#I'm sorry for abusing the tags like this

[silawastaken]

GOOD NEWS: I believe I have contracted the flu, and therefore I can and will be writing for a majority of all the time I am off school because my brain is too melted to do anything else.

BAD NEWS: My throat really hurts :(

[anendtopursuit]

not to gush too much abt neil newbon's performance as astarion (and stephen rooney's writing for him) but like. he's discussed on streams before how conscious the decision to make him feel like he's constantly performing is (regardless of outcome; theatrical spawn astarion & operatic ascended astarion), and how stephen rooney leaned more into the whimsy and fun of the character based on things he saw in his portrayal (hence astarion progressively getting funnier and more charismatic through game development). but the thing that drives me absolutely mad tbh is the moments where all of it drops and he's suddenly so sincere, because it hits you like a truck to the face.

his voice going all soft and quiet and brittle when he describes cazador instructing his spawn to torture themselves. his mannerisms shifting from seductive and playful to a little more nervous. but the one that always gets me is in the graveyard romance scene, talking about what cazador has taken from him, how it was taken by force; "but he did take it," in this voice that's so full of sorrow that it almost sounds hollow, muffled by none of his usual pomp and theatricality, when even in cazador's palace his admissions of upset were sandwiched between attempts to brush it all off. dear god.

[collegeboysam]

one of the most upsetting details of the scene where marius whips armand in his book is not only the violence and abuse, but also what marius does afterwards. armand is crying and begging him to stop the entire time, he hates what's happening, but only by the end marius puts his blood on the wounds he left on armand, which he knows is pleasurable for humans. armand hated the punishment, he did not want it, but marius forces him to enjoy it at the end by giving him something armand can't help but like because of the effect vampire's blood has on humans. marius is conditioning armand to think he likes the whipping by giving him his blood only after being so vicious he opens wounds on armand's skin. he's basically doing stimuli based pavlov mindfuckery with armand. i want to strangle marius until he's foaming at the mouth.

[hellonerf]

endless insanity incoherent shit about ame and love and family(featuring england and cana a bit specifically sorry france i actually do have thoughts about that there but i'm lazy and tired and this is incoherent already)(it didn't start off like that this is honestly like some stream of thought shit hence the incoherence)

some shit when i think about. sorry. colonial ame extremely upset tantrums theres no way england didnt hit him or spank him which would just upset ame more. ame would sulk and wish for england to drop dead because theres not much else he can say or do about the frustration. cana goody two shoes kid would be like why do you have to act out like that so much... ame immediate rage. probably hits cana like GO CRY ABOUT IT!!! and cana cries and then england walks in like America!!! and it just gets worse. but in the end when england has to leave again ame still clings and cries after england is saying his goodbyes. england does feel that he cares about ame deeply, so he does try to show his affection. theres some gap here between the care he shows and his "responsibility as a caretaker" if you will... and he's like a teen dad at this point? with his own shitload of baggage and ideas on responsibility from that baggage. man this family can be so interesting. i love tension

of course. this is just my crazythinking that in situations where, you could say, england's parenting was abusive of sorts, specifically in the physical way, to punish tantrums or etc... i think cana would be inclined to try to play polite kid to avoid punishment. and so he would feel maybe more vindicated? that he's the good example. in this it creates kind of a chasm between england/cana and ame. (why i think mapletea would just drive ame crazy wall smashing head insane, besides that ame already feels jealous/insecure like that anyways no matter what) this feeling is pushed by the revolution where ame and england are Like That, and here again cana sides with england(he's not Fully in it but he does technically side with england, and ame definitely views it like that). to him this is proof... of what you ask? i don't know..... that period where he was on decidedly bad terms with both of them, i always think he's like teenage-losing it about it. won't show it or at least will try not to of course, but it's genuinely something that eats at him so hard. (ame voice Nobody loves me. Everyone should love me. i could probably make that happen.) and ame decides things like that first and foremost with personal relations. this is specific, but im like, i think it's a mental testing he does on people. example, completely without their knowledge, someone's random act can register in his brain as an opposition to him, because his mind decided that's what it means.(somewhere subconscious). so for some time i'd imagine in his mind, that cana and england hated him, or looked down on him, or expected him to wind up dead anyways. ame is never not looking for approval and this fuels that sooooo much. it's like spite and anger and crying and stomping on the ground and in a way grieving. he's staring at the sky like it's unfair. they don't want me in their life. because i'm better than them. i hate them so much.(he wouldn't say it like this to other people, hate is a strong word, and i wouldn't say he hates them here either)

despite his bravado of "whaat? everyone likes me right?" the mental cogs are stuck here no matter what he says. cana loves him, even if it's so frustrating to, cana cares about him deeply. it fucks with ame's brain but he knows this deep down, that cana does love and care about him. at some point too he knows the same for england. but i also think he's like, specifically with cana too when he's specifically being really cynical about relations is like, "oh and he's only around... cause he has to be..." and ame wouldn't entirely be wrong there. and cana would argue so what! do you need a cosmic soulmate love to prove something? and ame is like (yeah i kinda do....). love can't just exist for you right here right now?! cana's love is "invalidated" in this sense. and also it hurts his brain too much to really think about the complexities in his relationship to both england and cana. that they really did care about him, but it's not easy. (hurts his brain... like why is interaction so stressful? why is it complicated? why can't people just go i love you and the end?). ame is not a romantic person but i think his view on love can get so fantastical like this. (he wants to be the one proposed to awwww omg you guysss...) at the same time it's a very simple view on love. he doesn't want to end up humiliated and is willing to humiliate others to avoid it. if love is true then there is One True Love... For him... JK! NOT FOR HIM!(slurps soda) who needs that shyit!!!(eats burger). a lot of things he can't/really doesn't want to accept. this is why i'd say anytime he ever felt feelings significant enough that even he would call it love it was mindnumbingly overwhelming. putting his eggs in one basket... don't fail me now!!! (and i always think none of his relationships are stable. duh. so). i like fics where ame is made to be like a crazy ex girlfriend. because he would. rather than love as a constant thing to do it sometimes feels more like an achievement or endpoint for him. something that happens at the end of movies lol... if love was happening REALTIME it'd be surreal for him to process. and like true genuine love not his fake idea of what love looks like

[transmascutena]

Good evening (or morning, depending on your timezone).

Absolutely no hate, but I want to ask how you reconcile your enjoyment of the show with the reality of what Ikuhara has (most likely) done?/gen

I understand Death of the Author, but what drew me to Utena in the first place was its theme of critiquing the patriarchy and calling out abuse, which feels somewhat hypocritical now. I resonate with this show, and many of Ikuhara's other shows, on a personal level, which is why I am especially disappointed with the accusations since I now have to wonder how that reflects onto me as a person...?

Obviously I don't know you personally, but you seem to spend a lot of time and care on your analyses (which are great btw) so have you also struggled with this?

Again, there is like zero judgement when I say this and I'm absolutely not trying to come off as hostile (in case that is how this reads). And, there is no pressure on you to answer this and I'll completely understand if you want to ignore the ask.

Thanks.

hi, i've been thinking about this as well since yesterday, and it is kind of tough to figure out how to feel about. i think it's important to remember that ikuhara did not make revolutionary girl utena alone, for one. he had a whole team of writers and animators and producers and so on, that it would not exist without. obviously ikuhara played a big part in the show's creation, but far from the only one (if it was, i have no doubt it would be very very different), and . idk what my point really is here but i don't think his actions reflect on the show as a whole. it still is what it is, it still says the same important things about our society's systems of abuse that we've always talked about, even if the director didn't understand it or didn't want to understand it or however you want to put it. and by extension i don't think it reflects on to all the people who have enjoyed the show, who have seen their experiences in it, who have learned from it more about how this kind of abuse works and so on. and i think we need to be aware of what has (allegedly, but again, i believe it) happened, but i don't necessarily think we need to write off the show just because he had a hand in making it. because it is just as important as we've always known it to be, you know? though i think there are (as there has always been and there always is in anything) elements of the show to be critical of, and maybe some new things as well in light of this. i'll have to think about it more.

[aithusarosekiller]

This is on my tiktok but I wanted to post it here too bc it's really been bugging me

The caption essentially said that if I see a characterisation I don't like (I used the example of big buff alpha remus) I just scroll because clearly the content was made for someone else and I'm not the target audience

[seaweedstarshine]

Hi! Long time no yap but I've been really bothered by this thing and I know you're just the person I can go to with this (even if we don't always end up agreeing at times).

I got into a tiff with someone in a comments section of a post that was about Amy (Which character do you think deserved to become a villain? or something similar). They brought up Amy's abuse of her boyfriend. I may have tried to defend Amy (key word is tried. I am officially rubbish at debating) but then I may have said something? Because they said that I (and apparently a lot of other fans) was excusing Amy's abuse because of her trauma. It got me stumped because isn't young Amy's treatment of Rory rooted in her trauma? Did I miss the memo where we separate trauma and abuse? Am I missing something?

That statement bothered me a lot because if there's one thing I never want to do it's defend an abuser. So here I am, humbly asking and hoping to clear the muddy waters.

Your really confused and disturbed moot, Tia 💌

TIA!!!!! Thanks for the ask 💌 , and I send you all the hugs.

Discussion of abuse, trauma, ableism, infidelity, and unhealthy relationship dynamics beneath the cut.

(First off… while I really appreciate your faith in my explaining skills <3 <3 <3 my passion for traumatized characters and mentally ill+neurodivergent rights doesn't make me especially qualified to fully clear muddy waters especially not knowing the full context, but I feel you, and what follows is my informed perspective!)

Speaking generally first, harm done in media is best examined by the impact on the audience, with a different lens than harm done to real people. While relatable experiences in media can be useful and validating and incredibly important, you can’t be “defending an abuser” when the abuse is fictional. It's actually normal for traumatized/ND/mentally ill people to project onto mentally ill villains, when villains are the only significant representation for those stigmatized symptoms in a media landscape that excludes and demonizes us simply for existing. RTD can't stop people who hallucinate from reclaiming the Master's Drums and projecting onto the Master, for example — 90% of the best Doctor Who psychosis fic by psychotic authors is about the Master, whether RTD likes it or not. It's not true crime.

(This is speaking generally. Amy Pond is very much not the Master.)

Abuse is a behavior, and there can be many reasons for it, but reasons based in trauma don’t make it not abuse (some forms of generational trauma can propagate abusive parenting styles, when the parent thinks abusive parenting is normal, or lives entirely vicariously through their child). This absolutely should not be taken to mean trauma correlates with abusive behavior; rather that abusive behaviors from traumatized people are more likely to present in specific ways.

Abuse is also a targeted behavior, based in control — not consistently displayed C-PTSD symptoms as seen in Season 5 Amy Pond through many aspects of her life. Mental health symptoms don't become abuse just because they hinder one partner from meeting the other partner's needs. Any life event can do that.

Without knowing the context of the arguments, this is the aspect of their relationship I've seen you talk about before (which I also feel strongly about), and what I assume is what you were debating? So, here I will talk specifically in regard to Season 5.

We all know Amy — she's never attached to Leadworth because she never wanted to leave Scotland, no steady therapist because none of them stick up for her, can't stick with one job yet her first choice is a job that simulates intimacy because her avoidant behavior (a known trauma response) isn't sustainable to her wellbeing. Rory knows her fears of commitment stem from her repeated abandonments, it’s why he’ll always wait for her, and it's why he blames the Doctor “You make it so they don't want to let you down.”, who apart from having caused a lot of her trauma, has actively taken advantage of her being the “Scottish girl in the English village” who's “still got that accent,” because he wants to feel important, so yeah, I think interpreting Amy's issues (and how Amy and Rory transverse them) as Amy abusing Rory indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of their relationship, as well as a misunderstanding of the (raggedy) Doctor’s role in Amy’s formative self-image (which of course she works through in Season 6, but I am sticking to Season 5).

Abuse is always based in control. That just doesn’t fit here. While Amy's detachment from her real life includes things like calling Rory her “kind of boyfriend” (which she is upfront about to his face; differing commitment levels isn't abuse, though it can be a relationship red flag for both parties IRL) — her Season 5 disregard of Rory’s feelings occurs only in response to the fairytale embodiment of her trauma. It's never a response to Rory; it's a response to the Doctor, who stole her childhood and led her by the hand to her death. She cheats on Rory with the Doctor in her bedroom full of Doctor toys, drawings, models, she made from childhood to early adulthood.

(And yes, like many repeatedly-traumatized people, Amy is prone to being sensitive and reactive. Take her “Well, shut up then!” line in The Big Bang; but given Rory responds to this by hugging her, clearly he doesn’t take it as her actually dismissing him. He knows her better than that.)

And by no means do I meant to imply this is fair to young Rory, poor Rory, who's left struggling with the feeling that his role in her life is in competition with the role of her trauma (aka the Doctor). But not every unhealthy relationship dynamic is unhealthy because of abuse. Labelling Amy's treatment of Rory in Season 5 more accurately isn't the same as excusing her harmful choices — but making mistakes is part of being human, Amy's mistakes are certainly understandable, and she works through them out of love for Rory.

If there's one thing to say about Moffat women, it's that Moffat allows his female characters the same grace that the male characters *coughTENcough* have always had, to hurt and struggle and make realistic mistakes and overcome those mistakes and to heal without being demonized.

Amy isn't perfect, but she is a fully realized character, and her story gives us a resonant depiction of childhood trauma.

[postaldouche]

s2, ep10 THE BAD RES STRIKES AGAIN PLEASE GOD HELP MEEEE whatever. anyways, REALLY good and cute henchman face as a re-opener for the monarch crew

"what do you think? pretty sweet, huh?" huge enjoyer of that thing monarch does when he's not being particularly manic or volatile and villainous you know, the thing where he's normal and polite and trying be all impressive/buddy-buddy with whatever person/other villain he's trying to warm up to? i know it's called "being normal" but really, i do think monarch is cute whenever he's not horrid and a migraine lol

"if you don't mind me saying - you seem to be a tad overstaffed in your control room." WHAT DO YOU KNOW???? ASSHOLE. MONARCH is a VERY (selectively) SOCIAL ANIMAL!!! he NEEDS his guys surrounding him and occupying his spaces at ALL times. if he doesn't then he gets too lonely and does that thing that cats do when no ones in the room and they start meowing/crying REALLY really loud (, ; _ ;)

also taking a moment here to point out how badass and cool the black guards are. very nice and impressive suits. intimidating and nice. fitting. honestly, without the wings they'd be good villain suits all on their own. something about how covered up and anonymous + quiet they are MAKES the whole situation + get up so good. really nothing like most other henchmen we see in the series at all. it's nice. also they're kind of hot lmao

"eeuuaahh.. him, and ah.. the dead guy NEXT to him." by social animal i meant he's a "whatever is whatever fucking kill that guy idc" animal sorry lel ALSO POINTING OUT THE SUITS AGAINNNN THEY LITERALLY LOOK LIKE THEIR OWN SOLO VILLAINS THEY'RE SO FUCKING COOOLLL

the boys gossiping you love to see it also pointing out that i think it's pretty cool that whenever monarch runs into someone that he deems as superior (on some really MENTALLY DISTANT level) (for the sake of his own ego), smarter, useful and/or mandatory - he'll mostly whatever it is they want/suggests (depends on the thing imo) so long as it also satisfies/benefits him (usually through the means of him receiving some sort of help or assistance) honestly not a MASSIVE "point out worthy" thingy since this is just basic shit and monarch kills henchmen like it's nothing: but i like that he's kind of big on first impressions sometimes idk lel i'm mostly mentioning this because i believe he TOTALLY wanted to fuck henry (will be brought up later)

"i'm still wearing an orange JERKIN! >:(" yellow jerkin. that is a YELLOW jerkin.

also you guys ever notice how huge monarchs head is it's either really tiny or a fucking unit

[pa-pa-plasma]

i don't think i'll ever get over how people treat kids that aren't good in school as worthless no matter what. "oh it can't be that bad" my guy idk how to tell you this but the last time i went to a normal high school the principal called me into his office to brag about how he failed me in all of my classes before the semester was even finished & i should quit while i'm ahead cuz i'm too stupid ("officially" diagnosed as such by a school counselor & a psychiatrist!!) to succeed. & this is considered normal

[name-doggo]

One thing I really wish the FF Community would Stop doing is Removing All Nuance from the Parents in Those Stories in order to Make Them Abusive Supervillains who Never Loved their Kid.

Like... In the Four Years I've been here, and for how Small the Community really is, you'd be surprised how many Times I've seen it-

[bunnieswithknives]

i would like to see the uncut "room punishment" (if you dont mind)

I might be hyping it up too much but basically what happened was this:

David's pretty spoiled and doesn't do much in the way of chores. Roy tells David to clean his room and David refuses, he says that can't he doesn't know how.

Roy decides that if he doesn't want to listen then he'll lock him in his room until he does it, but David gets too overwhelmed by the thought of even starting the task and basically just shuts down and starts crying, saying that he can't do it.

This goes on like all day. Eventually breakfast and lunch pass and he still hasn't done it. Lesley is getting more and more pissed that Roy won't just relent and they get into a big argument about it where Lesley points out that he said he wanted to be better than his own father was to him, and that finally gets him to give in.

[arctic-hands]

Time and distance heals things I guess. My parents got into an abusive fight with me after i took markers and pens to most of my clothes in middle school to scribble doodles and social justice messages (most prominently, Save Darfur–which really needs to be a rallying cry again given that the genocide has kicked up again as the Sudanese civil war rages). They were worried I'd look "unpresentable" in my massively oversized boy graphic tees and baggy jeans held up only by the grace of God (this was all by choice btw, i had and have always despised tight clothing and by middle school I had shunned girl clothes all together). But now at 31 I make mention of writing messages in sharpie on new t-shirts and my mom thinks it's cool and my dad offered to buy me proper fabric markers (I declined bc the cheap shirts will prolly wear out before the sharpies fade anyway). Go figure

[transmascutena]

thinking about how akio sees his younger self in utena and wondering if there's any fondness there. doesn't change the horror of what he does to her obviously but i do wonder

[babygirltangerine]

ah. so aaron deactivated his instagram. and the people that harass him in his comments section and laugh about his abuse to his face are going to act like they're not part of the problem. haha just grandma being evil again, right? because being absolutely horrendous about his life in his comments won't cause him to rely on her further? because we are all so caught up in the joy of having a laugh at his wife that we will do it without thought of the consequences they will have for him personally? because we care more about him as an entertainer than we do about the fact that he's a person? and a victim? right? haha? we're not part of the problem no of course not, it's all because his mean old ugly wife is old and ugly and that's sooo bizarre and we all deserve to fuck him more than her so we can say whatever we want and hurt him when he's vulnerable. can you people be smart about this for two fucking seconds haha fucking PLEASE??? i'm so tired.

the fact that he was even on social media in the first place was a blessing. he's been run off before and of course it happened again. he's talked about how it hurts, he sees that shit guys, and making mean-spirited jokes about his life is not the intervention you think it is. it hurts more than helps. but i'm glad you had fun i guess.

[the-sage-libriomancer]

okay but what if one of the zodiacs Left. what if they packed their bags in the dead of night and ran away, not letting anyone know where they went. what if Yuki escaped Sohma grounds? what if Kazuma took Kyo and bolted? what if Rin or Kureno decided they'd had enough and got the hell out of dodge? i know the bond supposedly keeps them under Akito's thumb and Akito would never let them leave, but what if they tried? what if a near-death experience scared them enough to finally escape. what if they got sick of their life with the Sohmas or were afraid of Akito's wrath and decided to run for the exit while they were desperate enough to try. what if the zodiacs just. left.

[fantastic-mr-corvid]

Attept 2 [the first is not seeing the light of day] I need to make her a proper pallet. This will take a lot of colour picking bc lighting effects but it will save time. The old one is badddd and idk what each set of colours are for... anyway her<3