger sibling, to older: “son of a bitch” “we literally have the same mother”
“I SWEAR TO GOD CAN YOU EVEN DRESS YOURSELF???? CAN YOU???? CAN YOU????????????”
“haha ur scared of the daaaaaarrrrrrrk” older says, as their brain is in a panic about whether or not there’s a serial killer in the dark room waiting to kill them
so yeah. i have so many metas i need to write about so many things
not to be all “tw*light did nothing wrong” but misogyny honest to god killed the hunger games
it was no masterpiece sure but it also sure as hell wasnt the love triangle bullshit everyone made it out to be. seriously everyone blames this whole “YA fiction with the special One and teens overthrowing the oppressive government tropes” trend on the hunger games but the truth is that none of those books are anything like thg
god!!! im mad!! name one cliche YA novel where the government actually is BAD like not just “oh love is illegal” or “they barcode you!!uwu” instead of like. actual slavery and rampant poverty while the rich waste their money on dumb bullshit!! and name one main character who ACTUALLY suffers under the government’s regime!! who actually starves and works and suffers and has genuine REASON to rebel!! thg is the only YA book that had anything to say about wealth disparity and the dehumanization of the poor,, every other YA book uses it as a plot device to put some dumbass romance together or show how “badass” the MC is!! thg is genuinely emotional and the focus of the book isnt katniss’s archery and how cool she is and its NOT gale or fucking peeta bread. and then the marketing for the stupid fucking movies took the WHOLE POINT OF THE BOOK (which is to satirize and critique how women in entertainment have any serious things about them ignored in favor of whatever dress theyre wearing or who they’re dating) and turns that into……….. a fucking love triangle. and then the world forgets it because its just another dumb teen girl series. okay.
Me @ myself rn
oh also last thing. the fact that at the end katniss chose to kill Coin (the rebel leader/soon to be newest dictator) instead of just having a plain and simple boring happy ending shows just how different thg is from the YA fiction its compared to. no other book in this genre would have the guts (or even the idea) to put out such a blatant, obvious “the fight against oppression never ends, stay diligent” message and thg is iconic for it and it shows how much thought was actually put into its message. im sorry to susan collins for my 12 yo self for not understanding at the time and thinking it was just bad writing
thanks to everyone adding on about the representation! about finnick’s story and being trafficked! and about peeta and his disability!! and katniss and her indigenous coding and PTSD!! And about how it shows how war n dictatorships always prey on marginalized groups!! and a billion other things!!! that the movies just fucked off n forgot about!!!
Also, like…Katniss’ love triangle with Peeta and Gale was never about the love aspect. She was choosing between war and peace. It wasn’t “oh nooo i have too many boys :(” it was “one of these people represents war and violence and revolt, which is necessary in the world but unsustainable, and one of them represents peace and love and rebuilding, which can tolerate too much but ultimately is the goal.” and it had to be a romantic relationship because she had to be put into a position where choosing one cut her off from the other. katniss choosing peeta was NEVER about choosing the boy she loved most; it was about choosing a future where she counted up good things in the world, where she had children because she was no longer terrified of what their future would look like, where she grew primroses in her garden and started moving on from living her entire life steeped in trauma. gale was important to her because he was ferocious like her; but even he goes further than her, like when he refuses to run away with katniss because he wants to be part of the rebellion.
thg is a war story. peeta and gale both represent another aspect of what happens when the war is over - you can focus on it, enjoy it even, continue to bring it back every time something goes wrong; or you can slow down, rebuild, heal, refuse to glorify the effect it had on society and you personally. choosing one means you cannot have the other. you cannot hold hands and play in the grass with peace and war at the same time: you marry one of them. doing so erases your ability to commit to the other. and katniss’ choice of peeta is significant because she is choosing peace. she is choosing, despite how hard it is and how easy it would be to be bitter and broken and angry, to heal.
YES THAT LAST PART
The Hunger Games is just a good book. Period.
#THANK YOU #FOR THIS AND FOR THE URGE TO REREAD THG
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