#Don't dismiss other people's trauma

[funcoolchickie]

[idiosyncraticrednebula]

People who side with Triton and criticize Ariel for rebelling against him miss the whole point of the story. I don't know what it is about Ariel in particular that many people online look for every reason to hate on her and justify everything that happened to her.

[kyungsein]

can't post about orv anymore

have too much to say and nothing to say at the same time which results in me shutting down

awful absolutely awful, 0 stars

[b-rainlet]

Me, going through my blog and seeing I left 'He's so Buffy to me' as a tag under a pic of Scott McCall: I simultaneously understand nothing and everything

[nebulouscoffee]

Kira for the ask game, because I've sewn you mentioned liking her but haven't seen you talk about it much yet and would like to enable you

Yayy thank you!! (and I'm sorry I took so long to respond, it's been a very hectic week😅)

one aspect about them i love

Kira really embodies a lot of what I miss most about Star Trek tbh, which was the real desire to make the audience uncomfortable. Don't get me wrong; there is a lot about TOS, TNG and DS9 that didn't age well- but I still think an important goal they all shared was to take certain ideas and ideologies that might've seemed far-fetched to the audience of the time, and say- "why not?" Also, "Does this character's existence- and presence- make you uncomfortable? Well, maybe that's a YOU problem." And that's a goal which (imo) really faded over the years, because they grew more and more afraid of turning off the conservative audience. But not with Kira! Within minutes of her introduction, she offers a scathing shutdown of the "frontier" that Star Trek was quite literally built upon. She is literally a sympathetic "terrorist" MAIN character (rare enough), and furthermore a woman- and that too a "difficult" woman, who refuses to let herself be ignored or compromise her people's needs for the Starfleet crew's comfort (!!!), who is ANGRY and deeply religious and nationalistic and PROACTIVE and stomps around and shouts and cries and disagrees and wears her passion on her sleeve and is not at all afraid to make a nuisance of herself- and yet, still has numerous flaws and so many moments of self-doubt and raw vulnerability. What a fantastic character! This was 1993; I can think of so few TV women from that era who actively challenged the constructs (and men) around them so much. I love everything she represents

one aspect i wish more people understood about them

That her arc is more about learning to land upon nuance; not toning down her Bajoran-isms. Her patriotism and faith do occasionally steer her the wrong way, yes- but Kira's growth doesn't at all involve her renouncing either of those things! If anything, it's Sisko who ends up having to adjust to her perspectives. In general I'm always craving more nuanced discussions re DS9's postcolonial dynamics, too- Kira has such a range of interactions with Cardassians on the show, and numerous episodes ('Destiny', 'Life Support', 'Ties of Blood and Water', etc) show that she's genuinely invested in peace between their peoples; something I think often goes ignored. Yes, she's justifiably furious about everything they did to her home- but at the end of the day, what she wants is justice and reparations for Bajor and Bajorans; and if a small (understandable) part of her does want to see Cardassia crash and burn, she really doesn't act upon it

Also, she's funny! Remember when she told Dukat the baby was O'Brien's with no further explanation? Lmaoo what a troll

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have about this character

That she only received a very basic education. She does mention finger painting and playing springball as a kid, but also- Kira grew up in a refugee camp and she joined the Shakaar cell at age 12; she probably missed out on the higher education even the average Bajoran of her generation received (which itself was likely Cardassian State-controlled). Idk, this is low key important to me because so many Star Trek characters are almost like- defined by their scientific and educational smarts, if that makes sense? It's refreshing to see a Trek character who doesn't quite make sense of herself or the world around her primarily through (Western) scientific constructs

Also, Kira absolutely has unexamined caste biases; she just never really learnt to recognise them because caste played such a minimal role in the Resistance- but most Bajorans are far more aware of caste dynamics than she typically is (I just do not buy that the D'jarra system completely went away in less than 60 years)

one character i love seeing them interact with

Ben Sisko! They have SUCH a fascinating dynamic, it's so complex and sweet and often quite trying and hurtful but still kept afloat on this deep, deep underlying mutual respect. Ben's position as the Emissary makes everything so wonderfully complicated, and watching Kira's frustrations at the fact that she actually believes in him morph into reassurance as he slowly transforms from being the Starfleet Outsider to truly being Of Bajor... ahhh it's so good. That scene where he invites her to a baseball game lives in my head rent free! (Also they high key make a fascinating ship imo, I am something of a post-canon Sisko/Kira/Kasidy truther)

one character i wish they would interact with/interact with more

I have multiple answers to this (Julian, Worf, Garak, Keiko, Ziyal, Cretak, Jake, Ezri, etc) but I'm gonna go with someone she actually interacts with quite a bit, because I just wanted mOArrr. Jadzia!

Yes, it was the 90s, so I'm glad they were at least allowed to be friends and not like, cattily pitted against each other. But I still craved more layers to their onscreen dynamic! I mean, Jadzia, the Starfleet "Science Officer" who openly dismisses Kira's religious beliefs on more than one occasion? Kira, the child soldier who finds most of Jadzia's pastimes and preoccupations frivolous and silly? It's so interesting that they keep spending time together despite such fundamental differences, and I would've loved a bigger exploration as to why! They deserved their own 'The Wire', basically. Much like the central two characters of that episode, the answer is that they actually have a LOT more in common than is apparent at first glance (fraught senses of identity, complicated relationships with their home worlds, a sense of loss regarding family) where they outwardly seem like polar opposites. And all of this is not even getting into the nonlinearity of Bajoran religion vs the lives of Dax... gosh, there was room for so much! They deserved a whole Big Sequence full of Monologues the actors could really sink their teeth into, they deserved for one of them to fly off on a dangerous quest to save the others' life- and you know what!! They deserved a little homoerotic hand-holding too!! But, I suppose that's what fanfiction is for😂

one (or more) headcanon(s) i have that involve them and one other character

She and Bashir definitely grow much closer after the show's end; whether he stays behind on DS9 or not :)

[catastrophicdisasters]

apologies, i'm still angry abt TUA S4

so, if we take out all of the blatant issues with the season (character assassination, 'resolutions' that create more plotholes than they solve, rushed scenes that make no sense, side plots that go nowhere, raymond vanishing for no reason, etc etc), what are we left with? let's see:

fatphobia (multiple jokes made about 'chubby Diego', when David just looks hydrated and healthy)

SA played for jokes (it's clear that Klaus having sex while possessed is supposed to be funny, but he's being held hostage and forced to do this for money, when we already know he didn't even want his powers back??)

cheating

problematic / borderline problematic age gaps (either way you spin it, either Five is physically 20-26 while Lila is likely mid 40s, or Five is mentally 70s while Lila is mid 40s; Aidan was 19 while filming, and Ritu was 34)

waiting for the actor to come of age before introducing a romance (we already know what some fans can be like over Five/Aidan, this will not have helped; I would be horrified if I found out the show runners had planned a romance arc with a coworked 15 years older than me and then waited for me to turn legal age to execute it)

sexism (i was reluctant to call it that but i also don't know what else to call it - Lila basically had her agency stripped away to become the love interest two men fought over; Steve wanted Five to have a romance and didn't care who with - use Lila simply because she was there)

complete disregard of character trauma (Klaus being buried alive despite it having been mentioned in every prior season that he was locked in a mausoleum by Reginald, including literally being left to die)

possible overstepping of an actor's boundaries (i've not been able to verify this, but i've seen it said that robert sheehan has requested not to do sex scenes?) (still havent been able to prove this; wasn't an issue with other roles so... hesitant to leave it)

actors requests being ignored (David asked multiple times if the Lila cheating sideplot was required, but clearly it went ahead anyway)

bad cgi

that awful vomit montage

Reginald (im not quite calling it abuse forgiveness but uh. it's not far off tbh)

i don't even know what to call this, but basically told the Hargreeves the abuse they suffered was their fault because they shouldn't even exist??

what did i miss? (im sure there's something)

from the replies:

the song in the ep3 dance scene uses a slur for romani people (and is also about a man and an underage girl)

SA dismissal (it's literally never addressed that Allison SA'd Luther last season. like, at all. everything's just a-okay now!)

more sexism (Allison's arc was also reduced to serving men; there's a single line to explain that Ray left, with no mention of why (i could go OFF about this but this post isn't supposed to be about mishandling of characters); even after everything, all her bonding with Claire comes through Klaus's storyline. also, Sloane is just gone and nobody gives a shit - Luther has one line and that's it??)

so many issues with consent (all of the girls shown in the place Klaus works look drugged / Klaus doesn't want to be there and doing any of that, it's all against his wishes / they all get their powers back against their wishes - although they do tell Ben that wasn't his choice to make / Klaus gets his powers back against his will when Allison is pressured to do it to save his life)

[areyoudoingthis]

me @ my therapist: i don't know how to deal with my anger (mostly about being misgendered)

my therapist: society changes very very slowly, learn how to be patient and tolerate frustration

my adhd: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[st-dionysus]

What is transandrophobia and why is it called that? By the guy who coined it and is kind of tired of seeing it defined in the opposite of what it's meant to describe.

In it's most simple definition. Transandrophobia is the way that the fear of men impacts the material reality and mental/physical health of transgender men.

Transandrophobia, is the way that the fear of men and/or masculinity effects transgender men’s ability to access queer and transgender spaces, sexual assault survivor resources, and reproductive health care.

Transandrophobia, is the way that the fear of men and/or masculinity holds back transgender men from transitioning or from presenting as masculine.

Transandrophobia, is the way the fear of men and/or masculinity results in the disowning of transgender men from previous found families and the isolation of transgender men in general.

Transandrophobia, is the way the fear of men and/or masculinity has resulted in people using their trauma as an excuse for abusing transgender men, physically, sexually, and emotionally.

Transandrophobia, is the way the fear of men has resulted in people refusing admittance to “male identified people” to certain queer events and safe spaces.

Transandrophobia, is the way that the fear of masculinity has led to people assuming that butches across the gender spectrum are inherently violent and hyper-sexual.

Transandrophobia, is the way that the fear of men and/or masculinity results in the forced feminization of transgender men in queer spaces, with the insistence that those who refuse to feminize themselves to make others more comfortable should not be allowed entrance to certain queer spaces.

Transandrophobia, is the way that the fear of men has led people to assuming that butches who were assigned female at birth, are at risk of becoming the enemy (a man) and should not be given the same amount of trust as a feminine presenting cis woman.

Transandrophobia, is when that the fear of men being in women’s spaces prevents trans men and non-binary people who present as male from accessing gynecological care, abortions, and birth control.

Transandrophobia, is when transgender men must make themselves smaller to be seen as “one of the good ones” and it is when a trans man who is loud or sexual or Black or Brown or too masculine is seen as a threat to the safety of other transgender people.

Transandrophobia, is when transgender men who speak up about how the normalized way of speaking ill about men in feminist and queer spaces has made them activity suicidal, de-transition, or prevented them from transitioning, are told to “shut up and sit down” or “good.”

Transandrophobia, is not when trans men face misogyny – that is just a trans man facing misogyny (which all trans men face, because misogyny and sexism effects everyone, not just women). However, transandrophobia is when someone says that trans men don’t face misogyny because they are men, make claims that trans men benefit from misogyny since they are men, or insist that trans men’s experiences with misogyny aren’t as valid or as bad as when a woman or non-male person faces misogyny.

Transandrophobia, is when trans men’s struggles are dismissed as being less important, because men don’t need help or men already have help or men don't face real struggles.

Transandrophobia, is when people refuse to acknowledge that the patriarchy see’s transgender men as failed women and not men, which is why transgender men do bot benefit from the patriarchy but are instead violently and systematically punished by it.

Transandrophobia is that and a whole lot more, I would need a book to describe the entirety of the issue, I have been writing a book on it for over six years and re-writing it over and over because if I say it wrong, or say it with too much emotion, or not enough emotion, or with too many numbers, or not enough numbers, and publish it without using perfect wording, trans men might not get another chance to speak up for a long ass time and we will once again have to find new words to say "Pretty please treat me like a human being and let me have access to the things I need in order to survive." and "Pretty please consider that if a large group of people from a minority are telling you they are being oppressed by these actions and fears, then maybe you should believe them or at least the material statistical evidence of that oppression, since you probably trust journals more than us describing our reality and lived experiences."

[teaboot]

Do you think that cis men feel the same way as trans men do? Like with how men get treated by society as being inherently evil and as predators?

I think maybe both cis and trans men experience these issues but it's easier for a trans guy to point it out because he gets to see people so quickly turn on him for being a man while transitioning

oh yeah definitely

I find "meninists" fucking obnoxious, especially as any of their VALID concerns fall under the bracket of feminism, but there does exist a presence of radfems and terfs that are scarily eager to lash out at anything resembling masculine that. Definitely needs to be addressed somehow

Like. There's a mile of middle ground between "Um yeah women have problems, whatever, but what about ME and MY FEELINGS 😢" and "I am genuinely trying my best to be thoughtful and considerate of others, and everything I do is being met with bad-faith interpretations and dismissal"

And I think the best advice I have for anyone else getting bogged down by this is that. like.

If someone is determined to see the worst in you, nothing you can do to prove otherwise will be enough. You will never change that person's mind. They don't want you to change their mind. So like... just focus on you, and keep doing your best, and learn, and know that people determined to find something nasty don't really have an issue with YOU- they have their own experiences and traumas coloring their worldview.

Someone who is determined to see you as a monster will only ever see a monster. So it's better to ask yourself, "would a monster do what I'm doing?". If the answer is yes, take steps to change that. If the answer is no, then it's not about you, and you can give yourself permission to move on.

So... yeah, I imagine cis men probably do feel the way I feel about this sorta thing sometimes.

Except, like. After a lifetime being a girl, living as a girl, fighting for equality as the only girl in a lot of men's spaces, being a feminist girl and an Eldest Daughter girl and calling out the bullshit only to later realize I'm not a girl... and that Im actually mostly a dude, still a feminist... at least when people call me a mysoginist, I know they're talking out their ass

I can kinda see where young men encounter their very first radfems calling themselves feminists and immediately become radicalized right-wing conservatives cause like. If I as a teen thought feminism meant Radfems and Terfs, I'd probably start running too

It's all just so exhausting

Any one group being wholesale grouped as "100% helpless gentle victim" or "100% selfish malevolent monster" is doomed, imo

(Now watch the notes blow up with "this is just 'not all men' rhetoric, lol)

But anyways I hate nuance I hate interpretation I hate implication and symbolism and context and I wish everything in the world was simpler so we could all blow a collective joint together and invent some new soups

[patricia-taxxon]

My take on sexual trauma, kink, and its intersection with queerness is already being dismissed by other non-terf blogs as 'white person wanting to be oppressed more' when i don't think i would have anti-assimilationist views this strong if i hadn't engaged with the thoughts of black women & queer people as much as i did. like that's what redpilled me on the inherent whiteness of 'passing' in the first place, the other intersections besides queerness along which people are ungendered against their will. im not going back.

[peridot-tears]

Quick addition on the Chinese cultural take: A lot of the things Jiang Cheng says to Jin Ling that white Americans read as "verbal abuse" are normal things that my parents say to me as well. (I literally need a moment in CQL when Jiang Cheng says to Jin Ling in the Burial Moments, "你小兔崽子，给我回来！" because jeeeeeez, that's how my mom talks to me and that's how I talk to my dog. I'm Chinese as well, with parents coming from the mainland. I found that a lot of our families tend to be more verbally direct or "harsh." My grandmother's first instinct, when chiding my grandfather for a mild inconvenience or fumble, is to curse him the hell out. (“你这王八蛋” etc.) I didn't like it as a kid and I don't like it now, but they're in their 90s and just chortle it off. And I know for a fact that this is normal in China and the diaspora. (Not everyone, mind, but it's common enough that when I share it with people from different regions, they're like, "Oh yeah, that's a thing.") I personally suspect that my grandparents have such a barbed tongue because they grew up during the war. My mother, while she doesn't do it as harshly as my grandmother, does the same thing. All this to say that while I'm not in MXTX's head, she's a millennial Chinese woman just like a lot of us. Meaning she's probably seen the same thing. And it reflects in MDZS -- your parents grew up in a horrific war/post-war era? Check. Now you're living in peacetime, and they're not as harsh as your grandparents? Check. But they still have a barbed tongue when they speak with you? Check. Just my little side commentary. The rest of your talk is more well-sourced than my master's thesis, so carry on.

haterisms beneath the cut

this hater poll brought to you by....a series of Bad Mcfucking Takes i had to read with my own eyeballs. seriously did we read the same book or not.

explanations:

"jiang cheng killed wei wuxian": jiang cheng did not kill wei wuxian in any version of the story. in mdzs wei wuxian died from backlash and in cql wei wuxin chose to let go of lan wangji after jiang cheng stabbed the cliff face. you can argue till the cows come home about how responsible jiang cheng is for wei wuxian's demise, but "jiang cheng killed wei wuxian" is just factually incorrect.

"jiang cheng abuses jin ling": jiang cheng does not abuse jin ling. first, the narration goes out of its way to establish that jiang cheng does not hit jin ling, specifically in a setting where hitting children is normalized and expected. in fact, wei wuxian says that jin ling is bratty specifically because he's never been hit. second, jin ling is also clearly comfortable talking back to jiang cheng and needling him in a way jiang cheng definitely was not with his own parents. even when jiang cheng is actively losing it when he captures wei wuxian in qinghe, jin ling remains completely unruffled - which speaks to how much jin ling takes for granted that he is safe with jiang cheng.

"jiang cheng could have easily helped the wen remnants, he just didn't": antis love to act like yunmeng jiang could have easily taken in the wemnants and jiang cheng simply chose not to because he was a hater/super jelly/various synonyms for ontologically evil. which is not the fucking case. learn to read. yunmeng jiang's own position post sunshot was very weak - they were a great sect in name only and were excluded from the alliance tying the three other great sects together - and jiang cheng could not politically afford to protect wei wuxian after wei wuxian alienated lanling jin. that's why jiang cheng says "if you insist on doing this, i can't protect you," and why wei wuxian then tells jiang cheng to let him go. because they both understand this. come on

"jiang cheng forced jiang yanli to marry jin zixuan": jiang yanli as a character makes so many sacrifices for her family and her brothers. her relationship with zixuan is like the one thing she chooses for herself. she loves him!! the tragedy in wei wuxian killing jin zixuan is that yanli genuinely loved zixuan!! ngl i think antis argue this purely to try to exonerate wei wuxian: if jiang yanli didn't love jin zixuan then wei wuxian donutting him isn't a problem anymore, apparently. this is the result of people thinking of jiang yanli as purely a thing for wei wuxian, rather than a human being in her own right.

"jiang cheng should have protected wei wuxian from yu ziyuan": this one is annoying because jiang cheng was also a child. when a child is abused, it is the fault of the abuser, not the fault of another child who is also subject to the whims of the abuser. come on.

[canis-constellate]

btw if you think "fakers" in plural communities are a legitimate pressing problem that needs to be fixed and is actively harming plural communities at large, i really think you should step back and find some perspective. coming from a collective with DID that has been fakeclaimed on many occasions for various reasons, we need you to ask yourself these questions:

(A) who are you accusing of being fakers? what characteristics are you looking for to determine if someone is faking? (B) do you know for a fact that they're faking, or are you just assuming they are because they don't act "plural enough" in your eyes? (C) is there anything similar between you and these (apparent, so-called) fakers that others might use against you? (for example, having too many introjects, having introjects of a particular type/source, having too large or too small of a system, having too much or too little communication between your sysmates, having too much or especially too little amnesia/dissociation (especially if you have a CDD), having certain comorbid mental illnesses (personality disorders, schizo-spec disorders, psychosis in general, etc), having or not having certain kinds of trauma (especially if your system is traumagenic in any way), etc) (D) do you think people theoretically faking plurality themselves are leading to people not believing plurality exists or believing its so rare, or do you think it's more likely that the pervasiveness of fakeclaiming others and choosing not to provide benefit of the doubt is what's leading to people dismissing plurality as something fake or too rare for them to ever be concerned with it?

and finally:

(E) do you think people who are actually faking plurality (who are most likely doing it to get attention or find a sense of community/friendship) will suddenly stop faking because you chose to be cruel to them, or could it be possible that it's more likely that they'll be more willing to listen and change if you're kind and respectful and offer compassion to any true struggles they might have?

[prismalmelonman]

Touching on Gale, Wyll, and Halsin's traumas being a bit undermined in parts of the fandom

So one thing I notice on Twitter is how some people act about the bg3 characters whose abuses were perpetuated by women.

Gale specifically for this reason (but I will touch on others)bbecause I see him dismissed super often as "can't get over his ex".

But Gale's case obviously be has the line of Mystra being like "she was my muse, my teacher, and then my lover" and sure to some that's a red flag in itself (when it comes to adults I don't really give a fuck about teacher/student) but if you view it from not only Gale's own words "ive been connected with the weave for as long as i can remember"

And that doesn't distract from his genuine love of magic of course. And it also doesn't mean that he's actually been in connection with mystra for an amount of time.

However, if you ascend Gale, and he becomes a god, you get a bunch of new little things. Tara reminiscing of course, but you get a letter from Elminster, detailing that Mystra had Elminster scope out Gale when he was eight!

And sure is that pretty cool that he's a prodigy that got the attention of the goddess of magic at that age? Yes. Mystra is, however, known in forgotten Realms lore to seek young young boys who are in tune with magic to make into her chosen. And from context clues, her chosen can be anything from Elminster and Volo, dedicated wizards who try to keep things in check, etc etc. or they're somewhat of playthings to her.

Minsc also has a conversation where me mentions that weave-touched boys in his homeland were hidden away to hone their craft, then suspecting that it was because of Mystra, given Gale's case.

Gale always seems so proud that he got to bed a goddess, and on the surface, hell yeah, that's cool.

Gale continued to have her attention even as he went to Blackstaff Academy, and Mystra eventually did take him on as an apprentice directly to her, later making him her chosen, and sleeping with him.

The reason it bothers me that people dismiss all of Gale's stuff to just "he can't get over his ex" is because that's is like almost textbook grooming? She was in his life from a young age, shaping and moulding him up as he grew up to be her perfect chosen, rewarding him by sleeping with him, and so on. And then of course casting him away when he has his folly with the netherese orb (and to be fair, it very well could have looked like to her that he was trying to seize the power himself and yes the orb does siphon off weave. That is a problem for the mistress of the weave yes).

But she also tells gale to KILL HIMSELF for her forgiveness.

Gale is much more than "unable to be over his ex" this woman was in his life since he was a kid. She's almost all he has ever known. If course it's going to be difficult for him to 1. Say no to her. 2. Get over the fact that he's lost someone that he spent his literal entire life dedicated to. Honestly if asked, I don't even think Gale would acknowledge or really see that what he went through was, in fact, abuse until it was spelled out in front of him. (Which does happen somewhat with the player character pleading to him that killing himself for mystra's forgiveness is actually horrific and that he should in fact be angry for how he was treated)

Similarly, and this one has been discussed a lot, Wyll and Mizora. Wyll was 17 and actively trying to help his people. 17, in a vulnerable state, willing to do anything to help and prove himself. Mizora very clearly took advantage of him, and regards him as a "pet", refers to him being "leashed", and so on. Personally, I do dislike the sexualization of their relationship, because it very much is also grooming (although a different type. Rather than manipulating and shaping his life from the ground up, she takes advantage of a vulnerable and desperate state to manipulate and contract Wyll into doing her bidding. I won't go too deep I to this one because it has been discussed to hell and back. But I did wanna touch on Wyll's situation as well.

Also, Halsin as well, though that has also been discussed in many retrospectives by a very good friend of mine. Halsin's trauma often get dismissed due to his polyamory, open sexual nature, and his own somewhat diminishing/dismissal of it, which honestly I love the representation of, cause for a while I did that with my own trauma. Halsin was a sex slave to a house of Lolth-Sworn drow, a matriarchal society, where the men are generally used as fodder or for breeding, though male Lolth-Sworn drow can be wizards and rise in the ranks if wizardry, but are limited everywhere else. (Minthara mentions that the third male, and every subsequent male child after third are killed for being"useless"). Halsin often referred to them as "hosts" rather than being captors, (though he does touch on that if the Player Character threatens to sell him back into slavery). Again, everything I'd have to say here for Halsin has entirely been discussed top to bottom by a friend, their link is below!!

Anyway, long story short, I dislike it a lot when Gale, Wyll, and Halsin's traumas and abuses get diminished, even if/when the character themself doesn't see or acknowledge the abuse in the same lens that we, the players, do.

[sorcerersandskillusers]

I want to talk about one of the most terrifying and interesting bsd characters who almost no fan remembers.

This character nearly tore down the ADA without ever getting involved herself, yet the entire fandom has ignored her because of her terrible anime adaptation.

Who am I talking about?

Nobuko Sasaki

If you haven't read Dazai Osamu's Entrance Exam, then you probably don't even know who this character is, in the anime she is watered down to the lovesick girlfriend of an actual villain, and you probably dismissed her immediately. But in the light novel, we get to see how dangerous and cunning she really is, to the point she nearly gets the better of Dazai and almost causes the ADA to be shut down. (Fukuzawa says he would have closed the agency if they hadn't caught her)

In terms of intelligence I'd put her on the same level as Mori, just slightly below the super human genius characters i.e. Dazai, Fyodor and Ranpo

The Azure Apostle

For those who don't remember, Sasaki was the Azure Apostle, a mysterious figure who challenged the agency with several horrifying cases, which would all lead to mass casualties if the agency failed to stop them. These were; uncovering an underground organ smuggling operation (which the agency failed to stop and which massively hurt their reputation) stopping a bombing of Yokohama port which could have killed hundreds of people, and preventing a commercial aeroplane from crashing into the city (this was not included in the anime)

Each of the people, who committed these crimes, had no Idea they were being manipulated and thought it was their own idea the whole time. There was no evidence that anyone else had been involved at all, and the agency had no way to connect her to any of the crimes. And she even makes the genius move of framing Dazai, the mysterious new member with suspicious knowledge of the underworld and a hidden past, as the true culprit.

In fact, she only made one mistake, challenging Dazai. If Dazai had been basically anyone else, they would have been cornered and arrested, but since Dazai's mind works on a level even master strategists can't imagine, he was able to turn the tables on her.

But even after Dazai sees through her plans, the ADA still has to act exactly the way she wants them too and stop the plane crash. Even when they know they're being manipulated, they still have to do exactly what she wanted.

Finally, after Dazai and Kunikida confront her and get her to admit to being behind all those crimes, even then they are powerless to stop her.

Even after being involved with so many massive crimes, Sasaki herself hadn't done anything illegal, so within the law the ADA is completely powerless to stop her.

They can't arrest her, and if they try then the agency will be put in even more danger as will many innocent lives. She has completely trapped the ADA, and even Dazai in a choice to follow the law and let her go or take justice into their own hands and prove they will stoop as low as she did.

In the end, there she has them in a perfect deadlock, let her continue her mission, or kill her themselves. Both are bad outcomes for the ADA.

In the end, Dazai has her killed by using a third party (Rokuzo) to shoot her, so the agency can't be blamed for her murder, though this ends her plans it deeply scars Kunikida and shakes his resolve in his ideals.

The trauma from this event still haunts Kunikida to this day, we see that when he is affected by Q's curse, Sasaki is who he sees.

So thats the Azure Apostle, a terrifying master mind who nearly brought down the Armed Detective Agency, but now lets look at the other side of this character.

Nobuko Sasaki Herself

We know several things about Sasaki as a character and her history from the light novel. That she was a brilliant criminal psychologist and was internationally recognised despite being so young

,that she was the ex-lover of the Azure King and the real mastermind behind his plans, and that she had very little motivation of her own.

That's not meant to be an insult to the character, she says herself that she never really had much direction in life, even with her incredible intelligence she never really had anything she wanted to achieve.

But the Azure King was the opposite, he had powerful drive and strong ideals, he wanted to punish criminals who couldn't be touched by the law and when he failed to change the law as a bureaucrat, she offered him an alternative.

A very important thing here is that neither of them were manipulating or forcing the other into this path, as far as we see they genuinely loved each other, each providing something the other couldn't, Sasaki her mind and the Azure King his drive.

When the Azure king died, Sasaki had no path of her own to follow, so she simply kept following his, even though she doesn't seem to have really cared about his cause.

All of this creates a very unique character, you can't say she was driven by revenge, because she wasn't really driven at all. It's more like she was running on momentum, she had chosen a path to follow and could not stop even though there was nothing pushing her down it any more.

She's a perfect antithesis of Kunikida and was the best possible villain a light novel about him could have had.

A man who brings his ideals into reality with his own hands against a woman who uses others to enforce ideals that were never hers to begin with.

Anyway, I made this because Sasaki is criminally underrated in this fandom, If you haven't read "Dazai Osamu's Entrance Exam" I highly recommend it, I've only put a tiny fraction of the amazing story here.

[ennn]

Let's appreciate how complex Agatha's relationship with Billy is

GIF credit to @isagrimorie

The genuine emotion brimming from Agatha in this moment is very interesting and I really want to break down all the layers of how Agatha is relating to Billy—because it is truly not as simple as Agatha feeling sentimental or motherly to Billy.

There are a few layers at work here (and I also want to give a shout-out to @trickofthelights for her excellent recap points):

Billy reminds Agatha (enough) of herself

There are two driving forces at the core of Agatha as a character. We know this because her characterisation has been incredibly consistent throughout the show and Schaeffer has talked about them, which is: (a) Agatha is self-serving and (b) Agatha loves powerful witchcraft.

Billy is a powerful witch who did a horrifying thing in order to survive. He's been lying to these wonderful parents. He also just tried murdering three people in a fit of rage, provoked by Agatha no less.

Would Agatha care if he was less powerful? Would Agatha care if he didn't have a dark side? If he hadn't shown to be duplicitous and dangerous and subject to his darker impulses?

If he wasn't alone and without a coven, a possible outcast even among witches because of his unusual origins and power?

I'm pretty sure the answer is no, she would not. She would have dismissed him the same way she did his "Teen" persona. Agatha doesn't care about witches, Agatha cares about powerful witches –because that's who Agatha is and what drives her.

And we also got hints of this with Agatha and Wanda (hello consistent characterisation). In Schaeffer's words:

There is respect and almost affection inherent in [Agatha's interest in enormously powerful witchcraft], as indicated by how she felt about Wanda. She was mean to Wanda, but really she was fascinated by Wanda and admired her and wanted to hang out with her. 

And if this wasn't clear enough, what Agatha tells Billy shortly later about breaking the rules and being a true witch just screams projection (more on that in my next point).

I was delighted that Agatha really did bounce back from the attempted murder – but it's not because she's forgiving. Oh no, I think, Agatha was testing her theory by poking the bear (calculated move, bad at math) and she's glad she was proven right.

I mean, she not happy about the attempted murder but her curiosity wins out. You see her poking at Billy and trying to figure him out in the rest of this scene.

Agatha also hates self-righteous moralising and searches out for the darkness in people – delights in it even – because she knows people and she knows her own darkness.

Billy is different but also not so different from Agatha, as much as Billy or his mom would hate to admit.

Agatha is dealing with her childhood trauma

Yes, Agatha is projecting on Billy, but she makes a choice about it. We hear her telling him what she would have wanted someone to tell her: that they shouldn't be afraid or ashamed of who they are or what they did to survive, that they are part of a community.

Don't you dare feel guilty about your talent. ... That's what kept you alive. That's what makes you special. That's what makes you a witch.

She's trying to be the person she needed when she was a child, because she simply doesn't want someone else – particularly a younger witch – going through what she did.

She doesn't want anyone to go through what her mother put her through. And that's a choice.

Because there are a number of ways a character can deal with trauma: they can lash out and bring others down, wanting others to experience to the pain they went through, or they can realise that what happened to them shouldn't happen to anyone else in their position.

There's something beautifully self-serving but also selfless in that, because this is a way for Agatha to heal from her trauma. She can tell Billy things she may not be able to tell herself.

And it's interesting because as a self-serving villain, Agatha could just be jealous of Billy's power. But in this moment at least, Agatha's empathy and compassion – as buried as they usually are – prevail.

And yes, Agatha was fond of kid Billy

This is what Schaeffer touched on in her interview answer and it makes sense, with the insight that Agatha – like any good actor – does invest a bit of herself in every role she plays.

Agatha does have feelings (as much as they might make her vomit) and I do believe she has a soft spot when it comes to kids, given her experience with her son and her own childhood trauma. And that kids don't have the level of hypocrisy and darkness that adults do.

It makes sense that Agatha would have some level of care about the Scarlet Witch's magical kid Billy. And that is a fondness that has carried onto teenage Billy – who is powerful and a survivor and has a potential for darkness in a way she can relate to.

There are layers and they intersect and it all ties back to how Agatha is incredibly complex and yet consistent as a character.

[s-4pphics]

WHERES ALL THE ANGST!!!!!

i needed something injected into my veins rq yayyy i wrote this in like 5 mins so it’s ass no context I GOT THE LAST LINE FFROM A PROMPT LIST BUT I LOST IT I NEED TO FIND IT BUT I NEEDED TO CRRYYY SOMEONE MAKE ME CRY PLEASEPELASS

vi being a piece of shit and projecting onto her sneaky link bc she misses yet resents cait I MISS EMO VI SO BAD …. OHHH MY SHAYYLAAAA

—

“C-Can you kiss me slower?”

“… What?”

“I asked if you could kiss me slower.”

“I heard what you said. Why’d you say it.”

Your eyes remain shut for your own protection. You fucked up the second you opened your mouth for anything other than the acceptance of her tongue. Your fists ache from how hard they clench on her back. Vi sighs before dropping her hands from your cheeks and rising completely from the bed. Only when you hear her rummaging through her liquor boxes do you open your eyes.

The arrangement she set up for the both of you had very simple instructions. You walk her home from the rink whenever she’s too fucked up to function on her own, and she eats you out in repayment, but you don’t speak about anything. No goals, no aspirations, no past hook-ups, no trauma, no nothing. You just guide her home, get your brains fucked out, then leave while she cries into her pillow. You never have the courage to ask what breaks her every night. When you first met, you attempted to keep the conversation light and goofy with every intention of cheering up a seemingly struggling individual. You would’ve never approached her if you knew this would be the outcome.

Vi’s especially cruel when she’s intoxicated.

You don’t know much about her, but on a good day, she’s caring and protective. You’ve only ever seen blips of that gentle side whenever somebody at the bar or rink tries drunkenly touching you in places they shouldn’t, but your heart never forgot even though she has.

“I hate when you do shit like that.”

She speaks with such calm conviction. Your face burns in embarrassment while your heart pounds in anxiety. You hate when she calls you out on your sensitivity. You’re not sure what’s happened over the past month. Maybe distance really does make the heart grow fonder. To say you missed Vi was, secretly, an understatement. Her warmth comforted you in a way your blanket never could.

“Sorry.” You say meekly, already reaching for your pants off the floor.

“Are you actually? It’s your second time doin’ it.” Liquid sloshes and you know she’s drinking from the source.

“I said I’m sorry. The fuck do you want from me?”

She scoffs with a bandaged fist clenched around her bottle’s neck, “I made it clear the second I met you, didn’t I?”

A distraction. A temporary fix. A midnight companion until she got her shit together. You know you’ve fucking heard all of it.

“I hear you, okay? My fucking bad—“

“What the fuck did you think was gonna come from this? I’m actually curious!”

You scramble to redress with a lump in your throat, trying your hardest to dismiss the beration she throws at you.

“You know what’s crazy about people like you? After everything we go through down here, you’re still so fucking trusting. Couldn’t sense danger if it was starin’ you right in the face, huh?”

Where the fuck did you put your bag? “Do you have to be such a fucking asshol—“ Your sob chokes when you drop to your knees and snatch your satchel from underneath her bed. Despite how small her space is, the door feels miles away.

“Don't you get it? I’m not a fucking fanasty, I’m not gonna save you, we’re not gonna be together—“

“FUCK YOU!”

“Yeah, fuck you, too. Maybe you shouldn’t have put your trust in someone else so much—“

You slam the door before she can spill anything else.