#(ie how long have they been PHYSICALLY ALIVE to be neglectful)

[sunstartle]

Interesting how Sada is getting the vast majority of the ‘solo’ bad parent memes (ie meme redraws posts only mentioning one prof etc) whereas people are being more sympathetic towards Turo in comparison.

I mean, it’s not like an absent mother is very different than an absent father, right?

[lightning-macrine]

Izzy Hands is not a cut-and-paste villain and deserves to grow and change

No okay so I hate it when people try to make Izzy out to be some sort of master manipulator and possessive monster over Ed because he tried to leave!!!!! He was packing his stuff!!! He was preparing the dinghy!! He APOLOGISED for saying all those things!!!! And even after they survived, after Ed and Stede’s plan worked, he still accepted and owned up to the disrespect he’d shown his captain and tried to leave/resign as he said he would.

That’s what the significance of “I need you” is, instead it’s actually Ed (possibly unknowingly) manipulating Izzy into staying with him because he knows he can’t go on without Izzy. He tells Izzy his ‘plan’, he “promises” (he doesn’t use the word promise but he highly highly hints at it and that’s how Izzy takes it:“he promised me”) Izzy a ship of his own if he stays. Izzy would have been perfectly fine leaving before this (he was practically docile!), before he was lured back in by Ed’s promises, Ed’s manipulation.

What Ed wants to keep Izzy around for (killing Stede himself because he can’t do it or keeping the ship running) isn’t fully clear but what is is that Ed knows what to say and what to do to make Izzy stay. Which is what makes me so frustrated when people demonise Izzy as some jealous hag (of course if we’re following DJ’s idea of him as a jilted spouse that’s certainly an aspect) because there’s multiple layers to just how spurned Izzy can and should feel here.

We know that Ed’s slowly become more and more distant, not telling Izzy and the crew what his plans are, and whichever plans he does decide on are dangerous and risky (ie. attack a Spanish naval ship!). We also know that Izzy has been the one handling it all the past few years. So of course he’s jealous that Stede and the Revenge crew are suddenly getting all this attention and affection when he’s been fighting tooth and nail for scraps of it for years. Of course he feels neglected when Ed continues to not tell him any plans (oh but he’ll tell Stede!) and the one plan he was told of progressively gets less and less likely to happen. It’s betrayal. A betrayal of his (and Fang and Ivan’s) trust, a betrayal of the years of work and energy he’s put into his role both physically and emotionally, and a betrayal of the lives of the crew members who died on his orders.

Of course, I’m not saying all his actions and reactions are justified, his ratting out of Stede to the British navy is definitely done out of spite and with malicious intent as well as with his genuine belief that he is protecting Ed (ie. sending Jack out to separate him & Stede, bargaining to keep Ed free), but I am saying that there’s no underlying dark evil master manipulator plan in all this. For as much as Izzy acts like a hard-ass, he’s very much controlled by his emotions and his pride. He wants to keep Blackbeard alive and get things back to how they were when they first started, so he works to do so. I truly don’t believe that he has a desire to keep Blackbeard under his control (look at how happy he is post-toe scene, his captain just mutilated him and he’s smiling, he doesn’t care what Ed does to him so long as his old captain comes back) but genuinely wants things to go back the way they were.

It isn’t healthy of course, for either of them, and part of his arc should be learning to accept the kindness and softness that Stede taught to Ed, which I do think is possible in season 2, purely because I do believe he’s not this unredeemable monster villain, but rather a very flawed and very human character who for all his faults has some valid reasons for the things he does.

[player-1]

MAJOR rant below, so be prepared (and spoilers for Operation Survival vol. 24-26)

To the peeps somehow invested in the manhwa side of Cookie Run, there is no way I can express in words how there is so much potential packed in a bunch of goofy gingerbread men by adding in legit moral dilemmas into its story. Of course its outside its original source material and the comics are canon in their own universe, but I have thrived with the potential of Aloe (and Vera) in vol. 24-26. While the idea of Aloe being chosen to be a faceless dictator to the entirety of Blue Star at the ripe old age of 10(ish) is extremely questionable enough, it still fits her character perfectly when a.) She's smart enough to know how corrupted the system is and works to change it a little bit at a time, and b.) She can barely handle a spoonful of responsibility when faced with the consequences of her actions. It may seem like a stretch, since in OB it takes a robot uprising and Cyborg screaming in her face about how much pain they've been in does she realize "Oh, this is my fault…I need to fix this"; and she does the fixing by lots of hugs and kisses for the robot fam, working herself to the bone to get a laureate, and actually listening to what Cyborg wants and needs in their upgrades.

In OS though…Oh boy, it's a ride. To make this easier for everyone, here's a step-by-step process of all the fuck-ups she's done: -Made a clone (Vera) to escape her responsibilities of being chancellor. -Not visiting said-clone regularly after months/years of studying to be a robotics engineer. -Keeping her identity as said-chancellor a secret in order to avoid any negative clout (for many reasons). -Kickstarts a industrial revolution with cybernetic prosthetics and full-body implants (foreshadowing). -Saves a complete stranger from a traumatic accident (pre-Cyborg) by putting them on life support in the palace, even if they were barely conscious or alive. -Keeps said-stranger in agony as she tries to find family/friends/associates/etc, making Vera bare the brunt of their "treatment" since he studied to be a doctor on the side (or spite). -Finally agrees to turn them into Cyborg to save their life, at the cost of losing their memories and/or becoming violent if ever put back in a public setting, agrees to hide them in a undisclosed location in stasis until the technology for memory implants is perfected. -Works together with Vera in creating a world-sized cryogenic freezer to combat rising pollution levels. -Vera finally snaps after years of emotional/physical neglect and banishes Aloe from the palace, blackmailing her with her identity as chancellor in order to expedite the creation of the freezer. -Vera takes the reins in mass-capture of every Cookie in Blue Star to the Freezer, replacing with cybernetic copies and ostracizing those with partial implants into the underdeveloped slums. -Aloe goes on the run with Ion Cookie Robot (hotwiring its fucking core in order for it to feel emotions) and evade capture from the space-police. -Tried to convince the lovable egg-bot that Vera, the "real" chancellor, is an emotionless unfeeling robot, and the only way to save Blue Star was to locate Cyborg and tag-team kill him. -Traumatizes Ion after shocking her into unconsciousness in order to gather intel on Cyborg's location implanted in her heart (don't ask), promptly stopping said-heart as she gets shipped off to the Freezer. -Wakes up in the Freezer for who knows how long to Ion and Cyborg being tortured and Vera threatening to shoot the OS Brave Gang after they destroyed the Freezer's main controls. -Discovers that Vera only saved her life after concocting a DNA-harvesting scheme to make Blue Star a world run by both clones and robots, all so he didn't feel alone after his entire life was marked by isolation and indifference from his original self (ie. Aloe).

And only after all of that does she finally realize "Oh…This is my fault. I need to fix this"; with hugs and pats for Ion, breaking the news to Cy that they would've died a loner if she didn't save their life, and beating the absolute crud out of Vera and locking him in the freezer indefinitely. All in all, fun times all around :)

Now the reason why all this happened was because of Aloe's strive to become a scientist, actually figuring out how to solve the root of the problem as an equal and not a spectator. It was simple at first, making prosthetic so Cookies can move properly again or replace a missing appendage, then it moved up to full-body transplants for critically-wounded individuals. While there isn't a lot of information on what Vera's role was in all this, but it's safe to assume that he managed Blue Star in a more legislative fashion, focusing more on dictating laws and regulations without thinking much about public opinion. And why is this important? Consider this: If Aloe never abandoned her position as chancellor, she would've been just as cold and heartless as Vera, maybe even more. And even when she fixed her moral compass, she built her entire career on lies and emotional manipulation.

She and Vera were the goddamn chancellor(s), no matter how horrible it is to give a kid that amount of power, they always had everything handed to them no matter what, and with their only source of company being robots and machines, they would've lived with the assumption of Cookies and robots were one and the same; cold, unfeeling, and following every command without a fault. Aloe figured out the truth later in her life, and if she was a lot smarter as a kid, she would've gotten a heavy dose of reality when she finally figures out how the modern world works; changing her personality and moral compass in order to help those in need. On that note, if Aloe didn't take the chance to explore her own passions, they both would've been too sheltered to realize how corrupted Blue Star was with its overall system nor would it have gone through the industrial revolution that caused it to become a polluted and robot-infested dystopia in the first place.

As for the robotic implants/transplants, Aloe eventually discovered the long-term consequences of the augments; stripping away a Cookie's emotions, feelings, pain, or even memories the more drastic the upgrades had become. Those with full-body augments or cybernetic copies of themselves become confused about which Cookies are real or made of metal, which in their point-of-view saw the OS Brave Gang as "deviants" from the status quo or something malfunctioning from their programming. Even the security Ions in the main city asked about serial number, coding, program, etc. without a second thought because of how technologically advanced Blue Star had become…Normal Cookies were becoming the cold, unfeeling, obedient machines Vera believed them to be, and the ones Aloe regretted and dreaded.

But now it makes more sense about her act of sympathy for Cyborg; out of every tragedy plaguing their life, living without a home to go to or a family to remember them by, she wanted to give them a second chance at life; even if they couldn't remember the very Cookie that saved their life and left them all alone until she can completely restore their memories. Everything Aloe did was for safety, improvements, and happiness for everyone and anyone she met. But just from the long list of grievances before, it's not like she has a sound mind in all of it; everything she did still caused Cookies harm either directly or indirectly, still lied to everyone she met about her true identity, still abandoned Vera to fend for himself and she took so many drastic and life-threatening turns no sane person would do without a second thought in order to prove herself right. And even after breaking the news to Vera that he was a clone to whole time, she doesn't fully recognize how much pain and misery she put him through being her shadow and not giving him a chance to live life to the fullest. She never truly apologized, not in front of everyone really, all that she did was paint herself as the victim despite causing all those problems in the first place. Even if she learned how to empathize and love others, Aloe still used and manipulated those who cared about her for her own gains.

And if you thought that was horrible, it's not like Vera's the odd one out. He was never given the chance to experience what it was like to have a normal life, keeping himself trapped in the rules of the autocracy and was more than willing to make Aloe's life hell in order for her to realize how truly powerless she is to change anything. Both of them grew up with the idea that everything should be given to them; while Vera believed it was absolute just for him existing as chancellor, Aloe simply internalized the need to stay on top with a couple extra steps: Become a prodigy in robotic engineering, gain recognition and praise from everyone in Blue Star, and concoct a scheme of her two prized inventions (Ion and Cyborg) to get back her rightful place on the throne without lifting a single finger. (And says the one who told Ion that Vera was a cold unfeeling robot in order to justify indirect fratricide…Hypocrisy much?)

Despite all those flaws, by adding the real and horrifying consequences of her past behavior, Aloe has become the loving and caring scientist she was in Operation Survival as well as fleshing out all the fascism vibes in Ovenbreak and putting her rap sheet of mistakes on the down-low. Even if she couldn't iron out all of her bad habits, there would've been another heartless dictator under Cookie Run's belt if she didn't learn about real life; or on the other side of the coin, Operation Survival would've been so close to confirming Aloe's villain arc if she was more than 5% unhinged. In this essay I will-

[hereticalheraldry]

Disney Princesses’ trauma types

IE, definitely the darkest take on Disney I have ever done!

(see this post on trauma types)

Lots of Disney characters have had Adverse Childhood Experiences (death of mothers, to start with!) and exhibit signs of traumatic stress. Below are my guesses as to their chosen coping mechanism.

What 4F trauma type is each Disney character below (Fight, Flight, Freeze, Fawn)

Snow White (dead mother, dead father, abusive and neglectful stepmother, stepmother literally tried to have her killed): It’s been a long time since I’ve seen this, but I’d say it’s Fawn-Flight. She is unerringly sweet. Her immediate reaction when in any form of danger (with a strange man, the huntsman, or the dwarves) is to try to appease, appeal, and make friends. She also has a ton of energy (flight), which she channels into obsessive cleaning, though she doesn’t seem to edge far enough into that to call it OCD. She also literally ran away in a segment that makes obvious how her fear drives her to flight.

Cinderella (dead father, abusive and neglectful stepfamily treats her as a slave): another Fawn-Flight. Unfailingly kind and sweet. So desperate for friends that she befriends the MICE. Also an incredibly hard worker (though tbf, her stepfamily forces that on her). When traumatized by stepsisters yanking to pieces her clothing (both a destruction of her hard work and a physical assault) she literally runs away into the garden to cry. She also runs away from the ball at midnight rather than turning back right there and explaining to the prince that she only got to go to the ball through magic because her family is abusive and probably stole her inheritance. Cinderella gets the wish that many with CPTSD have: that somebody would swoop in and rescue them! She gets rescued twice: by her fairy godmother AND by the prince.

Peter Pan (abandoned in Kensington Gardens and brought up by fairies, who are not the most emotionally stable beings out there): Flight. Classic ADHD: response: runs all over the island fighting, flying, and crowing. (Also literally flies.)

Ariel (dead mother, controlling and abusive father): Freeze-Flight. Instead of trying to please her excessively harsh father, like her hard-working singing sisters, Ariel ditches not only practices but CONCERTS in order to get away from her father and lose herself in her collecting hobby. She has a secret place where she hides in order to fantasize about having a different life in an entirely different place, away from her family. Her friends attempt to persuade her that life on land is impracticable for her. But when her father destroys her hidey-hole, she is retraumatized and resorts to flight to someone she thinks can fix her problems for her by making her human and sending her to the surface: she therefore literally runs away, and tries to get both Ursula and Eric to save her and get her away from her father.

Prince Eric: Surprisingly non-traumatized! I mean, as far as I remember.

Belle: non-traumatized? (at least to start with. I mean, we can always suggest Stockholm Syndrome later...) DOES seem to think she’s entirely different from everyone else around her (a common CPTSD symptom). Maybe traumatized by mother’s death? Bullying from the neighbors? Becoming a parentified child to take care of her absent-minded (though affectionate) father? Unaccustomed poverty? In any case, except for the trauma of her father’s near death and her own imprisonment, she is unusually competent and calm. If she edges toward anything, it’s probably Freeze-Flight: she has a pronounced capacity to become absorbed in fiction and ignore everything around her. When irritated by Gaston’s insulting and bullying proposal, she physically retreats entirely from the village in order to sing about how she wants to leave her poor provincial town for the great wide somewhere. She is fixated on escape, either mentally or physically.

Beast (dead parents, raised by servants who deferred to him rather than parenting him): Fight-Freeze. Hides in his castle; when encounters people is an ASSHOLE. Interestingly, Fight-Freeze types are notoriously hard to treat. Belle might have a future in psychotherapy if she can build better boundaries.

Aladdin (dead parents, has to eat to live, has to steal to eat, ostracized by his community, frequently threatened with death or maiming for theft): feels entirely different from the rest of the world. Flight. frequently in a state of frenetic energy, though a lot of that is because he’s stealing food and escaping the cops. His idea of a great date is to get Jasmine away from the palace: to escape and help her to do the same. intense feelings of shame and inferiority (despite his insistence that there’s so much more to him). He tries to hide from Jasmine the truth of his low-rank identity, though he does eventually recognize the need to tell her the truth.

Jasmine: surprisingly untraumatized (mostly just a healthy assertive), considering what she’s been through (dead mother, parentified child of a nice but absent-minded father who, judging from his looks, is closely related to Maurice; isolated from peers and almost everyone but her pet. I mean, there MUST be servants in the palace, but all you ever see are the guards...) She recognizes when people are treating her unfairly and says so, which makes her unusual among Disney heroes and heroines!

Simba (father died, was told it was his fault, was forced to leave home, almost died in the wilderness, subsequently raised by a couple of irresponsible weirdos): Flight. Literally runs away from his problems instead of facing them. Keeps himself busy with Timon and Pumbaa in order to occupy his mind.

Pocahontas: Non-traumatized! (Dead mother, but strong emotional connection with father and strong emotional support system in her community. Not to mention a maternal figure in the shape of a talking tree in whom she can confide.) DOES feel different from everyone else in her community, though. (Are you sensing a theme?)

John Smith (father died when Smith was 16, he left home, went to sea, served as a mercenary, engaged in piracy, fought the Ottomans): Flight. Constantly on the move: seeing new places, meeting new people, and killing them. Overachiever. Can’t sit still in England. However, he does have some healthy assertive skills and is able to stand up to people in power.

Quasimodo (holy emotional abuse, Batman!): Freeze. Taught that the outside world is cruel and wicked and that he can only be safe inside the cathedral. Daydreams to the point where he almost believes the gargoyles come alive and talk to him. Manages to overcome his Freeze instincts to save Esmerelda.

Esmerelda: Not traumatized, despite apparent lack of living parents and her position as an oppressed social minority. Probably the result of loving parenting while they were alive and strong community support from the rest of the Roma of Paris. Another heroine with healthy assertive traits!

Phoebus: Not apparently currently suffering from traumatic stress (though may have had periods of it in the past: he’s a crusader, after all). Surprisingly well-adjusted.

Hercules (kidnapped at a very young age and taken away from a one life to be placed in another, ENTIRELY different life. Despite strong emotional support from adoptive parents, has been rejected and bullied by his community. Feels he is entirely different from everybody else [I mean, he kind of is]): Flight. Yes, that’s right, flight, not fight. Hercules may be a “fighter” but he is a SUPER non-aggressive guy. Gentleness embodied. Feels he has to achieve something huge in order to be worthy of love and affection from the world (and especially from his divine father, who has literally told him that he has to earn his way back to Olypus by becoming a True Hero). Tendency toward despair when the people whose love and affection he thought he had (Phil and Megara) abandon and betray him. Eventually earns everybody’s love and affection--which is not the greatest lesson ever. Shouldn’t Disney be teaching us that we deserve love even if we never become heroes?

Megara (super traumatic history): Fawn-Fight. Puts the good of the people she loves WAY before her own, to an unhealthy level (sacrifices her own soul in order to save a man, who then abandons her). Seems sarcastic and rough, but heart of gold underneath. Acts like she’s superior, but actually feels enormous guilt and shame, with low self-esteem. Won’t say she’s in love.

Mulan (inconsistent expectations from her family and community. Sometimes her family supports who she is, defends her, and puts up with her unusual behavior; at other times they join with her community in criticizing her [lightly if frequently]. They apparently did not teach her society’s gender roles but then expects her to abide by them in public): she feels entirely different from everybody else and that she has to prove herself. Doesn’t know who she is inside. CANNOT behave the way she has been taught she should; is clearly triggered by a criticism from her father. Flight. Seems almost hyperactive, can’t keep silent when her society tells her she should. Driven to act and to succeed in order to prove her worth and bring honor to her family. Again, EARNS everybody’s love and respect in the end.

Shang: Possible inferiority issues from his relationship with her father. Not enough data.

Mushu (constant criticism; scapegoated by the ancestors): Flight. Has channeled this coping mechanism into ADHD (and humor). Feels the need to prove he is worthy of his spot (I mean, the ancestors TOLD him he did...)

Tarzan (storm and fire killed everyone around him in his infancy; parents had to resettle entirely alone in an alien land; parents were brutally killed right in front of him; he was nearly killed and eaten twice by a leopard; adopted by nonhuman animals; rejected by father figure and much of his nonhuman community): Realistically, I WOULD say that Tarzan should not be able to learn to SPEAK, since he doesn’t appear to have acquired language until his mid to late twenties. However, the film makes clear that the gorillas have a complex spoken language that can convey complicated thoughts like, “Jane will stay with Tarzan”. Feels entirely different from the rest of his community (he is). Scapegoated and constantly criticized for being different. I genuinely don’t know what his style is. lol

The elephant in tarzan: It’s been too long since I’ve seen this film, somebody do this one lol

Cuzco (dead parents, running an empire in his early twenties, nobody has apparently ever taught him limits, appears to have a very emotionally isolated life): Fawn-Fight. Extremely narcissistic, though his character development reveals that he does have a conscience underneath there somewhere. Charming but highly self-centered. Good with words and fast-talking, so may be Flight or gifted. Behavior improves quickly and immensely when provided with the emotional support (and healthy boundaries) of an ersatz family.

Lilo (loss of both parents; being parented by a highly stressed and very young adult who is struggling with poverty and her own trauma): Flight. Gifted, imaginative, ADHD, constantly into everything, constantly in trouble. Sometimes slides into Fight with defiant behavior.

Nani (loss of parents, pressure of having to parent her little sister and provide income for both of them at a very young age): Fight. Her temper gets the better of her when she’s upset, but she’s really trying.

Marlin (loss of his wife and all his children but one): Freeze. Constantly hiding from the perceived dangers of the world and trying to teach his son to do the same. Very nurturing of his child, despite his difficulty overcoming his own trauma. Considering he is a Freeze type, going on a big journey to save his son demonstrates ENORMOUS bravery.

Dori (???): Flight-Freeze. ADHD, constantly on the move, can’t sit still, just keeps swimming, just keeps swimming, swimming, swimming. I include Freeze because her difficulties with her memories may be a dissociative effect of trauma, and dissociation falls under Freeze.

Tiana (loss of beloved father, poverty, traumatizing lifelong experience of systemic racism, somewhat ameliorated by loving and supportive mother): Flight. The classic driven, achievement-obsessed workaholic. Always seems to only be halfway there. Fate helps her overcome these tendencies by forcing her to fail in her quest to become human again (and therefore to open her restaurant), though she actually does succeed soon after anyway. Actually, DID she overcome these tendencies? Like, she toned it down enough to maintain an apparently lasting romantic relationship, but she might still be a workaholic...

Naveen (highly critical parents): Flight. Constantly traveling care-for-nothing that can’t seem to stick to anything. Deep down has low self-esteem about his lack of achievement and how he can’t seem to please his parents. Demonstrates some symptoms of ADD or ADHD. Tiana and Naveen demonstrate how “Flight” behaviors can results in two very different character types!

Rapunzel (holy shit: kidnapped in infancy and raised by a woman who is demonstrably emotionally abusive and negligent and literally is only keeping her alive for her hair. Imprisoned in a tower almost entirely without company her ENTIRE LIFE. Demonstrates painful mood swings between delight and horrific guilt when she finally escapes for the first time. I seriously wonder how long her mental recovery took after Mother Gothel’s death...): Flight-Fawn. Overachiever, constantly doing EVERYTHING, EXTREMELY QUICKLY (cleans the entire place top-to-bottom between 7:00 and 7:15 AM). Literally runs away. Makes friends immediately with almost everybody she meets, including a gang of hardened, violent criminals. Wants desperately to be loved, but believes very quickly that Eugene doesn’t like her after all and has abandoned her. Note that it is not Rapunzel that kills Mother Gothel but Pascal. Rapunzel is so emotionally traumatized that she probably could never bring herself to “betray” Gothel in any real way.

Eugene Fitzherbert (orphaned; raised in an institutional setting, which is notoriously traumatizing. Poverty, social rejection): Flight. Channels his immense energy into complicated and daring heists. Adrenaline junkie. He thinks he wants to rest on a deserted island with an enormous pile of money, but I can guarantee that he would get antsy after a week (at most) and go back to his life of crime in order to distract himself from his pain.

Merida (was in a life-endangering encounter with a bear as a young child; her father was maimed. Has emotional support from her father, but her mother--primary caregiver, especially of a daughter--is highly critical): Flight. Tons of energy, adrenaline junkie, climbs a frickin WATERFALL, overachiever in her chosen hobbies. Greatly dislikes quiet pursuits like embroidery, possibly because they leave too much time for contemplation, and she needs more distraction.

Elsa (almost killed her beloved younger sister by accident, treated by her parents as dangerous and frightening, almost entirely isolated for most of her life): Freeze (HAHA) and Flight. Has been taught to retreat alone from a world that will reject her. Experiences enormous shame and guilt for herself, her gifts, and how dangerous she can be. Classic perfectionist. Attempts to protect herself and others by shutting down all emotions. When she fails, she literally runs away to live entirely alone forever to escape the storm of the rest of the world, because the cold of isolation “never bothered her anyway” (an obvious lie she has taught herself). “Let It Go” sounds like an anthem of freedom, but Elsa is actually literally running from her problems and from any human connection.

Anna (almost died as a small child, which she doesn’t directly remember, but may still cause her traumatic reactions. her beloved older sister SUDDENLY refused even to SEE her, and her parents wouldn’t talk about it, so she probably felt in some obscure way that there was something wrong with HER,  that it was all her fault. Then isolated almost entirely in the palace, and certainly isolated from other children, followed by the death of her parents and the CONTINUED isolation from her sister and anybody other than servants): flight-fawn. she seems possibly a little ADD, a little hyperactive (rides her bike around the halls), impulsive. VERY friendly and sweet to almost everybody she meets, desperate to make friends. Dreams of being rescued through marriage to a prince that she loves at first sight. Desperate to be loved.

Moana: probably NOT traumatized, for the most part. She DOES feel entirely different from everybody else (”what is wrong with me?”) because her instinctive love of the ocean has been criticized and squelched by her father and her society. However, despite her father’s clear struggle with his own trauma from the survivor’s guilt of his best friend’s drowning, this is one of the healthier families/societies we see in Disney! The silence around the death of Chief Tui’s best friend is meant to be kind, but I think Tui probably needs to talk it out more, and while I understand why they didn’t tell Moana about it as a young child, I feel like she SHOULD have been told before her father’s reactions to her hurt her own self-image: he’s actually just projecting his own guilt onto the daughter who is so much like him. She is less traumatized than she might otherwise be because she has both her mother, and especially her grandmother, to confide in. If Moana has a trauma style, I would say it’s Flight: she’s an overachiever who is constantly rushing from one task, one way to help, to another. In a deleted song, she also talks about walking around the island so much that she knows exactly how many steps it is to the ocean. She always wants to get away. All of this is classic Flight. Chief Tui is Fight. he’s not aggressive, but he IS controlling.

Maui (Most of the trauma in this film comes from Maui. he was abandoned as a baby, and probably almost died. grew up with the knowledge that he was not wanted by his parents. grew up away from human society): Flight-Fawn. Has spent the rest of his life trying to earn acceptance, love, and gratitude from humans. Constantly does crazy and death-defying tasks to try to win them over., but It never brings him true fulfillment. He clearly DESPERATELY wants to be recognized, celebrated, and loved for his achievements and his gifts, which makes him into a brash show-off.

[scripttorture]

This is a two part question. The first part will cover details concerning the character and situation, which I was wondering if either or both could highlight torture as okay. The second part will take the character and situation and give a scenario so I could check for accuracy. So the character I’m asking for tortures people, they do it regularly, and for fun, as if they get more stressed out they’ll pick up a few more victims to torture. (I’m wondering if there’s a max amount of people (1/17) someone could handle torturing in a certain amount of time?) When talking about it with others, they’ll claim it makes them feel better (more stable really) and that they need to do it. They’ve been hurting and killing people since they were a kid (about eight or ten, due to jealously and neglect), their parents don’t really care what they do and they’re allowed to make whatever decisions they want, so torture is pretty engrained in their lifestyle. This character is highly apathetic (2/17) and doesn’t care for people. They mainly torture people because they like the power it gives them over people especially because they hate feeling weak in any sense, and they also like causing people pain and watching them bleed. They do understand and state at some points that what they do is unforgivable, but they show no remorse or regret over torturing and killing people, it’s almost like a high to them. I’m not overly sure what type of effects torturing people would have (3/17) on said character, except that it’ll make them feel more apathetic and desensitized and maybe even unstable and feeling like they need to do it more often. They also like consuming the victim, though sometimes the victim doesn’t last longer than a few months because they really bloody and cruel procedures. I’m not sure how long a victim would last, they have a doctor on scene and have medical knowledge so they can keep someone from dying right away, and I’m also not overly sure on how (4/17) popular overly cruel techniques are. They aren’t affiliated with a government or anything, but they have a very wealthy backing making it really easy for them to do as they wish. They also don’t do sexual things to their victims, they prefer to keep that sort of thing separate and are more about seeing how nicely people can get taken apart. (I was wondering then if slowly killing people counts as torture actually as sometimes it can take several months. Nearly all of their victims die, (5/17) the longest never lasting more than a year. I was also wondering what type of torture methods they would really enjoy.) When they want to mix something up, they’ll use something like stress positions, but it’s not as fun because it’s less hands on, though they may leave someone like that while they go off to do something else. Most everyone turns a blind eye if they’re aware of what this character is doing, because if they don’t they could easily end up being the character’s next victim. (6/17) Sometimes the character will make people watch or even participate, (what type of effects could that have on someone, especially if it’s someone that’s really not prone to doing it in the first place?) I am worried about people turning a blind eye as coming off as writing off torture as okay, even though the main character states that it is not okay, and that they are a horrible person for doing it, especially since it’s at the expense of other people’s lives to do such a thing. (7/17)

OK so my game plan with this one, since it is so long is to post it as two separate questions that I’m going to try to post one after the other. This is the longest ask I’ve ever gotten and I really want to thank the asker for being so patient because it’s taken me a very long time.

It is also very very long so I’m putting it under a cut. :)

I don’t think this part comes across as condoning torture. But I don’t think it’s quite there in terms of realism. I’m going to go through it and highlight the differences between your scenario and reality, with a couple of suggestions for how to incorporate or work around some of them. I’m also going to try and answer the other questions peppered through this about the effects of torture on torturers and witnesses, types of torture that might work and time frames/physical limitations.

There’s a lot to cover so this is going to get long.

So the first thing that’s coming to mind is that this sort of set isn’t how legally defined torture happens in reality. And I think it’d be useful for me to outline the differences now because all the research I have on torturers is from legally defined torturers who operate in these ways. The same things might not apply to your character.

For starters organisations that torture actively screen out people who seem to want to torture. Anyone with marked sadistic tendencies usually isn’t let in. Neither is anyone with a noticeable mental illness. These organisations see people like that as a risk. They see them as disruptive and disobedient. So they screen them out and then pressure the people they’ve let in to torture.

The second major difference I’m seeing is time frames. Legally defined torturers are usually spending a substantial period of every day torturing. They don’t have a break from violence. It is almost constant in their daily lives for…..years. Abusers and a lot of violent criminals on the other hand are not usually committing violent acts for such a prolonged period, every day for years on end.

And that probably makes a difference to the effects on mental health for both groups.

There’s also the general set up- So the way he’s picking up victims at random and the scale of it with multiple victims at a time is very in keeping with the sorts of scenarios common in legally defined torture. But I’m not sure how sustainable that is with one torturer. The kind of organisation that I’d expect to operate in this general way would have hundreds, possibly thousands of members. You’re talking an entire army camp, the police force for a whole city, a massive hospital. The kind of place that would have dedicated on site cleaners and cooks, a host of ordinary members and probably at least half a dozen torturers if not more.

Generally legally defined torturers concentrate intensely on one victim for a period of about 2-3 days after they’re brought in and to a lesser extent for the next 1-2 weeks. After that they tend to loose interest and leave the victim alone for longer periods. That doesn’t seem to be what you’re going for. The impression I get is that this character is keeping up that first day intensity for multiple victims at a time over a prolonged period- until the victim dies. And well that’s just not physically possible for one person. It’s too physically exhausting and time consuming to keep up that long.

The differences for that last point are the easiest to change in the narrative.

I think there a couple of ways you could go with it- The one that seems most true to the scenario you’ve outlined is to shorten the lifespan of the victims and have this happening in spurts. Which I think is more in keeping with the behaviour of studied serial killers. (I am not an expert on serial killers and most of the reading I did on them was when I was around 12. Even if those sources were good sources they’d be outdated at this point).

Essentially rather than have the character constantly have victims that they’re devoting a lot of time to- have these kidnappings happen in short bursts. So the character kidnaps say, a maximum of 5 people at a time (I think 3 is a more realistic number) and spends anywhere from a week to three weeks torturing them to death one after another. The character then goes into a ‘rest’ period where he doesn’t go after anyone for a month or more.  

The victim characters might be captive for a month, possibly longer if he takes breaks between victims or goes into a rest period before murdering all his captives. But they won’t be continuously tortured for that period of time.

This scenario would depend on other people doing the hard work of actually keeping these victims alive; ie feeding them, cleaning the areas they’re kept in. This means a support staff of somewhere between 3-10 people. I’d suggest going for a higher number.

Characterising techniques that are more likely to be lethal as ‘worse’ or ‘crueler’ really isn’t a good idea. Torture is torture and everyone experiences pain differently. Trying to rank things as better or worse does victims a disservice and it’s often used to dismiss the experiences of survivors who don’t have obvious physical scars. That’s the majority of torture survivors.

I class torturous execution methods as torture. Whether the law does depends on the broader context and motivation of the murder. Legally speaking torture is something done by an organisation. In most places that means government bodies or armed groups holding territory but in some countries the definition includes certain large organised criminal groups. The motive is also defined as; for information, to force a confession, to intimidate the victim, to intimidate other groups or as punishment for something the victim/other groups have done.

This character isn’t acting on behalf of his government or a larger organisation. He also doesn’t seem to fit most of the defined motivations, though an argument might be made for intimidation. Legally speaking in our world he isn’t a torturer. If you want your world to have a different legal definition I don’t think there’s a problem with that but you should think carefully about how you end up defining it and who gets cut out.

Scarring tortures aren’t necessarily more painful or more likely to be lethal. I’m interpreting this ask as- talking about things like vivisection or breaking on the wheel. Things that are lethal but may take a long time to actually kill.

Given that context and the stipulation for ‘hands on’ violence I can suggest a couple of things. Given the length of the ask I think I’m going to have be brief here though:

Breaking on the wheel: systematically breaking the bones in major limbs working inwards from the extremities

Disembowelling: cutting through the skin and muscle to expose the gut and leaving it exposed

Flaying: removal of large portions of skin

Immolation: burning the majority of the body

Vivisection: dissection while the victim is alive and conscious

Repeated cutting using hundred of shallow injuries

There are a great many other forms of torturous executions. I’ve stuck to things that can leave the victim alive for days afterwards even though they can’t be saved (without magic or sci fi tech). I’ve also stuck with things that…. keep the torturer physically close to the victim and can take an extended period of time.

This would have a profound and traumatising effect on witnesses. The research we have suggests that witnessing these kinds of acts can radicalise people. Someone who was willing to ‘compromise’ and work with the character before could very quickly become strongly opposed to them. It encourages dissent and outright attacks.

If the ‘staff’ here are allowed to leave then there’d be a very high staff turnover. People would leave in droves. And a lot of those people might go on to form a base of dissent in society generally.

If they can’t- then the staff are all going to start showing symptoms of trauma. Spacing these attacks out the way I’ve suggested- it would probably take longer then it would for real world torturers. But I’d say that within three months all of them would have a noticeable mental health problem.

The list of common symptoms is over here.

You’ve got multiple characters so I’d suggest picking a range of different symptoms. These symptoms would impact on their ‘work’ as well as their health. I think self harm and suicide among the staff would be common. If they’re forced to remain then I think active confrontational resistance would be too, especially if a significant portion of them are suicidal or self harming.

Regardless of whether the staff are free to leave or not I think most characters staying in this situation, with direct contact with victims, for a significant period of time (a month) is likely to have some sort of mental health problem. Characters at a greater remove, ie those that don’t see victims, may have a little longer but I think even then they’re likely to be traumatised quite quickly.

As for the character himself-

Honestly this is not how I’d characterise a torturer. It sounds much closer to a person ordering torture without witnessing it. It sounds like torturing divorced from the trauma it induces.

It isn't the insistence that this is 'helping' him. Or the way he's doubling down on the subject of violence. It's the apathy.

None of the symptoms classically associated with torture cause apathy. The idea here seems to be that he’s doing bad things because he doesn’t or can’t care about people. Which seems to be leaning in to the idea that torturers hurt people because they’re mentally ill rather than torture causing their mental illnesses.

We’re pretty sure that the reality is that way round for a couple of reasons. Firstly, most organisations that torture actively screen out mentally ill people. Secondly we know that witnessing violence can be traumatising and repeatedly witnessing it increases the chances of developing a mental illness. That’s from studies of people with PTSD and studies of survivors from wars, genocide and famine. Thirdly the anecdotal accounts of both torturers and their relatives/friends back up the idea that most of them were healthy before they started torturing and became severely mentally ill afterwards.

I’m not sure how much the differences between legally defined torturers and your character would affect this but- If this story was happening over years then even on the somewhat slower time frame I’ve suggested I think this character would be ill. I think the chances are he’d be traumatised and would be prone to exactly the same symptoms as his victims.

Showing that means changes but I think you’ve got space to decide how big those changes are.

You could keep the character exactly as he is but rather than have him torture people directly have him coerce others into doing the actual torturing. I think that could fit with your scenario generally pretty well. It could help explain why their hasn’t been some sort of uprising against him: he’s shifting the blame on to others and silencing people by making them culpable too. It also fits with the social position you’ve given him and the implied need for control over others.

I think it fits with the idea of him ‘taking people apart’ as well. For instance say he picks out someone he wants to pressure into torturing a victim and the target is a family man. So the character uses the target’s family as part of that coercion process ‘Do exactly what I tell you and I’ll never go near your family. But if you don’t your children will go missing.’ If the character has done something like this before he’ll know there’s a high chance his target will be traumatised and develop a severe mental illness. Coupled with guilt and a lack of explanation the sudden change could easily destroy someone’s family life.

Another possibility is modifying the character.

There are a couple of ways you could take that. One is using an outside perspective of this character, having the character say that they get a ‘high’ from this abuse, that they ‘need’ it and that they’re ‘apathetic’. At the same time show that the character is…. not apathetic and not getting high from a traumatising and physically exhausting campaign of sustained abuse.

Pick some symptoms out and show those symptoms. While you have the character saying something completely different and possibly having other characters believe those statements.

It would be perfectly in keeping with the behaviour of torturers for your character to….put forward an explanation for their actions that’s at odds with what they actually do.

You could also try to select a symptom set that makes the character appear apathetic or unemotional to other people. In some people depression and suicidal ideation can appear this way to others, but I think it’s important to stress that this isn’t actually apathy and it doesn’t make people violent. It also wouldn’t get better with exposure to violence.

I think if you choose to use that approach then you’d need to be pretty careful about how you handled showing these mental health problems. I’d strongly recommend having good characters with similar mental health issues and symptoms to balance things out.  

I think it’s especially important that you disconnect the character’s abuse from any abuse or neglect they suffered as a child. That’s a really poisonous trope, telling survivors of child abuse that’s it’s going to turn them into abusers. Honestly I think the best thing to do there is to get rid of it. Have their parents distant if you like. Have the relationship be bad. But don’t fall into that trope. It’s really bad for survivors.

OK- what have missed?

I don’t see anything unrealistic about the character consuming bits of their victims. Though uh you may want to look up prion diseases because I think they’re more common among people who routinely engage in cannibalism. (Fun Fact: Russian makes a linguistic distinction between cannibalism of bodies that were already dead and murdering someone to eat them.)

I also don’t think there’s a problem with your character having no remorse for their crimes. This is anecdotal but- when torturers do express remorse it seems to be entirely in the context of negative effects their actions have had on them and their life, rather than any appreciation of what the victims went through. They lack insight into their crimes.

So having the character carry on with no regret, regard the victims as worthless or only really good for the torturer’s gratification- that’s possible and I don’t think there are any problems with making that choice here.

Wrapping this part of the question up- So far as I can tell your main concern is unfounded. I don’t think this is showing torture as ‘OK’ in any sense.

It’s also not that unusual for people generally not to combat a high ranking individual who tortures. The witnesses, victims and the relatives of victims are all likely to oppose this individual. But people who are not directly affect by torture in this society may well view it as too much of a risk. People at higher levels of society may consider themselves ‘safe’ from the abuse, think that it doesn’t matter if ‘commoners’ are hurt and materially profit from the torturer remaining in the high social position he occupies.

But there are areas where this significantly departs from the reality of torture. And some of those departures come with some unfortunate implications.

I strongly recommend changing some of the central aspects of the torturer so that this doesn’t suggest mental illness drives people to violent behaviour.

The suggestions for changing the set up; I don’t think there are any unfortunate implications tied up with the way you’re picturing things now. It’s about trying to figure out what’s practical for the sort of setting you’re aiming for. Similarly I don’t think there are unfortunate implications in the way you’re dealing with witnesses and coerced ‘helpers’ now, but appreciating the symptoms they’re likely to have and the effect it’s likely to have is more realistic and I think it adds to your story.

I hope this helps. :) I’ll get the next part up as soon as I can.

Disclaimer

[relbyshock]

Amy Winehouse, Princess Diana, Britney Spears, Marilyn Monroe, Aileen Wuornos, Angelina Jolie, Adolf Hitler, Darrell Hammond, Pete Davidson, Winona Ryder, Vincent Van Gogh, Tommy Tiernan….

What do they all have in common? Apart from being famous figures, they all suffer(ed) or were rumored to have suffered from Borderline Personality Disorder.

Hey, me too.

I’m over the moon to have something in common with Princess Di (apart from our shared plight with bulimia), but I have to say, I’d rather not have anything in common with Aileen or Adolf…..

Borderline Personality Disorder is a confusing term to say the least. On the borderline of what and what? Well, in the ‘30s, it meant you fell somewhere between psychosis (untreatable) and neurosis (treatable).

Great, that’s reassuring.

Come the ‘70s, BPD sufferers were described as being very emotional, needy, difficult, at risk for suicide, and to have an “overall unstable level of functioning”.

Check. *sings “Welcome to My Life” by Simple Plan*

We also have rapidly fluctuating mood swings, unstable self-image, and a fear of abandonment. This disorder wasn’t even recognized by the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) until 1980.

Today, we know far more about BPD – “neurosis” is no longer used in the diagnosis, and BPD is no longer considered a psychotic disorder.

 So what are we then?

Crazy?

Hormonal?

According to my family, yes. But in reality, the problem lies within our brains. Let me nerd out here for a minute:

The Amygdala (Ah-mig-dah-lah) is composed of two almond-shaped parts of the brain, deep in the medial temporal lobe, that regulate fear and aggression. People with BPD have amygdala’s that are noticeably smaller than that of a healthy person. The smaller the amygdala, the more overactive it is.

Like short guys with bad attitudes, or what I like to refer to as “little man syndrome”.

And then we have the Hippocampus – no, not pachyderm college. The hippocampus is responsible for spatial orientation (not falling over), long and short-term memory, and emotional regulation. Put simply, the hippocampus chooses the correct response to environmental events: Fight or flight.

You may be wondering if I was dropped on my head as a child. The answer is yes – frequently – but the chances of minor brain trauma causing BPD are slim.

The causes of Borderline Personality Disorder are unclear. It seems to involve genetic, brain, environmental and social factors. There are rumours that people with BPD have issues with serotonin production, which has been linked to depression, aggression and having a hard time controlling “destructive urges”.

As for environmental factors, those who have been a victim of emotional/physical/sexual abuse, as well as being exposed to chronic fear or distress as a child have a high likelihood of developing BPD. This is because our relationship with our parents and family has a HUGE influence on how we see the world, and how we feel about other people.

Gals are also diagnosed 3 times as often as guys. You’ve gotta wonder if that’s due to the fact that men tend to be more weary of the doctor, therefore avoiding a diagnosis altogether. This is pure speculation.

Shall we take a dive into the “Signs and Symptoms” as listed by Wikipedia?

-Markedly disturbed sense of identity

-Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment and extreme reactions

-Splitting (black and white thinking)

-Impulsivity

-Intense and uncontrollable emotional reactions that often seem disproportionate to the event or situation

-Unstable and chaotic interpersonal relationships

-Self-damaging behavior (ie, substance abuse)

-Distorted self-image

-Dissociation

-Frequently accompanied by depression, anxiety, anger, substance abuse or rage

We are also aware of the intensity of our negative emotional reactions, and since we can’t regulate them, we shut them down completely. What my doctor and I refer to as feeling “flat”.

BPD sufferers are also extremely sensitive to real or perceived rejection. Let’s explain with a meme, shall we:

*looking at an unanswered text from 12 minutes ago*

You: They must be in the shower or just busy, they’ll respond when they have a chance.

Me: Ok well they were active on Instagram 6 minutes ago and they just posted a snap story….they’re ignoring me, why do they hate me? What did I do? Are they mad at me? Should I send another text to get their attention or is that too needy?

If you’re annoyed just reading that, TRY LIVING IN MY BRAIN.

I annoy myself.

I feel grief, overwhelming shame and humiliation where others would feel mildly embarrassed. A minor inconvenience such as cancelled plans takes me from excited to absolutely miserable.

In the past, an unflattering photo on Facebook has caused me to reevaluate my self-worth, and even my life.

The Sickboy podcast explained it beautifully: Borderline Personality Disorder is like having a third degree burn on your emotions. I feel that. Everything hurts me just a little bit more than the average bear (or human).

Why am I telling you this? Because boys and girls, today is Bell Let’s Talk Day here in Canada. I’ll include the link at the bottom. Basically, in 2010, Bell began a new conversation about Canada’s mental health. They’ve enlisted such figures as Howie Mandel, Michael Landsberg, and Clara Hughes to share their stories of struggle and strength in the face of mental health.

I thought today was as good as any other to address the stigma surrounding mental health, but more specifically, the stigma around BPD.

I can’t pretend to know all the answers – I’m not and won’t pretend to be a psychiatrist. But this is what the world looks like through my lens.

If someone honks at me while I’m driving to work, I’m upset ALL DAY. I never want to drive again, I want to pull over and cry, or turn around and go home.

If I get a moderately rude email, my brain fills with cutting, angry, and just plain mean remarks to respond with. “I’m sorry your father never hugged you as a child” is not a suitable response to a professional email, but that’s where my brain goes.

When I make plans with friends weeks in advance and they bail 10 minutes before, I am a heap of inconsolable sobs for the rest of the evening, and even into the next day. This plays into the fear of “real or imagined abandonment”. My BPD brain does not care that something came up or you’re feeling under the weather. BPD tells me that you hate me and you never want to see me again and you were just pretending to like me this whole time and you’ve finally made your escape. My logical brain tries to tell me that it’s ok, and we’ll plan something for another time, but usually, my BPD brain wins the fight.

When I get nervous and start to ramble trying to tell a story and my mom cuts me off with “Anyways.” I want to crawl in a hole and die, but I also sort of want to throw a plate at her face. My mother is a saint, so why do I feel this way about her sometimes?

Let’s get back to the causes of Borderline Personality Disorder. Dad, Mom, maybe stop reading here…or don’t…but here’s your warning. You aren’t going to like this next part.

I was severely neglected as a child. Not physically – I had food to eat, clothes to wear, a roof over my head – but emotionally and mentally. The minor relationship I did have with my father was marked by him coming home from a long shift (as a firefighter) and starting a fight with me about my weight, my shoes at the front door, my marks in school, and more often than not, “why are you always crying?!”. My mom also worked full time at a stressful sales job. So by the time she got home, she didn’t want to have to deal with anyone else’s issues.

So when I would have issues with anything from being bullied at school to just having a ‘bad mental health day’, I had nowhere to turn.

See, my brother and I were latch-key kids. We got home from school at least an hour before my parents got home from work. He and I never got along, so some sort of fight would ensue, and by the time our parents got home, he had made me cry. I was deemed dramatic and sent away to my bedroom, while the 3 of them would eat dinner together (usually something I refused to eat – like meat – which would be another reason to fight).

I’ve voiced this to my mom before, and she remembers my childhood very differently than I do.

As long as I have been alive, I have come second to my brother.

No, honey, we can’t go to (insert activity I wanted to do) because Maxx has hockey/a book report due/needs a ride to the bike track, etc.

Every dinner or event we went to was with HIS friends and THEIR parents, who ended up becoming my parents’ best friends (still to this day). I was always the only girl; so naturally, I stayed with the adults, because the boys wouldn’t have me.

But the adults didn’t want me there either. I felt like a constant annoyance.

Thinking back on it, I realize that I may not have been as unwanted as I perceived myself to be. Remember, BPD brains are sensitive to even slight facial expressions and tones of voice. But, when I voiced this to my parents, that I felt unwanted, and why couldn’t we do things with my friends and their parents, etc. I was told that I was being ridiculous.

Enter: Invalidation

Invalidation is the number one cause of BPD, according to my psychiatrist. Growing up in an environment where nothing you do is good enough will cause you to internalize everything.

I have no memories or examples of healthy emotional behaviour or relationships. In our house, we got the point across by screaming at or just plain ignoring each other. So when I get hurt, or I feel let down, I have absolutely no idea how to deal with my feelings. Further reinforcing my belief that the world is full of bad people who are out to ruin your day and be unkind, because that’s all I’ve ever known.

Research shows that if you already experience these difficulties as a child, experiencing trauma as an adult could make things worse.

Dad - now is really the time to stop reading.

(Sometimes I feel like I live inside the DSM definition of BPD)

At the age of 21 – fresh out of college and trying to start my career in the fashion world – I was sexually assaulted. Cue the downward spiral.

I didn’t report. I didn’t seek help. I confided in a close friend, and was called a liar. But that’s a story for another time.

So I buried that part of me so deep, that sometimes I could convince myself that it never happened. Sometimes.

I reached the end of my rope in 2016. I knew that if I didn’t seek help, I would not survive. I finally went to my doctor and spent hours with her, just sobbing and telling her everything.

She hooked me up with a psychiatrist, and put me in Dialectical Behavioural Therapy, and started me on an SSRI (anti-depressant) immediately.

As of today, it has been 1172 days since the assault. I only told my mother this past summer.

Since reaching out for help, I have begun to repair the relationship with my parents. My mom and I are closer than ever, and my dad and I are working on it.

As I write this, I feel the judgements pouring in. But I have decided that this year, I don’t care. I am not ashamed of my story. I will no longer hide the things I have been through in order to make others more comfortable. I will not keep my pain to myself because it’s easier for others if I stay silent. If bearing my soul can help even one person seek the help they need, then I have succeeded, and all this pain has been worth it.

The long and short of it is SPEAK UP! There is nothing embarrassing about mental illness. If you aren’t feeling right, there are people who care and are here to help you, including me. The first step is to tell someone.

The best advice I can give is to find your people. People who trust you, who lift you up, who validate your feelings, who listen and take you seriously when you say you’re having a bad day. I have spent the past year painstakingly building my support system, because the truth of the matter is, I can’t do this alone. And that’s ok.

Today and every single day, be kind to each other – it’s the only thing that matters.

https://letstalk.bell.ca/en/bell-lets-talk-day

[saecris]

HEADCANON DUMP #7

a majority of these headcanons were written either pre or post volume three. so a lot of them have been debunked by canon info, but i wanted to save my speculations.

sixty one accommodate story about ren’s parents backing and participating in the oniyuri project. this is where they were planning to elope. you can still incorporate parts of the butterfly lovers in their story. because ren did not recognise oniyuri and has only heard of it, we can assume he’s never been there. this was just a plan that his parents discussed with him in secret. might have to spectate about ren possibly being from mistral. nora did not recognise the story. spectating about a kind of special grimm associated with this part of mistral. edit: looks like it was a nuckelavee edit: it is now after volume four, and a lot of the information has been rendered redundant. however: i. ren’s parent’s plans to elope to oniyuri has now been incorporated into his backstory. ii. they did invest a lot of time and money into the project, most of the money having come from what zhilan was saving.

sixty two include ren’s sensory abilities into the mana manipulation headcanon, about how he can sense not only his own but the aura of other individuals. seen in rwby volume four episode six: tipping point, able to sense danger in the form of tyrian approaching rnjr at incredible speeds. this kind of sensory ability was seen right before his fight with the king taijitus, all the way in volume one episode six: the emerald forest. but also write down your new headcanon involving his semblance having something to do with empathy, and his ability to sense auras, manipulating his own emotions as well as others, even at a distance. edit: ren’s semblance is solely empathy until that headcanon is also debunked.

sixty three the lunar cult, often referred to as ‶the lunar kingdom‶ is the source of a major religion practiced in the area of mistral surrounding kuroyuri, oniyuri, and shion. the cult itself protects a white haired witch with as of yet undeterminable powers, but the mountain in which they reside is considered haunted, forbidden, dangerous. there is no record of outsiders venturing in and coming out alive. the lunar religion celebrates the moon goddess, as well as the belief that human kind descended from the moon men. it’s effects on the surrounding region include grand festivals for the winter solstice to celebrate the longest night of the year. mistral is heavily in tune with nature, so referring to your sweetheart as some kind of natural element is common, ie. sky and sea, moon and stars.

sixty four prior to moving to kuroyuri ren lived in a compound with all the other members of the lie family, a network of beautiful traditional houses of both large and small stature, interconnected with bridges, walkways, gorgeous gardens, made of incredibly elaborate architecture. the property itself was miles long and covered a mountain range. the entrance of it was around a twenty minute walk from kuroyuri. when his family was attacked by bandits three years prior to the start of the series, a lot of the of compound burned down. lie cuifen (ren’s grandmother) who had previously not been very involved in the business transactions of their family, managed to reel in a lot of the investments they’d lost, and still remains incredibly wealthy to this day. ren’s mentor, feng (oc based on mushu lore), takes in students from time to time and trains them in the lie compound, which is being rebuilt. he has built a reputation of being an extremely selective but highly successful teacher, with all of his students passing their combat academy entrance exams with flying colours.

sixty five ren has good leadership qualifications, but his characteristics fall more into the ‘unwilling protagonist’ spectrum than anything noteworthy. i’m not that deluded in my admiration to currently admit that ren and nora’s roles in the show are anything more than minimal (ren’s background story functions more as a case study than anything else). this is more of a conclusion i’ve come to when speculating on traits commonly shown in mulan’s case. not necessarily in disney’s mulan, but most other versions of the story including the original ballad, she does end up assuming a commander’s position in the army after a few years of dedication. ren is shown to have an adaptive and versatile fighting style, using the elements around him in order to gain the advantage (this has even extended to using other character’s weapons as of volume four.) he’s also incredibly observant, so there isn’t any reason he wouldn’t be able to use another character’s abilities to further their lead. he’s good with organisation, tactics, strategy, and also has a strong sense of duty. he has very good instincts; holding jaune back from fighting tyrian, understanding the right time to strike, knowing what they need to do in order to survive. what i believe makes him a better follower than a leader in his team’s case is linked to his personality. ren is not personable, and the way he comes across in the beginning makes it seem like he views others more as tools than people. he does care for his teammates, but his instinct is to protect himself first, to survive. he works better on his own. he can follow orders to a t, and oftentimes needs instructions to function so he is at his most useful as a subordinate under someone he trusts.

sixty six ren is hypocritical. mostly he is live, and let live, but he will chastise those close to him about taking care of themselves and not getting hurt, but he will indulge in some of the most self destructive behaviour like alientating himself and smoking. during beacon days he constantly nagged nora and jaune about being healthy but he was constantly drinking soda, coffee, and energy drinks to keep himself awake. when he is a professional huntsman, while he understands that getting hurt is inevitable, he will ask his loved ones to put themselves above his own welfare, and then go behind their backs and sacrifice himself if he can. it’s honestly infuriating.

sixty seven ren’s noticeable improvement with physical affection was, of course, largely due to beacon’s influence. my characterisation has a lot of his personable attributes increase because of his interactions at beacon. my ren’s personal space issues are rooted deeply in the symbolism of connection. he is deathly afraid of someone getting close enough to him to hurt him when they betray him or when they inevitably leave, even if it’s through no fault of their own. surrendering to his occasional want to be touched means that he is building up some kind of relationship and he’s deathly afraid of that. he also just doesn’t like being touched unless absolutely necessary; he likes being aware about what people around him are doing, and being touched by people he doesn’t want to brings up memories he’d rather not bring up again. throughout the entirety of beacon ren has show distain for being touched, in the show and in rwby chibi as well. any light hearted pounce he’s seen to be visibly shocked by ( although i have noticed that the two times jaune’s touched him, ren has responded appropriately and in kind. the only other person he’s reacted to similarly was nora. ) if ren initiates physical touch with you, it means that he’s either treating some kind of wound for you, or you’re special to him. he touches mostly out of habit, and to reassure himself that you’re actually real.

sixty eight some characterisation notes that run alongside ren’s association with he chinese folklore god nezha are, firstly that nezha is a protection deity. ren is a huntsman, and it is inherently coded into their profession to protect those who cannot protect themselves. parts of the lore that are applicable to ren are some familiar thematics, which i can only guess were taken into consideration when ren was made ( just from the wind and fire blades thing ? that just seems like a big coincidence that wind and fire disks are nezha’s preferred weapon and ren’s preferred dust cartridges. ) there’s also the the theme that ren had to grow up far too quickly, while nezha was born into a fully grown boy already, then forced to wage war. the storms left in the wake of nezha’s sacrifice i associate with li’s sacrifice in kuroyuri, some of those being metaphorical and remaining in ren’s mind. then there is the continuous resurgence of being reborn, rebirth, reincarnation through the lotus themes, which appear repeatedly through my characterisation.

sixty nine it’s sort of a given why now, but ren hates horses. he hates the sound they make, and he hates anything similar to the nightmarish screams of the nuckelavee. hearing sound effects similar used to induce a state of panic but now only serves to trigger an extremely bad mood which won’t disperse for the rest of the day.

seventy i was thinking about ren’s capability to do single handstand pushups in chibi. basically all the feats that ren was capable of in rwby chibi, episode nine: “ren plays tag”. i couldn’t help but remember that he performed a similar movement in the season finale of volume four. in my other extended combat analysis of ren’s fighting style all evidence i gathered alluded to his legs being stronger, after all, ren’s agility has always been impeccable: he is seen to be able to reach incredibly high tree tops on single jumps alone, jumps that ruby and nora needed mechanised assistance to reach. but i neglected to talk about ren’s arm strength. ren utilises palm strikes, in grimm eclipse in succession, when attacking which is said to produce more energy than a regular punch with far less injury to the striker’s hand. the shock absorption required when this attack is being amplified with raw aura ( enough raw aura to burst open a king taijitu’s head ) must be immense. his main striking force when it comes to his regular slashing style also relies on the speed and strength of blade control, especially considering he does the most damage with the blades ( and very minimal damage with his bullets. ) there’s also the fact that he held back the taitiju’s fangs with his arms, the force field generated by aura would have helped when it came to stopping the fangs from sinking into him, but that he wasn’t blown away by a two tonne snake was also impressive. he held back the snake for a significant amount of time too, almost seven seconds on screen, possibly longer. i do know that he’s not getting fuckin’ k.o.’d during fights anymore, so he’s definitely gotten stronger, which is what i’m all about. okay, but that elegant flip thing he did at the beginning of volume four, chapter twelve: no safe haven is everything. not only was it a perfectly executed one handed handstand with a spiral flip, but he did it while armed as well. this boy is incredible. that kind of movement requires a lot of strength, and i’m finding that that’s just ren’s style, it’s flamboyant and beautiful, a lot of grace in power. i can’t even remember if there was a point to this hc anymore, i just wanted to talk about how some things in chibi are being alluded to in the show. and also there were a bunch of cretinous annoyances prior to volume three speaking about how weak ren is, and let me tell you, training next to him would give you so many confidence issues man. this boy is strong. not only that but his fighting prowess is spread out in multiple different ways. he has one of the most diverse fighting styles in rwby so shut the fuck up.