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This Twitter thread really spoke to me. I wanted to share it with anyone who hasn’t seen it. 

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Everyone told me testosterone would make me angrier. My family has a habit of attributing any anger I feel these days to the testosterone. I didn't feel any angrier, but my mother would still tell me that no, I am angrier now, and testosterone did make me angrier and *she* could tell.

A week or two ago, I got my proof to the contrary. I'd been having a difficult day, woke up late, and had to rush out the door, ran into minor inconvenience after minor inconvenience, and then the straw broke the camel's back.

I wrote out the kind of angry vindictive seething text message I used to write constantly. I didn't send it, of course, I copied it out and pasted it in the folder of my notes where I put all my rage venting.

And then I thought.

Huh, it's been a little while since I did that. And I checked the time and dates on my previous notes. The last one was a few days before I started testosterone.

And scrolling back, I noticed that they were *constant* at least one a week for *years* I used to get so angry that I would get the serious urge to say cruel hurtful things to or about people I cared about on a near-daily basis. I didn't realize how big of a problem it was until all of a sudden I hadn't gotten that angry in Eleven Months. Nearly a YEAR.

And then I realized in my rush to get out the door in the morning, I hadn't taken my T shot. My testosterone was the lowest it's been since August.

All of a sudden, I had demonstrable proof that testosterone really did make me less angry. That all that "you may not think you're any angrier but you are" was bullshit.

I feel like I should be angrier about this than I am. I know how angry I used to get. About everything. I just felt it again for the first time in a while. For once, it would feel justified to be that angry. But I'm not. I'm not mad. I'm just... disappointed, I guess.

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You can replace [ACTIVITY YOU ENJOY] with [SCROLLING] but watch out. This sucks bad 👍

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teacher deku doodles ft. coworkers

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Rating korean webnovels' protagonists' reaction to meeting another version of themselves for the first time

Kim Roksu: 10/10, very polite and helpful, worked to save his other self's world while also being thoughtful not to mess up his life and personal connections Kim Dokja: 0/10 tried to stab himself Han Yoojin: 0/10 tried to stab himself

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dabi becomes a father and is scared shitless that he’s gonna have a child that’s just like him i.e. hard to love and then he does end up having a daughter as emotional as he used to be but also she’s so so easy to love actually

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thinking about the differences between kim dokja's and yoo joonghyuk's suicidality. kim dokja's suicidality is one specifically designed to be familiar to the reader - he's miserable, he's in pain, he feels as though he's got no one to rely on and no prospects and really the world would be better off without him at all. it's a painfully common story, isn't it. yoo joonghyuk's suicidality by contrast is largely incredibly fantastical. suicide is basically his super power, and he never does it because he wants to die, it's always because he simply believes it'll put him in a better position than he currently is in. his regressions are definitely a type of death, both literally and figuratively - its a life he's given up on - but its never a true end. it's why i think so many modern aus will keep kim dokja's canon suicidal ideation to some extent but often drop yoo joonghyuk's completely. why would yoo joonghyuk kill himself if he wasn't regressing, after all?

but there are instances where yoo joonghyuk does express a more realistic suicidal ideation. first, in the 1863rd round, where he's sick of living and simply wants it to be over. second, in the pseudo-epilogue, where he believes that there's no longer a point to his existence and thus wants it to end. both are driven by the same thing, ultimately, i think - he's lost sight of his purpose. yoo joonghyuk isn't the type to continue living simply for the small pleasures in life - he would never have been able to cling to the updates of a favourite webnovel, for example, because he's simply not built to consider that enough. this contrasts with kim dokja, for whom small pleasures (or this one small pleasure, to be specific) is all he's got.

i don't really have a point here. just thinking about how on the surface kim dokja and yoo joonghyuk are both willing to die very easily, with their suicides often paralleling or influencing the other, but that suicidality ultimately comes from opposite ends of a spectrum. clinging to a small comfort vs seeking out a grand purpose. a lack of care for yourself vs the idea that you alone matter - you alone must save the world. etc etc.

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Watching some of "Merlin" again and realized anew just how henchman-shaped Arthur is in so many episodes, dealing with Uther's nonsense, and correspondingly drawing some (limited, of course) amusing comparisons between Merthur (& or /) and Moshang in SVSSS.

Merlin is dealing with basically being a demi-god and fighting both for and against the future, struggling with destiny and its arbiters. Arthur is comparably going around feeling like Just Some Guy doing his best to survive. He IS the Crown Prince, of course, he's deeply privileged and also aware of the burden of his position, but he has pretty much ZERO awareness of a planned narrative going on around him.

"It's my destiny to be this future king's servant! I both deeply resent this and will risk my life for him time and time again." VS. "Wow, this guy is kind of a pathetic and yet also incredibly disrespectful weirdo. Hm. I'm kind of into it."

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STOP MAKING NEW OREOS 🛑

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this has been said before but it is so funny that kim dokja spends 13 years reading about yoo joonghyuk and centers his life around him and spends every waking moment going god i wish i was yoo joonghyuk and then kim dokja meets yoo joonghyuk and immediately starts bullying the shit out of him

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han sooyoung (13 years old) (asshole): oh my god why do you keep harrassing me about this dumb plagarism shit like kys weirdo

han sooyoung (1863rd version) (watching her younger self suicide bait the person shes writing twsa for just so he won't do specifically that):

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looking back it really is startling how prominent of a theme sexual violence against women is omniscient reader's viewpoint in the beginning of the story and how starkly it disappears by the end. this theme is often a staple in apocalyptic fiction, and omniscient reader's viewpoint is no different initially.

sexual violence against the women characters of orv is a frequent occurrence, often acting as a driving force for the plot and characters. theres yoo sangah being on that train because shes being stalked and harassed by han myungoh (1), jung heewon being rescued after being assaulted and left for dead, han sooyoung allying with kim dokja after being rescued from being assaulted and killed, jang hayoung also being rescued from the demon nobles threatening to kidnap and assault her (2). thats four out of seven female companions allying with kim dokja through these sort of cirumstances! and theres the notable effect jung heewon being a sexual assault survivor has on her character.

and like i think its important to question whether these depictions are always done with the most respect (why is kim dokja so frequently the 'saviour' in these situations) (why was jung heewons trauma fixed by lee hyunsung hugging her really tight through a metaphorical ptsd episode when it reality that would be the worst fucking response possible) (why is it that these women rarely seem effected by these experiences outside of a few moments of upset) (etc etc) but like done well or not they do play a major role.

and its not just in the plot, with those instances of sexual violence against women often playing into larger themes + messages and even some metatextual analysis in the narrative. i've talked before about how the unique dehumanization and commodification female incarnations face in the star stream at both the hands of the system and individuals parallels the same things women often face in real life, playing into larger themes about dangerous systems of power and the capitalistic drive for commodification at the cost of all else. you can see this exemplified strongly in the coin farm arc and to a lesser extent the geumho arc. this is one example of the prominent place sexual violence against women has in orv's themes and messaging.

theres also the character of jung heewon and her breaking of the genre's typical victim mold. shes one of the many nameless assault victims who are used to illustrate how totally corrupt the new apocalyptic world is, and how our protagonist really needs to save it! but jung heewon survives and becomes more than one traumatic experience used for man pain, serving as somewhat of a metatexual critique on the typical victim extra in the process. (although honestly, given throughout her rescue she incites much of the same man pain and general distaste for humanity in kim dokja as said nameless victims are used to do, you can debate how effective this is throughout the earlier chapters).

so we see sexual violence against women as this major aspect of the plot, we see it as an important part of the stories themes and messaging, we see it as part of the metatextual narrative. and then it just sort of.........disappears? instances of it stop, and we more or less forget about the role its played in the story up until now. but why?

its entirely possible that sing shong simply ran out of things to say about it, and didn't think it really had a place in the story anymore. i can see why it wouldn't - most instances of sexual violence against women inspire a hopelessness and distaste for humanity in kim dokja that frankly don't suit his character as the story goes on and he becomes less jaded. theyre also mostly used to illustrate the mundane sort of personal violence one person is capable of doing to another, a horrific cruelty on a minute scale that kim dokja largely leaves behind as the challenges ramp up and he goes from fighting people to fighting galaxies.

i cant say im unhappy about it dropping off. it sometimes feels like it wasn't always done with the most tact. while i think sing shong makes some salient points and represents aspects of it fairly well (i think yoo sangahs story especially is pretty good for an action adventure fantasy), the question of whether further explorations of this aspect of the narrative would have been a) done well and b) made sense in the story is an open one.

at the same time, i feel as though there were more things to say about this theme and it's place in the story. in a narrative so built around exploitation of others, around violations of autonomy, around corrupt systems and what they do to those at the bottom, it feels like further discussion has a place. especially when its already been established as a systemic issue. i understand it is sort of impossible to find a satisfying conclusion for this idea in this story due to its nature, but that doesn't mean the lack of one doesn't leave me a touch unbalanced.

footnotes:

(1) while it is unclear if han myungoh would have actually assaulted yoo sangah i think there is a clear and implicit threat in his actions even if he never intended to follow through (which is a debate not for this post). either way her actions were still fueled by that threat.

(2) jang hayoungs status as a trans woman makes this instance a little different because she is initially percieved as a young man in this scene, giving the villains more of a 'predatory queer' than 'predatory man' type of threat (which, that trope in orv is its own whole post). im including her because her gender reveal does give that scene a new light, the dukes might have seen her as a woman in that scene cause in the demon realm they 'dont judge by appearances' (#diversitywin?) and also because when discussing sexual violence faced by women it feels very disingenuous to ignore that faced by a trans woman, as trans women often have it significantly worse.

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anything to keep him from disappearing again. i guess

original post

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This ABSOLUTELY works.

I have used this for many years. Definitely b do it.

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bro LMFAOOOO