#I think this goes for so much more than syscourse too

[circular-bircular]

I think there genuinely is an enormous problem in online spaces, I think in part due to the whole concept of purity culture, where everything people say and do online is scrutinized — not just in the case of “Is this person a good person,” but “Does this person represent the values we wish to see 24/7.”

Nobody is perfect, dear lord, and this place is not the place to seek perfection regardless. This is tumblr, home of the go nuts, show nuts rule; tumblr, which is as invaded by fandom and was originally meant to be a pseudo Facebook. People who use this place didn’t come here originally to be activists. And if you did, I'm a little concerned, genuinely, for your mental health and how well you're distancing yourself from difficult subjects and giving yourself the time you need to decompress.

And yet, we keep holding people up to this frankly impossible standard of representing a movement, regardless of what their blog content originally was for. Suddenly, every system on tumblr has to represent a certain Ideal for System Rights! They have to have the right views on system accountability, endogenic systems, plurality as an umbrella, littles, dormancy, fusion, functional multiplicity, parts language, the ToSD-

This is fucking ridiculous. A laundry list of topics that people have on their shoulders, along with every other laundry list of things that people need to care about. Fuck you if you're oppressed in any single way, you need to form opinions on every single one of those things, and if any opinion is out of place, then You Are Not A True [IDENTITY].

Somewhere along the way, many of us (I’m including myself here for a reason) managed to either convince ourselves or be convinced that we need to be Correct in some way about how this all works. That’s prideful and haughty at best, but typically moreso just… so detrimental to healing. None of us will be perfect… and so, when those of us who aren’t perfect are imperfect publicly, we are often harassed or attacked — or some of us attack others, for whatever reason it may be. And somehow, someway, we accepted that this is just how it works.

It's okay to discuss those things you disagree with online. It's okay to look at someone's take about, say, system accountability, or plurality, or littles, and reblog with your corrections and even anger! But you must be doing this with acknowledgement that people will be in different places, healing in different ways, and that there is nothing wrong with that. They're their own person!

But moreover, that's a whole ass blog. That's not a reflection of a person as a whole -- hell, it's rarely a reflection of the person at all. It's just a blog that they can put anything on. Have we not all heard the stories of people who've "Completely Changed" online, becoming people who others cannot recognize? People lie on the internet, intentionally or not.

Even me. I try my best to be who I am in real life here, and I share a LOT of myself with you all. You know I'm a teacher, and engaged, and have the most perfectest little cat in the world. But do you know me? I recently just got to visit an online friend in person (It was absolutely fucking incredible and I can't wait to do it again), and the entire time, I felt like I was just so awkward; I really struggled to stay present and talk more, which is something I don't struggle with nearly as much online. Believe it or not, I am not this long-winded in real life.

Maybe that's not lying, but it's not who I am. It's me being fundamentally different online than in real life. You all see me entirely through just the blogs you know me through. Maybe it's circie bircie, maybe you know my D&D blog, maybe you know me through positivitycombopack, or maybe this just shows up randomly on your dashboard. Maybe you don't know me at all.

And that goes for every person you see online. Do you actually know them? Do you know their beliefs? What they stand for? Why they believe those beliefs?

Or are you just seeing a blog?

[rayssyscourse]

My syscourse hot take:

Everyone needs to take a course on ACEs and how they impact children and adults. Everyone needs to recognize just how traumatizing life can be, and understand that trauma goes beyond abuse.

I am begging people to realize how easy it is for children’s developmental health to be impacted, and just what that means for adulthood.

- Circular

hi circular, good to hear from you!

agreed! i will be nitpicky and say it's much easier said than done for people to just "take a course" on something, especially as complex and specific at it is --but that's just me nitpicking, your point still stands. it's so important to understand what you're talking about and the nuances of it before you get into debates or convos about it, and to be willing to learn more. as for the specific topic, you're absolutely right. without going into too much detail, our system is an example of this; we were not abused as a child, but a combination of genetic and environmental factors disrupted our development enough that it manifested as trauma. children are very impressionable, and there's lots of different factors, including but not limited to abuse, that can cause stress, trauma, and mental illness. different things will impact different people differently (wow, how many more times do you think I can say "different" in that sentence?), and that's important to realize.

so that's a very long winded way of saying "you're right", lol. thanks for the ask, and have a lovely day! <3

[system-of-a-feather]

(Disclaimer: this post was written in two parts, the first half was done the day before but not posted cause I didnt feel it was a complete thought, the second half was added after. I did not edit or touch the first half as I like to keep space for the thoughts of myself as they were; i also have passive chronic amnesia so Im not 100% sure if everything is on the same page; regardless that is just context)

Honestly, I think the thing that is important to keep in mind when interacting with syscourse - or specifically for us cause the only one we really care about is the tulpa discourse - is that you are never going to force or change anyone's mind who is so set that they are sitting on tumblr and pulling the dumbest arguments out of their ass to support their claims and I do think those that spend their time arguing with @/sophieinwonderland and @/cambriancrew - while honestly doing the dirty work no one wants to do by balancing out their bullshit posting so mad respect - are largely wasting their time if they do ever think that a mind will be changed.

The only reason to ever engage or talk about the stuff they (and the clique that actually buys into those arguments) talk about is solely to make an example out of how incredibly deep their interalized racism and just disregard for POC goes and honestly looking at them as anything other than a stubborn white person is putting more emotional energy than its worth.

Because genuinely, in a weird way and me doing what XIV calls "The Riku Thing" of looking at a really negative, annoying, and/or harmful thing and finding the bright side silverlining to it, I do kind of appreciate how astonishingly White TM they are because their unapologetic and loud nature makes a really big spectacle for a lot of people who otherwise would not understand how bad certain issues are look and go "what the fuck" and in its own way, it brings good publicity to the issues AAPI and eastern cultures go through in a western and white predominant area.

AAPI issues often go under the radar and are disregarded due to a number of reasons, but honestly? This is the most I've ever seen people actually talk about how white people take advantage of eastern and Asian cultures (relative to the size of the community in question) save for the brief blip of when Stop Asian Hate got loud during COVID where sinophobia blasted up and a bit surrounding Cyberpunk as a genre when Cyberpunk 2077 came out.

In that regard, I'm kinda glad they are so loudly racist and White TM about AAPI cultures. It makes for good publicity and awareness by being the example of just the Usual Bullshit and it starts better conversations. I'd honestly prefer a loud bigot to a quiet insidious one cause the loud ones at least can serve part of a message and be ignored.

Anyhow, this is all just to say that bigots will be bigots and you can argue with them all you want and call them truthful statements like "bigots" and "racist" but thats about all you can do to really control their behavior. Those balancing out their bullshit arguments, mad props - I could never cause that shit is too toxic and too much of an investment, but it is respectable work. (insert "it aint much but its honest work" meme at yall)

---(cut between original thoughts and the added bit)---

That said, I'll just say it as the fact that it is, those two and those that follow their rhetoric do not care at all about AAPI individuals and are just racist. We don't have to debate it and it's honestly not up for debate and while we could put our energy to trying to tear down their following and make them shut up, in a world where the KKK still exists and thrives, its an unlikely and futile of a goal to try ti achieve.

Instead its best imo to treat them like the public case study of white and western abuses to AAPI culture, particularly since time and time again they redisplay some of the most classic and frequently used techniques white and western individuals do to try to excuse their shit.

If you wouldn't give a person arguing with any other loud and proud bigot, its best to just accept that bigots be bigots and rather than banging your head against a wall, put it up for display on the museum wall as a means of education and awareness.

Theres no point in talking to bigots about how they are bigotted. There is, however, a point to displaying it for those less effected and usually not given the opportunity to sed it in full get a much closer look at some of the shit we deal with

I like to think that while a lot of white and western people suck, that a lot of them genuinely are trying their best with the limited awareness, access, and understanding that they have.

I dont feel as though I would be correct calling them and bigots a "small minority", but I'd like to think they aren't the majority and I honestly appreciate those willing to learn and better understand and so ya know? Whats a better way to explain it than with a live dancing monkey that loudly and proudly displays the behaviors in question for all to see.

Anyhow, I digress. Take this as you will. I am just throwing some insight and personal thoughts about specific users in hopes that some people who might be overly stressed about it might find a little more peace moderating the topic

[creatively-cosmic]

New pinned? Earlier today we got some tags on one of our art that reminded me that we never really went back and explained anything about ourselves, so. Gonna do it now.

Heya! We're Starry. This is our artblog.

We're a 20y/o genderfucked queer polyfragmented system with a lotta fictives. Pretty much everything here is based on shit in our brain. Heads up: We post Gore, Horror, and occasionally Suggestive content (tagged), along with artistic and partial nudity (which may not get tagged).

You might notice we never take acknowledging our plurality very seriously, or explain things regarding it much ever. That's... Pretty simply cause we don't want to put that on the internet for everyone and God to see. We're explaining it here because it's a part of our art and a frame of reference for a lot of things we make and say.

DON'T TAKE THIS POST AS ANY FORM OF A DNI. We don't want things we make to be treated any differently because of this. The works, writings, designs, and stories we put here are all from a place of concious thought and passion! While we call this blog more of a personal art archival, we do genuinely still put it online to share art that we've put thought, heart, and soul into.

For the record, to make things abundantly clear, we'll put a list of specifications under the cut. But in a nutshell, the main "boundary" I give a shit about is this:

Don't interact with our posts any differently than you would literally anything else. When you talk to us directly, just remember to not treat us like characters.

Thanks for reading. More below if you want more clarification.

Stuff that's fine:

We're fine with "doubles." You can be, kin, ID as whoever you want. If you relate to our stuff specifically, too? I promise that's fine. Awesome, in fact!

Comments/tags. Pleaseee comment on our art in fact it always makes our day. We see all that shit. Analyze, keysmash, shit you can even say some unwise stuff if you wanna. Don't hold back.

Fanart. Look if you ever got possessed to draw one of our designs I think we'd die for you on the spot. No questions asked, go for it.

Asks! Man, feel free to ask about anything. Ask about our stories, designs, opinions, experiences, whatever. Just don't ask about our trauma.

You can use our art as icons and such, just make sure to credit properly if it's in a public space ie social media or discord profile. Don't use it for any of that AI shit though.

Stuff that ISN'T fine:

I can't be damned to fill this out in any thorough way cause I don't really have any hard NOs, honestly. So this is just like. One thing, and it's an elaboration on the earlier bolded thing: Don't TALK DIRECTLY TO US as if we are characters. What I mean by this is... Us being fictives and talking about our stories doesn't mean this is a character blog. It isn't a roleplay blog. It's just us being us. Don't send messages or asks looking for someone specific, or expecting a specific reply, cause their source is your blorbo. And don't get shocked or offended when we inevitably act out of character in our posts, cause we AREN'T a character. We're people.

I guess this goes in hand with that but, don't tell us we're existing wrong as a fictive, alter, or system, too. I'll just block you. This is the only serious response anyone who might try to fakeclaim us is getting. I am not here to explain why we are the way we are, who we are, or what happened. Anyone engaging in """syscourse,""" please. Step back and understand that all that shit is, is sticking your nose into the trauma of strangers on the internet to decide if they're "correct" enough in your eyes. Nobody owes you their life story so you can decide if they're valid. Put your energy into something better.

[moonshinedyke]

Pinned Post:

-Asteria/Eris (+)

-Mixed Black/Indigenous

-Intersex genderfluid multigender transmascfem

-Alloaro bisexual lilaen lesbian.

-Stud, butch, (bull)dyke, faggot, tranny, freak, bulldagger

This is my blog for venting and just talking about bigotry. I didn't want to clog my main too much with these types of posts since a lot of them involve discoursey topics. This is not a blog that I plan to use to argue with other people under most circumstances. I'm using this blog to vent about my experiences, no matter how big or small they are. Check below the cut for some of my beliefs.

Just because I reblog from someone doesn't mean that I agree with everything they say and do. What it DOES mean is that I think they made a good point in that specific post they made.

-Many white queers have a problem with using their queerness to try and avoid accountability for their white privilege and racism. There is a HUGE racism problem in both online and real life queer spaces.

-Gender criticals are enormous pieces of shit with a very flawed view of sex and gender.

-The hyperpolicing of lesbianism on here is super lesbophobic. Stop obsessing over lesbians not conforming to your neat little cis fem white woman centric boxes. Let lesbians have some gender fuckery without frothing at the mouth.

-Bi lesbians/gays do not hurt mono lesbians/gays by existing. We are not responsible for homophobic cishets harassing you guys and saying that we are is violently biphobic. Stop being a narrowminded cishet bootlicker, assholes.

-Straight passing privilege does not exist. Invisibility and erasure is not a privilege.

-Lesbian separatism as an ideology is transphobic, biphobic, lesbophobic, and racist. If you defend lesbian separatism or pretend that it was even remotely okay then you are a bad person, straight-up.

-Intersexism is rampant in trans spaces. We are not your transition goals, we are not your gotcha to use against TERFs, and we are not nonbinary icons by default. The diversity of the intersex experience is unfathomable because of how many intersex conditions there are and how intersex conditions are viewed across the globe.

-Slur discourse is pointless at best and a straight-up psyop at worst. Let a bisexual call themself a dyke, let a transmasc call themself a tranny, let a lesbian call themself a faggot. I promise that it's not hurting you when other queer people reclaim slurs. Quit your victim complex.

-Butch and femme have always belonged to the whole queer community and have NEVER been lesbian exclusive. Denying that is spitting on ballroom culture- in other words, you're racist and transphobic as hell. Furthermore, Black non-lesbians have more claim to butch and femme than ANY white lesbian does. Read more here. It's a Carrd, yes, but it's a Carrd with actual sources, which is more than you can say for literally every Carrd written by exclusionists that you all choose to use anyways.

-Queer is not a slur and it's up to you to avoid people who use the word if it makes you that uncomfortable.

-Flag discourse is ridiculous. If you hate a flag that badly, just don't use it.

-You don't owe anyone an explanation for why you blocked them.

-I'm very wary of anyone who is against non-traumagenic systems. I don't really understand endo systems or other non-traumagenic systems, but I've seen tons of fakeclaiming and racism coming from the anti-endo community, so I tend to avoid them. I'm not interested in getting into syscourse and I generally keep my system life private.

-Well-researched self diagnosis is good, especially if you can't afford to get a professional diagnosis. Ultimately, you are the one actually experiencing what's in your brain.

-Shipping discourse is ridiculous and literally all of you need to go outside.

-Anti-transmasculinity as a form of oppression exists and to say otherwise is antiblack and transmisogynistic, since it often goes in hand with transmisogynoir.

-Nonbinary people do not owe you androgyny, let alone any change in appearance once they come out as nonbinary.

-Nonmen and nonwoman are not just terms that are super hostile to multigender people, they're also racist due to their hostility towards Two-Spirit people as well as how they've been used to degender Black people.

[free-ren-hugs]

Listen up, bitches

We, your friendly local neighborhood DID system, is here to talk about system origins.

But Crows! I hear you say, That’s syscourse! And syscourse is bad!

Great, I’m glad you think so. Because, yeah, syscourse sucks ass. But this is something that, from what I can tell from my little place in the universe, half the relatively-newly-discovered systems on the internet are clueless about.

And I’m choosing to believe that they are under-educated and not malicious. I doubt demonizing them is getting the point across.

System origin, if you can believe it, is why your system originally formed. Not why specific alters formed, not how specific alters formed- Why your brain decided that your little child body needed to be piloted by more than one consciousness.

And that reason will always be trauma. 

This is the bit where I’m going to lose people. But I don’t say this out of spite, nor am I coming for anyone’s head with this comment. I say this out of common sense reasoning, as well as the knowledge of what “trauma” covers in the DSM-5. 

Because why would your perfectly healthy child brain, that is going through generally good experiences, choose to deal with life by passing on the responsibility?

No no, I mean actually think about it. What would a healthy brain need multiple consciousnesses for? Playing make believe obviously doesn’t require it. Imaginary friends don’t normally stick around once you get older, and they never lived in your head with you, right? Loneliness only goes so far before it’s considered isolation and neglect- which is trauma, where “creating friends” is a coping mechanism to deal with said trauma. And so I pose the question again:  What would a healthy brain need multiple consciousnesses for?

And, as mentioned, the DSM-5 (the official document used to define the criteria of roughly 300 different disorders) defines trauma as a broader thing than you would expect.

“Dissociative identity disorder is associated with overwhelming experiences, traumatic events, and/or abuse occurring in childhood.” (DSM-5, pg 294, DID)

“Exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence in one (or more) of the following ways: 1. Directly experiencing the traumatic event(s). 2. Witnessing, in person, the event(s) as it occurred to others. 3. Learning that the traumatic event(s) occurred to a close family member or close friend. In cases of actual or threatened death of a family member or friend, the event(s) must have been violent or accidental. 4. Experiencing repeated or extreme exposure to aversive details of the traumatic event(s) (e.g., first responders collecting human remains: police officers repeatedly exposed to details of child abuse).” (DSM-5, pg 271, PTSD)

And while I’m quoting this document at you, let me point to this bit too:

“ B. Recurrent gaps in the recall of everyday events, important personal information, and/ or traumatic events that are inconsistent with ordinary forgetting.“ (DSM-5, pg 292, DID)

YOU AREN’T SUPPOSED TO REMEMBER IT

You are so valid if you do remember your trauma, and you are equally as valid if you don’t. It’s just the hand you’ve been dealt. But if your brain is switching between people to deal with everyday life- you more than likely have trauma, even if you don’t remember it.

And while you are valid in refusing to acknowledge your trauma, because it is a very hard thing to do (and I wholly believe that you’ll be able to get there someday)- it spreads misinformation. You are, intentionally or unintentionally, making it ‘trendy’, a DIY project you can pull together in under a week, something to be played with and tried on like a costume in your grandmother’s closet. You have made it a lot easier to fake this disorder, which is horrendous, to say the least.

It’s called a disorder for a reason. Because it impacts our lives. We dissociated so much to escape our surroundings that our brain thought being more than one person was the best way to handle it. I’m sure you can understand why I feel strongly about this.

Now, going back to the ‘why and how alters are formed’ comment for a moment. What did I mean by that? Well, what I mean is that alters can form, after the system’s inception, for a whole lot of different reasons.

Hyperfixations? You can split introjects from them. Special interests? Those too. Comfort medias? Absolutely.  Brainmade formed to make sure a little has someone to tuck them in at night? To be a friend? To keep someone company? That happens! That’s valid!

But these do not make you a different origin!! Your origin was already set when you were forced into plurality!! We just have sucky labels!!

You!! Are!! Traumagenic!!

--------

TL;DR: If you are actually a system, you formed from trauma, even if you don’t remember it.

[chaos-in-one]

Okay been seeing arguments over blocklists and callouts a lot lately, mainly in syscourse so here's my 2 cents

Most of the time neither are helpful. They lead to drama being prolonged and made worse, toxicity being spread, misinformation at times, harassment (both of the person on the blocklist/callout and sometimes the creator of it), and a lot of other toxic bullshit, and, on top of that, rarely change very many people's opinion on the person.

So here's the guidelines I go by for whether or not it is responsible or reasonable to make something like that for someone:

1. Is the person directly causing tangible harm to others?

Yes a person can be indirectly harming a person or sometimes it could be argued that a person is the cause of another being hurt, but if it is either of those situations, making that kind of post on them will simply stir up drama, cause arguments, etc. And sometimes a person's ideology can be harmful (would be indirectly harmful in most cases as it can lead to someone being hurt but they are not directly trying to hurt any specific person), but making a callout for 1 person based on ideology also ignores the root problem: the ideology. There are most likely many others that share their ideology. Singling a specific one of them out will give their entire group fuel to add onto existing issues even more, it does more harm than good.

2. Are you mentally equipped to handle possible backlash for the post?

If the answer is no, DO NOT DO IT! Do not risk your own safety and wellbeing for this! If the 1st guideline is met but you are not equipped to handle it, try to find someone else who is to help!

3. Is the victim of the situation you?

If you are not the one who was hurt by the persons actions: ask the person/people affected if they are okay with you making the post before you make it. If they say no, respect that. They, as the victims, are the ones most at risk for being attacked in the aftermath. Same goes for if you are also a victim but want to share that other people where hurt too. And once again, if they say they don't want it, leave them out of the post. Period, end of story.

4. Consider who all will be put in danger, both by posting it and by not posting it

It is so very important to weigh the consequences of your actions, especially in serious situations! If posting the callout/blocklist will endanger more people than not posting it will, don't do it. At that point you are not being helpful.

5. Make sure you have all the *correct* information on the situation to the best of your ability

Not spreading misinformation is so important. If you are not sure you know what is going on or if things have changed, check. If you can't then either don't post it or make it clear that you are not sure on something so you don't spread assumptions as facts.

6. Consider if the person has apologized (and, more importantly, if they stopped)

If the person has already apologized and improved on their behavior, leave it the fuck alone. Brining back an already fully resolved issue unnecessarily stirs up old issues and restarts old toxicity that would have stayed gone otherwise is not worth it. If they haven't changed or they didn't apologize that's a different story (mainly with the former, the apology depends, sometimes even if they didn't apologize stirring it back up isn't worth it).

Often times rather than do something with all these risks and potential to get people hurt, you can simply let individual people you think will agree with you know that the person did something you don't agree with. It causes so much less problems, I can assure you.

[darklingduke]

Inspired by @/capri-suns-and-gushers and this post about how sys-meds shouldn’t get to write the narrative about endogenic/parogenic/tulpamancy/spiritual/etc systems on this platform. 

We wanted to use this as our official coming-out-as-a-system (on this blog at least) post, as well as answering some things. 

If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask! Don’t send us syscourse or hate, please. (Long post, so it’s cut)

1. What kind of system are you?

We use several different terms to describe our system type, depending on how we’re feeling that day, who’s fronting, or who we’re talking to. We use endogenic, MaDD/paragenic, araisagenic, soul-bonding, and gateway.

Most of us are in here due to maladaptive daydreaming and escapism from the “core”, as well as projecting onto characters or having comfort characters. 

There are a few subsystems in here, though. One of our Remuses is a traumagenic OSDD system, Zak is a traumagenic DID system, Cadence has unknown origins, and Cleo is a paragenic system. 

2. How many of you are there?

Currently around 80 or so, counting subsystem member. But our numbers are constantly fluctuating when someone decides to leave or come back or walk-in. The highest amount we have ever had was around 120. 

3. How long have you known about your plurality?

Our “core” learned the first time about aer plurality in... I wanna say... 2018? Ae came out to someone as a system and it didn’t go well, so ae decided to forget all about it and procrastinated everything. We’ve been out as a system since December of 2019 now, though. 

4. Had you heard of DID/OSDD/DDNOS before you became plural/discovered your plurality?

Kind of? Someone at work approached us back in 2018 (see answer to 3) and whispered “hey. guess what. i’ve got multiple personality disorder. i’m not kyle.” then walked away. Star (”core”) went home that night and researched it and that’s how ae realized ae were plural. 

5. Do you have a wonderland/innerworld? If so, what do you call it, and what are some things that you and your system members do there?

We do, but it’s very difficult to see, due to the body’s aphantasia. Very few people are actually able to see it. It’s more along the lines of us “asking” the brain what it looks like and guessing things until the brain is like “yeah that’s right.” 

We call it our innerworld, or our headspace. 

A lot of people like hanging out in the living room (our “control room”, playing video games on one of the tv’s in here, or hanging out in the pond outside.

6. What do you call your system members?

Headmates. We’re not against the term “alters” but we don’t tend to use it too much. 

7. If you’re plural and don’t use the word “system” to describe you&, what word do you use?

We use the word “system” but we’ve been considering using different terms, just aren’t sure what terms there are to use lol.

8. What are some of the best things about being plural?

Probably getting to hang out with comfort characters. We are all aware that they aren’t their source, but they have many personality traits in common with their source, so it’s a source of comfort to get to hang out with and be friends with them. 

9. What are some not-so-great things about being plural?

The occasional blurriness we get when we realize we don’t know who we are/who’s fronting, and we have to try to figure out who we are. 

10. Do you have a spiritual or psychological view of your plurality?

We think it’s more of a spiritual view, because a lot of us, if not all of us, view it more as that person’s spirit coming to our headspace from a different dimension and hanging out here. 

11. Do you ever experience “switching” or “possession” or any sort of change in who controls the body? If so, what do you call it, how easy/difficult is it, and what is it like? Were you always able to do this, or did you have to learn how over time?

We do experience switching, but it feels different sometimes than others. Sometimes it feels as though whoever is fronting is more along the lines of Star (”core”) being in front and someone else backseat driving, or vice versa. 

We call it switching. It’s usually pretty easy. Sometimes we do it without even trying to or noticing. We’ll be sitting here playing a game or watching Tv and then all of a sudden realize we aren’t who was fronting before. Sometimes we have to focus on “handing over controls” in innerspace and there’s meatspace blurriness while that’s going on before it snaps into full control and the blurriness/dissociation goes away. it doesn’t normally take very long. A minute at most. 

We have been able to do it since actively being plural in 2019 (see answer 3)

12. How do you and your system mates relate to each other? (Are you friends, family, romantically involved, caretakers, etc)

All of the above. There are some people who were born in the system, and their family is in here. There are some people who are dating, who were related before coming here, who adopted each other in here as family, etc. It’s more of a whole world in here than anything. People have different relationships with each other. 

13. Have you come out to anybody in real life/in a singlet space about your plurality? How did it go?

We came out to our partner system’s dad (well they came out to him for us, but we gave them permission to do so), and he completely ignored the situation. And then we came out to the body’s mom, and she ignored us and told us she didn’t think we were safe with our partner system since they came out publically as a system. 

14. What kinds of forms and appearances do your system members take on?

We have some people in here who are human, we have some cat-people, demons, vampires, sirens, ghosts, and other monsters/creatures. We don’t all look like how people look like in this world, though. We don’t look how most people would say is “life like”. It’s more along the lines of video game animation or a more realistic version of pixar animation. 

15. What are you and your system members interested in?

Current interests are: Minecraft, Sanders Sides, Grey’s Anatomy, drawing, writing. Some people are interested in Don’t Starve Together. Some are interested in knitting and painting. Depends on the person. 

16. What is your life like in the meatworld?

Assuming meatworld is like... “real” world. Currently with quarantine, there’s not much to tell. We switch out every few hours if the body’s anxiety or depression gets too bad for us, we vibe with our partner system, and we pretend to be the core around the partner system’s dad (whom we live with).

17. What are your music tastes? Movies? Favorite Colors? Animals? List any other favorites as well. 

Ummm.... lol.... it really depends on the person. We have a playlist on spotify for each person. We don’t have much variety in favorite movies/shows, though. Most of us like animated movies or comedy or romcoms, or stereotypically straight movies (think Hallmark romance movie, or general romcoms, or raunchy comedy).

18. Does your system have a host/original? If so, what do you call them? Explain what role they play in your system. 

We have Star. Ae are the “original” person in here. We call aem the “core” when need be, but we usually just call aem Star lol. Ae are just another person in here, ae don’t really play too much of a “role”. Ae just decides what name the body goes by on default and ae have the final say on haircuts and tattoos/piercings and stuff. 

19. Do any system members have notable relationships outside of the system?

Yes! We have a partner system, @systemofthelostsouls . 

Star is dating Omen, Dee, Animosity, Logan, Regulus, and Story.  Virgil is dating Dee, Regulus, and Ceto. Remus is dating Omen, Dee, Logan, Emile and Story.  Roman is dating Emile and Logan.  Bee is dating Logan, Omen, Nyx, and Dee.  Charlie is dating Omen and Dee.  Denki is dating Jirou. Shinsou is dating Jirou. Kyle is dating Kay and has sort of a thing with Kenny and Stan.

And I’m decently sure there are more, but I can’t remember. I’m pretty new here, myself.

20. If you haven’t been plural for your entire life/haven’t known about your plurality until later in life: what was life like before plurality compared to life now. 

According to Star, life before plurality was a lot more... stable. Now if we want to finish a writing project, Star either has to backseat write, let someone else write for aem, or it takes weeks. We’ve been working on one chapter of a fanfiction for a week now. Before, Star was able to finish a chapter in a day or two. 

21. If you chose to become plural: why? What has changed since then?

We’re not actually sure if Star chose to become plural or not. Sometimes it feels like ae did (which fucks up with our imposter syndrome lmfao), sometimes it feels like Star chose to be plural and invited people here out of loneliness and wanting to fit in with our friend group at the time, but usually it just feels like people chose to come here, rather than the other way around. 

22. Is there anything you’d like to say to the plural community at large?

Don’t gatekeep, please. Let endogenic systems use the words “system” and “switching” if it’s what works for them. They aren’t hurting anyone. 

And please don’t fakeclaim. You don’t know what’s going on in someone’s head. You aren’t in there. 

23. Is there anything you’d like to say to any singlets reading this post?

Thank you for reading such a long thing. If any of this confuses you, or you’d like to learn more, our inbox is always open. But be warned, if you send us hate or something, we’re more likely to just delete your ask than answer it. 

Thank you all for reading! -Cyra

[imjustaf444keriguess]

"The post I was referring to was from a blog who actually said in their bio they were endo." you were using a quote that didn't have a source and i was going off of the quote u said. saying that people who use "plural culture" before a post are not always endogenic. if a specific poster was, cool, but the original post made it seem like you were reading from a general "plural culture is" blog, like... all of the plural/system culture is blogs that show up in the tags.

"And with the non-surface level things, if you're an alter, endogenic or not, how could you not not recognize yourself in the mirror? /genq" you recognize the "self" in the mirror as the body you're inhabiting? or as the collective "self" you live as to non-systems? especially endogenic systems, who don't have that disordered disconnect, they could see the mirror as "one of their bodies" or just... them, as they are in the moment.

i deal with that disconnect so i can't fully comprehend it either, but sometimes we do look in the mirror and it feels recognizable as ourselves, even if it's like... alter A looks at the clothes and sees themself in them, whereas alter B sees the haircut we have and goes "that's me!", or something.

also, the concept of a "sense of self" is very complicated. is the "self" as in the body, as a whole? i know we have a collective "self" we sometimes act as, but it's different than each alter/headmate's sense of self, as an individual being and consciousness inside the body. sometimes, these can overlap, especially with systems who see themselves as "parts of a whole" instead of separate "people" inside one body.

"No, we don't always post about the negatives of being a system, and we don't believe anyone has to in order to be valid. But only posting about the positives of it just gives people a warped view of what plurality is, since there's always negatives to every positive." i think there's definitely a lot of variation on how much negative to positive an experience can have.

especially with systems who are in recovery, in safe places, and who are able to be themself/selves in safe ways, there's gonna be way less negatives. similarly, there's going to be systems stuck in abusive and dangerous and shitty situations that might feel like life is nearly entirely negatives. for some systems, being a system/plural is more joy than pain, and for some others, it's more pain than joy.

i don't think we have to change our own experience just to "unwarp" other people's opinions on what plurality is. someone being happy as a system and not experiencing many negatives doesn't "warp someone's view of plurality", it shows one experience of plurality. similarly, someone posting negative experiences is another plural experience.

also, this is social media. outside of this blog, i avoid syscourse like the plague, and we don't post about the "negatives" of our systemhood. if we did post, we'd want to share joy and be happy. seeing sad content and focusing on the negatives online can be harmful, and can lead into spiraling or triggering other systems. i know sometimes i see people venting about their own system experiences, and it affects us, so we try to avoid those posts. social media is intended to be happy and fin (although occasionally to a too-addicting level, but that's another topic for another day)

anyway, if you're op or anyone who's read all this, remember to drink water, take any meds you need, eat food, destress from syscourse and go play video games or write or draw if needed, or maybe go focus on whatever thing you're supposed to be doing, like homework or chores. this is long and i want people to remember that syscourse mostly doesn't affect people in real life (outside of a few shitty people and bad doctors who are looking for a scapegoat for their ableism) so don't stress too much and care for yourself first!

Is it just me or do endos just post the most surface level things about plurality??

I saw a post saying "Plural culture is having to explain to your friends why you sometimes don't remember things and act different."

Like sure that's true but it's like one of the most well-known things ever, it's been said hundreds of times.

It honestly strengthens my belief that these people really don't know what plurality is beyond Tumblr and maybe a Wikipedia page or two. It just makes it seem like they didn't put much effort into learning what plurality actually is beyond the most well-known things about it.

-Charlie and Kirill

(PRO/ENDOS DO NOT INTERACT WITH THIS POST.)

[garalina2000]

I posted 10,803 times in 2022

That's 9,238 more posts than 2021!

95 posts created (1%)

10,708 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@alwek

@thepsychedelicpsychotic

@goldenspirits

@shortgremlinman

@loverbear-butch

I tagged 779 of my posts in 2022

#feminism - 130 posts

#not safe for elsa - 60 posts

#lesbian - 35 posts

#pistachio - 23 posts

#iran - 22 posts

#lesbian positivity - 13 posts

#butch positivity - 10 posts

#unreality - 9 posts

#religion tw - 8 posts

#abuse tw - 7 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#it's always up to the individual but remember not everyone has your best interests online and you're handing them some pretty powerful info

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Ahhh. Our interview is in 4 hours and we're so nervous we might implode?

9 notes - Posted February 7, 2022

#4

Idk if the meme makes sense but PLEASE STOP FEEDING THE BODY'S ENERGY DRINK ADDICTION AT 10PM, JORDAN. WE'RE STILL SLEEPY BUT OUR HEART IS SO FUCKING FAST

*I'd like to note that right in the middle of making this I was told that Jordan and Claire both forgot the other drank an energy drink, so I'm not blaming either of them as hard, but still. Please. I'm begging y'all. Stop doing this to us. Also the last was drank at least four hours after the first, so they weren't like... back to back. But still. Here's to hoping 200mg of trazadone and 30mg of propranolol can cut through 700 or so mg of caffeine.

12 notes - Posted April 23, 2022

#3

Hey, just to broadcast our official system opinion on syscourse (we're all kind of divided on the issue, but this is the consensus we have come to) :

We'd rather not have endogenic blogs following us. I don't think we've seen any good evidence supporting systems being formed by things other than trauma (if anyone has evidence, feel free to share! I love learning new information, thinking critically and changing my mind), but even if endogenic systems could be proven to be real systems beyond a shadow of a doubt, we still wouldn't want endo interaction due to how much our trauma impacts every facet of our existence as a system, and how we would therefore rather have a community solely of people who are working on healing themselves and coping with an extreme form of PTSD than share those spaces with people who claim to be born with a fractured consciousness or willed one into existence. Those are just two groups who have different needs from their communities.

As for OSDDID supporters of endogenic systems, all opinions are welcome here, even ones we disagree with. If you take issue with any of what I posted, feel free to hop into our inbox and let us know*! I'm always open to friendly debate. Please be civil. No calling anti-endogenics t*****scum or s**med. The same goes in reverse, though, too! Anti friends, let's not treat pro-endo systems badly. If we see anyone not being civil, we will delete your comment/ask.

* - this also goes for anti-endos! If you took issue with anything I posted above, don't be shy! Please hop in our inbox and inform us!!

Xoxo,

Sophie and Elaine

13 notes - Posted January 30, 2022

#2

Anyway, I really don't get why y'all don't just block most of these vocal, hateful pro-endos (QA, Sophie, etc). Like, you're welcome to do what you'd like, it's your own online experience, after all, but they aren't listening to our arguments, aren't reading our sources, so why waste your energy talking in circles with these people?

14 notes - Posted April 1, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

I noticed like... Right after we pressed 'send'

24 notes - Posted September 15, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[1ff]

Advice for people struggling with selves-doubt (Am I multiple?)

This is in response to a question/rant/plea someone put to me, but I decided not to respond directly, or even @ them because my response broaches on some really messy territory and I didn’t want to add to their crisis by bringing syscourse to their personal blog. I also wanted to make a response on my own blog because I think it’s a crisis that a lot of multiples go through and I hope that our experiences can be helpful.

First of all: to anyone suffering through doubts, confusion, conflicting symptoms, conflicting perspectives and opinions, skeptical professionals, and angry gatekeepers: I don’t even have words to express my sympathy. It’s bad enough trying to figure out whether you are “actually” multiple without having to deal with everyone else’s hangups. Dozens of virtual *hugs* to you all.

In the end, please remember: anyone who comes to you and claims to be an expert should be treated with a grain of salt. Even psych professionals and other multiples. Even the “official” textbooks. Trust me, I’ve read dozens of them, and they don’t even agree with each other. The DID experts like to act as though there is a well-defined, broadly agreed-on model for multiplicity, but when you start to pick it apart you discover that there is no united, scientific consensus. It’s contradictory and goes through fads. Do not let them tell you the parameters of who you are allowed to be.

We were lucky to have discovered a broader idea of multiplicity early on. Reading about endogenic and spiritual systems allowed us to discover each other first, without having to deal with trauma right away. We were a mostly-mapped, selves-aware, and internally-introduced system well before we ever talked to a psych professional about it. Along the way, in the process of meeting and understanding each other, things started to crop up that pointed to trauma. Nobody could really say exactly what it was; it was more like a giant gaping hole in the past that was the shape of something nasty. Some system members were intentionally keeping secrets about it. Some members were missing memories about it.

Like almost every single traumagenic system I’ve ever met or read about, we all said “well, obviously there was some kind of trauma, but it wasn’t bad enough to explain how we became us.” After all, consider that we are a largish group (several dozen) with our fair share of members specifically dedicated to hiding memories, physically protecting us, dealing with fallout, dealing with anger, hiding emotions, etc, etc. We experience dissociation to varying degrees pretty much continuously 24/7. We look like a system that’s been to hell and back, but “obviously” we haven’t. So we assumed.

There’s three problems with that assumption, though:

#1. Different people experience trauma differently. The outcome (in terms of system size and nature) is not directly correlated to the kind or degree of trauma they endured. Remember, some people go through horrible trauma and don’t even become systems at all.

#2. The entire point of being multiple, in the DID model, is to produce at least one member of the system who is completely or mostly oblivious to ever having gone through trauma. They all have someone who can say “I can’t be multiple, I barely went through anything bad.”

#3. I know this will make a lot of people very angry, but I still stand firmly by the idea that there are multiples who didn’t become multiple through trauma.

Now, in regards to the crisis you are facing: I really, honestly do sympathize. I know how badly this can mess with your mind, both intellectually and physically. We have sketchbooks and journals full of diagrams and system maps and angry rants reflecting our process of trying to come to that answer. Nobody can tell you that you are or aren’t multiple. As comforting as it can seem for a psychiatrist to write down that diagnosis on a clipboard, that doesn’t really resolve it. Psychiatrists can be wrong, and this disorder is highly contested. There will always be another psychiatrist ready to cross that diagnosis out. And sadly, there are many psychiatrists who are all too willing to make that diagnosis without enough evidence.

When our group faced that crisis personally, it led to a big mess. It was like an internal civil war. Day after day of shouting and fighting, then weeks in complete silence as the arguing moved further down. We ended up re-traumatizing ourselves, and as a result the main front (Ian) fissioned off a new member (me, One. I was named after a crisis over whether we were One or many).

I’ve seen other groups sort of fade away, becoming “less multiple,” until finally realizing that they had sort of invented the whole thing. It does happen. Some people either invent a system for themselves through an overactive imagination, or experience some temporary low-level dissociation of identity that later resolves. I think it’s important to note that people who go through this tend to fade away within a few weeks. (And I bear absolutely no judgement against them, or consider them to be infringing on a culture or a disorder. Sometimes self-discovery is messy.)

I also believe firmly that there are median systems, both endogenic and OSDD. Some go through phases of being more or less present. Some don’t experience amnesia or aren’t fully separated. This is legitimate in my eyes and not infringing on anyone else.

The point, in the bigger picture, is this: Don’t let anybody else tell you who or what you are. Don’t let anyone else decide what boundaries you’re allowed to exist within. Take advice from diverse sources. Do your own research. Be prepared to accept yourself/ves regardless of what you discover. Take your time. Find peace. Don’t constantly obsess over the question: find hobbies and pastimes that give you catharsis and distraction. Consider other diagnoses and explanations that might explain things. It will take time, and will be difficult, so be careful with yourself/ves.

In the end, you won’t really find an answer to the question “Am I multiple?” There is no kind of test in the world (yet) that can answer that conclusively. Instead, eventually you will come to a conclusion like “It would only make sense to assume that this is how I/we are” or “Living like this is turning out to be healthier for me/us, so I/we will continue under this assumption.” And I promise that coming to this conclusion is a lot more satisfying than it sounds.

-One Faraday

Edit: Sorry, huge gigantic post, forgot to cut it. Fixed.

[thecircularsystem]

Hey.

Sophie’s post was about a server I helped run, one I tried my best to breathe life into, and spread so much vicious misinformation that it ripped my life apart.

Forgive me if I take this kind of personally.

Quotation marks in a post, particularly around a single word, are not used in an academic context. In academic contexts, quotation marks are citing the original text directly. In colloquial usage, quotation marks are often used as emphasis. They’re also used for sarcasm, for paraphrasing, for— honestly, please just look up what scare quotes are.

To put so much focus on the usage of quotation marks in this post is to obfuscate what actually happened. So let’s ignore the quotes for now and look at the claim and evidence.

Dia made a post where it posited that Sophie had made posts where she hoped anti-endos would split introjects of her in order to suffer. You are correct that this claim was unsubstantiated. You retorted that if someone says this and does not provide a quote, they’re lying. This is usage of overgeneralization, where you also make an unsubstantiated claim that boils a nuanced topic down to an absolute. You are also in the wrong. I believe a better way to make your point would be to have said something closer to, “Please do your own research, since this claim is unsubstantiated, meaning it could be false.”

But helpfully, someone provided one example of Sophie discussing introjects of her in anti-endos, in an effort to substantiate Dia’s claim. I agree with you that this should have been in the original post — if Dia’s original post was of an academic quality and more effort than over-a-year-old-dreams deserved. However, since it is the case that this was over a year old drama, I don’t blame Dia for not going digging for it (nor you for not believing the original claim without that evidence!)

You then ignore the existence of scare quotes and insinuate that the post linked needed to physically say the word suffer in order to prove Dia’s claim. This shows a severe lack of reading comprehension, so I thought I might explain the linked post to you to ensure you were aware that Dia’s claim is correct.

Sophie posits that multiple users (it was one) usage of a tupper (which didn’t happen, it was PK) repeatedly (it happened over the course of I believe one day, maybe 13 instances iirc). She also does not give sources for this claim, so I suppose you would’ve called her out in August 2023 if you’d been active then too. She then goes on to imply the space hates her (inaccurate but I would say a fair number were traumatized by her, and a fair number within the syscourse channel did hate her — not all, though, not even me.)

This gives her “mean-spirited thoughts.” This shows her thinking ill-will on others, by her own admission, which could be defined as wishing suffering on others. She continues on to describe how, by posting this post (again, positing that anti-endos who RP her would actually be splitting her) would cause doubts in those who were in the server, leading anti-endos to “give voice to the things they aren’t saying out loud.” Given context clues, I can infer (based on Sophie’s views of anti endos and the misinformation she spread about the server) that she intends for this line to be about ostracizing individuals who may or may not split a Sophie alter. She implies the entire friend group would “turn against them.”

Based on this reading, I would paraphrase this post as “Sophie had wishes she admitted in this post that anti-endos would split introjects of her, leading them to suffer.”

Let’s continue analyzing the thread. PSW posts Reliable Deniable, to point out that even though the post in question does not physically say the word Suffer, suffering is implied by what Sophie describes. You promptly ignore that fact, insinuating that you are in the right since you are calling into question Dia’s usage of quotation marks.

This is still ignoring the reason for the post. It’s distracting from the fact that Sophie caused irrevocable harm on many by spreading this misinformation, and moreover, it obfuscates the original claim being true.

Sophie wished anti-endos harm via splitting introjects of her.

She might not have said the word directly, but please work on figuring out what is implied.

let’s also mention how sophie said she hoped anti endos split an alter of her so they can “suffer”