#I know I can be dramatic the unfollow button is right there if anyone needs it

[dimples-of-discontent]

Bex, Im just so fucking sad. I liked NOTHING about that ending and idk what to do with myself now.

I hear you, friend, and the main reaction I had to reading about this hot garbage fire of a finale (b/c I didn’t have an easy way to watch it...and now I plan to wait until my emotional investment is lower) was concern and love for all the people who are going to be so let down by this. It’s not me, because at the moment I have more emotional distance from SPN than in the past. But I’ve been there. The show and this ship was there for me when I needed it the most and I cannot imagine what today’s episode would have done to me back in 2017/8 when this community is what kept me feeling ok with my life and connected to other humans. I hope anyone in that position will take a minute to remember the things that are good about the fandom, and about the show in the past, and remember that endings aren’t everything. I know it sounds so trite, but it really IS about the friends we made along the way.

So, I’m ok and ready to crack jokes as a coping mechanism. But that’s because I’m very used to getting bad news. And if you’re not, this ending would really knock you back. Like, it seemed almost aggressively insensitive to what the show and especially the DeanCas relationship mean to people in the fandom. I was prepared, mentally, for it to be open-ended. For example, way back when I even spec-ed that Dean would die and and Cas would meet him in Heaven, smiling and saying one final “hello, Dean.” Or even that they’d just amble off to ambiguously spend Dean’s life together on earth. To not offer that--and to so explicitly not offering it after going where 15x18 went--shows either how out-of-touch they are or how deliberately cruel they are. I’m hoping to go with the first option.

Let me back up a sec. When I tell you I’m very used to getting bad news, believe it. In January 2019 I was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer. That’s the latest stage and my best case scenario is constantly living in treatment (no “getting through it”)  that keeps cancer from killing me. That sounds dramatic and it is. My life expectancy (at 34) went to an average of 1.5-3 years. I have a tag for it and a sideblog about it if you want to follow, but that’s not the point. The point is that I’ve been through the wringer with this (currently in treatment 4 in 20 months, none so far have worked for long) and the way I prepared myself  for tonight’s finale was exactly like when I wait for the scan results that tell me if the cancer is better or worse. Like, even now that’s how fucking serious it felt to me. And yes, I can and do put it in perspective by thinking “hey! it’s a tv show! and I get all the good fandom things no matter what!” but don’t for a second feel bad for taking it seriously, ok?

So to answer a little the question of what  to do with yourself: feel sad. Or feel angry or feel like getting high (and go for it!) or play the cowboy scene in 13x06 on repeat...whatever lets you feel your feelings. Don’t tell yourself your feelings are “wrong” or let other assholes on here make you feel bad for having them. (And seriously? People on here? Just be fucking kind, ok?) Also don’t set a limit on how long you can feel sad. It takes as long as it takes. None of us have a lot to make us feel better right now, with this terrible year and heading into lockdown again, and this show used to. Now it’s been taken from you. It’s a loss, and you should grieve that loss.

Also, figure out what is making you feel worse and stop doing it. If that’s Tumblr, take a break for a while! If it’s particular blogs, mute them or unfollow but make a note to follow later. If it’s all of SPN, symbolically remove it from your life or (and I do this a lot!) find a new temporary hyperfixation. (Have you watched “Buffy” yet? Watch “Buffy.”) You don’t owe attention to negative things in your life. It makes them stronger. Ignore trolls and use the block button at will.

I’m not leaving and I hope other people will consider not leaving too. The show gave us a LOT, even if very little of it was in these last episodes. 

And, in the meantime, dear Nonnie, may I recommend diving into my archive through tags and getting heavily, heavily into Cockles because honestly they will never let you down and they are all sweetness and light. There’s a reason that I have a tag for “cockles is a happy destiel au.”

Take care, Nonnie, and so should the rest of you. Feel your feelings, disengage if necessary, but know that I at least will be here when I can. Our community has way more life left in it.

Love,

Bex

[meishutori]

THE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE; Mun & Muse - Meme.

fill out & repost ♥ This meme definitely favors canons more, but I hope OC’s still can make it somehow work with their own lore, and lil’ fandom of friends & mutuals. Multi-Muses pick the muse you are the most invested in atm.

My muse is:   canon / oc / au / canon-divergent / fandomless /

Is your character popular in the fandom?  YES (?)/ NO.

Is your character considered hot™ in the fandom?  YES / NO / IDK.

Is your character considered strong in the fandom?  YES / NO / IDK.

Are they underrated?  YES / NO.

Were they relevant for the main story?  YES / NO.

Were they relevant for the main character?  YES / NO (?) / THEY’RE THE PROTAG.

Are they widely known in their world?  YES / NO.

How’s their reputation?  GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL.

How strictly do you follow canon?  —Canon is my bitch and I utilize it as I see fit.

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutuals.  — Have you seen him? That’s it, that’s the pitch. Though, no, I mean.. He is just such an interesting character ! I am pretty much convinced he is based on Robert Plant, Especially where his looks are concerned. He is a super chill individual, and he FEELS a lot and allows himself to. He is a dramatic bitch, which is incredibly fun to write. He is also a visored which gives so much more angles to write with. 

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?).  —  I think people usually tend to say that his fights/abilities are boring, though I just believe he was done dirty lol. His abilities are really cool but they pretty much made him tell his opponents how to beat him so like ??? Also, the flair for drama is something some people might really not appreciate. 

What inspired you to rp your muse?  —  All the layers in writing him, and he also has a special place in my heart because I moved to him from Izuru. Where Izuru is a muse I picked up because I was in a terrible headspace, I moved on from him to Rose who also gives opportunities to play his melancholy, but has a positive note to his personality usually, which... Really helps me.

What keeps your inspiration going?  —  All the connections to other characters he has, and developing these relationships. At times it is also AUs I get to play (whether modern or something else), and because he is a visored you have a 100 years of human history at your disposal to use in your writing !

Some more personal questions for the mun.

Give your mutuals some insight about the way you are in some matters, which could lead them to get more comfortable with you or perhaps not.

Do you think you give your character justice?  YES / NO.

Do you frequently write headcanons?  YES / NO. (I tend to think about aspects of his character as they come up in writing. I do memes sometimes that force me to think about it, and that is when I do write them. But usually I don’t)

Do you sometimes write drabbles?  YES / NO. (I like being able to bounce off someone. That motivates me way more to write than just writing on my own...)

Do you think a lot about your Muse during the day?  YES / NO. (When I’m on tumblr I do, but I tend to fixate on the things happening in real life instead.)

Are you confident in your portrayal?   YES / NO.

Are you confident in your writing?  YES / NO. (it changes day by day lol)

Are you a sensitive person?  YES / NO. (;W;)

Do you accept criticism well about your portrayal?  — I have issues with Rejection Sensitice Dysphoria, so I don’t handle criticism well at all. I do my best, and try to get better at it. I also don’t tell people to never critices me, obviously, and please do so when I do something that hurts you, but where my portrayal is concerned I really don’t... Care what other people think and don’t need your opinion, sorry ^w^;

Do you like questions, which help you explore your character?  —  HELL YES. especially when they are based on threads I have or something. I love exploring dynamics between characters and I really like thinking about my muse’s motivations and choices. HC questions may take me a while though.

If someone disagrees to a headcanon of yours, do you want to know why?  —  Depends. If they want to tell me I won’t ignore them, but chances are you won’t change my mind.

If someone disagrees with your portrayal, how would you take it?  —  I mean.. The unfollow button is right there. There is no reason why you’d have to tell me, unless you think I’m being offensive in some way, in that case, do let me know.

If someone really hates your character, how do you take it?  —  Loooool Rose is too minor a character for anyone to hate him tbh.

Are you okay with people pointing out your grammatical errors?  —  Yes. they happen a loooot lol, and I’m not a native English speaker/writer. So if you see them, or we have a thread together, feel free to tell me, or to correct my mistakes on your reply reblog.

Do you think you are easy going as a mun?   —I like to think so. I am not a very chill person in real life and at the same time I am ?? I have a lot of anxiety lol but I’ve taught myself to cope, so my body will be like OH SHIT, STRESS and my mind will be like lol chill out. This translates in RP and interactions through me being a little distant to people I don’t already know (social anxiety lol) and coming off cold, I guess. I also don’t have the energy to interact with a lot of people, and I’m old... so like... I like what I’ve already built here. I definitely always try to be polite, but years on tumblr have made me very no-nonsense.

That’s about it, congrats for filling out!

Tagged by:  @hirako5hinji {holy shit anna that wa s a LOT (also you are so eloquent asdfh) } Tagging: @deviiatc @viciousvizard @kazeshinigami @despairforme @grimmjxw

[medleymisty]

A thing I had to write because I’m me

I really did plan to stay out of the Discourse about the wave of anon hate going around after the last thing I said about it, but today I was looking at my dash on my phone and I happened to see another post about it. Not going to link it or identify it because I don’t do public shaming and I don’t want to bring anyone else into this, and I don’t want to call out anyone. And it wasn’t really the post itself that triggered me, but some of the responses.

I just want to share my thoughts and my experiences and hopefully maybe reach one or two people who’ll think more about their words and their view of the world and other people next time.

Warning: This will be about trauma and blame and negative experiences and it will be very personal. You don’t have to click on the readmore if you don’t want to read about that sort of thing.

I wanted to have research and sources to point to for this, but the internet has become a cesspool in the last few years and it’s impossible to find anything decent without dedicating more time and energy to it than I want to. I found a link or two but nothing really great, so I guess this will be mostly based on personal lived experience.

I don’t want to weigh this down with an exact retelling of the Bad Times, so I’ll just say that from 2009 to 2011 I was the target of many, many hate secrets, which aren’t as easy to turn off as anon messages are on here. I was also being emotionally abused by the person who I thought of as my best friend, and he used the secrets as part of his abuse. The secrets eventually died down but he continued stalking my blogs until at least well into 2013, and yeah...it was a whole thing, with strangers judging me by the hate secrets and by behavior that they didn’t know the cause of, because they didn’t know about the emotional abuse. I’m not being “dramatic” and I’m not overstating anything when I say that it legit traumatized me, and I already had trauma from my childhood. Not going to go into detail there either, but there’s a reason why most of my characters in my serious work are traumatized and anxious.

I will say that the childhood trauma made it much harder for me to recognize the emotional abuse, and it made it much harder for me to not take the hate seriously. I am very happy for those of you who grew up with parents who taught you about boundaries and about healthy relationships and who made sure you knew that you were loved and worthy and that people who said awful things about you were wrong, but not everyone has that. And it’s not a sign of immaturity to not have it, or if it is then it’s not the sort of immaturity that should be judged and mocked. Kids aren’t really able to teach themselves that sort of thing without help. It took me nearly two decades to learn it after leaving my mother’s house, and that’s with the help of the best spousal person anyone could ask for. I’m one of the lucky ones.

People who get hate and who are affected by it need empathy and care and validation, not mocking and judging. It’s okay if you don’t understand, it’s okay if you don’t have the time or the energy to provide that empathy and care and validation, it’s okay if you have to unfollow or block them. What’s not okay is blaming and judging them for your lack of understanding and your inability to empathize, at least in public where they can see. Because they will see that, and they will internalize it, and it will become another voice among all the other voices they’ve internalized telling them that they’re wrong, that they’re bad, that they don’t know how to be human right.

Look, I agree that turning anon off is a good thing to do, and I’ve deleted hate and sometimes I’ve replied to it if I felt like I had a decent point to make, and I’ll admit that I wish I’d had the ability to just click a button and make the hate secrets go poof back in the day, but yelling at people and insulting them and saying they just want attention or whatever isn’t going to help them. What it does is make you feel superior and self-righteous, help you feel bonded to the other people who agree with your judging and blaming, and perhaps reinforce your belief in the just world fallacy, if you believe in that. And make me feel extremely suspicious of you and probably block you because my traumatized brain says you’re not safe to be around.

If you really want them to turn anon off or delete the hate without responding, you have to start where they are. And I don’t know, maybe you can’t do that if you’ve never been where they are. But I have. 

And I know that judging and blaming and harshness and hate never did a thing but make me feel even worse. Eventually I isolated myself to the point that if anyone was still willing to listen and to help, they couldn’t get past my belief that everyone hated me and that they were right to do so. I had to find another community and tell them about what happened and get their validation that it wasn’t my fault and that I was an okay person who deserved to exist and that yes, it was traumatic and it did traumatize me, before I could even think about letting a Sims person through my defenses. Which one person kept her hand held out the whole time until I was finally able to take it, and I will be forever grateful to her. *hugs to her if she’s reading this*

What they need is love and inclusion and empathy. Like, oh my gosh, all those wonderful birthday messages I got yesterday. I don’t know, maybe back in the day ya’ll could have sent them and I wouldn’t have gotten them because I would have been too terrified to check my inbox, so I don’t know if it would have helped me back then. But it definitely helped me now. 

It’s a wonderful thing to be valued and included. It’s a horrible thing to be shamed and excluded. Someone who feels valued and included is much much more likely to hear you and to consider what you say when you suggest that they turn anon off and delete hate without answering than someone who feels shamed and excluded.

I said I had a link, so here’s a thing I found: Challenging Victim Blaming.

The first step is awareness. Be aware of the mental trap of believing that the world is just. It is difficult to accept that sometimes, bad things happen to good people. Recognize the tendency to rationalize suffering, trauma, and misfortune in this way;

Also this: The Psychology of Victim-Blaming

At its core, victim blaming could stem from a combination of failure to empathize with victims and a fear reaction triggered by the human drive for self-preservation. That fear reaction, in particular, can be a difficult one for some people to control. Retraining this instinct is possible—it just isn’t easy. Hamby and Gilin both emphasize the importance of empathy training and openness to seeing (or at least trying to see) the world from perspectives other than one’s own, which helps people avoid falling into the trap of speculating about what a victim could have done differently to avoid the crime.

I don’t know what it’s like to believe in a just world or to think that you’re safe if you do the right things. I don’t know about consciously, but my body and my subconscious have known that I’m not safe since I was five years old, at least. So I don’t know how hard it is to fight through that belief and recognize and change it. But I do know how hard it was and how long it took to fight through my belief that I was always wrong and unfixably flawed and that people were always right to hurt me and abandon me, so if it’s anything like that then it’ll take years and years of hard work.

But I think, also like that belief, the time and the work it takes to conquer it will be worth it in the end.

The theme of Surreal Darkness is very much informed by my trauma and my lack of a just world belief, I think. So if you need help facing the fear that comes with the realization that the world isn’t just and you aren’t safe, here’s what I’ve learned from a lifetime of facing that fear.

The answer to the void is love. It’s us against a reality that doesn’t care about us and that has no moral system or just rewards, and the only way I’ve found to deal with that is to love and support and help each other as much as you can.

*hugs all the people who read this far and who aren’t wishing I had anon turned on so they could tell me how worthless and awful I am right now*

[medialiterates]

Kids These Days

Digital convergence, the technological merging of content in different mass media (Campbell 53), has made the life of media exponentially more convenient for virtually anyone that has access to a computer, smartphone, or tablet. Whether you want to watch the show you missed last night, read your favorite newspaper, research a quick fact, or listen to your favorite radio station, you can do it all in one convenient location and with the press of a few buttons. With the invention of smartphones, the possibilities of exploring various forms of media all in one location are endless. You no longer need to sit around at home waiting for your show to air, or carry around that bulky book with you, because no matter which form of media you need to get a hold of, you can usually store it in one convenient location: technology. Undoubtedly, digital convergence has made our lifestyle convenient and instantly gratifying, we no longer have to wait for the next episode because we can binge watch on Netflix, and we no longer have to wait until school tomorrow to ask our teacher about a homework assignment because we can just shoot them a quick email. To the vast majority of people, young and old, digital convergence is the best thing since sliced bread. However, to some of the older generations, digital convergence is what’s “ruining” self-esteem and communication.

In Carrie Brownstein’s satirical video about social media (http:// https://youtu.be/MacJ4p0vITM?list=PLsPxc8Yhqanlqm0a_WgVitTm1Gs7Q4yGm ) some of the dangers of digital convergence are made transparent, one of them being lowered self-esteem due to constant connection to social media. The video depicts a young girl, Abby, being most literally “followed” by her social media followers. One of the most poignant moments is when Abby is guided back to the office of the Minister of Public Private Relations and is most literally followed by a group of people. Confused, Abby observes how one of the individuals has turned away and started walking in the other direction, a concept social media users know as “unfollowing.” The secretary leading Abby to the back office explains how the followers are “fickle like that. You’ll never know what you did wrong so don’t even worry about it” (Brownstein). Unfortunately, this can be the reality of social media. People quantify their self-worth based on how many friends, followers, and subscribers they can maintain on their various social media forums. It is for this reason that a person posts a photo and checks vigilantly to see who and how many people will click “like” as a way to validate their attractiveness or their level of being considered interesting. When a person decides to unfollow or unsubscribe, the owner of the account can perceive that as a reflection of their personal value, that they are not attractive or interesting enough. As the guide mentions, because a person never knows why they are being unfollowed, it generates a lot of spiraling questions causing a person to think of all the qualities that could possibly be wrong with them. This is where the self-esteem issues come into play. As we see in the video, after learning she has lost a follower, Abby immediately starts to question whether her face is presentable enough for her followers because she does not want to lose any more than she already has.

This over-dramatic representation of social media is not far from the truth. Hundreds upon thousands of youth, adults, and everyone in between calculate the extent to which people find them attractive, funny, smart, entertaining or popular simply based on how many likes, retweets, comments, and shares they get on their posts. Social media users jump at the site of a notification, checking to see if it was someone who liked their post. This mindset and lifestyle can be really damaging to a person’s self-esteem, especially young adults who are struggling to realize their identity and find out where they belong in the world. Adolescents, more often than not, fall prey to the fame chasing aspects of social media, wondering if they have gained their peer’s approval.

In another video, (https://www.ted.com/talks/sherry_turkle_alone_together?language=en ) Sherry Turkle takes the total “mom” position of the argument on whether or not we spend too much time on our devices. Due to media convergence, anyone and everyone can check their email, surf the web, and all of those other useful functions that I’ve mentioned above. Sherry, like many other adults, claim that having all of this power at our fingertips is dangerous because people are becoming accustomed to hiding behind their screens and avoid face-to-face communication at all costs. Is this really true? In my humble opinion, to a certain extent, people like Sherry have a point. When children learn at a young age how to communicate via media only, they miss out on some crucial conversational and communication skills. However, what I have an issue with is how many members of the baby boom generation like to point fingers and complain that the millennial generation is always on their phone. To a certain extent, millennials are on their devices more often than older generations, but did Sherry consider why this might be? Students in today’s age are required to utilize technology to complete school work. Whether it’s filming a music video for a class, creating a PowerPoint Presentation, asking a classmate a question about the assignment via Facebook, or writing an email to a teacher, students in today’s society need to be connected to a device. This, admittedly, does not excuse our overuse of texting, social media viewing, Netflix watching, and etc., but are members of the millennial generation the only ones guilty of too much screen time? Right in Sherry’s TED talk she cites and explains that adults are checking their email and scrolling through social media during business meetings and presentations! Adults, too, are guilty of letting technology take over their life! Too often teenagers get the bad reputation for being glued to their devices, but in reality, I’ve seen many personal instances where the forty-somethings are glued to their phones while the twenty-somethings are engaged in what’s going on around them.

As I briefly mentioned above, Sherry does have a point. Digital convergence has allowed and/or caused anyone with a device to be glued to it, therefore minimizing the amount of face-to-face interactions we have with each other on a daily basis. But does that mean the human race is going to forget how to have a formal interview or be unaware of how to talk to grandma about what they’re learning in school? Doubtfully. We learn all of these behaviors by human interaction, watching mom and dad, learning in school, and many other pathways of learning.

It seems as though there are so many critics out there claiming that communication is being flushed down the toilet with the constant availability of technology, but what has anyone done to counteract this problem? Scientists are always quick to point the finger that technology is ruining our conversational skills as a society, but what steps are being taken to ensure that future generations still know how to have a conversation that involves making eye contact? If critics focused less on what’s going wrong and focused more of their energy on strategies to overcome this challenge, the world would be less concerned about “teenagers being glued to their devices” and more confident that the young people of today will be able to lead us into a brighter future of communication strategies.  

Sherry says that we’re afraid to be alone and we have this intense need to make connections, but without the presence of technology, and more specifically digitally converged technology, wouldn’t we still have those same fears and desires? Think back 50 years ago, before the invention of the cell phone, social media, Netflix, and online reading sources. No matter what year it is, man has the desire to have a companion. It’s why we find spouses, make friends, or even adopt pets. Every person is afraid of being alone with or without technology. What does a person who is afraid of being alone do? They go out and make connections. When a person is lonely, bored, in need of some human interaction, they call up their friend or go visit their neighbor. You certainly don’t need an iPhone to do any of those things. While many may believe that media can be damaging to the way we communicate (and I wouldn’t entirely disagree with them), I wonder if people consider the same scenario from a different perspective as I have.

References:

Campbell, Richard, Christopher R. Martin, and Bettina Fabos. Media & culture: 

                 mass  communication in a digital age. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 

                 2015. Print.

Wired. Conde Nast, 13 Sept. 2016. Web. 03 Feb. 2017.

Turkle, Sherry. “Connected, but alone?” TED. February 2012. Lecture.