#Q: ''why are you sympathizing with abusers?!?!'' A: you have more in common with ''abusers'' than you think -

[satanfemme]

"no mental disorder makes you a bad person" is very very true and a good statement to promote, but "if someone does something bad, they must've chosen do it, there's never any other possible explanation, and it's especially never b/c of any mental disorders" isn't true?? besides the fact that people can make honest mistakes (even big ones) without realizing what they're doing, or the fact that life circumstances can influence what choices someone even thinks are available to them in the first place, my hot take is that mental disorder can influence you to do bad things sometimes and that should be acknowledged.

that does NOT mean a person with a disorder would be a special extra evil kind of abuser compared to a neurotypical person (ie "narcissist abuse" is still a meaningless and harmful term). it also does not mean that abusers are more likely to have a disorder than to be neurotypical. but disorders are disabling, they cause disorder, it's right in the name, they negatively affect you and your connection to others... why do you think that wouldn't that affect your behavior too sometimes? I know my disorders affect mine. often in negative ways!

besides just "mental disorders are never disabling in ways that make me feel uncomfortable" being ableist, understanding this is important if you believe in prison abolition (which you should). "someone did something bad because they randomly chose to be bad idk" is just as unhelpful as "someone did something bad because they were born bad". but "someone did something bad because of X thing they're struggling with, or their Y need is unmet" is helpful, that's something you can work with and fix. integrate this into your anarchist worldview.

and lastly, tbh it's isolating to have "scary" or "bad" symptoms, and then get told by armchair "mental health advocates" online that you're just choosing to have those symptoms and maybe you could be a better person if you simply chose to stop having mental illness in the first place. so you know, don't be fucking rude lol

[mogaikinscourse]

warriors discourse time (tw: animal death, q word, patriarchy, sexism, caps, bad language)

hey anon!! i completely, completely agree with you. 

the number of lgbtq+/mogai-coded cats, both she-cats and toms, is mindblowing. there are so many! there is so much potential! and yet those identities are reserved for either villains or for cats who are killed off, as you mentioned. 

your mention of Tigerstar makes me think of Scourge, who was always described as having a ‘high-pitched’ voice and having gone through a literal lifetime of bullying & abuse. i do not sympathize with him in any way, but! but. the “high pitched” voice thing has long been theorized among lgbtq+ circles to be a way of stereotyping and othering gay folx. so you’re right about non cishet-coded cats being kind of pushed aside. 

when it comes to gender roles, even the names tend to be gendered. and there’s no reason for gendered names in this universe! at all! she-cat/molly names like Daisy, or Hollyleaf (luv her btw), or Leafpool, or Goldenflower, are much more common than tougher sounding +  gender neutral ones, ie Bluestar/Sandstorm/Cinderheart/Yellowfang. 

meanwhile, toms get names like Firestar, Brambleclaw, Tigerstar/claw, Lionblaze, and on and on. they get names that sound tough or neutral. which speaks to how the Erins actually view the she-cats/mollies in their universe. a she-cat is not as good a fighter, or a hunter, or a clan member, apparently, because they’re not as tough. 

i also don’t like how they treat disability. of course living in the wild, it can’t really make much sense for, say, a cat who’s lost their back leg function to still be a warrior. physically they are not able to do fight like an able bodied warrior, but are they useless? No! can they provide insight into what they’re dealing with? yeah! can they be medicine cats? yeah! can they be advisors to their leaders? yeah! can they be mediators? yeah, probably! there is so much disabled cats can do, and yet... look at what happened to Briarlight. Blossomfall was a massive ableist for being mad that Millie was upset about her sister’s disability... and the Erins showed Big Ableism by not having Blossomfall confront & unlearn her own ableism. 

and the sexism! omfg, the sexism! oof eek yikes! the names thing is a sexism issue, of course. yet. sexism was the driving force behind Bluestar’s Prophecy! why couldn’t she still go for the deputy position while being pregnant or raising her kits? the gestation period for cats is not that long, so would it really be a massive deal for someone to help her during that time... and then for her to take over as full deputy? i mean???? 

that and we see the she-cats suffer more, in general, than toms do when they get into half-clan relationships, with one exception being Graystripe. and even in that example, we see his suffering more than we see Silverstream’s. almost as if his pain matters more  because he’s a tom. hmm. 

i really was bothered that they didn’t let Ivypool be lesbian or aroace. i was bothered that, despite her initial discomfort with the idea of having kits (and even outright repulsion), they had her “get over it” and get a mate. that reminds me uncomfortably of the “oh she just needs some pp” thing that men do when women are in bad moods/upset. 

ahhh, there’s also the casual kitty xenophobia! the kittypet blood thing. i can understand why kittypets wouldn’t be allowed in clans that have to be as physically strong, fit, and used to nature as possible to survive outside. but .i don’t get why the clans have to despise kittypets’ very existence. live and let live. i guess that’s too much of a difficult concept for these authors to grasp. 

i shall also be pirating or borrowing my warriors books from now on, because i still enjoy the stories overall. but it really is nasty how much minority-coded cats are pushed aside and not allowed to be actual characters. 

i don’t think i need to say a single word  on the exclusion of nonbinary folx... the erins know animals can be born intersex, right? and if these cats are humanized, fantasy cats... then they can have gender identity, they know that, right???

let’s all just remember that we need to consume our media critically. and, as anon said, no work is ever going to be 100% free of problematic content. 

just because someone enjoys a work that has problems... doesn’t mean the person thinks those problems are good things. 

but! steer clear of people who like a ton of problematic sources, because that is a sign of their refusal to recognize the problems.

“ashfur just loved too much” -- shut.