URL is just one of many that leads to a hidden page. any ASCII encoding that isn’t supported, written in Windows-1252 encoding, will also send you there, e.g. /%e6 /%d7
going to a page with a broken URL will either generate one of two spanish Nescafé advertisements with broken characters, OR a very small chance of the aforementioned archived page with the flashing GIF. the
Nescafé
advert itself seems to be leftover from yahoo’s code, the text shows up on several yahoo/yahoo-hosted sites.
the flashing GIF page has an encrypted hexadecimal hash code, it translates to this
the tumblr GIF URL listed there leads to this image:
the flashing GIF has several QR codes inside of it. scanning them generates text
i love in fantasy when its like “king galamir the mighty golden eagle and his most trusted advisor who would never betray him, gruelworm bloodeye the treacherous”
When my sister and I were kids we had this one action figure, who was actually a brutalized batman doll without his cape (the dog chewed half his head, too), who we dubbed ‘Evil Chancellor Traytor’. The idea was that in the fictional society of our toys, ‘chancellor’ just came with the word ‘evil’ in front of it, as a matter of ancient tradition. Like ‘grand’ or ‘high’ or something along those lines.
Anyway, the running gag was that the king (an old Power Rangers knock-off doll) had absolute and unwavering faith in Evil Chancellor Traytor, who basically comported himself like a mix between Grima Wormtongue and Jafar from the Aladdin movies. Everyone was always sure that Evil Chancellor Traytor had something to do with the nefarious scheme of the day. The dude even carried around a poisoned knife called ‘the kingslayer’.
The additional twist on the joke, though, was that he never was behind anything. The king was actually right. Evil Chancellor Traytor was the most devoted civil servant in the entire Action Figure Dystopia. He spent his nights working on writing up new legislature to ensure that broken toys had access to mobility devices, was always on the lookout to acquire new shoeboxes for expanding city infrastructure, and drafted a proposal that once got half the ‘settlement’ in my sister and I’s closet moved to the upper shelf so that vulnerable toys were less likely to be snatched up by the dog.
The knife, as it turned out, was as symbolic as the ‘evil’ in his name. See, Action Figure Dystopia had a long history of corrupted monarchs getting too big for their thrones and exploiting the underclasses. The job of the Evil Chancellor was to always remain vigilant, and loyally serve a good ruler – or, if the regent should became a despot, to slay them on behalf of the people.
But since killing the king would be a terrible crime, the Evil Chancellor had to be the kind of person who would willingly die to spare the people from the plight of a wicked leader; because the murder would be pinned on them, in order to keep the ‘machinery of politics’ working as smoothly as ever.
Anyway, Evil Chancellor Traytor had a diary, in which my sister I would take turns writing out the most over-the-top good shit he’d done behind the scenes. Usually after everyone else had finished talking shit about him. I don’t know why but we got the biggest kick out of being like:
Barbie With the Unfortunate Haircut: Oh that Evil Chancellor Traytor! Why can’t the king see how wicked he is?!
Charmander From the Vending Machine: Char!
Jurassic Park Toy of Jeff Goldblum With Disturbingly Realistic Face: At least if someone puts a knife in the king’s back, we’ll know where to look!
Evil Chancellor Traytor’s Diary: Today I was feeding ducks at the park when I noticed another legless action figure sitting by the benches. I put a hundred dollars into his bag while he wasn’t looking. I really need to increase budgeting to the medical treatment centers. If only we had enough glue, I think we would see far fewer toys trying to get by without limbs… *insert iconic evil laugh*
Anyway, Evil Chancellor Traytor eventually fell victim to one of my mom’s cleaning sprees, and she decided he was too busted up to keep and tossed him out. My littler brother, who tended to follow my sister and I’s games like he was watching a daily soap opera, cried so hard that we had to do a special ‘episode’ where one of the toys found the Evil Chancellor’s diary, and so he got a big huge memorial and the king threw himself into the empty grave and then ordered the toys driving the toy bulldozer to bury him so that ‘Traytor’s grave would have a body’ (this seemed very important for some reason).
And then we had the Quest For a New King. Somehow or another that ended up being a giant rubber snake called ‘Tyrant King Cobra’.
valid criticisms towards the popularity of fidget items:
a lot of people don’t realize they’re useful for children (especially neurodivegent children) and treat them like bad distractions instead of useful devices
invalid criticisms towards the popularity of fidget items:
”you’re stealing something that’s useful for neurodivergent children only” this might surprise yall, but you cant expect fucking 6-11 year old kids to know that they’re neurodivergent. What you brush off as NTs treating your tools as a fad, could be a young child unknowingly finding a device that helps them focus. like what do yall want schools to do? psychoanalyze every single child there to see if they’re worthy enough to own a fidget item.
“they’re treating it like a fad” normalizing fidget toys can make a lot of neurodivergent children more comfortable with owning them.
“NTs are getting them banned from classrooms!” little kids aren’t getting the toys banned and pinning the blame on them solves nothing. the real problem are uneducated adults who fail to understand that these toys have a purpose and value.
Neurotypicals have been teasing us for using fidget items for LITERAL DECADES. We have had our items taken away, we have been mocked incessantly. We have been ostracized, bullied, and relentlessly abused for needing fidgets. And now suddenly because fucking NT’s use them they’re ‘acceptable’? No, Sorry. Brrrrt. Wrong answer. Maybe next time.
YOU DO NOT GET TO SUDDENLY ENJOY SOMETHING YOU USED TO MOCK SOMEONE ELSE FOR.
what the fuck kind of argument is that
you ABSOLUTELY get to develop an appreciation for a thing you previously disparaged, you’re allowed to reconsider stances you previously held in light of new insight or perspective, you’re allowed to stop trying to distance yourself from the needs and interests of those you’ve been encouraged to see as weak or defective
also NTs are not a collective consciousness and therefore it is impossible for a third grader to have been doing anything for “literal decades.” It’s not reasonable to punish small children (who, as the OP points out, may in fact be neuroatypical and have simply not been tested/diagnosed yet) because their elders are acting slightly less egregiously unkind than your elders did
the problem is not the normalization of stim toys, it’s the lack of understanding of stimming itself, and that’s not going to be fixed by treating the toys like some kind of holy relic that can be profaned by unclean NT hands
”you’re stealing something that’s useful for neurodivergent children only” – the OP has a good response to this (that, hey, you don’t know which children may or may not be neurodivergent!) but i think it misses a larger point
you can’t be “stealing” something if it’s not a limited resource
making more stim toys available, mainstream, affordable, and present in classrooms will only make them more accessible to ND kids who need them. nobody’s taking a stim toy out of the hands of a neurodivergent six year old to hand it over to some greedy collective of NTs. do you mean that you’re stealing the utility of the thing that’s “useful for neurodivergent children only”? do you think that these toys will stop being helpful to ND kids if some critical threshold is passed where too many NT people have them? Will it somehow make stimming ineffective? how exactly would that work?
completely double spaced version on google docs here – this post is more blocky for the sake of people’s dashboards, but still long so people will be less likely to glaze over it. my apologies if that makes it hard to read
things to look for and avoid in an autistic character
• symptoms only manifesting as “nonverbal and rocking”
• super smart / living calculator
• super dumb / doesn’t understand anything
• all the symptoms you can come up with for them are “awkward” and “has special interest(s)” (please do more research)
• trains, technology, and/or math as special interests
• acting like a child
•
getting treated like a baby
• unreasonably cruel and uncaring about others’ reactions to them being cruel
• if they’re comparable to sheldon from the big bang theory, start over
• animal comparisons
• a lack of feelings
• please no stories about what it’s like to be autistic told by allistics
talking about things outside of special interests (again…. come on……….) (special interests are usually the default things our brains go to when theres no stimulation or we want to entertain ourselves – it isn’t literally all we think or talk about ever. if a conversation has no connections to a special interest, reconsider having your autistic character bring it up in a context that is not an introduction.)
•
explicitly expressed to be capable of attraction and romantic feelings – if your character is an adult, add sexual feelings to this point
•
capable of general functioning, just with a disability that makes it more difficult – not a walking disability (….sigh)
• a wide amount of feelings and emotional turmoil (but perhaps only being able to express it in limited ways)
• we’re people
• just people whose brains are wired differently
things to avoid in research for an autistic character
•
autism moms / autism blogs and websites not run by autistic people
•
any affiliation with autism $peaks means you should walk away and never look back
•
a scientist trying to create explanations for what autistic people do without actually asking / not mentioning asking autistic people
• anything about a cure for autism
• a person that “worked with autistic kids” phrased in the same way as “worked with animals”
• talking about autistic people as if they are mysteries, are like animals, or are otherwise othered weirdos instead of people
things to look for in research for an autistic character
•
actual autistic people talking about their experiences and symptoms
• just stick to that and you’re good but it’s hard to find sometimes ngl. just look for the above red flags
things i would personally like to see in an autistic character
• less easy to swallow sadness and more destructive anger. i would love to see a canonically autistic character who was frustrated easily by small things and had trouble communicating why •
not a story about being autistic, a story that happens to have a character or characters who are autistic – it isn’t pointed out or questioned, they’re right at home with the rest of the cast and not othered (a la symmetra from overwatch) •
intensive sensory issues / small sounds making large reactions • clear communications about not liking x sensory thing (for example being touched) •
poor motor skills / clumsiness and not being laughed at for it • walking funny (body bent downwards, walking very fast, walking slowly,
big strides, shuffling, stiffness, etc) – no one treats it as if it’s funny or something totally strange • a big personality that has a presence so they can’t be cast aside (but feel free to have quiet characters too) – if this was along with being nonverbal they would probably leap to being one of my favorite characters ever • a fear of asking for clarification on sarcasm or jokes because of past experiences and an arc about the character becoming more comfortable asking questions
>> if any fellow autistic people want to add something, feel free <<
i'm very gay. i'd like a few dollars. 
