#'why don't you do that then' because it may not actually work and also i'm almost done with this chapter. lol 👍👍

[merlions]

Can I also add that unfortunately, "being kind to those you are afraid of/feel are hurting you makes you vulnerable to harm so you better be angry at them instead" is EXACTLY why bullies bully people. It is the start and end of their thought process, and it's why thinking like that will never break any cycle, will not protect you from being bullied, may even turn you into a bully yourself.

Here's why it doesn't protect you: all bullies WANT is for you to have an emotional reaction to what they're saying. If they're mean to you for the purposes of bullying you, they want you to get angry and frustrated and sad. That's the power they're trying to get: the power over you to disturb you and have effects on your emotional state. When you react as if they've successfully hurt your feelings, they have succeeded in their task, and their system is affirmed to themself. "Wow I sure bothered that person. It's going great!"

Being kind instead is SUCH a powerful tool against bullies for exactly this reason. If you are capable of maintaining your own mind and emotional state no matter how awful someone is to you, you show them that they don't actually have power over you.

Sure, this does freak a lot of people out (having what feels like a certain, 100% hit rate weapon for gaining power over someone suddenly firing blanks can do that to an insecure person), and sometimes this does make people angrier - at first. But that's not because you've made yourself vulnerable, it's because they're perceiving everyone as "I have to put them down before they have a chance to hurt me" and you've just shown them you're actually invulnerable to anything they've got.

They see you as having equal power (or at least they don't have power over you), and because they're afraid everyone is going to hurt them all the time if given the chance, they may then perceive you as a threat. Like on a nervous system level, fight or flight. Do it anyways. When you then don't immediately kill them, their nervous system gets a chance to start unworking the fuckin knots it's twisted itself up into.

A weird side effect of this is that they may start immediately sharing the most personal, vulnerable things you can imagine. It's so wild. Take this with grace. I've had so many experiences where someone who's well known for being universally cruel and hostile says something awful to me, and then when I respond with kindness, then says shit to me absolutely unprompted. Like "I think I lash out at others because I'm scared they're gonna hurt me first. I don't like myself much. My parents were pretty terrible to me growing up, and I don't know how to make friends." Or whatever their thing is that slams the fear button all the time. And then if I respond with sympathy and relate to them, I notice them slowly begin to change over time, trying out kindness instead of proactive hostility. (Or like especially with high school friends I eventually notice them come out as trans on facebook and then they're normal non-hostile people after that. Many such cases. Turns out being in excruciating, mysterious-origin emotional pain all the time makes you feel afraid of everything bc like what's causing that..."oh shit it was the gender again" lol)

Anyways. I've never regretted kindness, never had a bad experience, never had an experience where using kindness instead of reactive hostility didn't gain me at least something. At the very least they get afraid of ME. I've worked with some people who like, other coworkers will come up to me and go "you're so sweet! Tbh it's like a flashing dinner bell for predators! Why is our asshole coworker always doing you favors and working hard on things you request and asking for your help on things? ONLY ever you?" And I'll be like well every time they try to tear me down and I just don't even emotionally react to it at all and stay cheerful, they get FREAKED out like palms sweaty arms spaghetti and go somewhere else for a while. They're my little bitch now. And when they're afraid of something they sometimes actually come to ME for help cause they know I'm strong enough to protect them!

This power is immense...padawan you can learn the potent ways of this mysterious force and save the galaxy...seek within yourself.. the power is already within you............

I'm so serious about being kind above all else. it has genuinely changed the way I interact with the world on a fundamental level and has made me so so much happier.

[mameillieureennemie]

i had been thinking about this all day at work.

fwb!vi x f!reader - 1

summary: looks say far more than words can.

when you and vi first started this arrangement, the way she looked at you was different.

it was a look of hunger; a look that a mountain lion would possess as it laid its eyes on an innocent lamb. to say she wanted to eat you was too kind—she wanted to devour you, tear into your flesh with sharp, and wet her gullet with your blood.

it was possession that drove her to throw you on the bed before mounting you. the desperate urge to keep as she swallowed you whole, bones and all, until there was nothing left of you.

that was months ago, when the arrangement was still fresh. when you firmly stated that this was nothing but downright filthy sex, and vi agreed.

but everything has changed.

vi doesn't look at you the same.

except she does, but it's worse somehow.

while she still pins you down with that gaze of raw possession, it's...softened.

no longer is it harsh and jagged, slicing through your flesh with serrated edges. now, it cradles you, like gentle hands holding the delicate body of a baby bird. cautious, easy...

fond.

it terrifies you.

vi's nestled in the cradle of your thighs, hiding her face in the plush of your stomach. her arms are locked around your waist, tight and assured, and she's humming a tune. it's muffled, but it's familiar; a song that she lets loose when she's happy.

when she's happy with you.

there's a heavy rock in your stomach, pulling you down towards the ground. it may drag you through the earth, suffocating you in the terrifying heat of the earth's mantle. maybe the heat will kill you first, but you'll be killed nonetheless.

this is what your fear feels like. this is what you were afraid of.

vi's shifting on your lap momentarily draws you away from your inevitable breakdown. she's now lying on her back, baring her face back to the world—back to you.

the smile on her face is tender; it's what some might even call loving. the rock in your stomach gains five pounds, nausea pooling at the back of your throat.

no.

"hey, pretty girl," vi murmurs, low and slow, as if those words are her secrets. "what's going on in that head of yours?"

the words sit at the tip of your tongue, scrambling for freedom. they seep into your taste buds, leaving behind the most sour of tastes.

we need to stop this, is what yells to be said. we said no feelings. this was supposed to be about sex and nothing else. so why does it feel like you're in love with me?

why does it feel like i'm in love with you, too?

"nothing," you say instead, mimicking the low and slow, like you're also telling secrets. "just wondering about what i should do tonight."

you stress the i a little too harshly, but vi doesn't notice. or maybe she does and refuses to care. maybe she's acting on her own will, doing what feels right by her standards.

which is unfair; she isn't allowed to do this to you.

"well, if you don't anything in mind," vi says easily. "we could go catch a movie or something? maybe go and grab something to eat from jericho's?" the way she says we is too simple, as if it's always been we and not you and her.

you stare down at her for a moment, really take her in. the slope of her nose, the scar on her upper lip. the soft pinks of her cheeks, and her eyes. wide and power blue and far too expressive of their own good because she's looking at you with that look again.

that look that means way too much.

when you open your mouth, all that falls out is a lie.

"actually, i have to wake up early in the morning." you lie through your teeth because you need to get away from this—from her.

the look in vi's eyes changes, slips into something foreign; something unknown. you've never seen this look before, but you can't find it in yourself to worry about it.

when vi leaves, she presses a lingering kiss upon your lips. her hands grasp at you a bit too tightly, as if feeling you for the last time. then she's gone without a word, and a part of you wonders what that could have meant.

but as the weeks go by and vi goes unheard of, you suddenly realise on a deathly cold morning.

vi was saying goodbye.

[themoodyestj]

i doubt you actually know what it is like to live with a narcissist. i was in a relationship like that for a long time, he made me feel like i was nothing. i was fully convinced that i was completely useless and couldn't do anything right. i wasn't allowed to go out with my friends. i wasn't allowed to work, i had to depend on him. i wasn't allowed to have any hobbies. i was always the one who needed improvement, everything wrong was always my fault. everything always had to be spotless or else there would be dire consequences, i was so scared of him it made me sick. but in public he treated me different, he was the nicest sweetest guy, no one would have ever suspected. i honestly don't think this is Jensen's case, just look at him, he's a confident successful man with tons of friends, he gets to do what he loves for a living, he can have his music and go play golf whenever he wants, he's not afraid to be by himself for long periods of time, he's not afraid to call his wife and say "ups i messed up" and he always wants to come back to her. he's not scared.

Wow, we have an abuse gatekeeper here! Hi delulu! So glad to see you! Should I expect rain tonight?

I’m sorry you went through that, truly. And I'm not going to tell you where I have my experience from, I'm not an idiot. But your personal trauma doesn’t make you the human lie detector for abuse. You don’t get to point at a dude playing golf and go, “See? Not abused!” like that’s how this works. You think having friends, hobbies, or saying “oops, I messed up” means someone can’t be mistreated? That’s dumb as fuck.

Especially since, in this case, she needs his hobbies, his friends, his connections for him to WORK TO MAKE MONEY so she can get the lifestyle she wants!

Abuse doesn’t always look like black eyes and isolation. Sometimes it looks like constant belittling, having your achievements dismissed, your needs ignored, and walking on eggshells so much you don’t even realize it anymore. But hey, since you’re so sure, let’s flip this: if Jensen were a woman and zee kween a man, and he was being publicly humiliated, manipulated, and used as a TikTok aesthetic for “if men are easy to manipulate, they deserve it,” would you still be acting like this? Or would you be posting a whole damn essay about how “this is why women aren't protected”?

You don’t actually care about what’s happening. You just don’t want it to be real. Because if you did, you’d sit with those red flags instead of swatting them away like a toddler refusing to eat their vegetables.

And now, allow me to flip that pointing finger at you. If you were really a victim of narcissism, you wouldn’t be out here dismissing someone else’s experience. You know why? Because you’d know firsthand how painful it is, how isolating, how damn near impossible it is to reach out for help. Real survivors don’t gatekeep abuse, and they sure as hell don’t harass people for seeing red flags.

On a last note, I really hope you heal, but also learn to shut up and let others heal. Because the disgrace you just wrote, the lines you memorized from that old crumpled misogynistic evangelist pamphlet, basically forcing the idea that abuse victims have to fit a certain mold, is nothing you should be saying out loud, let alone to someone who may be potentially experiencing abuse.

It's a disservice to the people trying to survive/escape abuse. As if gaslighting and years of grooming weren't already a major issue for them.

YOU ARE PART OF THE REASON THERE STILL IS A PROBLEM.

[ilovelawrencee]

HE IS SIMPLY PERFECT. I LOVE HIM SO MUCH 👁‼️‼️‼️

I have a lot of nonsensical or silly theories. But I believe that Harley is not completely evil...? I mean, yes. He is probably a horrible "person", but who would do something good for the player and Poppy if he wanted to ( I believe he wants us dead ).

I don't know exactly what Harley's objective is or what he wants, but I believe he can use us during the chapter. I don't know, maybe he has realized the player's potential, and thinks it's a good idea to use him for his own plans ( ? ).

I really can't think of anything. I saw several people saying that Harley wouldn't be the main villain of this chapter, but rather an ally. And this possibility makes me very sad... like, where is the extremely cruel Harley Sawyer that they feared so much? I want to see this man committing crimes, deceiving us, betraying us!!

Even though I love the possibility of Harley being an ally, there aren't many things that prove it. I don't hate this theory, but no one has ever thought about the possibility of Harley at least caring about anyone. He didn't even care about the experiments, so why would he care about the player? If he does this, it's probably because he has his own reasons. I think it's pretty hard for the doctor to help us of his own free will ( but we don't know how he acts and thinks at this exact moment, so maybe he really is an ally ).

but regardless of his plans and goals, I'm sure he'll be the best character in this chapter. I'm not exaggerating, this doctor will be the best thing in this chapter ( I love him more than anything ). And I waited a long time to see him ( thanks to those who didn't take my theories seriously ) but I always said he was alive. AND THAT'S VERY GOOD!!! ( harley pls dont die )

now about this here

I have two theories about what these things are:

first: bodies that harley created for himself. probably extra bodies ( imagine he can go from one body to another. i don't know how this robot thing works )

second: followers ( ? ). I personally discarded this theory because it was very silly. but they would be like cheap copies that work for him.

but to be honest, it would be really interesting if Harley really was an ally. and it would be amazing if the one responsible for the hour of joy was actually him ( it may not make sense, but it's a really interesting concept to me, especially because the experiments are his creations. if anyone could free them. wouldn't it be him? )

Hm. That's it... I love Harley Sawyer. And he's going to be amazing regardless of whether he's an ally or a villain. And I've waited so long to see what he looks like. So it's really cool to see that he's getting a chapter where he'll be featured!!

and also, please don't die. you are my favorite character.

[corviddusk]

I can add on to this a bit as well as an intersex transfem who was AFAB (I will also add on the fact I was raised primarily as a boy and bullied for being too feminine when seen as a boy and bullied for not being a real enough girl the other times)

1. Intersex transfems are indeed valid I am one. I'm transfem because I'm transitioning from being seen as a man to being seen as a woman. This has led to, in my case, detransitioning from transmasc and retransitioning as Transfem. However due to the fact T had very minimal changes for me as I already was growing facial hair and thick coarse leg hair at 13/14 and didn't start T until 17 and already had ambiguous genitalia and masculine features many of this is retransition and not just detransition (I'm changing things I naturally have not just stuff T gave me. I may even need to take medication to suppress testosterone production when I start properly medically transitioning once I get my doctors appointment to finally work out)

2. Transfem alters in a body that is not transfem are not transfem in any meaningful way and should not be seen as the same thing. There are emulations of being transfem that show up in systems. It's the same as how the plural community treats race- alters may appear to have a race you physically are not but they are not that race they have a physical appearance in your own mind as someone with that race but as you and them are one in the sense of sharing a body you cannot EVER claim that race. All my alters are mixed white/native regardless of what they look like. Genders can be anything as that's based on self identification, but factors like transness are about bodily situations.

3. FtMtF which in some ways one could consider me (though currently I'm more X and my assignment and body are contradictory) is not inherently transfeminine. My getting off of T is not me being transfem that's not whatsoever a part of my retransition that was solely an act of my detransition and is separate from my transfemininity. Anything I do to change the effects of T specifically is not retrans actions it's detrans actions. My retrans actions are things like getting on Estrogen to be on normal levels because my body naturally is not there. It's getting bottom surgery to actually have what I have only sorta half of be fully there.

4. Enbies who were AFAB are not transfem they're either transmasc or transneu depending on their own paths. Unless they're intersex and can transition femininely and are doing so.

I'm also going to be blunt, transfems like me who were AFAB are massively privileged over transfems who were AMAB. I said this recently in a post but I'm saved from so many laws that many transfems are not and it's why I don't think I'm always fully TMA. I am socially TMA and sometimes by laws or dealing with medication, but I also have massive privileges. It will be easier to access hormones most likely and it will be easier to have paperwork that I want. It is a privilege to have that even if it was never treated as existent. My lost girlhood and my body not being what I want is the main things I experience, others have more forms of oppression. Thus we should center them the most.

All in all I will also say the the original poster- no it isn't bait

Yes I hate the term AFAB transfem too. I'm not AFAB I'm intersex and was AFAB. AGAB happened to me it's not who I am. I have privileges from that because it in some ways aligns with my identity (even when I would rather have X as a gender marker I am not horribly dysphoric by F and as it is what I was assigned there is some level of cis privilege even as a nonbinary woman who is transitioning and that's okay).

That blazed post about an “afab transfem” tumblr community that I just got. That’s 100% bait, right?

[entropicbias]

star trek online with a youtube video.

(note, this is an old post, but i've decided to do more blogging like this here, so i remembered it.)

i decided to try out star trek online and live out my trekkie fantasies the other day. my first run in with the game was eons ago at a thrift store, but my current laptop is lacking a cd player, so i couldn't really try it out for sure. i don't know if it would work anyways considering it's a copy of the game from, what, 2010? what would be the point of that.

the first star trek game i ever played was the TNG game for the snes. i emulated it on my shitty old laptop. it was unfortunately a bust, cause i had no idea what i was doing.

speaking of tng, before i do my review, did you know a certain somebody used to make tng edits? can you recognize that flute sample?

anyway, my best friend dave (who doesn’t even have a tumblr) brought it up, assuming i’d never heard of star trek online. TCH! who do you think i am, you simpleton? naturally, i had to flex on him. whipping out the cd like some kind of seasoned star trek online veteran just to make a mockery of him. but really, the joke is on me, because let’s be honest, no one takes a self-proclaimed star trek online expert seriously.

so, i downloaded it off steam and ignored all the mixed reviews! i didn't stay in character creation for too long, but i tried to make him resemble me as much as possible. that's because my character's name is john kirk. he is john tiberius kirk.

john t. kirk of the u.s.s johnterprise. because enterprise is a restricted word (STUPID AND LAME?)

here is what i was greeted to.

quite frankly, i'm a little upset at the amount of diversity aboard. already i am seeing TWO vulcans. this is absurd. there is only one vulcan that should be aboard my ship, and he hasn't finished downloading the game yet.

OK! TIME TO PLAY THE FREAKIN' GAME FOR REAL! :D

after picking some of my skills (i chose to be aggressive, pistol handy, and uhh... i forgot the other one but believe me when i say it was good.)

i am meet this son of a bitch

captain...? CAPTAIN? OF THE JOHNTERPRISE? THE HELL YOU ARE! GET YOUR FALLOUT CLAYMATION ASS OFF OF MY FREAKING CHAIR! i thought you started out as captain? what is the point of naming my ship if i don't even get to be captain??? i need to show this guy who is BOSS.

the second thing i figured out about this game, is that if you walk into an object and believe in yourself you can actually gyrate with skill akin to that of a zumba instructor. so, i immediately had to gyrate next to captain isaac carrot to put him in his place.

it was a massacre for garrett. if i was you, "captain", i'd hang my head in shame and go back to being an ensign from being so hopelessly outmatched. it was also at this point i remembered that i could record my gameplay, which countered my ability to remember that my computer's cpu couldn't properly cool itself and i hadn't turned on my laptop fan. so amidst scanning some debris, my computer shat itself and died.

AND THEN RECORDED THE REST OF MY GAMEPLAY! watch it here. https://youtu.be/eeEs0el8Woo?si=djN9iLpkH3bGwNle there is some impossibly hard to read commentary there, and you may be wondering why i don't talk, and that's because i sound like bart simpson, so it's best that you just squint your eyes and pretend like morgan freeman's sultry voice is narrating my captions. if you do not want to sit through half an hour of shitty footage, then feel free to skip to 24:47 where i realize that you do not get a chance to meet captain kirk at the end of your first rodeo, and it genuinely breaks my heart. that is todays post, goodbye. update from jan 2025: i haven't touched the game since because i realized that i was just not going to be all that invested if most of the gameplay was from outside of the ship and i didn't have my very own personal spock.

-eb

[the-bad-batch-baroness]

UPDATE

There will not be a new chapter of Where's Mommy? today. Sorry, y'all 😮‍💨

I tried really hard to get it done in time, but alas, I could not. I'm hoping to have it done for next Friday, though 🤞🏻

It's been a crazy beginning of the year. I am very busy at work, but it's a very good busy! Because of my hard work last year, I got not one, but two raises! Which calculates out to a 6% increase to my annual salary 🥳

So, now I'm hard at work again to do even better this year! I'm not burnt out or anything like that, but, since I'm doing a lot with documentation and spreadsheets, after 8-9 hours of typing, I really don't want to type when I get home 😅 It's been a bit rough.

I'm also busy in my personal life, with friends, family, and my volunteer work, all good stuff, so I don't get a lot of sit-down-and-write time. There's also this guy that I'm falling for 👀🤫🤭 Honestly, I'm living my best life right now, even with the not great stuff. I'm happy.

In between work and life, I'll still be writing, but you may not see me around here too much. I've even been tossing the idea around of just posting my fic updates on AO3 and not on Tumblr. Don't worry, I'm not leaving Tumblr or deleting my blog. It's just a lot of extra time and energy to cross post. If I do decide on that, I'll make an announcement.

And now, if you've made it all the way down this post, below I have a little snippet from the next chapter as a show of good faith 🥰

Cara stood between Wolffe's knees and slowly swayed back and forth while staring at blankly at the woman. "Why's your hair yellow?"

"Cara!" Wolffe scolded, tapping his left knee into his daughters side. "That's rude." Wolffe looked up at the woman with an apologetic expression. "I'm sorry. She's not usually like this."

Lilith chuckled. "It's alright. Actually, it's pretty normal behavior." With a bright smile, Lilith leaned over her knees to look Cara in the eyes. "Why's your hair black?"

Cara grabbed the hem of her shirt and played with it while she thought of an answer, a tell-tale sign that she was embarrassed. "Because of Daddy," she said while pointing behind her.

"Ah," Lilith said knowingly. "Well, my daddy had yellow hair, so I have yellow hair. Just like how you have black hair like your daddy."

Cara stared silently as the wheels turned in her head. "Oh."

-

Tag List:

@nahoney22 @sunshinesdaydream @padawancat97 @coraex @lickylickylicky @homemade-clones @523rdrebel @clonemedickix @moonwrecked @stunkbiggu @cdblake1565 @ladytano420 @moonlightwarriorqueen @returnofthepineapple @clonethirstingisreal @dreamie411 @trixie2023 @cw80831 @ca77m3anna @reader6898 @kimiheartblade @dukeoftheblackstar @arc-trooper-8008 @knightprincess @kell-of-storms @skellymom @grindeeloo @totallyunidentified @ladylucksrogue @tesahuy1629 @tanaka @gjrain20-starwars @nerd-ika @imabeautifulbutterfly @tallrock35 @ivanessame @msmeredithrose @griffedeloup @salaminus @rebell-ious @nursekyra @clones-cyare @roboticsuccubus83 @totally-not-your-babe @rinwritesfics @vithe-potato @haybellewrites @unicorngirl17 @notgonnaedit

[licorishh]

double ?? upload ???? yeaaaahh i've gotten FASTERRrr for whatever that's worth so complementary blyla because guess what i miss them too (nobody was surprised by that)

[thedreadvampy]

lmao it is undeniably true that I am Depressi Spaghetti but you know. fuck it we continue.

[frogeyedape]

I am so unbelievably pissed off. FUCK HOAs

Oh, my trash/recycling bin can't be visible except on pickup day? Ok whatever fine I hate you but I can deal with this

Weekly inspections?????? FU FU FU FU FU

SECOND NOTICE ALSO WE'RE CHARGING YOU MONEY TO SEND YOU CERTIFIED MAIL OF THIS TOTALLY LEGIT TOTALLY SECOND NOTICE OF WHAT IS ACTUALLY A VIOLATION cue me: checks notes. Hmm. My recycling bin was. on the curb. on recycling pickup day. You know. The day it has to be out. The day it is motherfucking ALLOWED TO BE FUCKING OUT AND VISIBLE.

so. 1) not a violation

I have sent them the trash AND recycling pickup schedules, which are DIFFERENT, btw

I have disputed the fact of the violation

I have disputed the linking of this "violation" to a previous violation MONTHS AGO--their "first notice" in this case was a "Courtesy Notice" LITERALLY 5 MONTHS AGO and they've done so many inspections since then and my bin CLEARLY WASN'T OUT IN THOSE INTERVENING MONTHS so WTMFH

So I am posting like a crazy person here instead of sending the absolutely deranged email I almost sent (I did send a slightly less deranged version with the disputes, and requesting a hearing)

OMG. It has been. Less than one hour since I learned this fun fun news. My bin was out YESTERDAY, y'all. YESTERDAY. I am going to blow a gasket

[tinystepsforward]

ngl it makes me want to die a little bit that it's so often trans people who feel that sex is mutable but oppression is always-forever based on asab in ways that allow them to demand that information from other trans people. like it feels fucking bad. it feels bad when it's people holding up someone who posts a lot of selfies as transition goals to a degree they have to clarify what they have or haven't done or what "direction" they're going in, it feels worse when people are out there like "caster semenya is not tma" or whatever the fuck. i am, as always, not a trans woman, but here's a sentiment echoed by many of the trans women around me who log the fuck off, quoted directly from one: "people who draw a clear line where they say that semenya or khelif are tme and then call me tma are just calling me male at this point".

like i get it. i really do. we seek community and shared experiences, and we feel betrayed when people have less in common with us than we thought they did. [*more on this later.] but that's not those people's faults and my god in the case i'm seeing play out on twitter rn this poor person did absolutely nothing to intentionally mislead people, just posted pictures of their actual kid self. who looks a lot like i did, because shockingly enough "we can always tell" doesn't fucking work for trans people either!

on the one hand i move in intersex circles which are unapologetically welcoming in cis "dyadic" people with pcos, because it serves nobody to draw a clear line where mutilation or genetics or some ineffable childhood suffering are what make somebody intersex, especially when most of us (esp in places like nz) have never been karyotyped and are being treated for symptoms without a pinned-down cause anyway. the more of us there are the stronger we are, the more pressure we can exert on a medical profession which doesn't like to consider how common outliers are, how uneasy sex is at all. and then on the other hand there's dyadic trans people on the internet who've yelled me out of spaces because a couple of traumatised incarcerated trans women i worked with as a prison abolitionist assumed i was also a trans woman and i didn't immediately tell them my entire csa-involved history of being sexed in varying ways as an infant and child and/or exactly how big my phallus was at birth or where in my junk config my urethra lives so they could decide i was tme or whatever.

returning to the * for a related but not identical thought: i think presuming shared experiences leads to some fucked shit in general! "oh we all had a radfem phase" or "oh we all were channers" no we fucking weren't and it's particularly obnoxious when me & mine are trying to build trans community locally to organise and resist the growing wave of far-right backlash against our existence, and there's just white people in there on a spectrum from "straight up being antisemitic and trying to get the n-word pass" through "handwringing about how they need to make space for people who aren't politically correct" to "handwringing about how brown people are right to be mad at them but doing shit fuckall". and then the other fucking brown people in the space are on some identity politics shit where they're like "trans joy inherently excludes those of us who could get deported" or "big city white queers are killing us by being visible instead of going stealth bc it stirs up the discourse" or whatever the fuck i've heard pulled out this year. there's a bunch of reasons i primarily organise outside of trans spaces and that's one of them. i've never felt more alone in spaces where people claim we're all the same than being left as the brownest moderator or organiser in a space full of people to whom "this is a safe trans space" apparently means they get to abdicate all other responsibilities not to lapse into presumed shared patterns that are fucking racist or otherwise alienating. i've never felt more alone than surrounded by exclusively trans people who sort people into boxes and assume everyone in those boxes has the transition goals they have. like i was on cypro until it disagreed with me to the point of endocrine crisis and now i'm on t and at both those points people were so fucking presumptive or entitled to my reasons or journey or personal relationship w my body

literally just submitted on (and was invited to consult on) the nz law commission's review of the human rights act and like. it's straight up fucked how many nz trans people fully do not comprehend that any "sex assigned at birth" type definitions fundamentally exclude migrants who have no way of proving it and many intersex people who happen to have been reassigned later or many times or never assigned at all as a baby. we can't make law with this shit and that's why we have to have symmetrical protections for all genders/sexes/expressions/presentations, bc naming and defining a protected class here often leaves the people who already are left out from those shared experiences of marginalisation out in the cold when they face violence

[lovelikehomicide]

My interpretation was that merging with the reflection actually didn't add anything to the vampires, but erased a part of them--like a tole.

I get that this doesn't fit with how the series presents the reflections as sentient beings, but hear me out:

Mirrors often serve as metaphors for self-awareness and empathy. We tend to be kinder to people we 'see ourselves' in. We 'hold a mirror up to' people when we want them to recognise their own mistakes. Mirrors can be used to represent truth and reality beyond what a character wants to see/what they think is best for themselves.

If we continue with the idea that mirrors represent self-awareness and empathy, losing your reflection would mean giving up those feelings. People who are incapable of feeling empathy (and there are a variety of conditions that cause this--I'm trying not to draw any direct parallels, given I'm talking about a work of fiction) tend to also struggle with guilt and remorse, unless the situation directly harms them. They also generally don't feel shame or embarrassment, as those emotions require you to care what others think of you, which is arguably an empathetic response (again, being very general here).

It's my headcanon, then, that merging with their reflection eliminates a vampire's capacity for emotional empathy. This would be beneficial for the survival of their race, as their primary method of feeding requires hurting/killing other members of their species (vampires are human, after all) in a very intimate way, which would be extremely traumatic for the average person. In addition, the amount of war, death and suffering anyone who lives for centuries would be forced to witness would quickly become unbearable.

We see evidence of this over the course of the show.

Ingrid shows guilt and empathy in season 1, particularly in 'Slaytime TV', where she admits to tricking her father because she doesn't like how upset it made Vlad, and 'countdown', when she saves the Branaughs. There's a lot less of those moments in later seasons. She sacrifices an entire netball team in an attempt to slay her brother, is onboard with executing her father until she finds out he actually loves her, and doesn't seem to feel anything when anyone she's bitten gets dusted. While she seemed to care about the Branaughs prior to her transformation, the implication is that she didn't contact them for the three years following season 2, despite still being in the Stokely Castle.

Boris didn't have much character development beyond being an anxious person and afraid of the transformation. The most apparent change is in his confidence, which could be the result of no longer caring what others think of him. Research has found a strong link between high empathy and anxiety.

Finally, let's look at how Vlad changes after the merge. He's more confident, but that could be put down to him no longer caring if he hurts someone else's feelings. He shows little remorse for dusting people, unless it turns out he was wrong about his reasons (more about his own sense of morality than any actual care for the person), and doesn't hesitate when doing so. In season 5, when he finds out his entire family would be punished if the council learnt about Sally, he genuinely doesn't seem to understand why his father would value their unlives over Vlad's curiosity. He tries to rationalise his selfishness, but he does genuinely seem to struggle to understand his father's very valid concerns.

The sadism we see in Sweet Sixteen and Bad Vlad may be side-effects of bloodlust. In these episodes, both Ingrid and Vlad are coming into their full powers, which are most likely fuelled by blood, so they would be starving. Vlad had already existed for months without feeding his powers, so the added bloodlust that came with increasing them would have been overwhelming. The sadism created by bloodlust would also be a survival mechanism to keep the more moralistic new vampires, like Vlad and Boris, from starving themselves.

I know this doesn't entirely fit with the canon, but I found myself overthinking the concept of the transformation and what it actually does, so this has been knocking around my head for a while.

some part of vlad, even if it was only little has always been a bit evil

ok, so this post is me rambling about vlad and the fact that even though he seems directly opposite to his dad and sister in the way that he doesn't drink blood and wants nothing but peace, a tiny bit of him isn't like that

obviously the best episode we can look to is "bad vlad" when he goes full evil from his reflections possessing him

in my opinion, their reflection isn't a diffrent being entirely. in some capacity,it is part the vampire looking into it. even for the least evil of characters, it focuses in on that tiny shred of darkness in them, and magnifies it. for those already evil, like ingrid or the count, this is fine, because its barely a change. but for Boris and vlad we see that it creates a massive difference. Boris goes crazy with power and vlad almost kills the count,ingrid and erin for a second.

Then, in the episodes following, we see him do stuff he wouldn't have done before and vlad gets to lashout at people (and rightly so 90% of the time) now you could use that as a way to prove that, no a fraction of vlad wasn't evil, he was just dealing with the merging of him and his reflections. but as I said, the reflection is showing who that tiny part of vlad could be.the only thing is,now that little part he kept locked away is getting to come out more through his actions and words and everything.

and then, he bites erin.

while it was in order to save her, he was pretty resigned to doing it until ingrid persuaded him against it.and we know (again from bad vlad) that he tried to bite erin twice. that might just be because he was hungry and she happened to be a breather, but (we're kinda getting into headcannons now) I think that after that or maybe even before, he has wanted to bite her. he mentioned he gets bad cravings sometime at the start of season 3 and erin was the only breather other than renfeild in the house. so there is a possibility of him wanting to bite her before then.

i might be clutching at straws a little with this but I don't care. I do not think that vladnis in no way at all a lille bit on the evil side

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

Just once, I would like to be able to have a conversation about my feelings with someone where they don't, at some point, start trying to explain to me why something happened such that they are either implying or outright stating I should stop having noticeable feelings at them about a thing and/or telling me that I'm wrong about how I feel and actually if I just understood this thing I would see that I'm being unreasonable to say I feel the way I do.

Just once, for someone's response to be "it sounds like you're feeling [insert thing, e.g hurt, sad, scared, tired, angry, etc], I'm sad that you are dealing with that." Not to take responsibility for my feelings! But for them to acknowledge that they're happening and might matter to me before they move on to whatever the fuck next thing they have to say is

[keeps-ache]

blood of the covenant

[sapphosremains]

Okay, so firstly I think I ought to clarify some terms a little because they overlap. So if I assume that you're responding to my post in the way I meant it, you would be suggesting that non-Christian theologians couldn't publish things because they didn't believe them religiously, and I'll assume that's not what you meant and there's just been overlap of terms, as you seem like a nice person and I've followed you for a while. I believe it academically, as I'm sure all theologians who publish work believe academically in their work, but I think it's wrong to expect people to believe things religiously.

Secondly, of course what you write and publish matters and affects people. I hope that very few people think they can publish what they want with no effects. However, at the end of the day, these people exist, and, also, people publish bad theology. It happens. I won't make a judgement on what's bad theology, as no one can do that objectively, and I'm sure many people think my theology is bad theology, but you get my point. However, as far as academics should be responsible for what they put out in print, pastors who, as you were saying, are trained in theology, have the responsibility to choose what they preach from the pulpit. If they do not think critically enough to believe everything that is published and think that all of it is suitable for a congregation (especially when much of academic theology is so incredibly different to preaching material), that's on them. It is not a theologian's job to anticipate that a pastor may preach their research, because research is precisely what it is.

Following on from that - your point on why people do theology. And again I think our different experiences with academic theology (yours in seminary, mine in university) play into this. I can understand your perspective on not understanding seminarians publishing work they don't believe in, but again, this strictly academic theology is a completely different field. In my course, we learn about, think critically about, and write critically about, the theology of a variety of religions, despite not believing them. So what is the point of doing theology? I think a number of different things:

Yes, actually, to further the academic field. In the same way historians research and write and publish and work together to get a more accurate view of history, and chemists research and write and publish to further the field of chemistry, I write and publish theology to further the field of theology. To contribute to a better understanding in different aspects of the field.

Also, because we do care about the effects and the real people involved. There's an excellent bit in Phyllis Trible's foreword to Terror in the Bible where she explains how researching and presenting bits of the Bible that were painful, and sexist, and traumatic actually really spoke to victims of similar things. My Cozbi essay was really important to me and others as it examined where common translations obscured the true violence and sexism of the event, and how her race and gender play into it. I think that's important. I wrote my icons essay because I wanted to combat the idea that icons are forbidden in the Church of England, thereby providing support for people that find them useful.

And yes, for the sake of it. Because it's interesting, and exciting, and academically rigorous. Because it's challenging. Because we love doing theology, whatever that means.

If we only do theology because we believe it, we miss out incredible opportunities to engage with people we disagree with (which is really, really important), and to understand other religions. If we only do theology because we believe it, if believing something is our starting point for doing theology, I think we'd see very little progress in both theology and religion. It also makes us incredibly biased, and makes it difficult to engage with people who disagree with us. I don't think not believing religiously in something you write makes it pointless, I think it makes it personally challenging, which is a good thing.

Should we all publish the most ridiculous things possible to prove a point? No, absolutely not, and I seriously hope no one is suggesting this. But you do not have to believe something religiously to believe it or support it academically.

Also, I think the distinction between liberal and progressive is really important here - it's on my page somewhere.

"Anyway. I just wanted to add in the perspective of someone who genuinely agrees with what I write, because I believe that my work matters. Especially as a queer person doing queer theology, I need to be up front and genuine about my sincere belief in what I write. It's important. The work of theology is important to me, and I (and many other theologians) believe that it is my duty to perform that work responsibly."

I don't like the implication here that I, and other academics, don't believe our work matters, or that we don't think theology is important, or we aren't responsible.

Maybe there are some. I don't know. But I know that I personally, and all other academics I have engaged with, believe our work matters and has an impact, and theology is important. Theology has been a driving factor in fighting against slavery, subordination of women, racism, sexism, homophobia, and a whole list of other injustices. I will always, always argue that theology is important. You won't catch me agreeing with Richard Dawkins on this!! I do feel responsible for my work. But some really incredible Christian theologians have been non-Christian, and I'm sure the same is true of other religions.

Some theology is religious. Some is as objective as it can be. Most is probably a mix of both. And, I think some theology is pretty much impossible to religiously believe. For example, Harriet Lutzky's work analysing the name of Cozbi (https://www.jstor.org/stable/1535280) is so interesting, and academically compelling, and I believe it academically, but it is not something to be religiously believed or not believed. How would I go about incorporating that into my religious beliefs? This is what makes me think that we're not discussing the same theology, or the same type of belief, so I hope we've just misinterpreted each other!

Anyway, hope this makes sense and best wishes to you and your seminary work :)

“i love it theologically but in my personal religion idk how it makes me feel. this is actually a super common phenomenon - christian theologians are often very liberal in their theology and more conservative in their own religion.” Can you please please please talk more about this distinction????

Of COURSE! I’m still trying to find where I got this fact but I always have like 10 books on the go not including journal articles etc so I have a lot to dig through! So firstly, it’s quite an important distinction. There is a massive overlap between theology and religion, and exploring theology naturally impacts one’s own religious beliefs, and vice versa, therefore it’s not a hard line per say. However, it is crucial that theologians can have some separation. For example, one of the first questions they asked me in a certain unnamed university interview that you’re not meant to give any details about picked up on this. I was given a few passages taken from different religious traditions, and we discussed their similarities and differences. A little into the conversation, they told me that the passages had been written sequentially, with each a few hundred years after another, and asked “Could the later ones possibly have been inspired by the earlier one?” One of the later passages was taken from the New Testament, with this question carrying the suggestion that an author in the NT had been inspired by Ancient Greek mythology. If you’re answering that from a religious perspective, no, absolutely not! This is where they start to separate. 

A good part of theology requires looking at religious texts as a piece of literature. In my Extended Essay for IB I wrote about Cozbi, and a significant chunk of my work looked at word choice in a variety of translations, including the original Hebrew. This meant looking at how she had been named (Cozbi was probably not her real name - it means ‘to lie’ and ‘lies’, and the Akkadian equivalent of her name, ‘kuzbu’, means ‘voluptuousness’, ‘sexually vigorous’, and is a euphemism for genitals) to convey a message, and the use of grammar and vocabulary in order to pin the blame on her as opposed to the Israelite man Zimri. So in this, I’m looking at the Bible as literature, and making arguments which are quite tricky to make from a Christian standpoint - to look at my religious text and say ‘The author of this text has chosen these words to manipulate the reader’, when in my Christian head, the author of the text is God (as discussed in earlier posts, expressed by humans). So, I think that interview question aimed to very quickly sort out those who are not able to have that distinction. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it would make it very difficult to study Theology, and be taught Theology, I think.

But this distinction is where the liberal theology vs conservative religion comes in. My argument in my Cozbi essay, that the Bible deliberately uses women as plot devices and scapegoats, is liberal, and, honestly, not something I really want to believe! And arguing something academically, especially in the field of Theology, doesn’t necessarily mean you have to believe it. If you’re arguing something in Chemistry, that’s a bit different! Do I think my Cozbi essay is academically compelling? Yes. I am academically persuaded by it. Do I believe it religiously? Do I think that’s what God’s word is really trying to say? No. Do I think my icons essay is academically compelling? Yes. Do I think it justifies the use of icons in the Church of England? Yes. Would I have icons without it? Also yes. Writing that essay, although informative, did not alter my personal religious beliefs.

I think there’s also this weird overlap in the Tumblr-Christian-Theology little niche that you and I like to sit in. You do it much better than me. Your theological arguments persuade me, and I do think I often believe them religiously. However, my theological arguments aren’t meant to do that. Mine are often purely academic. This also links back to a post you made a few months ago that I wanted to talk about but didn’t have the words for. You talked about not liking people distinguishing between ‘theologies’ ie ‘feminist theology’ ‘liberation theology’ etc etc. And I agree and disagree, once more based on this distinction. If ‘theology’ is your personal theology, what you believe about God and religion, then yes, this idea of ‘feminist theology’ is really weird. However, when I say I’m a ‘feminist theologian’ or I’m interested in ‘liberation theology’, I mean I am interested in the niche in the academic subject Theology that belongs to ‘feminist theology’ or ‘liberation theology’.

So, why are Christian theologians often more liberal in their academic theology and more conservative in their personal religion? I think because we’re not compelled to believe it. You can try out ideas, and argue for them, and find evidence to support them, but none of this means you have to believe it. This gives Christians the space to figure out ideas that they may not agree with religiously, or might get push back from their religious community, in an academic sphere.

[Throwback to this great conversation with my (LDS) coursework supervisor:

Her: *finishes reading coursework* Oh no, you can’t submit this. I hate it, I really disagree.

Me: Oh gosh, sorry! Which arguments are the weakest?

Her: Huh? Oh, no, all your arguments are really strong. I can’t pick holes in them.

Me: Oh, that’s good. How can I improve it then? What’s wrong with it?

Her: I really disagree with it.

Me: That’s… that’s fine… You don’t need to agree with it.]

Also, I think it’s a lot easier to be liberal hypothetically! And academics can argue whatever they want. You could put a claim I hated in front of me and I could still defend and support it just as strongly as something I agreed with. Also, there’s less responsibility. If you’re consciously publishing a religious opinion in a religious space, that’s something people might take away and believe, which comes with an element of danger! Obviously you don’t have control over how people use your academic work, they might well go away and incorporate it into their religious beliefs, but that likelihood is lower, so this throwing out of ideas and ‘what if God meant this’ and ‘what if Paul meant this’ is a little safer, and comes with the understanding that it’s not necessarily your belief or a belief you endorse! 

Anyway yes this was actually a very difficult question to answer and, despite it being true of me, I don’t really know! But this is an attempt for now, and I’ll come back to it after I’ve done some more Theology!! Definitely next academic year after I’ve done some uni :))

[meownotgood]

THAT'S 60,000 WORDS LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOOO!!