#I am not responsible for regulating your emotions for you unless you are a child (children learn emotional regulation by you helping them)

[vampirebeverage]

That thing that people do when they hate that you use "big words"¹ because it makes them feel small, fragile, and insignificant, so they decide that you're doing it on purpose to make them feel that way rather than accept their own feelings of insecurity?

Bane of my autistic existence.

People have been doing that to me since I was a child. Adults did that to me when I was a child.

The sad part is that I don't consider myself to be of exceptional intelligence. I might be very slightly above the mean, I suppose? I know what actual intelligence looks like, and the people I consider to be exceptionally intelligent are like... particle physicists and rocket scientists.

If someone is made to feel insecure by ME of all people? Bit sad. I don't even work at CERN, bro. I'm not that clever. If I'm your idea of a smart person, that tells me how many actual smart people you have encountered (few).

¹ - These are just normal words like "incongruous" or "antithetical" that you can usually glean the meaning of from context clues, unless you have an immediate emotional reaction to seeing a word you don't know which causes you to become enraged for some fuckin' reason... idk man.

[jedi-enthusiast]

I am once again asking anti-Jedi people to get the fuck off my page--and yes, this poster was specifically anti-Jedi because they literally made a post about "sure the Jedi are better than the Sith, but anyone can be better than those and the Jedi are still evil/red flags/etc."

I have made it very clear through many of my posts and my fucking blog description that I don't tolerate anti-Jedi propaganda on my blog, but apparently I haven't been clear enough--so here's another:

KEEP YOUR FUCKING ANTI-JEDI BULLSHIT OFF MY FUCKING BLOG, EITHER POST IT ON YOUR OWN BLOG OR SHUT THE FUCK UP ON MINE

Is that clear enough for you assholes?

Now, first of all, on the post this was commented on I didn't even mention Athena Andreadis and I want to make it clear that 1. I've never even heard of this person and 2. I've never read this essay. I was just venting about how I can't talk about SW without some anti-Jedi jackasses popping in with comments on how "the Jedi were evil," but apparently now I can't even fucking complain about SW shit without anti-Jedi jackasses popping in their two-cents.

The irony.

Now, I've looked up several iterations of "Athena Andreadis strange horizons anti-Jedi essay" and I cannot find it--so I won't be picking apart the specific points made, since I can't find them, but I will be picking apart the general points here.

First of all, I have no idea how being anti-Jedi could possibly be seen as a "feminist" thing.

Like...there are plenty of female Jedi, most are viewed in-canon by other Jedi--both male and female--as good and wise (how fandom views them is out of my control), there are female Jedi in leadership positions, there are both modest and non-modest dressing Jedi and neither of them are viewed negatively for how they dress--nor do any Jedi comment on how they dress, they're diverse in both their looks and beliefs, as far as I'm aware there aren't any rules the Jedi follow that are specific to the women...

Like, I'm just not seeing how the Jedi Order is sexist or how it's feminist to be anti-Jedi.

Can singular characters be sexist? Yes, of course, obviously. But unless I'm remembering wrong, it's actually Anakin (y'know, the baby-murderer guy who's horrible at being a Jedi and turns into a fucking Sith Lord?) who's shown to be sexist in SW media. Other than his behavior, I don't really remember other Jedi being shown as sexist--someone feel free to correct me if I'm forgetting something, though.

Second, the Jedi also didn't want to join the war, but they had no better options.

It is made clear throughout the movies and TCW that the Jedi don't want to be generals in this war, Mace Windu even spells it out for Palpatine by saying "we are keepers of the peace, not soldiers" in AotC. However, in the end, they're forced to take up the role in order to work towards the greater good.

There's literally an entire episode in TCW where the "the Jedi should've just been pacifists and not fought" thing is addressed, and there have been many many posts made by many people about how the Jedi did the right thing and also about what might've happened if they didn't--I specifically recommend looking at @antianakin and @david-talks-sw's posts, if you want an actual in-depth response on those.

I'm not gonna regurgitate their points on this post, but I will pose you the same questions I did on the post this comment was under:

So the Jedi should've just stood by while Dooku conquered and enslaved the rest of the galaxy? That would've been better than them fighting to protect the people and planets Dooku was enslaving?

Finally, everything we're shown about the Jedi in-universe--and what we know of child development irl--shows that the Jedi's way of life isn't harmful, and is even helpful, in childhood development.

First of all, we're gonna dispel the myth that the Jedi teach emotional suppression--what they do teach is emotional regulation which, as others have pointed out, is something taught in therapy and is a good and healthy thing.

But guess what? You also teach emotional regulation to children at a very young age!

When your child is throwing a tantrum, screaming and breaking things, and just generally losing it because they're unhappy with something, what do you do? If you're a good parent, you-

1. help them calm down.

2. teach them how to work through their emotions in a healthy way for next time (taking deep breaths, counting to ten, walking off the anger, etc.).

and 3. talking with them about what made them upset and helping them understand why they were upset so they can avoid it or deal with it better next time.

All of that is emotional regulation. Parents all around the world teach it to their kids every day because it is healthy, and just because the Jedi need to emphasize teaching it more than most because Force-sensitives are susceptible to the Dark Side doesn't mean that it's any less healthy than regular people teaching it.

Secondly, the Jedi Order is a community and--like it or not--it's shown that children raised in a community setting are actually generally better off than children raised strictly in the nuclear family model because they have more support and access to a more diverse pool of opinions, beliefs, and people. All of which we see reflected in the Jedi Order--community support and teaching.

Anakin fell specifically because he didn't follow the Jedi's teachings, and even he was a fucking outlier. The Jedi that fell in the Prequels either fell because of the War (which was orchestrated by Palpatine) or because they were directly manipulated by Palpatine. Neither of those things had anything to do with Jedi teachings and all but one of the Jedi that fell were adults, again all of which except one that lived in the Order perfectly fine for years until Palpatine started doing shit.

Now that that's covered, I'm gonna make my own point.

All of you "the Jedi deserved their genocide crowd" people sound like fucking Nazis and fascists.

Everyone who's saying that "the Jedi were the real bad guys" have like 0 media literacy and obviously take issue with anything that isn't strictly following western ideals--and, frankly, I think you're all willfully being ignorant and stupid at this point.

When you're anti-Jedi, those are the people you're aligning with.

Now, it's none of my business what you believe or what you post on your own time, but keep it the fuck off my page.

This is my space.

Keep your shitty opinions to yours.

[ofthefog]

For the purposes of this discussion I think it is worth digging into exactly what informal hierarchies are.

You mentioned Family as an example, but this one seemed off to me based on my experiences. Of course it is heavily mediated through cultural differences. I grew up in a Catholic household. It was very explicit what the hierarchy was. The church was on top, then the father, then mother, then children based on gender then age.

And it wasn't something that you had to come up with on your own, it was explicitly taught.

In English there are the sayings like

JOY = Jesus Others Yourself, Honour your father and mother, children should be seen not heard, spare the rod spoil the child, etc.

So for a child who you go to to escalate a problem there is an explicit answer - you don't. It isn't a very functional system but it is explicit.

In that way, I think there are two spectrums - personal and impersonal, and explicit and implicit.

You went over the personal vs impersonal already. A family is highly personal, the participants all know each other over a long period of time. This is different than a government office for getting an ID or something. In between would be some school and church depending on the community. And then explicit is like no black people allowed signs vs you can't be strollers on a bus.

So if I were to point to an example of an informal hierarchy, I would point to a community enforcing norms. At worst it can be through shame or stochastic violence. It is more implicit, and less personal ( compared to family ). You may go up to your neighbor and talk about being gay or having an interracial relationship or being gender non conforming, but they might say "While I'm not against it, what will other people think?

There's no one other person you can point to as being the leader, though there are certainly a specific subset which would go so far as to do a lynching.

Though at the same time, informal disaster response often provides greater service than formal, government systems. On the ground, there is extensive collaboration between government response teams and informal systems during such scenarios.

It's not exactly something that you can separate in a vacuum, and is certainly not monocausal.

On the subject of bullying, I don't think that the cause has as much to do with hierarchy per se, but how violence is conceived of and used in a child's environment.

Corporeal punishment can be used in the family at home just as it can be used at a school. Laws differ between jurisdictions, but there are plenty of cases of both, neither, and either or existing in these two places in the real world.

In practice, children that are not beaten get into fights less. They have better emotional regulation, and speculate that comes out to less bullying. Does it impact emotional based bullying? I am less aware of the evidence for this, so I can't say.

But regardless of the place, the mechanism of bullying seems more based on physical things like being hit or having lead poisoning than the more abstract structures around the child.

In terms of fighting, say, white supremacism, I'm not really sure that adding a formal system is the real ticket here? I don't see there being a diversity training course in a corporation as an effective solution. Now it can be a good sign that the public generally deems this as a necessary problem to work on.

I'm sure we're all aware of hate crimes yet American police will still racially profile and enforce discriminately. Like, unless the formal system is doing something material to the effect of getting races to intermingle more, using the same mechanism behind cities being less racist, then it seems like it won't be doing much. So the lens of formal vs informal seems less applicable.

Somewhat related to that last post.

Relatable as I often find them, a big difference between anarchists and me is that I am much more scared of informal hierarchies than of formal hierarchies. And I have found that formal hierarchies being used in the fight against informal hierarchies is often helpful, EVEN IF the formal hierarchies themselves are bad for unrelated reasons.

A common rebuttal of this view is that informal hierarchies are often informed by formal hierarchies. For example, school children bullying each other is unsurprising because they are at school, i.e. subjected to extreme hierarchies, and the understandable frustration with that finds a pressure valve in the socially weakest classmate. Therefore, employing official school channels in the fight against bullying is counterproductive, because the school can only work through repression, which is the original problem and cannot be part of the solution.

But I just don't find this very convincing. Firstly, it does not reflect my own experiences, but also: The bullies are subject to other informal hierarchies as well, most notably the family. Even if it is true that hierarchy begets hierarchy (plausible but not overwhelmingly so), the informal hierarchies are still there every step of the way, they are not an epiphenomenon.

Formal hierarchies have their own pitfalls of course, navigating them can feel kafkaesque because they are so unhuman. But they are at least in principle understandable. There are official channels for appealing a decision. Someday, somewhere, someone will look at things levelheadedly, and they will be uninvolved and able to recognize an injustice. Good formal hierarchies try to induce these situations as often as possible. Formal hierarchies can also have democratic elements in order to determine what is an injustice.

In an informal hierarchy on the other hand, nobody is ever uninvolved. Calling out an injustice means putting your own comfortable position on the line. And the whims of the person with the most power are utterly unpredictable.

[momoliee]

It’s probably too early for The Meta No One Asked For That I’m Gonna Write Anyway about XQC, alas…here we go

Dr. Xie Qingcheng, 32, male, straight (so far), 180 cm with only one current family member.

Xqc is introduced as a cold, aloof and apathetic retired doctor who has no passions, cares about nothing except for his sister, and unless he’s angry, you can barely get an emotional response out of him.

Through meatbun’s character notes on how he has no favorite food, no favorite color or animal, no personal preferences outside what’s most practical and how he’s very very responsible and rules abiding and honest and sober and serious, and through he yu’s POV that continuously paints him as this heartless cold blooded person, I dare say we were…deceived by this so far shades of gray picture we had of him.

Xqc was born into a finically stable middle class family consisting of two cops for parents and a younger sister that came into the world 8 years after him. When he turned 13, and his sister was only 5 at that time, his parents were fired from their job due to a case they shouldn’t have been investigating going wrong, and they had to move to a rural area. Not long after that, he witnessed both his parents’ deaths and saw their corpses with his own eyes, the site was bloody and there’s no way it didn’t traumatize a pre-teen like him. He then was tasked with taking care of his sister, becoming a doctor despite not wanting to, owing others favors and spending all his money on smth that’s yet to be revealed instead of enjoying it. He got married, not to a woman he loves but to someone whom he thought of as “suitable and appropriate”, got cheated on and went through a divorce before losing full interest in the marriage life. He was finally able to retire (we don’t know why yet) and live a quiet, normal, boring life.

I believe xqc loved his parents, I believe he loved them so much cause in chapter 20, he mentions how he thought he wouldnt be able to live past the grief, he wouldn’t be able to go on or move forward, how the grief completely overtook him. He also mentions how he used to play with knots and handcuffs when he was a child, which shows how close he was to them. So for a child who had a good stable life with two loving parents to suddenly fall from a class to a class, suddenly lose both parents and see their corpses with his own eyes, that must’ve fucked him up big time. I’m talking “when can I fully register all of this” kind of fucked up. But he didn’t have time to fully absorb all of this, didnt have the time to sit down and cry, he had a sister, she was only 5, where will they get the money from? What were they gonna do? How was he going to continue school while caring for her? He didn’t have the time to sit down and grief, to sit down and adjust. For a child who had a normal life and didn’t have to worry much about the money like every other middle class kid, he was suddenly burdened with poverty AND loss, and duty and responsibility. Good bye to the days of playing with handcuffs and knots huh?

You ask me, why does xqc not have a favorite food? I answer you, because many many nights, he didn’t know what to feed his sister, much less himself. Cause I bet that many nights, he would have to give up his portion for Xie Xue, to make sure a kid like her is full. Cause he couldn’t afford to be picky, couldn’t afford to choose; whatever was edible will be eaten, taste and flavor be damned. He had to start working from a young age, balance school, babysitting and working all at once. The last friend he made (I think) was that Chen Man guy whose parents were friends with his parents, back when they were alive and life was good. He didn’t have time to make friends, or go out, or have a favorite color or visit the zoo and decide on a favorite animal. No, he had to study, and study hard to become more financially stable and support Xie Xue, he had to raise his baby sister and protect her, he had to work or else how will he put food on their table? Yet he never lost his soft kind heart, cause when his sister asked for a laptop, he bought her one just so that she wouldn’t feel less than any of the other children.

Xqc had to SURVIVE, he had to make do with what he had and what he didn’t have. He didn’t have time to sit down and cry or process his trauma, didn’t even have time to think of adolescent love or his youthful days or do what kids his age did. And all of that carried forward into his adult life. He pushed his emotions back so hard and had his practical, business like mind take care of everything in order to make it through the days. He started to believe that passionate emotions such as love and hate and lust and desire were all a waste of time, a distraction from his duties, smth that will rock the delicate balance he created with his everyday busy schedule. Emotions will stunt you, emotions will delay you, crying and not going to work today means no food to feed his hungry sister with. That’s when he started thinking, strong emotions are a DISEASE, they will take up your time, cloud your judgement, have you make reckless decisions that you’ll regret later. And he couldn’t afford any of that right? Strong emotions are for the weak, they put you in crutches and disable you from moving forward. Wasnt that what he told his ex wife? If he had submitted himself to his grief back then, where would his sister be? Where would he be? How could they have grown up to be healthy and successful adults?

So this man taught himself practicality and duty and priorities. He stopped thinking about himself, about what he wants and what he feels, and instead started making sure that those around him are happy and content and safe and well taken care of. He no longer had desires or passions, he only had rules and regulations. If a person lost their sense of taste, would they still want chocolates and burgers? Would they still have cravings and foods they’d rather swallow medicine than eat? No. If so, how will they decide on what to eat every day? They’ll simply start following a “perfect nutritional plan” and “balanced diet”. They’d eat what they have to eat, when they have to eat, and in the exact portion they need. To them eating would be another chore they have to do every day to keep their bodies going. Similarly, with xqc, graduating, working, marrying, taking care of his sister and auntie, these all became “tasks” and “chores” that he had to abide by and follow. They became the dietary plan for his life till he dies, the outline he shall follow, the textbook rules he will carry out, no need to think of what he “wants” or “desires”, what will make him “happy” or bring him “joy”. He no longer listened to his emotions when making decisions. Even when marrying his ex wife, he married her cause she was “a suitable match”, not for her looks or personality or anything. Feelings are life’s taste buds, and once you remove them, everything becomes tasteless and mundane, and practicality/logic takes over. He stopped knowing what it felt like to choose based on your preferences, cause he stopped having the luxury of choice ever since that night when he was 13, and he no longer was able to re-teach himself the meaning of free will and choice.

So when he yu, in chapter 20, asked him how he would’ve acted if Xie Xue had died, and he said, “I would’ve continued living as I am today till my last breath,” he wasn’t being “cold” or “heartless” or “indifferent” as he yu likes to say. He was being practical and methodical and thinking with a logical approach, rather than an emotional one, just the way he taught himself to throughout all these years. His almost 2 decades of pure survival mode and severely repressed feelings spoke in the form of autopilot. “I would do what I have to do, what I’ve always done every day of my life so far cause what choice do I have?” Is what he meant to say.

But I believe that he’s a soft hearted, kind and loving person. He never says no his sister, never says no to his auntie, helped that homeless man as best as he could, taught he yu that he was normal and that he wasn’t a monster, believed in treating his patients with words instead of medicine prescriptions, believed that the mentally ill deserve to live normally instead of being locked up. I believe that underneath all the shit he has buried, there’s a lot of passion and love that’s been kept dormant for 19 years.

In conclusion, idk where meatbun is gonna take his character but I genuinely hope he gets to heal, and start having more color and flavor in his life. Start allowing himself to live, not just survive.

[greatfay]

since ur answering asks and shit can u explain what u meant by generational differences in communication

Damn it’s like 2015 tumblr when my inbox used to be WET. So if you’re talking about the controversial opinions post, YES, like I totally understand where people are coming from when they say that generational divides aren’t real (because they aren’t, they’re arbitrary) and distract us from real problems and yes they paint past generations as collectively bigoted when Civil Rights protestors in the 60s (who are in their 70s and 80s now) are mirrors to BLM protestors today, who could be of any age, but the most vocal and famous (at least online, especially irt to the founders, like Patrisse Cullors who is 37.

But how we communicate is sooooo different. I really point to the Internet and Social Media as a major influence in how younger millennials (more Tom Hollands and less Seth Rogans—see even there, I feel like there are two different types of Millennials) and Gen Zrs/Zoomers and even Generation Alpha behave and communicate. We live in a world where we grew up either knowing right out the gate or discovering the hard way that what we say and do has permanence, the kind of permanence that prior generations have never experienced until today. The dumb things kids have been saying since forever can now follow them... forever. We have an inherent understanding of how online spaces work. Compare that to, idk, let’s say you posted on your Facebook (for the first time in 18 months) “All these big and bad grown ass Senators going after actual child Greta Gerwig lol ok, you’re so brave for attacking a CHILD over climate change” and then your aunt, who’s turning “forty-fifteen” in May replies to your post with “So happy to see my passionate niece! Much love from us, hope you’re doing well. Paul is doing great, waiting on his screening results. Tell your mom I said we miss her, we need to get together, we forgive her for last Christmas.”

Like... ok there’s a lot going on there, but your hypothetical aunt is oversharing on a publicly accessible post. And even with the most strict of privacy settings, she’s oversharing where your other Facebook friends (which may include classmates, coworkers, etc.) can see. But she’s saying things that would only be appropriate in a 1-on-1 conversation. This Aunt doesn’t have an understanding of such boundaries, she’s not as technologically literate and hasn’t grown up in a world of Virtual Space, she still gets most of her news from TV, she trusts what a reporter on Channel 4 will read off a script more than what actual video footage of an incident might reveal on Twitter, and she has no clue that she’s been sharing her location data with every post she makes.

There’s such a huge difference. I think it even affects how we experience and express stress and frustration. I think growing up partially in online spaces has made me more accustomed to conflict and consequence-free arguing than someone who never had to worry about that. I’ve been exposed so much to harassment and bullying, triangulating and echo chambers in forums and threads, and vastly opposing point of views at such an early age that it’s had an effect on how I see the world. Compare this to a customer I helped two weeks ago who was looking for a specific type of supplement for children. I found it for her, I handed her exactly what she was looking for, even though her description of the product actually matched several different products; to make sure I’d done my job thoroughly and that she leaves happy and satisfied and doesn’t bother me again, I then show her more products that match her description so that she knows she has options. And she proceeds to freak out, saying “NO, NO, I’M LOOKING FOR [X] AND IT HAS TO BE [XYZ]” and when I say freak out, she looked stressed and PANICKED. And being a retail employee wears you down bit by bit, and add COVID on top of it and little shit like this makes you snap, sometimes. So I have to cut her off like “Why are you screaming and freaking out, jfc you’re holding what you said you wanted. It’s in your hands. I gave you what you wanted, I’m just showing you more things.”

That customer is not an exception, she’s not a unique case. She’s representative of a frightening percentage of her generation, the kids who watched Grease and The Breakfast Club and Ghost in theaters when they were originally released. This is how they communicate and process information. She could not, for some reason, register that her need had been fulfilled, and defaulted to an extreme emotional response when given new and different information.

I’ve yet to deal with someone younger than 35 act the same way, the exceptions being the kids of very wealthy people at my new job who reek of privilege I gag when they walk in—but even they are like *shrugs* “ok whatever” and understanding when there’s something I can’t do for them.

Me: “sorry, we are totally out of that one in your size, but I can order it for you, it’s 2-3 day shipping at no cost to you and we ship it straight to your house”

A rich, white, attractive 22-year-old who’s had access to organic food, a rigorous dermatologist, and financial security since she was born: “mmm... sure, I’ll order it”

A 47-year-old of any socioeconomic background, of any race, in the same situation: “AHHHHHHHHHHH”

I just think it’s crazy how three generations of kids and young adults raised in a world where everything moves so much faster, where knowledge and entertainment and communication can be gathered so much faster, are often so much more polite and patient and understanding. Yesterday I told an older man (mid-50s) whose native tongue is the same as mine, as clearly and succinct as possible, that what he’s looking for is “in aisle 4.” He proceeded to repeat back, “Aisle 7?” four time before I dropped everything to show him what he needed in aisle 4, despite his insistence that he didn’t need me to walk him there. 4 and 7 sound nothing alike in English. There’s just something going on up there 🧠 that’s different.

Oh, other generational divides!!! We have different approaches to labor and working. Totally different! I’m a “young” millennial where I’m almost Gen Z, and I’ve noticed an awful trend among my demographic where people actually brag about working 90 hour work weeks. Or brag about how they skip breaks and live on-call to get the job done for “the hustle” like this “hustle, become a millionaire by 30″ culture that’s dominated these kids, idk where tf that came from. Like why are you proud of being a wage slave, getting taken advantage of by your millionaire/billionaire overlords. Compare this to my mother’s generation (she’s a borderline Genius X’er, she and her best friend were a year too young to watch Grease when it came out and had a random older woman buy tickets for her; she went to Prince concerts, took photos of him, then sold the photos on buttons at school, that’s her culture and teenage experience), where she’s insistent on her rights and entitlements as an employee, and these things she instilled me: “whatchu mean they didn’t schedule a break for you and you’re working 12 hrs today? oh no, you’re off, don’t answer your phone cuz you are NOT available!” There are Gen X’ers who entered the workforce at a time that America was drifting toward this corporate world, with more strictly defined regulations, roles, and understandings of labor rights (and also, let’s talk about how the 80s there was so much more attention on workplace harassment, misogyny and gender divides in wage gaps, etc. etc... not that much has changed, but at least it was talked about!). There are young people today who are taken advantage of because they aren’t as informed or don’t feel as secure and valuable enough to claim what belongs to them.

At the same time, those generations (Gen X and older) have a different viewpoint of hierarchies in the workplace and respect irt our direct supervisors. That’s how you get this blurring of boundaries between Work Life and one’s Personal Life that leads to common tropes in media written by their generations, where oh no! I’m having my boss over for dinner and the roast beef is still defrosting :O is such a “relatable thing” for them... meanwhile us younger generations are like I don’t even like that you know where I live, and if I see your 2017 Honda Civic pass my place one day, we’re going to have a problem. I think older generations have a different relationship with the word “Respect” than we do. Like, my grandma, who’s turning 87 (?) this year, and the other seniors in my area, they have a different concept of honor and an expectation of professional boundaries that I, and my mom and her generation, just don’t see (so then there’s something in common with Gen X’ers and the rest of us.) My dad grew up in a world where talking and acting like George Bailey and knocking on someone’s door with a big smile could get you a job, a job that could pay for college and rent no problem. My mom grew up in a world that demanded more prestige, where cover letters and references could get you into some cushy jobs if you’re persistent and ballsy enough. And I grew up in a world where potential employers literally don’t see your face when you apply unless they lurk on any social media profiles you have publicly available and they hold all the cards, and you need all those CVs and reference letters just to make minimum wage... so I feel like I am powerless in the face of such employers.

[crystalgirl259]

The Flame and the Dragon Ch17

Chapter 17: The Reason

"Would you hold still?!" Kai snapped, pulling the cloth soaked with medical herbs from the kitchen away.

"That stings!" Cole argued as he moved his clawed hand to cover the wound and prevent Kai from touching it but hissed every time his claws grazed the surface of the wound. Kai snorted feeling his blood boil in rage. He'd had to drag the man back to the castle and wake up some of the servants to get the things he needed. Then he had to drag Cole to the kitchen and force him to sit on the table. Shade all but exploded when the two entered the kitchen covered in leaves, dirt, and blood, all of which were scattered all over the room.

Then he practically buried Kai and Cole with questions when he saw the wound on the man's chest, despite Cole's insistence that it was only a scratch and that he was fine.

He only managed to free himself of the other noirette's badgering by pointing to Kai. The brunette was digging through the cabinets for anything he could use. Shade all but exploded. Now, Kai had to put up with the Dragon Lord acting like a child while he tried to remove his coat and the remains of his shirt to nurse his wounds. His already thinning patience was on the verge of snapping.

"If you'd hold still, and let me clean the damn thing, it wouldn't hurt as much!"

"If you hadn't run away, this never would've happened!" Cole yelled in a voice bitter with sarcasm before he deliberately scolded. "Do you have any idea how stupid that was? How much danger you were in! You were only lucky you were on your way back to the castle, or I wouldn't have been able to save you!" He shouted. Kai growled and threw down the washcloth.

"If you hadn't started blasting things and scaring me, I never would've left!" The teen countered, if for nothing more than to wipe the smirk off the man's face. "You scared the shit out of me!"

"You shouldn't have been in the West Wing in the first place! You were specifically told what it was, by several people I might add, and I never permitted you to enter my room! How would you feel if someone entered your room without permission? And don't lie to me because we both know you've would've reacted the same way!" Cole retorted. Kai felt his ego bruise at that comment and opened his mouth to protest but bit back the words and exhaled.

"You're right." He said with no emotion. Cole was stunned and clearly not expecting such a response.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I said you are right." He repeated in a more civil voice. He was tired of this blame game. "I shouldn't have gone into your room without your permission and I'm sorry." He said and his apology was sincere, but when he looked up again, his fierce eyes bore into Cole's. The dragon hybrid sat frozen by the intensity. "But I'm not the only one at fault here! You should learn to control your temper!" He scolded. Instantly, Cole opened his mouth to counter but immediately realized he had no answer.

He felt his pride deflate when he realized the boy was right. He had lost his temper, but he refused to take all the blame for this.

"I'm the only one with a temper or at fault here! You should learn to listen and do what you're told!"

"I already know that!" Kai snapped, collapsing into a chair. "I'm too impulsive; it's one of my faults but, to be honest, if you weren't always hiding maybe I wouldn't be so curious." He mumbled out loud, dumping more yarrow on the cloth. "I've been here almost a month and the only thing I know about you is that you have a temper, you're a control freak and you can throw energy."

"Haven't you ever heard 'curiosity killed the cat'?" Cole snorted but chuckled lightly.

"Yeah, I have." Kai chuckled. "As a kid, I always heard the story of Bluebeard; everyone always said it was supposed to show how curiosity only causes trouble." He chuckled then smiled. "But I always thought that if that were true and the girl obeyed her husband, he would've killed her anyway, and start the process all over again, but because of her curiosity, not only did she find out the truth, she and her brothers managed to kill the guy and save a lot of other girls from suffering the same fate." He burst out laughing at the memory.

Cole just stared as he listened intensely.

"No one could answer that one, not even Mom and Dad said curiosity was a double-edged sword; it helps us learn new things and make discoveries but if we let it get the better of us, we set ourselves up for trouble and I always let mine get the best of me."

"Obviously," Cole added before his voice took a stricter tone. "Next time you want to ease your curiosity, you should try asking."

"So if I asked you, you would have let me into your room even if it was for the sake of getting to know you better?" He asked with a raised eyebrow, his voice a mixture of sarcasm and teasing.

"Hell no!" Cole blurted out fiercely. He realized his mistake when the smirk on Kai's face widened. Again his pride was dented. "I see your point." He mumbled with as much dignity as he could muster.

"And you say I'm impulsive." Kai teased.

"You are." He countered, leaning closer to him. Since he was sitting at the table, their eyes were level with each other. "You're reckless, that's why you get into trouble and you never have the control to hold your tongue when the time calls for it, and you always put others or your pride before your own safety; there's a time and place when your own safety should be more important than defending your pride."

"Like in the woods, when that thing tried to kill you?" Kai asked as he raised an eyebrow in an accosting tone. "I don't care what happens to me if someone I care about is in danger! If I can help them I will!"

"You care about me?" Cole smirked and a blush painted Kai's face before he growled back.

"That's not the point!"

"I know what you meant." He chuckled as he shook his head with a small smile. "But I stand by what I told you before, if you keep focusing on everyone else's happiness and let your pride get the better of you, you'll never be happy." He said and the statement didn't anger Kai as much as it did the first time, but he still felt his irritation spike as a result. He opened his mouth to protest but Cole cut him off. "Everyone else who goes out of their way to try and make you happy will constantly worry about you because they know you'll always put everyone else before yourself." The hybrid said and any protest or angry words died in his throat.

He never looked at it that way before but it was as if the last piece of an extremely difficult puzzle had suddenly been put into place.

Nya had told him something similar before she and Lloyd had left. Everyone else in the palace had been sick with worry over him since he arrived, worse after his and Cole's fight. The teen put the medical supplies down and lowered his head.

"Why did you let me stay here?" He asked in a low voice, unsure if he wanted an answer.

"I don't understand." Cole blinked. Kai raised his head and glared at him.

"When I asked you to let me stay in Nya and Lloyd's place, why did you say yes? You said so yourself, I'm nothing but trouble?"

"I never said that." Cole corrected.

"That doesn't answer my question." Kai glared. Now it was Cole's turn to smile, a smile that curled at the corners.

"You really want to know why I let you stay here?" He asked and Kai nodded.

"Because you fascinated me the second I saw you." He replied and he raised his claws and spoke in a passionate, free-flowing voice as if he no longer had to keep something secret. Kai was clearly not expecting such an answer.

"What?"

"I'd never seen or met anyone like you; you found my castle all on your own, you were willing to sacrifice everything for your family and when you saw my true form for the first time, not only were you not afraid of me, you knew who I was! I didn't believe it when my staff called your arrival here a miracle, but everything about you astounded me." Cole paused for a moment, taking in the stunned expression on Kai's face. "Every time you saw me, you showed no fear and you refused to obey or respect me unless it was earned and you defy my every order; you countered every rule, regulation, or demand I made with one of your own and you had an answer for each one."

He paused for a moment and looked around the kitchen, not surprised to see the staff had left.

"You treat everyone in the castle-like people, where anyone else would've fled in terror, you let them pamper you even though you hate being waited on, you treat this place as if it were your home, and you put your own needs on hold for the sake of someone else." He sighed and Kai blinked again, but Cole was unsure if he was truly confused or if he disbelieved Cole meant what he was saying. "I agreed to keep you here for the reason that everything about you fascinates me from your beauty, intelligence, spirit, fiery temper, fierce independence, courage, heart... need I go on?" Cole smirked at the crimson blush spreading rapidly across Kai's face when he realized Cole was serious.

"I-I..."

"You're like a desert rose, Kai, something so unique and powerful that it can grow in the wildest of places." He smiled warmly. "You're like one giant puzzle and no matter how hard I try, I can't figure you out, but mark my words, I plan to." He promised. Kai just sat there for a moment, too stunned to speak. His mind was still trying to process what he was just told, completely ignoring the blush he knew was blazing across his face. When his mind finally put everything into perspective, he smiled a small smile and laughed.

"Funny, back home everyone but my siblings considered me everything from odd and peculiar to weird and bizarre for the way I am, and yet here, everyone seems to like me for that reason."

"Then those ignorant, backward fools need to get their asses out of the past and accept the end of aristocracy; I've been trapped in this castle for over a hundred years and I know full well things are much different." Cole laughed. Kai couldn't help but laugh in agreement. He flashed a small smile before turning back to the cloth soaked in yarrow medicine.

"Now hold still and let me finish cleaning this, it'll sting a bit." He warned before pressing the liquid-drenched cloth to the wound. Cole bit his lip, a hiss making his pain evident but he held still while the boy gently worked.

"Just a little longer, I promise." Kai comforted him, throwing away the dirty rag and grabbing another one. Once the wound was clean, he screwed the yarrow jar shut and took out a cotton-padded patch large enough to cover the entire wound. He grabbed one of the thick aloe leaves, cut it open, and squeezed the clear gelatin onto the patch before carefully spreading it all over. Cole watched patiently as he emptied the entire leaf until it curled.

Once that was done, Kai carefully lifted the patch from the bottom and pressed it to the wound.

Cole hissed, but this time, he only felt slight discomfort.

"Don't worry," Kai said, wiping off his hands. "It's aloe, it's more soothing than yarrow and it'll stop the itch and it's also a very powerful disinfectant." He explained, pressing his hand to the patch gently. "Now, I just need you to remove your coat so I can bandage it." He said and Cole shrugged the garment off his shoulders, revealing his entire upper body. Kai bit back a blush as the naked flesh was revealed to him. Kai quickly grabbed the bandages and carefully began wrapping them around Cole's waist.

"You're a good nurse," Cole commented, noticing how skilled the teen was.

"Thank you." He replied as he forced down another blush.

"Where'd you learn this, if you don't mind me asking?"

"My mom and dad taught me," Kai replied. "Our family was well known for their knowledge of herbs and since we traveled a lot when I was younger, we had to make sure we knew what to do in case one of us got hurt before we reached the next town or doctor, but most of the time, it was just me and Dad always teased me, saying that was why the yarrow stung; it was both a healer and a punishment for misbehaving."

"Sounds like the two of you were close."

"When I was little, he would always buy me the most beautiful and bizarre things wherever we went and he'd tell me stories about them." Kai smiled. "My favorites were always the ones about how our family descended from a powerful line of warriors from Japan."

"He sounds like a good man." Cole laughed. "My father was like that, he always told me our family was chosen by the legendary dragon to protect this kingdom from corruption and prejudice, and obviously, this castle's theme was modeled around that myth."

"I noticed," Kai replied as he tied the bandage tightly. Once he was finished, he frowned and turned away again. Cole looked concerned until he noticed another blush forming on the boy's cheeks. "Thank you, by the way." The teen finally spoke.

"Hmm?"

"Thank you, for saving me." He clarified. Now it was Cole's turn to blush, but he hid it by coughing in his hand.

"You're welcome, and thank you... for coming back." He added.

"I made a promise and I intend to keep it."

"Oh, is that all?" Cole replied, sounding a little disappointed.

"No, that's not all." Kai giggled a bit. "Honestly, I like it here; it's nice to be away from that town for a while and I'd feel bad if I left everyone without saying goodbye, and besides, I want to get to know you too." He added. Cole just smiled and gently ran his claws through Kai's hair before scooping him into his arms like a bride. The teenager yelped at the sudden movement.

"H-Hey! W-Wait a minute!" The teen protested.

"Don't think this means you're off the hook, you're still in big trouble for going in my room," Cole smirked and laughed. Kai snorted and crossed his arms. He hated being carried. The few staff members watching backed away as Cole flew through the hallway with his captive in his arms. The four creatures stood frozen, their eyes bulged and their mouths dropped in identical masks of shock.

"Um..." Jay mouthed, pointing to where the two men just were. "Did they just—"

"Uh-huh." Ronin nodded.

"And then they—" Tox continued.

"Yup." Echo finished. This was certainly an interesting turn of events...

[crimeronan]

i wanna hear more about your headcanon of declan as autistic (no pressure! only if u want to)

oh ariana we’re really in it now

not all of these bullet points are specifically related to autism bc this just turned into a post about how fond i am of declan.  however.  autistic declan lynch rights here we go

speech

declanisms

really, keeping a list of action-based conversation starters to meet your goals that all sound like something a caricature of a high-level business executive would say... honey

memorizing clever turns of phrase and the cadence of storytelling

and refusing to ever use this love of language in public lest it make him vulnerable or ruin anything he’s built

having practiced regulating his vocal tone and inflection to make them both as normal and as free of personality as possible

being unable to modulate his vocal tone and inflection when he’s Not actively concentrating on regulating them - speaking impulsively from a place of upset, getting excited about things, etc

physicality

having also practiced his physicality to appear as unthreatening and unobtrusive as possible

mirroring strangers, casual acquaintances, criminal associates

actively schooling himself not to talk with his hands; natural storytelling comes with gesturing and physical involvement

having pleasant conversations and being pleasant to exist around while managing to have absolutely no friends

anxious stomachaches

nervous tics

refusing to allow himself comfortable clothing or a comfortable living space despite seeming to want these things

deciding he can have nice shoes, as a treat (doesn’t have anything to do with neurodivergence i just think it’s cute)

internal emotions

Everything Is Horrible, All The Time, But That’s Fine Because That’s Just How Life Is For Me And I’ve Accepted It

deeply unhappy, deeply bored, deeply exhausted, deeply terrified

given up on dreams and ambitions because they will never be accessible to someone like him (one of those things that in-narrative isn’t autism-related, but sure can be a hashtag relatable feel)

happiness, excitement, joy, any positive emotions are all “dangerous” because they represent a loss of control

zero to one hundred IMMEDIATELY in terms of anger, manic excitement, terror, misery, self-flagellation

constantly self-regulating, compartmentalizing, putting aside, and refusing to act on emotions despite feeling Incredibly Deeply

anxiety

obsessing, catastrophizing, making contingency plans, exploring bad outcomes, regretting past actions literally every single second of every day

aforementioned physical anxiety manifestations

resigned to ronan and matthew’s eventual deaths even when things are Mostly Okay

convinced that if and when something happens to ronan or matthew, it will be his fault

none of these things are autism-related specifically, there’s just something in his repetitive thoughts / methods of self-soothing / ways of internalizing trauma that's..... a feeling

child development

one of those kids who would have been called “precocious”

had developed a system for watching/protecting ronan and trying to convince ronan not to dream things by age five

specific interests in things deemed uninteresting or unimportant

didn’t engage in the same play behavior most kids his age would

got overwhelmed and cried over liking a gift too much

consciously aware of niall’s disdain for him, aurora’s ephemeral nature, and ronan’s dangerousness to himself at age five

some of these things are definitely exacerbated or fully caused by a childhood of emotional neglect and endangerment; autism reading integrates with this rather than replacing it.  i strongly feel declan would still have been a “precocious” child with a healthy happy parental upbringing as well

sense of responsibility

extremely stressed by any situation he can’t control

will attempt to control situations beyond his jurisdiction to minimize this

studies so many parenting books after technically becoming ronan and matthew’s caretaker because he has no frame of reference for parenting and does not trust his instincts

“if you want something done right, do it yourself” a life motto by declan lynch

“everything is my fault, all the time” a life motto by declan lynch

“except when it’s dad’s or ronan’s fault” a pretty fair addendum by declan lynch

mental stimulation

so unbelievably bored with his life situation

THRILLED any time he gets to play games or engage in clever conversation - seen a little in his “crime makes me feel alive” vibes, his back-and-forth banter with jordan

won’t let himself get engaged in things because passion feels unsafe

enjoys himself for about one hour of one single night and then immediately starts cracking to pieces about how living in a constant state of mental dissatisfaction is killing him slowly

somehow manages to be surprised by this turn of events

interests

he hides art he loves in a murder attic like a feral cat who refuses to eat in front of people. i don’t even need to get into this

absolutely immediately enchanted to the point of self-labeled stupidity by watching jordan paint

infodumping about art history

trading art interests with jordan bc he’s legitimately interested and excited by what she knows and feels passionate about

this entire post should just be the murder attic. declan oh my fucking god

aforementioned collecting of language he likes

the whole tyrian purple thing.  again.  declan oh my fucking god

emotional intimacy

craves emotional intimacy but is TERRIFIED of being known and/or being rejected

is convinced he can never and will never have emotional intimacy in his life

has all the stamina of a wet tissue in terms of keeping his emotional secrets when jordan cottons onto them

gets annoyed by relationships with people who want emotional connection but continues playacting through the motions of said relationships in the hopes of being less lonely

comforting people / expressing genuine care

declan attempted to dispense comfort.  “everybody dies, matthew”

i have to put attempted to dispense comfort on the list again.  oh my god.  to declan’s brain, emotional comfort is a vending machine that’s eaten ten dollars in a row and is now falling on him after he made the mistake of shaking it

declan regretted saying anything.  [immediately says the worst thing possible]

write your routine, ronan. now. now. write it. write it down. (because i’m worried you’re going to kill yourself but have no idea how to say that so i have to focus on concrete action.)

every time he’s tried to say “i’m worried about you” and instead gone “why are you inconveniencing me this way.” king

having no sense of how to communicate feelings or solve emotional conflicts through talking despite attempting to do these things frequently, AFTER STUDYING OUT OF BOOKS, to his detriment

preferring to take care of people silently and subtly through protecting them and making things easier for them, extremely similarly to how ronan does

irritability

constantly in a low level fugue state of annoyance

runs on caffeine and fumes

very thin patience for anyone else’s inability to stick to plans, manage time, regulate emotion, do their jobs, follow through on commitments, etc

the unceasing “i’m not unhappy. i’m not unhappy. i’m not unhappy” while at work screams of “i am in sensory/emotional hell all the time and checking slightly out of this plane to deal”

loses control all at once, when he does lose control

drains energy like a broken cellphone battery from the effort of combating misery, anxiety, mental overload, boredom, masking all thoughts and feelings

bonus content: parents

the actual in-universe reasons for these things aren’t related to neurodivergence as far as we know, but

growing up as the unfavored child whose interests are constantly ignored or shut down 

seeing your siblings get preferential treatment for no reason

being silenced or punished every time you express dissatisfaction or unhappiness or anger

being considered disposable

internalizing the idea that you’re a burden unless you’re worth something to others

that’s a real common lived realty for autistic ppl

bonus content: brothers

i read all three lynch brothers as being on the spectrum and all having different experiences with it

i read matthew as having had the inverse experience of declan, in which he flaps and stims and chews loudly and talks a mile a minute and expresses himself with excitement and passion and bouncing

& he has Not been punished for it or made to feel like it should be hidden

declan’s ferocious protectiveness of matthew is in many ways bc he wants to keep matthew from suffering the same way he has

differing autism spectrum experiences fit neatly into that

ronan and declan’s experiences are in some ways wildly different

in other ways, though

going zero to one hundred on the emotional spectrum, defaulting to anger to avoid fully feeling internal chaos, being unable to understand the other’s feelings or thought processes / making wildly incorrect conclusions about them, preferring to show feelings through action rather than words, struggling to translate genuine emotion into expression without coming across as a dick

they are Very Similar

declan and ronan do a lot of “dog growls at its own reflection” about this because neither of them is more furious than when they see their own perceived shortcomings in the other

i’m positive i’ve forgotten some things and also positive i have not communicated all of these thoughts as effectively as i would like but i have been typing this post for a thousand years.  here you go

[eiriini]

Meta: Personality Analysis

Disclaimer: I, in no way, am a psychologist nor claim to be good at this. This is purely for fun, and for character growth. Also, this is based on the way I write Kamui/Corrin. Some of her personality is divergent from canon, due to past interactions in the four+ years I’ve written her. 

Edited: August 15th, 2020

Also this got even longer and I’m sorry.

Enneagram: Nine

Nines are accepting, trusting, and stable. They are usually creative, optimistic, and supportive, but can also be too willing to go along with others to keep the peace. They want everything to go smoothly and be without conflict, but they can also tend to be complacent, simplifying problems and minimizing anything upsetting. They typically have problems with inertia and stubbornness. At their Best: indomitable and all-embracing, they are able to bring people together and heal conflicts.

MTBI: ENFJ “The Protagonist.”

Protagonists are natural-born leaders, full of passion and charisma. Forming around two percent of the population, they are oftentimes our politicians, our coaches and our teachers, reaching out and inspiring others to achieve and to do good in the world. With a natural confidence that begets influence, Protagonists take a great deal of pride and joy in guiding others to work together to improve themselves and their community.

Four Temperaments: Sanguine

Your temperament is sanguine. The sanguine temperament is fundamentally spontaneous and pleasure-seeking; sanguine people are sociable and charismatic. They tend to enjoy social gatherings, making new friends and tend to be boisterous. They are usually quite creative and often daydream. However, some alone time is crucial for those of this temperament. Sanguine can also mean sensitive, compassionate and thoughtful. Sanguine personalities generally struggle with following tasks all the way through, are chronically late, and tend to be forgetful and sometimes a little sarcastic. Often, when they pursue a new hobby, they lose interest as soon as it ceases to be engaging or fun. They are very much people persons. They are talkative and not shy. Sanguines generally have an almost shameless nature, certain that what they are doing is right. They have no lack of confidence.

Moral Alignment: Chaotic Good, "Rebel"

A chaotic good character acts as his conscience directs him with little regard for what others expect of him. He makes his own way, but he's kind and benevolent. He believes in goodness and right but has little use for laws and regulations. He hates it when people try to intimidate others and tell them what to do. He follows his own moral compass, which, although good, may not agree with that of society.

Chaotic good is the best alignment you can be because it combines a good heart with a free spirit.

Chaotic good can be a dangerous alignment when it disrupts the order of society and punishes those who do well for themselves.

Astrology: Taurus

Strengths: Reliable, patient, practical, devoted, responsible, stable

Weaknesses: Stubborn, possessive, uncompromising

Taurus likes: Gardening, cooking, music, romance, high quality clothes, working with hands

Taurus dislikes: Sudden changes, complications, insecurity of any kind, synthetic fabrics

Practical and well-grounded, Taurus is the sign that harvests the fruits of labor. They feel the need to always be surrounded by love and beauty, turned to the material world, hedonism, and physical pleasures. People born with their Sun in Taurus are sensual and tactile, considering touch and taste the most important of all senses. Stable and conservative, this is one of the most reliable signs of the zodiac, ready to endure and stick to their choices until they reach the point of personal satisfaction.

Taurus is an Earth sign, just like Virgo and Capricorn, and has the ability to see things from a grounded, practical and realistic perspective. They find it easy to make money and stay on same projects for years, or until they are completed. What we often see as stubbornness can be interpreted as commitment, and their ability to complete tasks whatever it takes is uncanny. This makes them excellent employees, great long-term friends and partners, always being there for people they love. Earthly note makes them overprotective, conservative, or materialistic at times, with views of the world founded on their love of money and wealth.

The ruler of Taurus is Venus, the planet of love, attraction, beauty, satisfaction, creativity and gratitude. This tender nature will make Taurus an excellent cook, gardener, lover, and artist. They are loyal and don't like sudden changes, criticism or the chase of guilt people are often prone to, being somewhat dependable on other people and emotions they seem to be unable to let go of. Still, no matter their potential emotional challenge, these individuals have the ability to bring a practical voice of reason in any chaotic and unhealthy situation.

Taurus – the Wandering Bull Being the one who betrayed their best friend, goddess Hera herself, this is an unfortunate being that has to wander the Earth in order to find freedom. As if something was always poking them behind their back, reminding them of happiness that once was, stinging and pushing forwards, they close up in their own worlds, lonely and separated from their core. To find love, a Taurus has to travel the world, change perspective or make a shift in their entire belief system and their system of values.

Conclusion:

There are some contradictions in these results, but overall, it is her at a basic premise. She tends to be very strong with her foundations, doing whatever she can to keep by them. Most of the time, she will listen to what others have to say, for they can hold more wisdom than her. However, there are just some things that she won't change on. Her Nohrian family knows this the most, and there are some thing that they've tried to change about her. Especially Leo ( sorrcerii ).

When it comes to the vices, she holds those in as much as possible. The insecurity, the side of her that may be uncompromising -- her reaction to sudden change that isn't what she planned for. Things like that. As a tactician, she likes to be as many steps ahead of her enemy as possible. In mundane life, she tries to put that side of her away. But there's always going to be a part of her that takes notice of every little thing. She notices how someone reacts to a gift, a conversation, and logs it away. However, unlike the standard, she tends to be rather lenient. She's also like clay; she picks up on traits. For example: because of Jeanne's ( noircisaint ) influence, she has more of a backbone than the 'standard' Avatar. With Zero ( echoedfates ), more of her playfulness comes out. He’s shown her that it’s OK to be a bit of a prankster -- well, more than she was before -- and it’s OK to put the title away when it’s just them. That there’s a difference between ‘princess’, ‘general’, and ‘wife’. 

In her Type Moon verses, Makoto ( dekirukoto ) and Yi ( einhcrjars ) have taught her it’s OK to let her guard down. Especially while in Chaldea, and around them. That it’s OK to love, and even though it may hurt when they are returned to the throne, that things don’t have to stay at a standstill. That, hey, it’s OK to be you -- even more now than you were. 

However, that doesn't mean she'll bite the bullet on it's first fire, and will always try to resolve a conflict before it arrives. Her anger is one of a slow fire, unless you pour the right amount of gas. 

Kamui also holds in a lot more than most people. Even around those she calls her confidants and her retainers, she rather watch herself burn and suffer than those around her. She's very much a 'the world must be saved instead of myself'. Yet, over time, she's grown to understand that some people don't deserve it. Later on in the game, and depending on what route/verse, she will show some aggression to those who she deems deserves it. Which, as we know, is extremely small. ( Base game alone, Anankos, Hans, Garon, and Iago are the ones who get no special treatment from Kamui. And if she's acting nice, it's an act. ) 

There are times where she’ll return to a child-like state as well. There were many things that she didn’t get to experience, which lead her to have an imaginative mind and, at first, such a naive personality. Even during and after the war, she still retains it, since it’s so ingrained. It’s hard to ignore, hard to hide, but over time she comes to accept it. This is why she’s always reading; always wanting to learn; always wanting to experience what others have. A void can only be filled so much.

However, even though she may not seem it, she is rather intelligent. Because of lack of human contact outside of her retainers and teachers, she can come off as an 'airhead' or 'aloof'. Over time, that fades, and her true colors begin to shine more. She's able to find hoops she can jump through, but only will if the time seems right. Calculating outcomes begins to come second nature to her.

This is especially true when in Conquest, where she goes and knocks out almost all the Hoshidan soldiers she fights, just to put on a show for King Garon. In the end of that route, TECHNICALLY, she committed treason and blasphemy against Nohr. But thanks to Xander, she was absolved, and history wrote it to be that King Garon was dethrone on the basis of madness and insanity, dying in a battle in the Hoshidan capital.

And that’s it on this segment of, “Carrie adores Kamui too much, and has a problem.” Back to your regularly scheduled fluff! Thank you for reading this, and I’m sorry this turned out so long. asdfg

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 031: Just How Many Kids Am I Gonna Have to Adopt

Previously on BnHA: Bakugou went on a roaring rampage of revenge. The once-mighty class B ate some humble pie and got shut out of the finals. Tokoyami was the fucking MVP and kept Team Deku’s hopes alive at the last second. Todoroki used his Arm That Reminds Him of His Dad Who He Hates for a half second and had instant angst. He, Deku, Baku, and the mind control guy with purple hair advanced to the final round along with their teammates. Todo and Deku went off to have a private chitchat while their dads met up in a random hallway.

Today on BnHA: Todoroki thinks All Might is Deku’s dad (but is he wrong?). He then tells Deku all about his dad, who is terrible. And his childhood, which is also terrible. And his scar, which, you guessed it -- terrible. All Might and Endeavor have their own separate conversation during which Endeavor is, wait for it... terrible. Deku has no idea how to respond to any of this, so he affectionately declares war. Bakugou listens in on the whole thing because of course he does. I basically lose all of my shit and then some and I’m not gonna pretend like I didn’t.

(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I’ve read up through chapter 68 now, so any ETAs will reflect that. Although there is one ETA here that was written the day after I read the chapter and is noted as such.)

well hello there Todoroki! are you about to become my third adopted son from this series, because it’s getting a bit crowded tbh. but you’re all good boys, so. it’s hard to say no to you

finally some more info about this guy!

his mouth is relatively ill-mannered? I haven’t gotten that vibe from him

(ETA: and I still haven’t? like is he using the wrong kind of keigo or something and I just never noticed or what)

Todoroki’s burn scar: dot dot dot. except that this is one of the few things I think I might have accidentally spoiled myself for, because there was a gif making the rounds a while back that I happened to see accidentally. which is my own damn fault, and it’s not like it’s other people’s job to keep me from getting spoiled. if anything this taught me to take extra care now that I’m at the point where I know and recognize the majority of the cast, and am thus more potentially spoiler-literate than I was before

anyway

(ETA: haha so let me just explain here. I actually was not spoiled, but I thought I was. what happened was that I saw a gif of Todoroki lying on the ground and then his flames slowly ignited, starting from around his left eye right where his scar is, and then expanding to cover the scar. and I thought, oh, that must be what happened originally before he learned to control it! hence, burn scar! little did I know that was not the case at all and that the actual story was so. much. worse. omg. but the whole thing really set me up to be properly shocked, so.)

he apparently is another one who’s not immune to his own abilities! he has to use his left side to regulate the temperature changes from the right so he doesn’t give himself frostbite or anything like that

“if he uses his left side for too long”... yeah I’m pretty sure I did spoil myself there lmao. we’ll see, I guess

IZUKU: “you wanted to talk?” TODOROKI: [GLARES]

well this is off to a smashing good start

there goes Deku comparing everyone and everything to Kacchan once again! Todoroki apparently has “a much colder sort of intimidation”

“you overwhelmed me. so much that I broke my own pledge.” it’s kind of a stupid pledge, honestly, Todo

whoa hold up

did this kid just fucking put two and two together and actually come up with four

“I felt the same pressure coming from you.” hahaha! you don’t say! :’D

WOW he’s SO DAMN CLOSE

I’m pretty sure he’s not! he supposedly does have an actual bio dad somewhere out there, but we’ve never seen him and he doesn’t seem to be around! but!! aside from that, All Might did pass down his quirk and he has adopted him now, so! I’m gonna give him close to full marks for accuracy!

motherfucker, Deku is going off on some meandering rant of denial and it’s possibly the least convincing thing I’ve ever seen

lol Deku. at this point maybe just shut up

now he’s asking why Todoroki thought that. well I guess it must be because he himself is the son of a famous hero, right?

oh shit

yeah, come to think, it really does imply the existence of a “but” there, huh

now he’s telling Izu that his dad is Endeavor. would Izuku have already known that, what with the degree to which he tends to stalk his favorite heroes? the number two hero having a son his own age definitely seems like the type of factoid he would have made a note of

“all the more reason for me to crush you.” boys, no. :( why are all of my sons so antagonistic toward each other

cut to All Might and Endeavor!

All Might is being super nice so naturally Endeavor basically tells him to shove it!

hey, Endeavor! get fucked!!

DAMMIT ALL MIGHT STOP MAKING ME LOVE YOU EVEN MORE

he’s talking about how Todoroki (or “little Shouto” as he calls him... what was the Japanese equivalent? don’t tell me it was Shouto-chan) (ETA: nope, just the same -shounen suffix he uses for all of his kids) won the round even without using his left side, and says that “someone has been raising him well”

are you guys going to have a battle of who is the best dad

?! All Might is asking him for tips on how to dad?

All Might, maybe he’s not the best guy to ask? unless you’re going for a “how to make your son hate your guts” thing here

oh. whoa. hold the fuck up

[PULLS THE CAR AROUND!!] I’VE MADE UP MY MIND, SHOUTO, YOU’RE ADOPTED. HERE, YOU CAN PUT ALL YOUR THINGS IN THE TRUNK, AND I’VE BROUGHT YOU A TEDDY BEAR. TAKE IT EASY, KID, EVERYTHING’S GOING TO BE ALL RIGHT

ENDEAVOR YOU ARE ALSO CANCELLED. I’M SERVING YOU PAPERS. BY THE WAY, I HATE THAT STUPID MUSTACHE

All Might is all, “wut”

lmao I just realized he basically went up to Endeavor and was like “can you give me some advice” and Endeavor’s response was basically, “FUCK YOU!! NO!!! I HATE YOU!! ALSO!!!! MY SON WILL BE BETTER THAN YOU AND THAT’S THE ONLY REASON I HAVE A SON IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!”

and he said all of this while being, just... on fire. just all over the fucking place

what a weird conversation, is my point

he says Todoroki is a “rebellious little brat”, but that he’ll make him surpass All Might

wowwwwwwwwwww. CANCELLED. SO FUCKING CANCELLED

back to Shouto! Shouto we’re on a first name basis now

his dad basically embodies the worst of all this pro hero crap. the complete antithesis of All Might

All Might. bud, hold up. we need to sit down and discuss. there are three of them now, All Might. we need to do everything we can to make sure that none of these impressionable young kids ends up going down the wrong path and ending up like this salty fuck. I apologize for my language, All Might, but this is serious stuff. I know Katsuki is pretty rambunctious, but he has a good heart underneath it all, I’m sure of it. Deku is a good influence on him. now, I don’t know what kind of emotional damage this new one has been dealt, but he seems all right so far, so we just need to make sure he stays on track and makes some good friends, and is doing all this because he wants to be, and not because his POS father tells him it’s what he’s supposed to do

-- oh sorry guys I went off track there

so anyway, Shouto is telling Deku all about his horrible dad who wanted to be better than All Might but wasn’t better than All Might (AND HE COULD NEVER!!!!)

so he “came up with another plan.” oh honey ;_;

Deku apparently doesn’t have any idea why Shouto is telling him all this, because he’s still relatively new to this shounen protagonist stuff, and it’s his first tragic backstory. hush and just listen for a sec, Deku

“quirk marriages” fucking shit we’re really getting into fucking eugenics now. that got real heavy real fast

so basically Shouto’s dad forced his mom’s family to agree to marry their daughter to him. WOW. WOW

now Deku has shut up and looks properly horrified

I’m glad he understands that his father is a total piece of shit, though. like, good. good fucking show, Shouto, you keep it up

“as I remember it, mom was always crying...” ;_;

-- WHAT

WHAT.

DEKU. YOU AND ME ARE TWO OF A KIND HERE

FUCKING WHAT. SO YOU’RE TELLING ME BOTH PARENTS WERE ABUSIVE. DAD IS A NARCISSISTIC ASSHOLE WHILE MOM TOOK HER OWN HORRIFICALLY SHITTY SITUATION OUT ON HER FUCKING CHILD, WHICH IS NOT FUCKING OKAY NO MATTER WHAT THE CIRCUMSTANCES, AND ABUSED HIM EMOTIONALLY AND PHYSICALLY. HOLY FUCKING SHIT

I APPARENTLY WAS NOT, IN FACT, SPOILED BY THAT GIF, THANK GOODNESS

YEAH THIS CAME TOTALLY OUT OF LEFT FUCKING FIELD FOR ME TBH

SHIT

poor Deku really does look so shaken up all of a sudden. like, he has the best mom in the world, who loves him so much even without him having a quirk (as far as she knows). and then along comes this cool kid who seems to have it all, but in fact his home life was horrific and abusive, and he just came up and told Deku all of this out of the blue lol, and I say lol, but I’m not actually lol, you guys, I’m so not lol

okay. okay, dude, I get it. but! I still think that if you were to go ahead and use it, it would still be fine, because in the end you are not him, you’re not his tool, you are you, and you can go ahead and be as incredible of a hero as you want, and it’ll be in spite of Endeavor and certainly not because of him

(ETA: this is basically exactly what Deku ended up telling him. only I bet you I could have done it without dramatically ripping every fucking limb in my body to shreds. but hey, you know, shounens gonna shounen)

does U.A. have counseling. aside from All Might, who to be fair does try his best. but like, real counseling

because if not, they should. have counseling

-- !!!!!!!!!!!!

[AUDIBLE GASPING SOUNDS, I LITERALLY GASPED IN REAL LIFE???!!!!]

KATSUKI OH MY GOD. SURE, GET IN ON THIS. OF COURSE YOU WERE LISTENING, NO FUCKING WAY DEKU AND TODOROKI GO OFF ON THEIR OWN AND YOU DON’T NOTICE AND SLINK OFF TO FOLLOW THEM AND EAVESDROP. BUT I BET YOU WEREN’T EXPECTING THAT, WERE YOU

ARE YOU HAVING FEELINGS OF EMPATHY?? I HOPE TO GOD THIS IS HELPING YOU WITH YOUR EMPATHY MY ANGRY SON

LESSON ONE: DON’T BE LIKE ENDEAVOR!!

LESSON TWO: JUST BECAUSE YOU’RE COOL AND STRONG AND POWERFUL DOESN’T MEAN YOUR LIFE IS AUTOMATICALLY GONNA BE GREAT

LESSON THREE: I’M JUST CURIOUS, WERE YOU LISTENING IN ON THE “IS ALL MIGHT YOUR DAD” PART OF IT TOO?????

OH MY GOD

[shaking out hands to dispel all of my crazy excited nervous energy] oh my god. deep breath. okay

s-sigh. okay, Deku. now you have to say something, okay? don’t think about it too much, just. say something back to him, dude

oh shit Shouto’s walking off now. DEKU YOU DIDN’T SAY ANYTHING!!!!

also!! Shouto mentioned the All Might connection again, so even if Katsuki hadn’t heard him the first time, he definitely heard him now

ugh I’m SO FUCKING DYING TO KNOW just how much Kacchan has actually put together when it comes to the “Deku received his powers from All Might” thing and it drives me fucking crazy and I’m pretty sure I’m not going to get answers any fucking time soon. this manga has been good to me so far, but not that good

(ETA: this is a next day ETA! like, just to be clear, I haven’t read any additional chapters yet. but I was thinking on this some more, and basically I’ve come to the conclusion that Katsuki must know. the thing is, I keep forgetting just how insanely thorough Horikoshi is when it comes to his attention to detail. and I just can’t see him going out of his way to show Katsuki within earshot of a conversation like this, twice (here and on the bus to USJ), and not have that lead up to anything. yes, Katsuki has shown himself to be fairly oblivious to a lot of the goings-on surrounding him if it doesn’t involve him directly. but we’ve also seen that he absolutely does pay attention if the matter involves Deku. and he showed during the fight with Kurogiri and the rest that he’s definitely clever enough to pick up on subtle clues and connect the dots. and the thing is, the thing with Deku getting his power from All Might is not subtle at all. it’s the most obvious fucking thing ever, so obvious that two of Deku’s other classmates have come close to figuring it all out even without any hints. and neither of them had Deku literally come up to them and say “I got my quirk from someone else, but I can’t say from who.” yeah, Bakugou didn’t seem to understand it at the time. but he’s had time to process it since, and I just can’t see any way he wouldn’t have made the connection by now. so until we’re shown otherwise, I’m going to operate under this assumption from now on.)

(ETA 2: as of chapter 68, this is still up in the air! so I stand by it! I’m putting it out there!)

-- DEKU IS SAYING SOMETHING!!!! DEKUUUUU

and he says he’ll repay everyone who helped him by becoming the best

“let me return your declaration of war with my own.” awww. “declaration of war” isn’t really the best description for it lol. not when it’s being done like this

;_;

a healing shounen bond of determination is born

meanwhile Kacchan’s still listening in but doesn’t say anything. last time he got upset because they were having a rivalry without him. I wonder if he’s gonna let them have this thing for themselves this time around

don’t worry Kacchan, no matter what happens you’ll always be Deku’s number one rival. seriously, no matter how many other people he goes around declaring war on, you’re the one that fucking inspires him and lights that crazy fire in him and spurs him on to do crazy things and be amazing. you and All Might. but he’s not in love with All Might

lunch break is over. I wonder if they ever got to eat lunch

lol I’m so checked out of the sports festival now. I just want these three to go get ice cream together and chill

apparently they prepared some sort of “recreational activity” for the kids that didn’t end up making it to the final

um. what

I’m hovering my hand over the “cancel” button once again, people. don’t make me do it

[REPEATEDLY SLAMS CANCEL BUTTON FURIOUSLY!!!!!]

...okay, we’re back to the actual plot now

YESSSS THIS IS WHAT I FUCKING HOPED FOR THE MOSTTT

I mean come on, you can’t have a fucking shounen tournament arc without a fucking tournament

wait a sec. I’m looking at these individual panels, and the only conclusion I can draw is that Aoyama and Ojiro were somehow on the purple haired guy’s team this entire time and I didn’t realize it?? how’d he manage that? (mind control. obviously.)

quick bold predictions: MY GIRL OCHAKO TAKES IT ALL. LET’S GOOOOOO

more seriously, Deku and Todoroki will obviously have to fight each other, most likely in the final. so Bakugou is probably out in the semi or quarterfinals. although I can’t picture him going up against Deku again this soon, and if the finale is going to be Deku and Shouto, having Baku fight Shouto first kind of takes away from that, I feel? so maybe he won’t make it to the semifinals either. in which case probably the purple haired guy will, along with... MY GIRL OCHAKO. DID YOU NOT HEAR ME EARLIER. LET’S DO THIS. PLEASE. SOB

(ETA: honestly this tournament ended up surprising me at every turn. what a fucking ride)

BONUS:

STEEL RYOHEI!

Tetsutetsu is actually a pretty easy name to remember, but I just like calling him Steel Ryohei so much because I feel like it’s so fucking accurate

this guy really likes spinach

[p-artsypants]

Nine Lives (1- The Plan)

When Adrien Agreste is scheduled to go to a Military School in Germany, Chat Noir must make a critical decision. Does he give up his Miraculous? Or does he give up his life as Adrien? I'll save you the trouble of guessing, he gives up being Adrien.

Full disclosure, I’ve been planning this in my head for a few years now, but I just wanted to write other stuff first. But now, I’ve fallen back into Miraculous Ladybug hell, and I had to get this out. I have no update schedule. But I hope you all enjoy!

FF.net | Ao3

—

Finally, it was done. All his planning, all his underhanded dealings. It was all worth it. Now he'd live in peace. That is, after he died.

It was complicated.

Adrien Agreste was planning something big.

It all started when he came home from a late night photoshoot two weeks ago. As soon as he walked in the door, his father was standing on top of the stairs, staring at him.

"My office. Now."

His father never even said his name. He knew this had to be bad.

It turned out to be even worse.

The chairs in the office were uncomfortable, and hard. His father looked at his computer and files on his desk, anywhere to avoid eye contact.

Finally, he looked up briefly. "You're moving to Germany.” He stated.

These words were French, yet they might have been Swahli, because all comprehension flew from Adrien’s head.

“What?”

“You heard me,” said Gabriel, heartlessly. “Germany.”

“G-Ge-Germany?!” Adrien stuttered.

"Don't stutter, boy. It makes you look foolish."

"But—Germany!”

"That's what I said."

"But why?"

“There is a very prestigious school in Tannenwalde. If you insist on going to school, I’ll have to ask you to attend on my terms.” Gabriel stood, his hands behind his back, and paced over to the windows. “I only want what’s best for you, after all.”  

"I think...it's a lousy idea.” Adrien crossed his arms. Though it was an act of rebellion, it sounded weak in his ears.  

Mr. Agreste met his eyes, a look of intense focus on his face. "Listen here, boy."

Oh no, here we go.

"You have no right to speak to me like that! I am your father and you will do as I say! I own you!”

Adrien didn’t like the use of the word ‘own.’ Was he a slave? A pet? Or a trophy?

He winced. “Did you even think about how I'd feel?”

“Yes, but you’ll get over it.”

“Not likely! This is my future!”

“Watch your tone.” His father glared. “And I know it’s your future, that’s why I took it into my own hands. You’re only 17 years old. You’re still a child, just learning how to walk. You can’t possibly make these kinds of decisions on your own.”

“I wasn’t planning on it! Father—Germany?!”

“Yes, Adrien! How many times must you make me repeat it?”

Adrien stood and paced. “This is just unreal…I don’t…I’m only 17! I can’t live that far away from everyone! This is the only place I’ve ever known.”

“Your bodyguard will be going with you.”

Stellar.

“And it’s only a day’s drive, it’s not that far.”

It is when there’s an akuma attack, he thought bitterly. “Why?”

“I already said, there’s a prestigious school—…”

Adrien cut him off. “But why now? Why not when I started school? Why do you have to do this to me?”

“Paris is too dangerous for you. What with all this superhero nonsense.”

Adrien slouched in his seat. “Isn’t it dangerous everywhere? Why not just keep me home, where you know I’m protected?”

“Oh, did I not mention? Saint Erhard’s is a Military school. Highly regulated dorms, schedules planned out to the minute, maximum security. I know you’ll be fine.”

Adrien’s mouth fell open. “You’re joking, right? I can’t believe this. This is completely unfair!”

Gabriel looked away from him, and returned to his desk. “Life is unfair. It’s nothing you won’t get used to. It’s a lot more fair if you respect my wishes and listen to what I have to say.”

Adrien shook his head, his body filled with rebellion. “I won’t do it.”

Gabriel glanced at him, quirked an eyebrow and frowned. “You will. You’re enrolled and set to begin at the next trimester. You have no choice. I know what I’m doing. End of discussion. You are dismissed.”

“Discussion?! More like commandment! Please don’t make me do this!”

“Adrien, you are dismissed.” His father raised his voice. Then he turned back to his computer without another word.

The teen, more angry then he had ever been in his life, stomped to the door. Before he left, he threw, “I hate you,” over his shoulder, and then slammed the door.

Adrien was fuming, surely there was smoke coming out of his ears.

Plagg zipped out of his jacket and whizzed in front of his face.

“Germany! Why that man is a monster! German cheese is vastly inferior to French!”

Adrien snatched the cat out of the air, a bit forcefully. “Not now Plagg!”

When he reached his room the threw open the door, slammed it behind him, dropped Plagg, drop kicked his backpack, and slammed face first onto his bed, where he laid silently for many moments.

The black cat came an nestled next to the boy, a small paw playing with a tendril of hair. “I’m sorry for joking. I’m not good at taking things seriously.”

Adrien didn’t answer.

“Please say something Adrien, these are the emotions that get someone possessed by an akuma. If you get taken, who will help Ladybug? Surely, you wouldn’t make her fight you, would you?”

That got a response. The teen turned his face to his Kwami. “Plagg…what am I going to do? It’s easy being Chat Noir when my dad ignores me. But Germany? I’ll never be able to help Ladybug! Forget Hawkmoth, I’ll never have a minute to myself! This is a mess!” He buried his face back in his pillow. “I want to die.”

Plagg sighed. “C’mon. You don’t want to die. You can’t help Ladybug if you’re dead. And…would you really make me find someone else to be Chat Noir? Some poor boy that can’t afford Camembert more then once a month? You’d do that to me?”

Adrien could tell the Cat would actually miss him if he was gone, and he was trying to convey that, in his own way.

“Well, I don’t wish I was dead. I wish Adrien was dead.”

“How would you manage that? You can’t kill one without the other…unless you faked it.”

Adrien had to hand it to Plagg. Sometimes his wisdom of a thousand years really showed. “Fake it, huh?”

The kwami stared at him, wide-eyed. “Now, don’t do anything rash. You know your father sometimes changes his mind.”

“Yeah, like the amount of times he’s pulled me out of school, because he changed his mind. Fencing, piano, Chinese, modeling…those were all his ideas. He made me do all of those, despite the fact I didn’t want to.”  

Plagg was quiet for a moment, thinking. “So what are you going to do?”

Adrien was getting angry again, and had to take a calming breath. “God, I wish there was someone I could talk to about this.”

“What about Ladybug?”

That much was obvious. It just took some prompting to get to. With only a nod, Adrien uttered ‘Claws Out,’ and Chat Noir was off into the night.

It wasn’t a patrol night, so Chat just had to roam around and hope for the best. He withdrew his baton, and called his Lady.

Miraculously, she answered. “Chat? Is everything okay?”

“Um…not really. Like, Paris is fine, but I’m not. Can we talk? Like, face to face?”

Her soothing hum came from the line, “Of course, Chaton.”

The city was peaceful, but ever bustling. The lights glittered in the cool autumn mist, and the sounds were drowned out in the height of the Eiffel Tower. Chat had arrived first, but was only alone for a moment before Ladybug arrived.

“Hey,” she greeted softly.

“Hi,” he returned.

She hurried her steps to him and enveloped him in a comforting hug. Whatever was wrong, she would do her best to fix it.

“So,” she began, after many moments of silence. “What’s wrong Chat?”

Chat pulled away from her to sit, his knees up and rested his arms on them, folding his hands in front of his face. “My lady…would you be able to fight without me?”

“No.” She didn’t even hesitate. “You have always saved my butt, and swooped in in the nick of time. I just…I know I wouldn’t be able to do this without you. Why would you ask such a thing?”

Chat took a shuttering breath. “My father wants to send me away. Countries away.”

Ladybug’s eye brows rose. “I—…” She didn’t know what to say.

“I don’t want to go. Some of my friends I could keep in contact with, but you…my best friend…” His brows knotted together. “I don’t know what to do,” he whispered.

Ladybug had never seen her partner so lost. Her heart went out to him. “Oh kitty…” She rested her head on his shoulder, and wrapped her arms around him. She felt him press a soft kiss to her head as he leaned into her embrace. “I don’t know what to do either…” She bit her lip. “I’m…I’m still a kid, there’s so much I don’t know…did you talk to your kwami?”

He hummed. “Plagg…helped me come up with pretty extreme solution.”

“And that is?”

Chat hesitated. “For the sake of my secret identity, I probably shouldn’t tell you.”

She nodded in understanding, as she thought, “God, I don’t want you to have to give up being Chat. You’re my partner, I trust you with my life.”

“As I trust mine with you.” He admitted. “And my heart.”

She scratched the back of his head with affection and then asked. “Have you met Master Fu?”

“Oh!” He shouted, nearly forgetting. Chat sighed with relief. Having a real human adult on their side really made him feel like there was a security net underneath them for this exact scenario. “Yes, but…I don’t know how to get in contact with him.”

“I’ll reach out to him for you.”

“Thank you, My Lady.” Chat said sincerely.

Ladybug smiled back, “and if there’s anything else you need, you just let me know. Okay? Chat Noir comes first, and that includes who you are under the mask.”

Feeling a bit more relieved, Chat sat up straighter and managed a genuine smile. “Thank you Ladybug, I knew you’d be able to help.”

—

The next day, Adrien came home from school. He hadn’t had the courage to tell any of his friends that he would be leaving soon, in one way or another. So he acted as normal as possible, and as far as he could tell, no one suspected a thing.

“Your Chinese Instructor is sending a substitute again today,” Nathalie explained. “Mr. Chang, if you remember him.”

Adrien smiled. Ladybug worked fast! “Oh, okay, Nathalie! He was really good, and I liked him.”

The secretary offered a twitch of a smile and went about her business.

Master Fu arrived within the hour, bowing respectfully to Adrien. “It is good to see you again,” he said in Chinese.

“It’s nice to see you too.” Adrien responded in kind.

Satisfied, Nathalie closed the door and left them alone.

“So, Ladybug said you needed to speak with me.”

Adrien invited him over to the couch and sat heavily. “Yeah, I have…a pretty big problem.”

“Regarding the Miraculous?”

“Well, sort of. It effects it.”

Fu nodded, urging him to continue.

“My father wants to send me to a Military school in Germany. 24 hour surveillance, and even if I was able to get away, it would take hours to get here to fight an akuma.”

“Well, I suppose I’ll just have to find a new Chat Noir.” Fu said easily, stroking his beard.

Adrien winced, clenching his fists.

Plagg looked to Fu with sadness, and then anger. “That’s it!? You’d just replace him!? That’s not why he called you here! If you take that ring…I’ll— I’ll—“ He frowned, knowing that he couldn’t do anything.

“Now we know that Plagg is willing to do what it takes, are you Adrien?”

The question stunned Adrien, as he hunched in on himself. “I…” There was real, true conflict in his eyes. “Chat Noir is the only freedom I’ve ever had. And now that I’ve had it, I can’t go back. It…it would destroy me.” He nodded once to himself, steeling his resolve. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Even if it means hurting those you love?”

With still great hesitation, he nodded. “Yeah…”

Fu smiled wisely. “You would not be the first Miraculous holder to seek a new identity. I myself had to do it once before. Whether they were compromised by public knowledge, or they wanted to invest full time in being a hero, the reasons vary, but the process changes little. Though in this modern world, we will have to take new steps. Are you 100% committed to this?”

“I just have a few concerns…”

“And they would be?”

“If I were to run away, my father would hire PIs to find me. He will not stop until he finds me.”

“So we make it that he won’t look for you.”

Adrien’s understanding grin was wavering. “You mean…fake my death?”

“It is the most drastic, but obvious solution. But you are a celebrity, with a very rich and powerful father. Drastic means to an end.”

“I figured.”

“When are you being shipped out?”

“My father said I’m starting next trimester…which is only in a few weeks.”

“Then we better work quickly. I will set up a private bank account for you and make up a Birth Certificate. Since you are younger than 18, I’ll will be your legal guardian. It only makes sense, right?”

Adrien could only nod, a lump in his throat.

“You can stay with me until you are ready to go out on your own. I don’t have much room, but it’ll be a safe place to go. I also don’t have a lot of money, so don’t expect me to pay for university.”

“My father gives me a pretty good allowance in my personal bank account. He hardly checks the balance either, so I can funnel it into the new account.”

“If it is your own personal account, that will work, I think. I will need you to create a private email address so that I can contact you with the details. Are you following me?”

“Yes sir.”

“Alright, your new surname will be Fu, same as mine. But you get to pick your first name, whatever you desire.”

Adrien thought a moment. “Emile. Emile Fu.”

[responsiveparenting]

In the past, I found it was almost impossible to keep my own nervous system regulated, while my child’s was not. Since learning more about my nervous system and how it reacts to stressors, I’ve been able to change that! Unless I am stressed about something else (hello emotional capacity!) I find it easy to stay calm while they are dysregulated. I can empathize and share my calm without feeling the urge to stop them from releasing their feelings. I can hold space for so much longer than I was able to in the past. If you are struggling with your child’s emotions or your own, I really encourage you to learn more about how our nervous system reacts to stressors. We spend our childhoods being taught not to listen to our nervous system, to ignore it, so it takes time to connect our mind with our body again. Learn more about this in my latest E 📖 Finding Your Calm: A Responsive Parents Guide to Self-Regulation and Co-Regulation Link in bio @responsive_parenting or on the Website: responsiveparentinginspirations.com #ResponsiveParenting #JMilburn #ParentMentalHealth #MaternalMentalHealth #PostPartum #MensMentalHealth #ParentingLife #HealingJourney #GentleParenting #AttachmentParenting #Attachment #AttachmentTheory #Parenthood #SelfHealing #SelfCompassion #EarlyChildhood #ChildDevelopment #PTSD #CPTSD #ChildhoodMemories #Triggers #HoldingSpace #SelfRegulation #Empathy #UnconditionalLove #Parent #KidLife #AlwaysLearning #PTSDAwareness https://www.instagram.com/p/CfFibtdrmES/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[scoundrels-in-love]

For the OC ask game: 3, 10, 11, 18, 21, 36, 42 and 45. You can answer about any OC, but you know I love my boy Awan.

This only took me like a week or more. I’m so sorry. I am going to answer this for your boy Awan + Another OC in shorter way, if I have someone that this question applies to vividly.

Under cut cause long af.

Ask me OC asks 1 or 2? (But specify which one, if you do? :D)

3. What is/was your character’s relationship with their father like?Awan has no complaints, really. His parents were busy and out of house, even village, for most of the time, providing for him and his siblings, but when they were home, they’d always listen to him and find time for him, the best they could. Even if they couldn’t quite believe his incredulous stories of things he has seen or experienced on his small adventures. But no adult really did. His father taught him a lot about fishing, the ocean, general survival and encouraged him to pursue what he wanted, sensibly. Even after Awan left with the lions, he’d return from time to time, always to be greeted warmly and sent off with loving, encouraging worry. His father is long gone now and Awan holds nostalgic warmth for him and his childhood, for the most part.

Leila adored and idolized her parents, really. With all her child’s heart. Losing them really did a number on her, psychologically. Over time, she grew to temporarily resent them, father in particular, and in some ways she still has not made up with him in her mind. She might, she might not. Even if she does, she realizes he was far from flawless and eternally wise (or kind) as she pictured in her early years.

10. Does your character feel more comfortable with more clothing, or with less clothing?Awan used to love to run around part undressed, playing on the ocean shore. Even when he would have to dress more warmly due to weather or little expeditions into the woods or the mountains, he’d love to stay barefoot. That is one thing that hasn’t changed - he really loves walking barefooted in nature, to dig his toes in the sand and feel little waves lap at his feet. But overall, he is definitely more on the ‘let’s bundle up’ type now. Good part because being around the lions is constant drain on his energy and he is more prone to feeling cold.

I8a feels fine either way. She does not feel cold or hot easily, regulating her body temperature and the fabrics of her clothes work similarly as well. She is more about how things look and feel. Patterns, design, fabrics. She could go all out in huge dress or skintight bodysuit with cleavage for days. Or bikini. The concept of more skin/showing off curves = sexy does not register with her, because ‘sexiness’ does not mean anything to her, other than a criteria that humans use. This has sent the wrong signals and gotten the wrong attention and later on, she knows how to ‘control’ her appearance to suit missions, but it’s just a purposely learned behavior.

11. In what situation was your character the most afraid they’ve ever been?

This is a good question for Awan. I’ve actually not considered this. I feel like his biggest fear moment is yet to come, but in the past? Possibly ending up in a small rockslide when he was 7 or 8 in the mountains. He got really lucky then, getting only broken ankle and whole lot of bruises and scratches, but the fear was great, so was impact of his parents’ worries and he has become a lot more observant/cautious about his surroundings since then. Even known ones, because you never know what small change has transpired to change everything.

For Ryan, I think it was the moment he realized he’s probably going to legit lose his arm and eventually life. He was stuck in apathy and depression loop for a long time, he’s still not out of it (in some ways it has even worsened), but the pain was getting way too much and survival instincts kicked in... Except there wasn’t much of anywhere to turn to help. So he went to some place that turned him into a test bunny in ways that weren’t comforting or fear-soothing in itself. He was rightfully afraid for his life, also at their hands. And in some ways, that fear and hate hasn’t gone away and he’s always internally snarling and baring teeth at them like a dog backed in corner. Looking for a way out that would hopefully also give him a way to tear a chunk out of their shins.

18. Is your character more likely to admire wisdom, or ambition in others?

Awan would definitely pick wisdom. Ambition without wisdom can be borderline greed - because if you don’t pick what you want wisely, it can be quite dangerous. And so can be the ways you go for it. Ambition is good, but it can’t be the sole thing driving you, it can’t ride on itself alone.

Awkward moment when all characters I’ve spoken more about would more or less agree with this viewpoint. I mean, both Leila and Elinor would strongly be like, sometimes you gotta just drive forward and Elinor might appreciate wisely guided ambition but she is definitely impulsive as heck. So, yes, this was sort of meta question for me, lol.

21. If something tragic or negative happens to your character, do they believe they may have caused or deserved it, or are they quick to blame others? 

Awan definitely feels like he has caused it in some way. With great power comes great responsibility and feeling like you could’ve prevented it. You had to foresee. In fact, he may end up feeling guilty for things that weren’t even connected to him at times, especially in the initial period of living with the lions. Time has dulled this, he can outweigh what was in his control, what was his responsibility, and what was not. But the mindset is there.

Elinor is a mix of two. Honestly, deep down she’s definitely ‘I’m guilty for everything’ type, but it’s not in her nature to reveal that to many people, if any at all. Not to the very bitter dredges, anyway. So, she can and will blame other people, often rightfully, call them out on their bullshit and what they did wrong. She can be petty and bitter and downright cruel and then deal with original guilt + guilt that stems from issues she caused with this reaction via drink (tho this is more of her pirate!self method) or putting herself in harm’s way, starting bar fight’s etc. Being generally reckless, bordering physically abusive to her own body.

36. How does your character behave around people they dislike?

Awan... is reserved with his emotions. For the most part. But just as you will know that he is warming up to you, you will probably feel the cold shoulder, the stare that goes deep into you, trying to sort you out, the absence of laughter sparkle or smile. Serious Awan to the max, not inclined to do any favors to you/help you specifically. Not going to get a card reading from him, for sure.

And, well, if Awan doesn’t like you, you will probably have one very grumpy black lion showing his dislike in every way, from petty things like tripping you to downright slowly tearing down you as a person and all that you love. Though, unless you’re truly a villain (and even then), Awan will try to rein that in.

If Elinor doesn’t like you, you’ll know. She’s snarky, argumentative and at times, down right rude to people as is, and if you have earned her dislike from her, she will not be afraid to fight you, physically even. Especially if you’re forced to interact. Otherwise, she might resort to just ignoring you and rebuking you with some snark. Now, there’s the fact that some people that she does treasure get pretty similar treatment, since they do irritate her as well... But they can tell the difference. Or so they say and she just rolls her eyes.

42. Has your character ever had a parental figure who was not related to them? 

I would say the lions, but it is more a sibling dynamic with Awan, especially with Achan. Meira can be sort of kind but overbearing mother, but she also listens to him deeply, so, again perhaps more of older sister that wants to mother him, but understand he’s an adult with important insight. Other important familial figures also fall into the vein of sibling, instead of parents.

Leila did have someone, but she was abusive and cruel (while having best intentions for Leila) and died at the girl’s hands. It was the natural order of things, though, just the ‘madame’ did not expect the day to come so soon. Leila bears many physical and mental scars that still ache, given by this person. And lives in mild fear that if she was ever in position of being parental figure to anyone, she would hand this side of her experience down more than the fading memory of her biological parent’s love. (Mostly groundless fear, but that is what I know.)

45. What does your character believe will happen to them after they die? Does this belief scare them? 

Awan knows with certainty that you do not cease to exist when your physical body dies, that there is spirit and soul and the concept of heaven and hell the Outside World has is very tilted and not true. He knows some come back and cycle through lives, but also that not all do or wish to. He is at peace with what will happen to him after he dies. He is, however, not at peace with thought of the chaos his death will bring to the world, or idea of leaving something or someone hurt/unaccomplished.

In fact, most characters I’ve spoken of, again, fall in this same vein. No matter if they believe in something after they die or not, they’re okay with the concept of it and their bigger fear is failing to do something in their lives. Such as Elek. I8a knows she will join a higher consciousness, essentially. Ryan doesn’t think there’s anything and that’s essentially sort of relief just as much shitty feeling as this entire existence is. Genie believes death is just transformation, an inevitable part of nature. A change. And so on.

Now, Elinor.... Is an outlier, because she is someone from religious background, but was also forced to act out against the very basis of it, from early childhood and has grown to feel both like sinner and beast that somehow god has permitted to be. This has steeped her in resentment, for god, for herself. Over the years, she’s learned of great many other religions and basically goes like ‘Oh, so there’s all these conflicting concepts? Well then who can fucking knows which one is true and I guess I will find out after. Don’t plan on dying soon anyway.’ But, deep down, a certain unease remains, for sure. She does feel like she will be judged, for who she is and what she has done, just as she is in this life, just tells herself she won’t give a damn, just as she does not now. (She does, though, but shhh.)

[voicehumanity]

The Humanity Party®’s Portrait of a Mass Shooter.

This is a framed mirror.  

This is THumP®’s portrait of a mass shooter, of a killer, of a murderer, of a shooting victim involved in a suicide.  

At any time, in the same circumstance of emotional imbalance and despair, any one of us could be in this portrait.

THumP® has outlined its official response to the recent American mass shootings and our stance on gun control.  (Here is a link to this response.)  

Here are a few of the main points of our response:

There will be no effect on gun violence until there are rational changes made to American law and order.

 ...

We do not believe that government should force the American people to give up their guns.  We need the right form of government that can prove to the people that its “well-regulated militia” can do the job better, safer, and more efficiently than unregulated gun owners.  Only when the people are convinced that the government is able, will they feel safe enough to trust a government controlled “well-regulated militia.”

Therefore, THumP®’s first course of action is to establish a type of government in which the American people can trust, in which the rest of the world can trust.  Only then can people be influenced to give up their possession and use of guns. 

Furthermore, we acknowledge that most gun deaths are a cause of suicide. When people lose hope, they lose their desire to live.  We insist that if the right form of government existed in which people could hope for a better world, less would want to end their life. 

...

Our patience comes from our hope that people will consider many of the underlying causes of violence against oneself or against others.  Economic and social inequality is one of the root causes of desperate, hopeless acts of violence.  Another one, just as important, is emotional inequality, where one feels less valued than others.

We have outlined our platform and presented our plan to give hope to people through economic and social changes, as well as personal self-worth and value.  A strong, righteous government that is not self-serving can provide relief from the pressures of hopelessness and worthlessness. 

...

We ask people to please consider our proposals for the right form of government first.  Keep your guns and back our proposals.  Once we have proven to the people that the right form of government is one in which a person can hope, and we can prove that this government’s “well-regulated militia” can indeed provide safety and freedom to the people, then we hope that people everywhere will put down their guns and support human equality and a unification of the world.

“Hope” is the intrinsic measure of our humanity, or better, that which we feel can be possible in spite of the improbabilities that seem to be part of our present experience.

It is improbable that we can convince American gun owners to put down their guns, but if we do not try something different that demonstrates a measure of our shared humanity, that we feel can be possible, then there is no hope.

We all share the same humanity.  None of us started out in life as one who would kill another person, or our self.  So, what makes us become a killer?  

What would we find out if we had the patience and took the time to get to know the perpetrators who take others’ lives, or their own?  What happened that caused the moment of emotional imbalance when each decided to take the lives of other people, many of whom, in most situations, the perpetrators didn’t personally know?

Society doesn’t seem interested in WHY a person decides to kill others.  Once a person makes the choice, the person is no longer seen as human.  Society and the media brand them as “perpetrators,” “killers,” “terrorists,” “monsters,” or “mentally ill,” to name a few of the inhumane names given to these human beings.

It will not make a difference whether the U.S. passes stricter gun laws or takes away all the guns from people outside of a “well-regulated militia” (see and read the entire 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution).  A knife is a weapon.  A rock is a weapon.  And a properly aimed vehicle can take many more lives than any gun can, even quicker.  Take away all guns and we will witness an emotionally imbalanced human use a vehicle to mow down tens of innocent school children as they walk in crosswalks, to their school bus, or down the street to their own homes.   

These types of seemingly senseless violent acts will not end until, unless, we learn WHY human beings become emotionally imbalanced.  

Many will say that all of us have personal problems, that all of us have experienced the unfairness of life, but that few of us would kill an innocent person.  Can any of us honestly claim that we have had the same experiences, of whatever kind, that the perpetrators had?  Have we walked in their shoes?  Have we experienced life as they have experienced it? It is The Humanity Party®’s claim that all of us (the world) have contributed to these mass shootings and to the increase in instances of suicide.  

Suicide holds the highest rate of death by a gun.

New York Times reports:

“When Americans think about deaths from guns, we tend to focus on homicides.  But the problem of gun suicide is inescapable: More than 60 percent of people in this country who die from guns die by suicide.

“Suicide gets a lot less attention than murders for a few reasons.  One big one is that news organizations generally don’t cover suicides the way they do murders.  There’s evidence that news attention around suicide can lead to more suicides.  Suicide is more stigmatized and less discussed than homicide.

“But, as a matter of public health, gun suicides are a huge problem in the United States.  Suicide is the second-most common cause of death for Americans between 15 and 34, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Across all ages, it is the 10th-most common cause of death, and caused 1.6 percent of all deaths in 2012.

“Not all of those suicides are by gun, but a majority are.  And while some people feeling suicidal impulses will choose another method if a gun is not at hand, public health researchers cite two reasons guns are particularly dangerous: 1) Guns are more lethal than most other methods people try, so someone who attempts suicide another way is more likely to survive; 2) Studies suggest that suicide attempts often occur shortly after people decide to kill themselves, so people with deadly means at hand when the impulse strikes are more likely to use them than those who have to wait or plan.

“That means that strategies that make suicide more inconvenient or difficult can save lives.  Guns, when they are in the home, can make self-harm both easy and deadly.”

It is our position that a child’s upbringing, culture, religion, and other societal pressures heavily contribute to suicide.  

Take for example, a child who colors outside of the lines with crayons and says, “Look how pretty, mommy!”  

A loving mother responds with caring platitudes of adoration and appropriate accolades.  The child’s coloring is proudly taped on the refrigerator for the rest of the family and others to see.  The child’s art is loved and praised, but later, if the grown child shows no natural artistic ability and shows their work to the world, the world rejects the person because the person draws “outside of the lines.”  Where the child could once do no wrong, and no matter what the child did, the child received praise and acceptance, the world does not treat the aged child as the child was emotionally foundationalized.  

The alignment of a child’s emotional balance begins from infancy.  Children do not learn how to fail.  Parents, teachers, the world, do not teach children that failure is okay.  Children learn that failure is not an option.  The aged child only receives worldly value and acceptance when the person meets the world’s conditions of value and success.  

The child is loved, supported, fed, clothed, housed and cared for when sick or when emotional pain is experienced, but once the child reaches the age that the world has determined is adulthood, the child is thrown into a world of inequality and of forced economic livelihood (you either work like everyone else has to or you die.)

In the real world ... in the adult world ... no one cares about the child’s “out of the lines coloring.”  Unless the aged child submits their free will to the enslavement of employment, they will have no money, and no one is going to clothe, feed, house, and provide health and mental care for them as their parents did.  

The child loses an extreme amount of emotional self-worth and value to the world once the child becomes an adult.  The child must forget about everything that the child did to find personal happiness in life from the personal freedom enjoyed as child, liberty that is ripped away when one becomes an adult.

Besides economic struggle and inequality, the self-worth and value that a child receives from established emotional anchors of religion and the prejudiced teachings learned from parents, are threatened as an adult.  In the real world: Everyone is right. Which makes everyone wrong. ™️

If we base our individual self-worth and value on our personal right, and another tells us we are wrong, we naturally respond in self-defense.  And so many times throughout our shared history this self-defense results in killing through murder and war.  

Why can’t we have a world where everyone is right?  Why can’t we teach our children that everyone has their own version of right; that the version taught to the child is pertinent and relevant to the child only; that every other child has the right to be right and protected and supported in this individual right?  We do not teach this to our children because it threatens our own emotional anchors of, I am right and everyone else is wrong.

We have a world where no one really cares about anyone outside of their circle of loved ones and friends.  We stand in this circle, protected, praised, and supported.  The circle has replaced our parents and the security of our childhood home life.  Few dare to step out of this circle because once one steps out of the circle, and if one does not step into a new circle, the one feels lost, unloved, valueless, and hopeless.  Why wouldn’t one take their own life and end this emotional pain and suffering?

The above things are about suicide.  What about mass shooters?  Why do they do what they do?

To explain why we will use a real-life scenario: 

The Humanity Party® has become the only supporter of, and we also could have provided a caring circle of humanity that could have surrounded a human being who lived by the name, Thomas Hamilton.

In March of 1996, Thomas walked into a Primary School in Scotland and killed 16 innocent children under the age of 8.  He killed their teacher, then himself.

Why?

Thomas Hamilton isn’t around any longer to tell the world why, but we know why.  

Here is why:

Thomas loved children.  He was the Director of a few local youth clubs.  He was the leader of a local Scout group of young boys.

“Thomas Watt Hamilton was born on May 10, 1952, in Glasgow, Scotland.  His mother, a hotel chambermaid, was divorced from his father by the time Hamilton was born.  Hamilton never knew his father and grew up with his mother's adoptive parents, believing they were his biological parents.  They legally adopted him at age 2.  He also thought his biological mother was his sister until he was told the truth when he was 22 years old.”

A loner, Hamilton never formed any close relationships with adults of either sex and seemed particularly uncomfortable around women.  Can one imagine why?  If you were brought up to believe your grandparents were your parents and your mother was your sister, wouldn’t your view of normal relationships be affected?

There had been several complaints to police regarding Hamilton's behavior towards the young boys who attended the youth clubs he directed. Claims had been made of his having taken photographs of semi-naked boys without parental consent.  The entire local community was suspicious of his moral intentions towards boys.

Thomas was never arrested, charged, or convicted of ANY immoral act or behavior towards any boy, of any age, but the people spread their rumors.  The police did their investigations.  The world took away the only thing that gave Thomas self-worth and value: his ability to be involved with and help young boys.

Thomas Watt Hamilton took from that local community what it had taken from him.

How many lives have been destroyed because of rumor?  How many lives have been destroyed because of the unregulated freedom of the press?  How many innocent people have been arrested and charged with a crime that they did not commit, but had their name blasted in the media as the “alleged” perpetrator without being given the due process of law that Americans tout is part of their inalienable rights?  Rumor, gossip, and the sensationalized media reports generated by unscrupulous journalists are a gross representation of what our humanity has become.

Let’s consider the more recent mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in the United States:

In December of 2012, Adam Lanza outdid Thomas Hamilton and killed 20 children under the age of 8 and 6 teachers.

Why?

No one has ever investigated and reported why. 

Why?  

Because an honest investigative journalist would be crucified by his or her peers and blacklisted from journalism if he or she investigated and wrote a story about the human being ... not the killer, not the monster, but the human being ... named Adam Lanza. No media outlet in this world would dare publish an honest and thorough exposé of the real life of Adam Lanza and what was really going through his head when he decided to kill 20 innocent children and 6 innocent aged children.

The Humanity Party® has done its homework.  We are not afraid to tell the real truth.  We are not afraid to report it.  We know that only if we start to understand why, can we begin to find a solution to, not only mass shootings, but the increasing number of suicides.

Here is some of what the world believes and is taught about Adam Lanza:

“Lanza attended Sandy Hook Elementary School for four and a half years.  He started at Newtown Middle School in 2004 but according to his mother, Nancy, he was 'wracked by anxiety'.  His mother told friends her son started getting upset at middle school because of frequent classroom changes during the day.  The movement and noise was too stimulating and made him anxious.  At one point his anxiety was so intense, his mother took him to the emergency room at Danbury Hospital. In April 2005, she moved him to a new school, St. Rose of Lima, where he lasted only eight weeks.

“At age 14, he went to Newtown High School, where he was named to the honor roll in 2007.  Students and teachers who knew him in high school described Lanza as ‘intelligent, but nervous and fidgety’.  He avoided attracting attention and was uncomfortable socializing.  He is not known to have had any close friends in school.  Schoolwork often triggered his underlying sense of hopelessness and by 2008, when Adam turned sixteen he was only going to school occasionally.  The intense anxiety Lanza experienced at the time suggests his autism was exacerbated by the hormonal shifts of adolescence.  He was taken out of high school and home-schooled by his mother and father.  He earned a GED.  In 2008 and 2009, he also attended some classes at Western Connecticut State University.”

Some of the clues to the real truth about Adam Lanza are in what the world believes about him, but the world does not want to see Adam as a good, caring human being.  The world wants Adam remembered as a monster, as a killer, as a mass shooter, as mentally insane.  

The real truth: Adam did not want the children to suffer through the same educational process that he did.  This is the only reason why he killed them ... to save them from the world that had abused him.

The Humanity Party® doesn’t want anyone to suffer through the same social and political processes that can change any one of us from a human being into a monster.

We are our biggest problem.

THumP® has the solutions.  No one else does.   

[this-is-not-a]

I don’t believe in politics

I have politics. I think we need to tax the rich and use that money to help the poor. I think that includes the ultra-rich but also working rich like me. I think we need to regulate industries which when unregulated are shown to have detrimental societal effects. And I think we need to fund research into what kinds of things have detrimental societal effects so that we’re not just strong-armed by major players in those industries. I think that whatever regulations we come up with shouldn’t be so strong that people are no longer motivated and excited to build businesses, and I think that it’s good for industrial people to be monetarily compensated for their industriousness, but that at a certain point they have been compensated enough and that money would be better spent helping those less well off.

But here’s the truth. I have never really believed in politics. I have never felt like it matters to my day-to-day who the president is. I have never felt like either of the two large parties represent my interests. I have never felt like any political movements outside of the two large parties have any realistic chance of affecting large scale change. I have been told that local politics is the only real politics and yet I have never been to a city council meeting. I am supportive of protesters but I don’t expect their success.

When Trump was president I maintained that he for the most part was enacting normal Republican policies, and the most pervasive criticism of him, though it was not put this way, was that he doesn’t think before saying things. And I still believe this. Every accusation that Trump is a racist or sexist more or less breaks down into a) he said some racist or sexist stuff without thinking about it and b) he simultaneously supports some normal Republican policy which is argued to lead to regressive outcomes.

Even when Trump supporters attempted to impede the final confirmation of Biden’s election victory, it still didn’t seem real. Even as every news outlet, all of my friends, all of my social media was talking about it, whether or not to call it a riot, a protest, or a coup, what it said about the double standard of police, the double standard of progressives, or the double standard of conservatives – even then, it didn’t seem real. On the contrary, it felt like the series finale of Game of Thrones was on: it was an exciting, public, cultural moment, which was also fictional and conceptually distant from anything actually affecting me. Even a friend in DC told me it was remarkable how little disturbance there was to anything not near the actual Capitol building. In fact, “thousands” of protesters is not very many people. Even the upper bound of ten thousand is not very many people. The US is not literally on fire. And whether or not you call it a “coup” does not change the ineptitude of the operation through the lens of actual revolution, to the point where it begins to make more sense to view it as something closer to a sporting event / renaissance fair.

To be fair, I do think Trump’s inciting of this event was totally unprecedented, not at all a normal Republican tactic, and also as people have been saying, absolutely predictable given the last four years. Though maybe I differ from the Twitter armchair experts in that my armchair analysis is that this is more about class war and the partisan divide than the white power movement.

But now that Biden’s term has started it has reminded me again that I really still don’t believe in politics. That the president has changed, and the biggest shift in my life is that I no longer get to be the contrarian pointing out the president sucks but not for the reasons you think he does, and now have to revert back to just pointing out that the president sucks.

And you’re saying, hey, if you feel like the policies set by our government don’t affect you, maybe that’s because they don’t. And maybe they don’t because you have the privilege of being well educated, well off, having a strong safety net, being raised in a safe place, having your health, and facing more or less no oppression. And if you cared about other people who are experiencing this oppression, maybe then you would care about politics. Maybe then you would do something about it. There’s a goddamn pandemic. Trump dropped the ball. Who knows if a Democrat president would have done a better job and avoided 400,000 deaths. Maybe even a more normal Republican president would have done a better job. Three times as many Americans are out of a job than in the 2008 recession. They’re waiting for stimulus money to come in. Most Americans have less than $5000 saved up. This $2000 is going to feed people. It’s going to save lives. I mean not literally, because our welfare services are good enough that very few people literally starve in the US. But improving lots of people’s lives is also an objectively good thing to do, you don’t have to go all the way to literal life-saving. And stimulus money and COVID response are just a few examples of real life change that depends on politics. Lives are at stake.

Well okay. Sometimes I do think I’m better than other people on social media because I’m not getting as worked up about politics. Sometimes I do vaguely feel that smart people who understand what’s really going on and aren’t just getting swept up in trendy politics are less angry about the scandal of the week and What It Says About Society. That those who can get over initial tribalistic emotional responses to things end up having a more Pinker-esque optimistic view. That in the grand scheme of things, short term political movements mean a lot less than scientific achievements gradually raising the water line. That getting worried about them is a waste of energy insofar as it’s just worry, and even if you are the 1 in 50 people who actually translates that worry into action, even the action tends to be a fairly ineffective use of your time.

But I do also think it’s important for me to remember that policies affect the real world. And to the credit of people who get worked up about politics, I think a major strength you have over me is that you remember this all the time. You’re absolutely right that a lot of policies don’t impact me because I’m not very oppressed. Even almost all of my social circle (queer children of immigrants who are minorities) is not very oppressed. But I know oppression exists. Maybe it’s not enough to just vote in elections. Maybe we should be in the streets and on the phones. Maybe the US is sort of on fire and having a measured response isn’t all that valuable.

And at this point I would just like to say, congratulations on ALMOST understanding our place in the world as Americans. Because the truth is that the US is sort of on fire. In fact, the whole world is sort of on fire, and the US is one of the least on fire places to be. US residents estimate that the global median income is $20,000 a year. In fact, it’s $2100 a year. The US is the out-of-touch 1% of the world.

Here’s my thought process when I encounter US political angst on social media. First: this is a dumb thing to get upset about. Second: But I guess it’s good that you care about the wellbeing of others. Third: Except if you care about the wellbeing of others, then in the grand scheme of things, this is not the thing you should be getting upset about.

Sure, sometimes I forget that US politics matters. But then when I see people acting like the reason it matters is because they care about other people, I start to become more confused. I do think people care about other people, but I also think they are extremely prone to just reacting to whatever media is beamed into their eyes, and so unless they work really hard to curate those beams, they end up saying and writing things which hit this weird inconsistent type of caring that looks like virtue-signaling to outsiders, but which I try to understand as being just a non-rigorous, emotional, plea for connection -- a sort of “I’m hurting, do other people feel this way?”

And then at the same time, these people know in the back of their heads that there’s a lot of people in the world who have it really bad, whose lives could be improved if they donated small amounts of their wealth to effective causes. And I start to think, these people don’t think global poverty is real! I mean, they don’t think it doesn’t exist, it’s just not real to them the way US politics are. It doesn’t take them on an emotional journey. It’s not beamed directly into their eyeballs. And it’s not chic to care about. 400,000 deaths? So one year of global Malaria? $2000 stimulus? So one year of median global income? I’m not saying that greater pain invalidates lesser pain, I’m just asking you to have some perspective before you come telling me to have some perspective.

So what do we do? Well, there’s the Giving What We Can Pledge. I took this when I first got a job outside college and have since donated over 10% of my income every year to effective global charities. Peter Singer advocates for a sliding scale which makes sense to me -- 10% means a lot more to people with less than me. And that money can save literal lives (at a much higher rate than it can in the US). It’s not popular because it’s not easy. I mean it is functionally very easy to do, but it’s not easy to walk yourself to a place where you want to. I mean it’s your money, and you probably already help the less fortunate in other ways.

But it is political in a way that is very real. It’s political in the way that investing in education is political. Deworming children (for about 30 cents each) so they can attend school and to avoid organ damage has been shown to dramatically increase their life outcomes. Delivering Vitamin A supplements (for about 1 dollar each) substantially reduces child mortality. It is an apolitical good.

I wrote this because I was frustrated. The thing that improves the world is never the thing that people are talking about. If everyone took the GWWC pledge, we would have enough money to solve global poverty, eliminate all treatable diseases, fund research into the untreatable ones for approximately the next forever, educate anybody who needs educating, feed anybody who needs feeding, fund an unparalleled renaissance in the arts, permanently save every rainforest in the world, and have enough left over to launch five or six different manned missions to Mars. And that’s using just 1 year’s donations. Yet people, global one-percenters nonetheless, seem to continue getting angry about things that matter less.

I wrote this because in real life I would only ever be supportive of someone wanting to get involved politically. I am a firm believer that the war is not to be fought between people who both want to help but in different ways, but between those who want to do something and the apathetic. If you want to get on social media and harness political rage as a way to enact eventual policy change to help people, then in theory I’d like to support it.

I wrote this because I wanted to express the tiring thing about your politics to me. That it’s all lies. It’s all half-true stories being published and publicized. News which is sold because it’s what people are buying. It matters, it doesn’t matter. And none of it’s real, except it’s all real, it’s just not happening to you. But in the end there are still other people, and they are still our neighbors, and we do still want the best for them. So it is good to keep trying. Maybe even consider adopting radical politics like me. Take matters into your own hands and seize the power to do good by recognizing that we the one-percenters of the world already have it.

[tvdas]

Is there anything especially expert about being a philosopher?

by David Egan, a visiting assistant professor in the Dept. of Philosophy at CUNY Hunter College in New York.   Outside a university setting, telling people that I’m pursuing a career in philosophy can be a bit of a conversation stopper. More times than I can count, I’ve faced the bemused but well-intentioned question: ‘How is that useful?’ I seem like a nice guy, smart, capable – why am I intent on doing something that won’t make me rich and won’t in any appreciable way make the world a better place?

This sort of befuddlement afflicts labourers in the humanities more generally. In contrast with the ‘hard’ disciplines of the STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, mathematics), the humanities are often disparaged as ‘soft’. You don’t need an advanced degree to read a novel, the thinking goes, so why bother?

What do these adjectives ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ denote? The ‘hardness’ is often glossed in terms of difficulty, but there’s nothing easy about work in the humanities – as my students often learn to their dismay, after turning in the first essay in which they confidently claim that the topics we’re studying are ‘subjective’ or ‘relative’ and therefore not open to rigorous critical scrutiny. It might be closer to the truth to say that the ‘hardness’ of the STEM fields is owing to their more technical nature, even if the humanities disciplines also have their technical aspects, as anyone who’s taken a course in logic or struggled with scansion can attest. But that answer just invites a further question: what is it about the STEM disciplines that requires a greater density of technical apparatus?

Let me work toward an answer to this question by way of an analogy. One of the most celebrated films of 2018 was Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma, a semi-autobiographical take on the director’s own upbringing in the Colonial Roma neighbourhood of Mexico City. The central figure, an indigenous maid named Cleo, was played by the first-time actor Yalitza Aparicio to great acclaim, earning her an Academy Award nomination among other accolades. Aparicio is only one recent and prominent instance of a nonprofessional actor wowing audiences. The Italian neorealists in the postwar period made a virtue of working with nonprofessional actors; directors such as Werner Herzog, Ken Loach and the Dardenne brothers have made significant use of them too; and the first-time actor Haing S Ngor won an Academy Award for his role in The Killing Fields (1984).

By contrast, imagine being invited to a violin concerto in which, you’re told, the violinist will be playing her instrument for the first time. To put it mildly, this does not sound like a blueprint for artistic triumph. But why not? Why can directors get masterful performances from first-time actors, but no conductor gets a masterful performance from a first-time violinist? Is it that playing the violin is in some way harder than acting?

The answer, I think, is that, really, there’s no such thing as a first-time actor. Every socialised human being has embodied knowledge of what it’s like to fly into a rage, to explode with laughter, to eye someone with suspicion, to listen compassionately. Learning these things is part of learning to be a person. But unless we go out of our way to acquire it, we don’t have embodied knowledge of what it’s like to drag horsehair across catgut. We all have an intuitive feel for how to perform fictional characters because we perform ourselves all the time.

That said, acting schools are not a scam. Acting is a craft, and the people who make a living from it train hard and work hard to acquire mastery of their craft. Nonprofessional actors, like child actors, win accolades only in a fairly limited range of roles. For one thing, starring roles for child and nonprofessional actors are almost exclusively restricted to screen acting, where camerawork and editing can cover for some of the limitations in their craft. And accolades for successful performances emphasise the ‘authenticity’ or ‘naturalness’ of actors playing in roles fairly close to the ones they occupy offscreen. You wouldn’t expect an untrained actor to excel in the role of an orc, a Victorian aristocrat, or a morose prince of Denmark.

Consider the different kind of training you might expect from an acting coach and a violin teacher. Your acting lessons will start in medias res, as it were, teaching you to become more attuned to emotional processes you already experience and more precise in the verbal and physical expressiveness that you already possess. That training is sometimes highly technical, but it mostly hones capacities that we all have to some degree. The first thing a violin teacher has to do is get you familiar with holding the violin and bow, and feeling out for the first time what happens when you draw the bow across the strings.

There’s a similar contrast we could draw between a first class in philosophy and a first class in electrical engineering. I lead my students into philosophical questioning by starting with intuitions that they already hold and then applying pressure to those intuitions, asking them to take their reasoning farther than they’d normally take it. We all make claims to know things, for instance, and we all recognise that sometimes these claims are justified and sometimes not. But outside a philosophy class, we rarely press very hard on the question of what constitutes knowledge and how we might distinguish it from, say, a lucky guess. I invite students to press harder on this question by starting with their familiar intuitions about when they are and aren’t licensed to claim to know something. By contrast, although I confess I’ve never taken a class in electrical engineering, I’m pretty sure that the course doesn’t begin by teasing out the students’ intuitions about how electrical circuits work.

The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein compared language to an ancient city: a centre packed with a maze of streets and squares, with new buildings squeezed in against old ones, which gradually gives way to newer, planned suburbs with an ordered grid of streets and uniform houses. We could think of the field of human enquiry similarly. The sciences are like these well-regulated suburbs, rigorously ordered according to precise methodologies, and the humanities are like the chaotic centre, as messy as the human lives that buzz about in it. You take a trip out to different suburbs for specific purposes: you want to send a rocket into space, treat an aggressive cancer, or devise a proof for Goldbach’s conjecture. Most of us will never visit these suburbs, and no one will ever get deeply acquainted with all of them. But we all come together in the city centre. All human lives feature some deliberation over what matters to us, what we like and dislike and why, what’s meaningful, admirable or despicable, what’s to be hoped for, what’s to be feared. When we start asking these questions more deliberately and rigorously, we’re intensifying an activity that’s already familiar.

So how is philosophy useful? The response I’ve learned to counter with is that the question being asked is itself a philosophical question. One of the things we do in philosophy is precisely to ask what’s worth doing and why. For the most part, my questioners have already presupposed a fairly limited set of acceptable answers to the question of what’s worth doing – answers that generally bottom out in the material wellbeing of oneself and others. But those answers, innocuous as they might seem to the speaker, are philosophical answers to a philosophical question.

In other words, we’re all doing philosophy all the time. We can’t escape the question of what matters and why: the way we’re living is itself our implicit answer to that question. A large part of a philosophical training is to make those implicit answers explicit, and then to examine them rigorously. Philosophical reflection, once you get started in it, can seem endlessly demanding. But if we can’t avoid living philosophically, it seems sensible to learn to do it well. This article appeared on AEON.co

[modernfamlawguidevljf561]

Everything about Divorce And Child Custody

Things about Getting Custody Of Your Children

Thanks for subscribing! Created by of lawful authors and editors. In a perfect world, divorcing or separating moms and dads would certainly have the ability to reserve their individual distinctions and decide-- with each other-- the best Below are response to a few of the most typically asked questions concerning that gets guardianship.

That decides that will get wardship of our children? A: Usually the response to the inquiry "who will get custodianship?" will be identified in big part by the procedure that is followed by the parties entailed in the child protection scenario. In the majority of circumstances where parents get to an out-of-court agreement on kid custody and visitation, the issue of who obtains custodianship is mostly as much as the parents themselves, typically with input from attorneys, counselors, or mediators .

Q: If my youngster wardship case goes to family members court, just how will the court determine that gets safekeeping? A: In determining who will have custodianship, Q: A close friend that has actually experienced a guardianship dispute told me that the court in his case positioned a whole lot of importance on identifying that the kids's "key caretaker" was.

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His mother as well as I never wed, and also I am wondering what I can do to get custodianship of my boy. What are my choices? A: In many states, an unwed daddy typically can not win wardship over a mommy who is an excellent parent. But, if you can develop that your kid's mother is unsuited for parent or is unable of dealing with him, you may be able to obtain physical custodianship, especially if you can show that you're the youngster's "main caretaker." Even if you can not get physical wardship of your child, you need to have the ability to acquire common legal protection, providing you the right to make vital decisions regarding your son's training and welfare.

Q: Can any person besides a parent obtain guardianship of a kid? A: Sometimes, people various other than a kid's moms and dads may want to get custodianship-- including family members like Q: Just how can I get specialist assistance in deciding who obtains wardship in my instance? A: Quality counsel is essential particularly when encountering the inquiry of that gets safekeeping of your youngsters.

The very best method to start is to search for a family members law attorney near you with experience handling guardianship conflicts. .

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One of the greatest inquiries in a youngster guardianship situation is "Who will get protection and also visitation rights?" The solution to this critical inquiry can be complicated with a lot of aspects entering play, but there are some basic guidelines and also factors to consider that come right into play when youngster custodianship is chosen.

This area takes a look at usual variables a family members court will certainly consider in making a protection decision as well as how a kid's benefits are established. Determining the Child's Primary Caretaker A significant consider choosing who obtains safekeeping of a kid after a separation is the determination of that the primary caretaker is.

If the two moms and dads have the ability to concern a mutually acceptable decision on their very own, after that the courts need not step in (they will merely accept any sensible strategy). Nevertheless, courts will certainly consider a variety of aspects to decide that the primary caretaker is when there is a disagreement. Specifically, the court will certainly would like to know which moms and dad deals with the list below types of parenting tasks: Showering, grooming Preparation and cooking meals Health and wellness treatment decisions Instructing standard skills, such as reading, and also aiding with homework Preparation as well as joining recreational tasks The most effective Rate of interests of the Youngster Regardless of what the court ultimately decides in a protection hearing, it is called for to find a solution that remains in the kid's best interests.

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In other words, a moms and dad's preference ought to not take top priority over what is in fact best for the child. Children over a particular age (but still minors) might indicate in behalf of themselves in most states. Courts will certainly think about the following aspects when determining a child's finest interests in a child custodianship instance: Physical and also mental health and wellness of moms and dads Any kind of unique needs the child might require for a secure house environment Youngster's own dreams (if old enough to share this) Communications and also partnerships with other participants of the house Proof of medication or alcoholic abuse Modification to the area Guardianship in Non-Divorce Cases Child safekeeping instances are not always linked to divorce.

There additionally might be non-divorce cases including the visitation rights of grandparents. As a general guideline, most states call for that the mom automatically be awarded full guardianship of her child if she is single-- unless the papa makes an effort to obtain custody too. But besides that, child custody in non-divorce instances is made a decision in similar way as in separation instances.

Commonly, the specific have to submit a non-parental guardianship petition, a copy of which needs to additionally most likely to the kid's moms and dads. Click on web link listed below to get more information regarding that gets safekeeping of a youngster and just how this decision is made.

How Divorce And Child Custody can Save You Time, Stress, and Money.

Judges have to determine wardship based on "the best interests of the kid." The "benefits of the youngster" law requires courts to concentrate on the kid's needs and also not the moms and dad's demands. The regulation needs courts to provide custody to the parent that can meet the kid's requirements finest. Juries look at many things to see what remains in your child's ideal rate of interest: Will your youngster have a refuge to live? Will your child be well-fed and clothed? Will your kid be managed enough? Will your child obtain enough emotional assistance? Which parent has been looking after your child? Does either moms and dad misuse your youngster? Does either parent abuse medications or alcohol? Does either parent reveal your child to residential violence?.