#and this is also A/T in the context of A using and manipulating T in. ways different from

[theophagie]

Reverse cuckoldry where it's not about humiliation but about A. letting other people fuck B. exclusively on their terms & under their watch/B. completely utterly relying on A with & for their body and safety...

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

Wait, I was reading your posts and came across something I've found confusing. How is Adrien asking Ladybug wth she is doing in Volpina a bad thing? From Adrien's perspective, Ladybug's a celebrity tracking down a middle schooler with zero clout and humiliating her for lying about meeting her before. That's, uh yeah? Imagine if that happened irl lmao. Millions of teenage girls would perish at 1D's hands. My middle school would be a horror story. And it's made clear multiple times in the episode that her motivation is jealousy. It's one of the few episodes where the lesson Marinette gets makes sense I think, because she was genuinely spiteful in shitting on this random girl in front of her crush. That's significantly different than Ladybug just asking for a retraction from the Ladyblog. It's also one of the few times when Adrien's celebrity background actually affects how he acts, and it makes sense that Marinette doesn't make the connection between superhero=celebrity=not allowed to scream at middleschoolers in public. If half the kids in her school didn't lie about meeting Ladybug before, my suspension of disbelief is gone.

I've seen this argument before and it makes no sense to me, especially in the context of the lie that Lila actually told and the way the Lila confrontation actually goes down. A lot of people who have this take seem to think that Lila's lie was, "Ladybug saved me," and that Ladybug made a big public confrontation which is not what canon actually gave us. The confrontation was done in a mostly private setting and, while we never see Lila's full Ladyblog interview, this is how Ladybug sums up the interview in Volpina:

Ladybug:(sarcastically) Well hey Lila! How's it going? Long time no see. I saw your interview on the Ladyblog, awesome job. Oh sure! I remember our instant connection when I saved your life and we've been really good friends ever since! Practically BFF's! Uh actually, when did I save your life again, Lila? I don't recall. Oh yes! Of course, now I remember. Never! And we're not friends either! Miss Show-Off here was trying to impress you and everyone around her.

Lila didn't just lie about meeting Ladybug, she lied about having an ongoing, close relationship with Ladybug, two very different things. And Ladybug isn't just a celebrity, she's a superhero who is fighting an active terrorist. If I had to rewrite this confrontation, I'd keep it pretty much the same and just change the "Miss Show-Off" line to something like:

Miss Show-Off here was trying to impress you and everyone around her, putting herself and all of you at major risk! You know that Hawkmoth would do anything to get these, right? (gestures at her earrings) Did you even stop to think about what he'd do if he learned the identity of my supposed best friend? Of course not. You were too busy trying to look cool to stop and think things through like an actual superhero! We keep our identities and relationships secret for a reason!

Is this the kindest, most gentle way to confront someone like Lila? No, but it's very in character for Marinette to be filled with righteous fury when she sees someone using her name for their own personal gain. I really can't blame her for getting incredibly angry at this total stranger presenting herself as a Ladybug authority and using that authority to manipulate Marinette's friends. As I've said before, take away the crush complication and Marinette's actions still make total sense to me.

I'm not a huge proponent of virtue ethics. That's the idea that you need proper motivation for an act to be morally justified. If you do the right thing for the wrong reason, then the act is bad no matter how good the results and vice versa. If you view the world that way, then sure, you could possibly argue that Marinette's actions were wrong just like you can also argue that Gabriel's actions were totally fine, but I don't view the world that way. Switch Marinette's motivation from jealousy and a little righteous fury to pure righteous fury and almost nothing changes. She'd still need to confront Lila, the words would just be a little different.

It's not like this confrontation stops Lila, either. Chameleon gives us this:

Lila: (in flashback) Not only did Ladybug save my life, we've become very close friends. Marinette: She lies with every breath. Nino: Wait. You eavesdropped on Lila and Adrien? That's not cool. Alya: A good reporter always verifies her sources. Can you prove she doesn't actually know Ladybug?

Quick mini rant before I give the next Chameleon quote: this isn't how verifying your sources works, Alya! You should be verifying that Lila does know Ladybug, not the other way around! Right now, Marinette and Lila have equal authority on the topic as far as you know and there is no evidence to support either claim, so you should be looking for proof that Lila isn't lying! Proof isn't a first come, first serve problem even though a lot of people fall into that trap. This is especially true since Lila goes on to make claims like this:

Lila: Of course Ladybug saved my life. She never misses an opportunity to rescue her best friends. Max: Didn't your tinnitus give you vertigo when you went up the Eiffel Tower? Lila: Oh no. Ladybug knows me so well that she brought me an earplug to stick in my right ear.

So Lila keeps right on lying about her relationship with Ladybug, presenting them as close friends, making it even harder for me to get on the "Marinette was in the wrong for privately confronting Lila" train. If anything, Marinette was too tame! She needed to go full scorched earth and have Alya post a public retraction that included a message about the dangers of claiming to be personal friends with someone you don't actually know.

If the show went that route and had Ladybug give an equally furious smack-down and Alya posted it without a second thought, THEN I'd probably be on team "Marinette needed to tone herself down because she went too far" because that isn't a heat-of-the-moment reaction. It's something Marinette would have time to think through. But Volpina didn't go there. Instead, we just get Marinette reacting live to someone using her name to flirt with her crush. Remember, this is the setup to Marinette transforming and jumping in to stop Lila:

Lila: Not only did Ladybug save my life, we've become very close friends because we have something very special in common- it's what I wanted to tell you about. I'm the descendant of a vixen superheroine myself, Volpina. Adrien: Volpina? Marinette: Volpina? Adrien: Wait a minute! I think I read about her in my book. Lila:(stopping him from grabbing the book) Of course she's in your book. She's one of the most important superheroes. More powerful and more celebrated than Ladybug. Between you and me Ladybug doesn't even make the top ten. My grandma gave me this necklace. [Marinette runs off to transform] Adrien: (holding Lila's necklace) Are you telling me this is a Miraculous?! (Ladybug lands in front of them)

This wasn't a planned confrontation. It was Marinette reacting live to some pretty massive lies. If Ladybug had been swinging by and just overhead this, then the scene once again wouldn't change much. That's why blaming Marinette for confronting Lila in the "wrong way" feels so victim blame-y to me. "How dare Ladybug not be perfectly poised at all times and react with grace when someone lies about being her close friend and teammate!" is not a take I'm ever going to agree with. And if you want to use the middle schooler defense? Then it applies to Marinette, too. She and Lila are the same age. Why the different standards just because Marinette has fame that she never asked for or sought out?

I've never been much of a fan of holding celebrities to an "always on" standard where their every interaction needs to be done with poise and grace even if the interaction happens out in the wild and not at a planned even where the celebrity can be mentally prepared for dealing with fans. That's extra true for accidental celebrities like Ladybug. Marinette didn't take up the earrings for fame and they certainly haven't brought her fortune, plus she has no PR training. Expecting her to be a PR master who knows how to handle her accidental fame is, once again, a little too victim blame-y for my tastes. Ladybug is here to save the world, not sign autographs. You can hold her to politician standards when you start paying her for risking her life on the daily.

There's a version of Lila where I would have a different take. A version where the lie really is minor and Marinette really did "overreact", but even there my lesson wouldn't be "Marinette was totally in the wrong" because I genuinely think that sends the wrong message to kids and kids are the show's target audience. Think about what you're actually saying here, "Because Marinette is famous, she needs to accept that people will lie about her and just ignore them even if people believe the lie."

While that isn't exactly a wrong take, it's still really messed up. It's not okay for people to use Marinette's name like that just because she's famous. The reason she needs to learn to let it go is because that's what's best for her mental health, not because her fame makes her lesser than others when it comes to things like personal privacy. The lies are not magically okay just because she's well known.

Remember, Marinette is a fictional character, but the kids watching this show are very real and they're way more likely to be Lilas than Marinettes. And the kids that do relate to Marinette in this episode? They'll be kids who have dealt with the rumor mill spreading lies about them or their friends without the celebrity complication. The show should not be telling either set of kids that Marinette is the one in the wrong here. That is the wrong moral and why I hate this episode so much. I might feel differently if the intended audience was teens and if this plot was allowed to be more complex, but none of that is true. The show is aimed at kids ages 5 to 12 and every episode is supposed to teach its own moral with Volpina's moral being "Marinette was explicitly and totally in the wrong here."

This is the age of internet personalities where there are more easily-accessible celebrities than ever and where many of them do not have the wealth needed to protect themselves from fans nor the PR training to know how to handle extreme fans if there even is PR training for that! That means that it's honestly really important for kids to learn to view these individuals as people who it's wrong to lie about and who deserve the same respect as non-famous people. Treating celebrities as public commodities is how we get things like the Kit Connor scandal where an 18-year-old actor felt forced to publicly come out because the internet wouldn't shut up about his sexuality. Oh, and since you brought up one direction, I'll also note that the band members have publicly stated that online shipping discourse has negatively impacted their relationships. So, yeah, I'm never going to agree that kids should be told that it's okay to lie about celebrities or treat them as fictional characters to play with and that the celebrities are the ones who are wrong if they get upset about that behavior. That shit is toxic.

If we go the "minor" lie route, then my version of this episode would be a very sad one where Marinette learns that people are going to ignore her boundaries and lie about her and there's nothing she can do about it. A lesson in mental health training that will hopefully help kids who are dealing with bullies, but that does not present Marinette as totally in the wrong. It just teaches her when to pick a fight and when to let it go, which is a very important skill to learn even outside of lies about your own person. There will be many times when you hear people say something that you vehemently disagree with and it's important to learn when to pick a fight and when to just let it go, knowing that no good will come from speaking up even if you're 100% in the right. It's a very sad, but also very necessary skill.

I think Adrien has a place in that story. A place where he still tells Ladybug to let it go, but it should NOT have been played the way it was in canon where he acted like Ladybug was totally out of line. He needed to be way more compassionate and understanding of her very justified anger. I've written Adrien giving advice on this topic before and it's always presented as, "people are going to be assholes and you have to learn to ignore them for your own well being," not as, "you are wrong to be upset about strangers telling lies about you. You agreed to deal with this when you decided to be a hero" because what kind of asinine lesson is that?

You could also keep Adrien's canon reaction and have the lesson be him learning that it's okay to have boundaries. That his fame doesn't negate his bodily autonomy and right to be treated with dignity. That people chasing him down, invading his personal space, and otherwise preventing him from living a normal life is wrong. I love it when fanfics take this approach to Adrien's part in the Lila conflict. It's very cathartic to see his friends supporting him and protecting him from Lila.

I really have tried to see Volpina from the "Marinette was totally in the wrong" perspective because I've come across it several times, but I just can't wrap my head around it. If you've got a counter argument, then feel free to try to change my mind because I've given you my full thoughts here, but know that I'm probably not budging on this one. You'd have to make some pretty dramatic changes to canon for me to feel like this take has a point. I think the only way that I'd be on Lila's side is if it was very clear that no one believed Lila and Marinette still had the same reaction that we see in canon as that does feel like going too far. But everyone believed Lila so that's not a solid argument and I'm just never going to agree that people have to be cool with others lying about them just because they're famous. I honestly despise celebrity culture so much and hate that people are basically forced to deal with that bullshit if they want to be successful in certain artistic fields.

[grison-in-space]

honestly so much of the way we conceptualize autistic special interests is predicated on there not being anyone who shares them with us? and like. have you met humans. have you talked to any autistics. because lots of them are pretty interesting actually! and autistic people are often pretty good at infecting you with their interests so that you share them too even if you're not as motivated to fixate happily on them for their own sakes!

huge whorls of autistic-generated human communities exist, and people who aren't used to autistic people never seem to realize that Yes Those Are Also Autistics, often because people are used to autistic special interests occupying some very limited contexts like Computers because Computers were a big new societal innovation and community spinning up right when people also started thinking about autism as a Distinction Among Humans. Also Pokemon. And the Internet. Nineties kids know what I mean, eh?

anyway here are some heavily autistic communities that allistic people never seem to realize tend to concentrate autistics and be driven by them:

every non-commercial domestic animal fancy ever, including dog, cat, pigeon, chicken, and horse people; also includes a fair chunk of the commercial kinds but there are slightly less of these

fandom of any kind (for some reason--it's misogyny--no one seems to realize that this also applies to female-slanted forms of fandom focused on storytelling and modification as well as male-slanted ones that involve information curation)

religion. especially any kind that involves any kind of organization--less the charismatic ones that involve manipulating other people, more the kind that draw people interested in the way that religion works. less/more is not all/none.

kink and sexuality generally and also gender. we think a lot. it's a problem. and we get snagged on stuff. plus sensory shit ties into everything. just saying. e v e r y t h i n g.

academia. look we get. we get interested in things. if you get interested enough in things people call you an expert and sometimes they give you money. money is nice. it lets you buy more objects of special interest.

acting. we wear masks all the fucking time and we get caught up in it. which makes you think about structure, eh?

comedy. ditto.

building shit. admittedly the allistics have largely noticed that engineers concentrate us by now but it has taken a surprisingly long time to realize that this also applies to other, older crafts.

fibercrafts and textiles. what about "we like textures and also figuring out how things work" is a surprise to you. also math. again the answer to how the allistics keep failing to notice this one is "there's lots of ladies in there."

I bet I'm missing plenty that I'm just not thinking of but my god, man, look at how many of these things touch us! look at how they shape our understanding of one another and ourselves! how cool is that

[fiddleyoumust]

I have many The Boyfriend finale thoughts, but I haven't organized them yet (and may not). I do want to yak about a few things, though.

Ikuo, buddy. Relationships are not communal property, and you should have minded your own business, especially in light of the later reveal that you have feelings for Dai. It truly casts a shadow over your intentions. And before anyone comes at me about this, I think in the context of Ikuo's letter, his actions DO look a bit shady. All the "I wouldn't make you feel anxious or sad or treat you carelessly" with the unspoken "like Shun" hanging over all of that just makes everything he did with the DaiShun fight feel icky and manipulative.

The DaiShun fight was, once again, a masterclass in communication once they both got over throwing their solo tantrums. I really liked Dai telling the others that he's tired of always being the one to initiate the hard conversations (even though this isn't true because Shun initiated the convo after their fight in ep 7 and he also says "I love you" first), but I understand why Dai FEELS like that's true.

Shun is a lot of work. He's going to continue to be a lot of work. A lot of people watching the show are annoyed with him and think Dai deserves better. But here's the thing. Everyone deserves love. Everyone. Even deeply flawed broken people deserve love. And we all deserve the chance to pursue the love we want. Dai chose Shun. Over and over again. Despite Shun being a pain in the ass. Despite Shun pushing him away and testing him and making him feel anxious. Dai kept choosing Shun. I think Dai knows better than any of us what Shun is like, and yet! He still wants him. He's still willing to do the work, and it's a lot of work! Even the best relationships with the healthiest people are a lot of work. So, for me, it's not about who Dai "deserves". It's about who Dai wants, and Dai wants Shun. Dai thinks Shun is worth it, and that's what matters.

The convo Dai and Shun have about the t- shirt is really layered because you once again see Shun's past coming back to haunt him. And you see Shun acknowledge (him saying "if this happens again...") that some of his worst behaviors are going to repeat. Even if Shun gets or is getting therapy, there is a lot of work to be done to break him out of these behavioral cycles, so I think it's great that both he and Dai acknowledge that Shun is LIKE THIS. He is probably going to be LIKE THIS again. He is probably going to be LIKE THIS for a long time even if he's working hard to not be like this.

But now that Dai knows what's going on in Shun's head, he can help solve the problem when it comes up again. It's never going to work to tell Shun, "Don't doubt my feelings for you." Shun does doubt and will doubt again. The same fears are going to pop up over and over again for him. His trust issues are going to be a challenge for them. But Dai saying, "I won't let this happen again, " is so good. He's unlocked another Shun level, so when he finds himself back there again, he can sprint through it now because he knows how to solve it. And the best thing is, he WANTS to solve it. I don't know how to tell you how meaningful it is for difficult damaged people to have someone who thinks they're worth the work it takes to have a relationship with them.

I hope everyone out there who is hard to love finds their Dai. We all deserve a Pylades to our Orsetes!

[smollillithstuff]

MAJOR RUIN SPOILERS

On my first play through I noticed some very mean words from the UI. And no, I’m not talking about Helpi. Under the objectives in the pause menu. I have seen no one talk about this and no documentation of it at all. So I went on a quest while getting all collectibles and the last ending I needed to document every single ui pause menu objective. And I ended up having my heart broken because of it

These will be put into mini compilations to help ease the photo limitations but I am almost 100% sure I have every single objective text documented.

Here are the ones that pop up before you have the mask.

Now compare that to your first message with the mask available.

THIS IS THE FIRST WITH MASK MESSAGE. LOOK AT THE DIFFERENCE IN TONE. ITS DOWNRIGHT MEAN.

Here is the compilation of the mean things said to you in this manner.

The fazer blast one is during the prototype Freddy chase. And during the music man vent chase. It knows you are in danger and does not care.

There’s also a lot

And I mean A L O T

of messages wanting to use your mask.

The context to the bottom one? A camera puzzle where you are required to wear the mask.

There are also a lot of messages that don’t seem to make sense to be from Cassie.

More context: you know where Gregory is before you even get the mask. The camera distraction during that message suddenly changes to Gregory. During the gator gondola message, why would Cassie ever reference herself in the second person? During the dead end message, Cassie fully screams out that she is stuck, with only Helpi telling her she isn’t. During the daycare attendant message, you are about to use the cameras to find anomalies with the mask on for the first time. The hurry message displays while you are already trying to get to Gregory, why the sudden urgency? With the halfway message, we don’t even know we are halfway done until Helpi states so. Why would Cassie refer to herself in the second person to compliment herself on a mask she can’t even see how it looks on her face at the time?

Then comes the section of the game where the messages become downright brutal. Roxy. Reading the messages at this point made this scene so much worse, and actually drove me to TEARS.

It is aware that it’s Cassie’s birthday, aware of Cassie’s relationship with Roxy, and even tries to invalidate Cassie’s feelings to make her keep moving forward.

Then comes the messages on the way down.

That last quote persists after you find the mimic. That’s the last message you receive. The mimic was manipulating us right from the start.

These little details add a whole new fucked up layer to the game, as you aren’t even safe from the mimic in the pause menu. It’s always there. The game was rigged from the start.

[genderkoolaid]

hey i’m sorry to bother you but what are some warning signs that someone is a terf? i would very much like to be out as gender-fluid at my small town southern school (surprisingly supportive) but the school nurse had that “fallen sisters” book on her desk :( i don’t want to put myself in danger and i don’t know if she was reading it because she’s a terf or because she was curious about what was in it. thank you for your time!

Quick note: a lot of transphobes are not TERFs; they don't subscribe to the movement of radical feminism. But especially right now TERF ideas have become more widespread, since a lot of transphobic people turned to TERF speakers and authors for support. But that's also because a lot of TERF ideas meld very nicely with traditional patriarchal ideas (like the idea that the gender binary is required for safety of women). Things like "trans men are manipulated girls suffering from misogyny!" has gotten really popular recently, but in the past your average transphobe would probably be thinking more along the lines of "huh what a freaky dyke" than assuming it's the patriarchy's fault trans men exist.

Anyways! That's all to say that someone might use transphobic or radical feminist rhetoric without being a radical feminist themselves. Here are some things to watch out for:

Use of "female" and "male"; in medical contexts I tend to give people more grace, but if she's really insistent on sex language that's a red flag.

Highly concerned with pushing womanhood on students AFAB; if they're a TERF this is less likely to look like "pink and bows" and more likely focus on Female Power, uteri and menstruation, and identity with womanhood as a feminist act itself. Comments like "remember you can dress/act however you want and still be a woman!" can be well-meaning but they can also be a subtle way of trying to prevent GNC students from thinking about transitioning.

Fearmongering about the effects of HRT (especially T); educating about all possible effects is important, but if she focuses on negative effects, treats them as horrifying or more dangerous/common then they actually are, that's a red flag. Especially when it's tied to reproductive ability. Same when it comes to surgeries.

If she believes ROGD (rapid onset gender dysphoria) is a real thing, she's transphobic. If she doesn't use that term she might talk about transness/transmasculinity being a social contagion or trend, something young girls are pressured into (esp. by misogyny/lesbophobia), even if this is dressed up with "obviously SOME trans people are real but there's just too many now!!"

Of course, any kind of weirdness around trans people in locker rooms/bathrooms is a major red flag

If she does end up being transphobic, since you mentioned your school is supportive you might be able to tell the admins about that and have them back you up. If there are other trans people at your school, definitely ask them if they've noticed any transphobic behavior from her (you can ask cis folks too although they may be less aware of what subtler transphobia sounds like)

[marioluigifan134]

The Voice of Skeeter/Henry about Nora/Starbitedreams/UmbreonDarkEdge

Hello, this is Nickolas of Miiblr writing for a brief moment here, I need to address what is really happening between us (more specifically, a user named @patti-mayonnaise A.K.A. Skeeter/Henry) and Nora/Starbitedreams, because I am getting really sick of watching people defend this person when they are not an innocent person at all. I will give this post to Skeeter's side now, here's his side of what is going on.

This is about Skeeter's relationship with Starbite.

Everything Skeeter/Henry writes will be in black text to avoid confusion (my text is in purple).

Also, there are some Trigger Warnings that I want to warn you all about, as this post contains sexually explicit and suggestive content and manipulation!

hey. im henry (starby's ex boyfriend, who came out about his actions to the mods.) fuck idk where to begin. maybe i should start with the harmless stuff because god i suck with my words starbys obsessive behavior always bothered me when i was with him. i felt like it'd be impossible for me to even speak to him because of how clingy he could get. this also came to play when i started to get f/os (i use self shipping as a coping mechanism which i guess.. pissed him off??)

ah! speaking of his bpd! he would blame it on literally everything. especially his hypersexuality. hell, he even thought making porn of IRL ME, WHOS 15 (he drew it when i was 14) WOULD BE OK??? STARBY HAVE YOU LEARNED NOTHING THAT SHIT CAN GET YOU IN TROUBLE

before you say "oh henry!! why didn't you stop him??" well with the given ss, i didn't have a choice. considering i was his bf at the time, i thought it'd be best to keep my mouth shut and let him do what he wants, but i was very uncomfy. considering im asexual

starby, YOU. ARE. MY. BOYFRIEND. i should be having to ask you to comfort me, ffs!!

now here's the flat out racism. before september 8th hit and i was still 14, i was talking to starby about how my dad didn't give me a quince (for personal reasons, even tho its our tradition) and with one google search, heres what he had to say

"pedophile ass shit" STARBY THATS NOT HOW IT WORKS??? AT LEAST THATS NOT HOW MY FAMILY DOES IT??? you're not even mexican yourself so how do you know???? insensitive ass

anyways moving on, going back to my self ship discussion, he would get very butthurt about my obsessions and f/os (mostly doug, my comfort character and bravoman, my f/o (who is portrayed without his suit and his mii form) which i find very ironic considering he would not stfu about wanting to fuck an old man (taizo hori)

(context for the last two images) i was in a doug server with him (since he asked and i figured cuz hes OBSESSED) with me and idk i guess he got jealous that i wasnt in the same fandom as him so he found reasons for me to not like doug??? idk but the way he worded it was very rude and i was reached out by two mods and the server owner with how uncomfortable he made everyone felt. so eventually he got banned

..thats all i have to say. bottom line is that i hope he gets the help he needs.

henry out

Alright, Nickolas is back, and I want to mention that me and my friends also had our fair share of experiences with Nora. While it is not finished (as far as I know), I feel the need to share the doc explaining them here, because what it contains should tell you everything in our true experiences.

[naoreco]

I figure it’s worth putting on the Tumblr radar since much of this is current discussion of Niosi is happening on Twitter.

(content warnings for sexual assault, abuse, manipulation, and otherwise taking advantage of people)

On Chris Niosi, and Kyle McCarley’s defense of him:

Recently Chris Niosi (aka Kirbopher), who has admitted to abusing people around him for at least a decade, was cast in Honkai Star Rail as the character Moze. Five years have passed since his public apology, where he addresses some specific callouts from victims to debatable effect, but unfortunately he’s lied about apologizing to all of his victims (1, 2), and the specific apologies he has written are now deleted from his tumblr, calling his efforts into changing for the better into his question. Furthermore, as he has a history of taking advantage of his fans even in his more underground days (1+2, 3), putting him in a situation where he has access to more fans to put him on a pedestal is dangerous. Other users have iterated much of this already on tumblr, where it was already discussed in previous years, so this is just some context.

But I’m here to talk about something related that hasn’t gotten any Tumblr coverage. For example, people here have talked about Griffin Puatu’s reddit post defending him already. But nobody has mentioned Kyle McCarley defending him yet.

On July 19, 2024, in the replies of Moze’s introduction tweet, he had this to say:

He addresses his use of “bad boyfriend” downplaying legitimate abuse later. I don't think it's great but we’ll get to that. However, “the court of public opinion” is a concept that he does stand by, perhaps reinforced by the backlash he received for this. Some of this was vitriolic, given the kind of person he was defending from further criticism, but others did try to reason with him, including some of the above and more as evidence that Niosi isn’t being entirely truthful about his atonement, and overall most responses expressed disbelief and disappointment more than anything else.

Still, he deactivated his account the following day, on July 20, 2024.

Unfortunately, our story doesn’t end there. In the early morning of July 21, 2024, he made an announcement in his Discord server.

So here's the thing about Niosi not being a confirmed sexual abuser or rapist or pedophile. I don't have everything, with this being such an expansive case so this is off what I've found. You know the time he planned to take advantage of his girlfriend at the time while said girlfriend was intoxicated (plus this follow-up where he attempted to cover for himself)? Drunk people cannot consent, especially not when drunk sex is already a hard boundary. Although this technically doesn't make him a rapist, to my knowledge, if you're gonna argue semantics it'll just sound like "well he didn't ACTUALLY rape someone so it's not as bad". Is it not already terrible that he tried to and still downplayed it when called on it? Besides, as mentioned in Lighty's testimony linked above, he's let other in his sphere groom minors under his watchful eye, and his other ex Audrey had things to say about how he weaponized sexual favors too. If someone actually has more on a history of sexual abuse and pedophilia, though, please bring it to my attention. I'll add it to this post.

Either way, we don't know what he knows. At best, Kyle has a very incomplete picture of the situation, and at worst he does have a complete picture and he just doesn’t think it’s valid or up-to-date criticism. The person who first brought this to people's attention on Twitter also mentioned that her messages in the server were being deleted when she spoke up to provide evidence, so for someone who welcomes others to share evidence how open he actually is to it is questionable. (UPDATE: There's more to this part of the story but we'll get to it in a future update.) His final message a couple of hours from these just solidifies it.

Having joined the server myself to see, around the time of the announcements seems to have been scrubbed clean, but there is some current discussion of the topic as of this post. Furthermore, someone there has stated that they're compiling sources to send his way to give him a better understanding of the situation (even if they're not sure if he still wants to talk about this), so maybe this will finally get him to reconsider his stance! Only time will tell.

Overall, though, I stand by my point that if Niosi makes a living, it should be somewhere far away from the public eye. Don't give him a platform to find new fans to take advantage of. Don't give his victims the opportunity to be retraumatized whenever they start a new game of show. He's been given more than enough chances. It's time to turn over a new leaf instead of digging his heels into the ground.

Still, I don't know if Kyle will change his mind at this point. I want him to - I tried, back when his Twitter was still up - but even at this stage he's doubled down on a situation he knows he might not have the full story on and I'm not sure if I can trust that. For any other fans, give this some thought - keep an eye out for any future developments if you still want to have faith in him, move on from him if you can't stand it. I just want him to at least hold his friend accountable instead of trying to shield him from the lasting consequences of his own actions.

(I'll be linking future updates here: #1, #2 and #3 for now.)

[taldigi]

I uh went back to that dadske post and was going add a few more tags for flavor or context but I wrote toooo much so I'll just post as a text post instead. Yes, this is my hyperfixation and yes!! I do want to make my blorbo sad and miserable as all hell but I also need him to be loved relentlessly and made whole by his friends.

anyway Yuuko got her hair from her mother- and Yosk lets his hair return back to black because the wife hated him dying it. you can only handle so many years of being addressed as a disappointment before latching onto the fist person to express otherwise. (3 for 3! Get Saki'd, idiot!) then working too hard to do ANYTHING please that person (even though they might not really be the best person and are using you)

Go on boy, ditch your weird friends and your hobbies and things that make you happy and settle for the stable but soulless option of being a manager at a job you hate! (I am a firm believer in a "Manager of Junes Yosuke NOT good enrichment" after all.) Cause all thats embarrassing. dont you want me to be proud of you? The only person who's ever loooved you for you? (which is fundamentally untrue but when has depression or manipulation ever been rational?)

n/e/way one nasty divorce later and he's moving back to inaba for the cheaper rent for a place a that can actually fit him and a kid- and to be closer to his parents- hoping that maybe they would able to help out with the kid. Besides, he has an assured position at the Inaba junes. (the prodigal prince returns... return of the king... of junes)

BUT Surprise his friends are still there and Yu is too!! and yeah they're mad cause he basically evaporated but guess what? Yoosk isn't Yoosk anymore cause he's been drained of all his Yosuke colors.

"I spent years in a bad relationship and all I got was this lousy t-shirt... and a bad haircut and the total eclipse of my personality by the creature who steals my face when I perform customer service!”

I need Chie to try and fall into her usual banter and be met with... that and for her to grab Yu by the shoulders and shake him “Hes BROKEN FIXITFIXITFIXIT" and Yu having no direct answer because how can he help someone who's totally closed off?

Well, he can start through small things and reminders and food and Yuuko, which is proof that he's still there somewhere? After all, she's named after him.

I also need.... not JUST souyo but also the whole IT. Teddie and his niece bonding, Yosuke crying in some kind of relief and/or happiness when Kanji helps him dye his hair back again, Naoto helping him keep custody (so hard for a guy!!!) and Chie finally getting her usual banter back (thank god!) only for Yuuko to step up and kick Chie and forcing Yoosk to admit that what he and Chie have isn't antagonism (via explaining it to her)

Rise: *gentle gasp when she sees Yuuko* Tiny Yosuke. Yukiko, slamming her hand on the table and wheezing loudly: YOU'RE RIGHT.. SHE IS A TINY YOSUKE!!!!!!!!!!!!! and then they gift her strawberry hairpins which she loves and it embarrasses him because oh god thats right-

Yu having to confront Yuuko's energy and be like "aw shit Nanako was easy in comparison" and Yosuke looking him dead in the eyes "I'm giving everything in order for her not to turn out like Nanako" which sounds bad at first (cause it's foot in mouth disease Yosuke still) but...

"What happened to 'partner', Yosuke?" "I don't think I deserve that, after disappearing and everything, huh?" & then Yu being too damn happy and giddy when it finally slips out.

anyway, I apologize for nothing. ur the one who read thru the Indulgent asf au/story concept. throws self out window and books it down the street.

[sunsetsover]

i know i'm late to the party and most of these points have probably been touched on already, but i said i would make a post about why kant safewording in episode 8 was so impactful and i am nothing if not a man of my word so here we are

(under the cut bc this got completely out of hand)

tbh i feel like i could write 10,000 words and i still wouldn't be able to fully articulate the way it completely turned me inside out when i first watched the ep, but i still wanted to pull this scene apart anyway bc as i said at the time, there were (and perhaps still are) people who think kant safewording in that moment was silly or out of place or whatever, and so for my own sanity i need to list all the reasons it was not only not stupid, but actually incredibly powerful for both kant and bison's characters and their relationship overall

bc think about the context. think about how shy bison had been when he had introduced the idea of a bdsm dynamic to kant, how he had admitted it's something he had wanted for a long time but never had the opportunity to actually have that with anyone. think about how reluctant he had been to actually hurt kant, and how enthusiastic and happy he was when kant told him he was into it too. how careful he was with kant, how thorough he was about consent (excluding the scene in his bedroom obv, considering he was drugged and couldn't consent nor dom properly). how insistent he was that they have a safeword despite kant's dismissiveness bc he knows how important it is that they're safe, and that they trust each other completely. to have it and to use it.

and then think about how gutting it must have been thinking about all of that in the context of a lie. a complete farce. this thing that bison wanted so badly, a thing he was so happy to finally have w someone, to trust someone with that part of him after a lifetime of keeping it inside. think about how vulnerable and exposed bison must have felt in the wake of that realisation, esp considering he doesn't have really any experience actually domming someone fr. how used he must have felt, knowing that this really deep and personal desire had been used as nothing more than a tool to manipulate you by someone you thought you were developing a genuine bond with. kant betraying bison is one thing - imo, it was the sheer depths that kant had seemingly gone to just to use him that was what really hurt bison (which in turn made him angry). like think abt it from bison's pov: why would kant make a point to project the northern lights all over the walls for him, sit and make all these plans together so that bison's dream come true? and why the hell would he go so far as to let bison dom him when bison had tried so hard to basically talk him out of it? that's not just betrayal. it's sadistic and it's cruel. it's like kant didn't just want bison arrested, but also to break him from within.

so that's the context. keep all of that in mind. and then think about kant, tied down, completely at bison's mercy. following bison's every instruction. taking all his abuse. and then think about him safewording. he could have said anything, could have done anything. but he chose to safeword. why? why that word? why right then?

well. the use of a safeword is obvious right? it's someone's way of telling their partner 'that's enough, i don't like this anymore'. and that is the very surface level of what kant was saying by safewording. but obv the context is very, very different here. and i think it goes back to the conversation that they had when they agreed on the safeword in ep 3: kant doesn't understand then the importance of what a safeword is and what it represents. he thinks he can just tell bison to stop and that he will, and bison is obviously like 'well no, that's not how it works'. he basically says to him 'how am i supposed to know you're not still enjoying it? how will i know you actually want me to stop? what if i get confused and hurt you more?' and kant says he gets it, and to a degree he obviously does, but i don't think he got the depth of what a safeword represented until it was tumbling out of his mouth on that beach.

bc as i said, a safeword is about trust. it's about two people (or more! but we're just talking abt these 2 rn) trusting the other that if this word is said, then everything stops. no ifs ands or buts. the sub obviously has to trust that the dom will stop if they safeword, but it's just as important that the dom trusts that the sub will safeword if they're unhappy with whatever's going on. the dom has to trust that the sub trusts them.

and so kant safewords. and yes he's saying 'i don't like this anymore, i want to stop'. but he's also saying 'i paid attention, i listened, i remembered. i know you meant it and i meant it too. what you told me was important to me. i value what is important to you. i didn't just dismiss it, i didn't just dismiss you. this was never just a tool. it was never fake to me. i never used this against you. i really am telling you the truth and here's the proof.' (which, for the record, is also what he was saying before the safeword when he was like 'i know you've never trusted anyone before, i still haven't forgotten our plans, i still want to go to iceland together' - it's all reassurance that he hasn't forgotten and that it wasn't fake, that he meant all of it and it's all important to him too). and he's also - maybe even more importantly - saying 'i trust you. i trust you to stop because i'm telling you stop. if you will listen to nothing else i say, i trust you to listen to this. i'm trusting you because this is important to you, and it's important to me. i trust you to keep me safe. i trust that that if i say this word, you won't hurt me anymore.'

which is exactly why one of the first things bison says to kant afterwards on the beach is 'you think i can't kill you, don't you?' because he knows. he knows exactly what kant using that word meant, what he was saying. it's why he froze, why he was so thoroughly devastated, why he briefly lost his shit then completely fell apart afterwards - because even though it was just one word, he heard everything behind that word, and what was underpinning all of it, which was basically kant saying this isn't over for me yet. i'm still in this relationship with you. i'm still yours and you're still mine. i still trust you. and though you might not trust me right now, i know you'll trust this.

(and that's also why he repeats it so many times imo. by saying it over and over, he's proving that it isn't just a desperate or panicked plea to get himself out of that situation - he says it again and again, making a point to look bison right in the eye each time, bc that's acknowledgement that he's well aware of what he's doing and saying by using their safeword, and he wants bison to know that too: this isn't an accident, this isn't a mistake, this isn't a last ditch effort to live. i'm saying this on purpose, because i know what it means for you and me both.)

which yeah, is kind of a kick in the guts if you're bison. he knew he couldn't hurt kant. he knew he wasn't angry the way he was pretending to be angry, because the hurt was just too visceral (which i'll expound on in a second). and here was kant basically sticking his fingers in a fresh wound. here was this man he shouldn't trust at all, telling bison that despite who bison was and after all things bison had done to him (deserved or not is irrelevant here), he still loves him - not just with words but proving it in a very tangible way. a way that was theirs and theirs alone.

that was what gutted me on my initial watch. i obviously didn't think about all of it consciously in that moment, but i still knew it was there. i still felt it, the same way bison did. kant safewording in that moment was never just about him saying 'stop, i don't like this, please stop hurting me' and bison knew it, which is why he reacted so strongly to it (and why i did too lmfao)

so that was my initial thoughts, but liz @ropebunnykant brought up a really interesting point that i hadn't considered at first which is that kant was also safewording for bison's sake. which, while it hadn't been my first thought, definitely wasn't the first time i've heard of something like that happening either - a sub safewording, not bc they necessarily need to, but bc they've noticed that their dom isn't enjoying it/isn't in the right headspace to continue etc. and when i went back i could see it so clearly, esp as kant started to repeat it.

bc what happens immediately before the safeword use? kant pushes, and bison says shut up. kant continues pushing, and bison keeps telling him to shut up. the back and forth of bison and kant's safeword discussion is once again so important to the context here - kant asking if he can just say bison's name to stop him, and bison telling him no, that they need a way to differentiate when 'stop' is just a word and when it's genuinely meant.

bison telling kant to shut up was his stop. and kant pushed, because he didn't realise it straight away, because he had so much to say and for the first time bison was listening, because sometimes stop doesn't mean stop. but at some point kant realised that this stop did. and what did bison teach him to do when he really needs to stop?

and so kant safewords.

i do think kant could have kept playing that game for as long as he needed to. as long as bison was angry, kant would have stayed chained up like a dog. he didn't have to - he proved he could easily get out of his restraints in their very next scene. he could have asked the caretaker to help him get away. but he didn't. he chose to stay. maybe he wasn't on the boat, but at that point kant was a willing participant in what was happening, he was consenting. why? bc kant deserved punishment. bc bison deserves to punish him. bc to him staying there is it's own kind of proof. bc if bison's angry then he's still talking, and if he's talking there's hope. apathy is what was going to kill kant and he knew it - if bison's angry, that means he still cares.

but then we get that shot of kant's pov, of bison staring down w the gun pointed at him, barrel shaking, tears in his eyes. and it's not fun anymore. neither of them are gaining anything from this. bison's anger has finally given way to hurt, to heartbreak - kant knows in that moment that bison isn't getting any kind of satisfaction out of making kant squirm, and likely never was. which literally goes back to the core of a dom/sub relationship, doesn't it? you engage in that kind of dynamic bc both parties are getting something out of it. kant was getting the flagellation he thought he deserved after what he'd done to bison, the punishment he wanted (and to a degree needed) as payment for his wrongdoing and the sense of absolution that provided him. bison got the satisfaction of providing that punishment, of letting out that anger, of making kant hurt for what he did - or so kant thought. bc the reality is that bison wasn't getting any satisfaction out of punishing kant. no matter what he said or did, no matter how he hurt or degraded him, none of it made him feel better. and kant hadn't noticed that until that moment (which i think he can be forgiven for, given everything that he was going through). but then he does notice.

bison wasn't getting anything out of the hurt he was inflicting, and was inflicting pain upon himself in the process. and if one of them is not getting anything out of it - if one of them is actively hurting themselves in a way that doesn't feel good - then they need to stop. someone needs to safeword. kant knows this. and so he safewords - not so bison doesn't kill him, as some people have said, but to stop bison from hurting himself any further.

and so kant safewords immediately. retracts the consent that perhaps bison hadn't even realise he'd given willingly. he ends the game. he uses his safeword just like bison taught him to, bc it matters and he trusts him and he loves him. that hasn't changed, not even like this. and he repeats it so many times for that very reason.

and believe it or not, i feel like there is still so much more to it i could pick apart even beyond this. bc god there are just so many layers!!!! like there's fear in it too, bc as much as kant is unconcerned abt the gun and is sure that bison won't hurt him, he's still human. some degree of fear is normal. i also think kant sensed an opening in bison's defenses that he wanted to get at just so that bison would just listen to him - bison wasn't really in the headspace to listen to anything before then, which is exactly why kant hadn't really tried to explain himself properly. it would've been pointless. and as much as he loves bison, kant is still kant - he still knows how to work people. i also think kant was tired and hungry and emotionally exhausted and while i do think he would've played along for as long as he had to, i think he also needed bison's anger and attention to fuel him. faced w nothing but his sadness, he lost all steam. kant's own sadness and overall feeling shitty probably hit him full force in that moment too, and he didn't have the strength not to fold under it. and so he safeworded.

however, if i start picking apart all of that i really will end up writing 10,000 words and no one really wants that, least of all me. but the point that i really want to make is that kant safewording in that moment was never really abt him not wanting to die. it was about care and it was about trust. it was about acknowledgement. most of all it was about love. and we'd all be doing the story and these characters a disservice to simply go 'hehe he safeworded out of murder' while not also addressing what it really was! which was kant acknowledging their bond, showing bison care in the only way he could while telling him he loves and trusts him all at once!! it was him claiming ownership of the ownership bison has of him!! he said penguin bc there was literally nothing else he could have possibly said in that moment that would have had the depth and significance than that one little word did!!! he said more with that one word than he could have said with a thousand other ones!!! and it drives me crazy whenever i think about it for more than 5 seconds at a time!!! thank u for coming to my ted talk!!

[dapperd3m0n]

Hypnosis as a symphony.

I saw some discourse on here recently (link here) about a good litmus test for a skilled hypnotist is whether they've had discipline in another art form. That really stuck with me, and I began wondering about my art form of choice, music, and how studying and pursuing music and composition creates my particular flavor of hypnosis -- and I found something interesting.

(Forgive me, it gets a bit rambly from here.)

I found that, to me, effective hypnosis has a lot of the same qualities as effective music. I'm a bit more biased toward a classical approach, as in, symphonies and sonatas as opposed to pop music, but the same principles apply.

At a bird's eye view level, good music is well structured. Whether you're writing something in sonata form or a song for your first album, there are certain conventions that are expected and, for the most part, adhered to. Sonata form is strict and rigid, with rules on rules (and heaven help you if you break them). But even with pop music, we have a generally expected format: intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus, outro. It's nearly like clockwork.

Coherent hypnosis, too, also has a similar sense of structure, though not quite as rigid as sonata form, and even not as rigid as pop music. But the way that the hypnotist establishes rapport, sets the tone, cadence, and rhythm (all of these music words coming up so naturally, I love it), drops the listener like EDM, and brings them back up again, whether on the listener's own time or in a guided manner, reads to me the same way.

Of course, these expectations can always be subverted. Maybe we start with a chorus. Maybe we change keys, change tempo, change styles halfway through the piece. Maybe we pull a Beyonce and have several key changes. Done effectively, this isn't a jarring effect (at least, not in a negative way), but can greatly enhance the piece or hypnosis session.

Getting into the weeds a bit, great music to me makes use of motifs, or uniting ideas throughout a piece. It can be a hook, a lyric that comes back, or even the four notes that open Beethoven's Fifth (the universally recognizable dun dun dun duuuuun). I love listening to symphonies or large scale works, and finding hidden instances where these ideas come back. It's such a treat, and even when I know it's there, the piece doesn't lose any effect -- in fact, I have a deeper appreciation for it.

In the same way, we see this similar "motivic" idea with great hypnosis. The repetition of a word or phrase -- even, to an extent, the idea of triggers as motivic material -- makes the listener feel like they know the tune, can hum along, can dro-- ahem, be lulled into that sense of familiarity. Those who can do this on the fly and make it sound natural have the same virtuosity to me as jazz greats, who use the exact same principles of structure and repeated, recognizable ideas in their solos. And that's the key, isn't it? Repetition legitimizes, and it should be recognizable enough that one could get that lightbulb moment (or, you know, that dizzy, glassy look in their eyes) even when it's not in the exact context presented originally (think a trigger out of trance, for example).

Finally, a piece of music to me is truly exceptional when you can tell every note is crafted with intention. Some of these instances the audience may never know. For example, why did they choose a particular key? A particular time signature? Why this specific set of notes for the recurring idea? Was it someone's name? A word? And how does the changing of that idea reflect the story arc of the piece?

I'm reminded of Hector Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique, and the Idee Fixe (fixed idea) that occurs throughout the work. The occurrence, reoccurrence, and manipulation of the Idee Fixe isn't immediately recognizable. I didn't get it my first few listens. But after reading it (being forced to read about it) in school, I developed a newfound appreciation for the piece and the story that it follows, even if Berlioz was a total nut.

Exceptional hypnotists, those who seem to command the craft like it's breathing, do exactly this. Some of these things, again, the listener may never know -- how the hypnotist is analyzing changes in breathing, or using imagery that they know will resonate with the listener, or even using details about the listener that they don't consciously realize, but the hypnotists includes it in their composition anyway because they know the resulting effect is one they will want to listen to again, and again, and again. Of course they will. Of course they will.

If this all comes across as gobbledegook, oops. I've been tossing this idea around for a while, and it could be that it sounds better in my head. I would, however, be curious to hear how these ideas translate to painting, sculpture, or hell, even computer science. I'd love to hear what gets you excited about your craft and hypnosis, and how they come together to form something truly unique. That's what makes this world so special, after all.

[tavyliasin]

Villain-Fucker Angst Hours

Good timezone, darlings~ Are you ready to get all up in your feelings? No? Me neither, loves, but here we are regardless so the words are going to flow as they usually do... This is focused on Raphael from Baldur's Gate 3 and his fandom, but the latter section can easily apply to any villain fandom.

Self-Analysis of Devil-Fuckery, Or Why Do I Adore Raphael When He Is Very Obviously Evil: A Short Essay by TavyliaSin (Who Still Cannot Name Anything With Less Than A Full Paragraph) ((NSFW)) (((Game Spoilers)))

The following may discuss heavier topics, but without specifics, so whilst it should be safe for most to read without triggering any difficult memories please be aware of Raphael's entire vibes, the content and context of his story, and I'd also like to mention that this isn't a "woe be us for we are terrible people" piece, it's actually more about:

"There is an inherent kindness and warmth to much of the Raphael fandom, and I think there could be some common threads behind that, pulling us all in closer in a comforting blanket that we wrap around each other to keep out the cold of the world."

So, what in the nine hells am I on about? Well. Raphael-fandom is a wild and wonderful place to be. The rest is in sections, so feel free to skip through to what you feel is relevant to your interests. I am so prone to waffle I should open a restaurant~

Who Are Fans Of Raphael? What Do They Want?

We are feral, unhinged, all sheets to the wind "I want that devil man, carnally, and there is no force in all the planes that could stop me". There's the vanilla to the extreme and every level in between, tops, bottoms, versatiles, Doms, subs, and switches - there are a whole lot of people who would love to get their hands on either (or both) of Raphael's forms, for a simple smooch or something far more spicy~ [edited in] To add on to this, not all of us even desire him in a sexual way, for many it is romantic, soft, or even just the rather pleasant thought of spending an evening with drinks by the hellfire because he would be fascinating company. Aces, Aros, and AroAces may all find themselves well within the devilish corners of fandom too~ which is a whole other essay~ [end edit] So, I see you. I'm one of you. Extremely loud and utterly hingeless in my fan appreciation for Raphael. He's one of my favourites to write about, I seek art of him, and the same goes for his mirrored other half, Haarlep, who I arguably love more despite there being far less content of them in the game.

And the Fandom? The Vibe?

From my experience in the Raphael Fandom areas, we have a very deep and abiding understanding of consent, respect, and treating each other with an absolute and uncompromising kindness. We've had talks about keeping each other safe in fandom, exchanged details of people we have encountered who need to be avoided, even shared details between moderators of different fandom servers to pre-ban people proven to be creeps and/or art thieves. We've also discussed consent, including the issues with it in the game, and how areas of the story can only really be considered dubious at best and could easily be triggering for people. And these discussions have been open, honest, fair, and with the acknowledgement that most of us love these scenes anyway. So there's a sense of care that runs through everything, behind the horny-posting and fan content, behind the endless thirsting after our favourite fictional characters. We have a depth of kindness that warms my sinners soul every time I see it.

What Does This Have To Do With Self-Reflection, Raphael, or Villainy In General?

Well let's look at Raphael. He's a villain, obviously. He's manipulative, devious, and inherently evil by his very nature. He keeps Hope chained in his basement, constantly subjected to endless torture. There's also mention of how Gortash was sold into his service at a young age, clearly not an enjoyable experience given the other details and how things turn out (particularly as Raphael would need Gortash's own plans to fail entirely in order for him to succeed in his own and get that crown). And as fans, we accept that. We don't sit making excuses, or trying to say "well actually Gortash is a little shit and Hope probably deserve it", and we don't shy away from or conveniently ignore those darker sides of him with malicious intent to enable more evil to flourish. What I noticed, when I allowed the thoughts to continue, is that there is a theme here.

If Evil Can Be Loved Then So Can I

That's the core. Of course, darlings, I am not claiming to be a heinous monster. I certainly do not have a laundry list of crimes that would make the devil himself say "Uh, that's a bit much." But I sure as fuck treat myself like I do sometimes. You see, I think a lot of us have that tendency, to judge ourselves far more harshly than anyone else. Our patience, understanding, and forgiveness for others runs deeper than the Mariana Trench, but when it comes to our own flaws? One minor mistake and we think ourselves to be the worst beings ever to disgrace the earth. Thus, the villainy we see reflects how we are treating ourselves. So by loving and accepting all of those things that should be terrible, hated, we are actually learning that no matter how poorly we think of ourselves that we can be worthy of that same love and acceptance. We are extending the affection we are unable to show ourselves to someone we see the worst parts of ourselves amplified within. And that's why villains attract the people with the most kindness. The most forgiveness. Because it takes someone with a truly huge amount of empathy to find love for the embodiment of evil.

Or, IDK, maybe villains are just hot and we're too far down to care.

But wait, before you go!

THERE'S SOMETHING WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT.

All of this is about FICTION. We should never be accepting of the kinds of evil we see in the game irl. We do not owe anyone kindness if they do not show it to us.

What is hot in fiction is not always OK IRL.

Look after yourselves out there, remember that consent is key in all things, and please do try to learn to love yourselves, darlings, you are worthy of it and you should judge yourself by the same standard you judge others. If you are in doubt, if you are worried, if you feel afraid - reach out, talk to someone. There are many who will listen.

Treat yourself as you would treat a friend. You deserve that much.

Oh, and all Raphael fans who understand kindness are welcome around me, any hour of the day, I adore our little fandom circles and would gladly collect all of us together. I'm following a lot of you as soon as I find you, like hunting shiny pokemon~

See you in Avernus, my darling Little Mice, may we all find joy in the Cambion's Embrace~

[venus-is-thinking]

A Narrative Defense of Levi Accomplice Theory

Hello everyone! I’m finally back with this post to celebrate the fact that DRDT is back tomorrow! aaaaAAAAAAAA–

For any of you who have no idea what the title means, consider it the second part to my year-old Narrative Defense of Eden Culprit Theory. In this, I’ll go over the narrative reasons why I think Levi being the accomplice (to Eden as the blackened) would make sense and open up interesting opportunities for DRDTdev to explore, if they do choose to go in this direction. I’m not at all trying to prove, evidence-wise, why Levi is the accomplice in this post. 

My thoughts on the functionality of the Chapter 2 murder method are basically exactly what @1moreff-creator (nickname FF) outlines in their A Summary of the Levi Accomplice Theory + How We Got Here post. I STRONGLY recommend reading it, both because I think it’s a great read and because as far as I know, the concept of Levi as an accomplice isn’t really talked about outside of it, so it’ll provide some useful context as to why I believe this is a possibility. 

That being said, I do want to disclaim this by saying that this post will be a lot more open-ended and speculative than the Eden version. Levi accomplice theory, at least in the context of being paired with Eden culprit, is objectively less likely to be true than Eden culprit theory by itself, and I could definitely see a world in which Levi is either innocent or involved in the crime in some other way. 

There’s also the fact that, because I don’t believe Levi will be executed this chapter, there’s a lot more question of where his character is headed. I predicted the trajectory of Eden’s arc to end in a handful of episodes; Levi will hypothetically be facing entirely new motives and twists that I have no way to meaningfully predict, so take all of this with a grain of salt.

Still, I’ve been meaning to make this post for literally an entire year, and I’m not gonna let the “Chapter 2 resumes” deadline pass! So, without further ado, here it is: the long awaited Narrative Defense of Levi Accomplice Theory!

SPOILER WARNING THROUGH CHAPTER 2 PART ONE!

T/W: Murder, blackmail, traumatic pasts 

I’m going to follow roughly the same structure as the Eden Narrative Defense, which means that I’m going to be looking at the following topics:

Motive (Why Levi would choose to help Eden commit the crime)

Story Arc (How Levi being the accomplice fits into the overall narrative)

Relationships (How Levi’s relationships impact this writing decision)

Character Arc (How this plays into Levi’s individual character arc)

Wildcard (A specific topic that I think is relevant to discuss for this theory)

These are listed in the order they appeared in Eden’s narrative defense, with Eden’s Wildcard slot being taken up by her emotional breakdown in the Trial and justifying how that wouldn’t be entirely fake/how it would be possible with her still being the culprit. Hopefully that all makes sense! 

For Levi, I actually think the best starting point is: 

TOPIC 1: Relationships

Because this theory is dependent on Levi helping Eden commit literal murder, I want to start off by examining Levi’s relationship with Eden. 

Interestingly, they don’t really interact much of all in Chapter 1; to my memory, the clearest example of them being highlighted in the same scene is when Arei throws a fit over Eden not inviting her to bake with her, where in the same scene, Arei manipulates Levi after he tries to defuse the situation.

However, we open Chapter 2 on the two of them having a rather important conversation. Notably, Levi gets “good person” name dropped in this conversation. For those who don’t know, beneath the “All That Glitters” chapter title, there’s a faint hidden text of “A Good Person.” Pretty much everyone who is called a good person is incredibly important to this chapter (Teruko, Eden, Arei, David, and Levi), so Levi getting hit with the “good person” right at the beginning definitely flags him for importance down the line. 

Interestingly, what is said here is: 

Levi is called a good person due to his reliability, which clues us into the fact that Eden might be open to relying on Levi, even if it’s for something important. Notably, here, Levi still wants to help others and try to be the best person he can be, despite his slip-up yelling at Ace in the Chapter 1 Trial. 

The existence of this scene at all, and especially given the fact that it delves further into Eden and Levi’s mental states as the killing game progresses, seems to indicate that this is a pair to watch moving forwards. 

Levi also notably has another relationship that heavily plays into the idea of Levi being an accomplice: Ace. 

Ace has spent the chapter telling Levi to fuck off and leave him alone, holding the fact that Levi said he would strange Ace over his head. To me, Levi’s strong reactions to Ace play very heavily into his secret quote:

I always believed that a person is defined by their actions alone. But maybe that’s just a poor excuse for my heartlessness.

(If you don’t know what the secret quotes are, basically, on everyone’s profile page on the tumblr website, there’s a secret quote hidden that you can find by inspecting elements. This is the one on Levi’s page.)

I’ll get more into this later on, but this is a rather interesting quote when paired with Levi taking the action of threatening Ace, but doing it through words alone. You could argue that he didn’t actually do anything, but that’s not completely true. Ace certainly seems to think he did something. 

Levi is caught at the crossroads of his words of intent to harm Ace being treated as the true him, but any attempts he makes to reconcile are being treated as “just words.” 

However, any actions that Levi tries to take are rebuffed. He can’t repair things with his words, and he can’t take action without violating Ace’s wishes, so he’s stuck. This, of course, frustrates Levi.

This was clearly a big character moment from Levi. It seems like his will to repair things with Ace, at least, is fully gone in this moment. Notably, we haven’t really seen any demeanor change from Levi that I can think of as a result for this conclusion he’s apparently drawn, which raises my suspicions that he’s hiding crucial information from us this Trial.

But, most people who think Levi is set up to be suspicious and giving up on everyone think that he’s going to be the killer. Why do I think he’s going to be the accomplice instead?

Well, a lot of it has to do with the evidence itself, notably the grippy tape and the contraption used in Arei’s killing (see FF’s theory post). But, there’s also the fact that it’s not unreasonable to think that Eden and Levi could’ve gotten scheming here. 

While Levi walks off before Teruko, we don’t know exactly what happens afterwards. It seems like Ace got bandaged up at some point (possibly because Eden helped him?), but either way, I could see Eden and Levi talking afterwards about their opinions on everything that happened. And, of course, about their secrets.

TOPIC 2: Motive

For the sake of this theory, I am strongly assuming that Levi’s secret is “You’re a murderer, and you hold no remorse.” If it isn’t, toss this entire thing out the window, because it doesn’t make any goddamn sense. 

I think there are two conceivable paths to Levi’s motive for helping out Eden here. I know that in FF’s post, they outline one of them: the possibility that Levi would prefer that Eden escape and everyone else die over the continuation of the killing game as-is. This would be based on Levi’s belief that Eden is a good person, and his increased belief over time that everyone else (including himself) is a bad person, unworthy of living.

I certainly think this is possible, but it leaves Levi’s character off in a bit of a weird spot. Like, okay, he decided to gamble it all on Eden and he loses. Then what? It’s only Chapter 2. There are certainly ways for his character to go, but I feel like at that point, he’s either dragging his feet before dying or dragging his feet before he gets to do his survivor arc. I’m not sure if it would leave enough room to explore his character over the course of who-knows-how-many-more chapters. I have to imagine that, if Levi is the accomplice under this plan, he’d make it through Chapter 3, because otherwise, it seems like the message of Levi is that he gave up and that means he died. But, what would he be doing throughout those chapters?

So, I think that’s a possible read, but it’s not the one I favor. The second read is a little more complicated, but I think it makes sense. Give me a bit to explain it.

This theory really focuses in on my interpretation of Levi’s secret quote, which is again: 

I always believed that a person is defined by their actions alone. But maybe that’s just a poor excuse for my heartlessness.

What this says to me, in combination with Levi’s secret, is, “I am only a murderer if I am actively murdering someone.” Sure, Levi was a murderer– but that was in the past!

(Levi makes many cryptic mentionings of his dark past. I don’t know what exactly it is, but I believe that Levi has killed someone, and might not feel remorse for at least one specific killing. It’s also possible that he feels no remorse because that’s just how he grieves– by feeling nothing– which he alludes to in the opening conversation with Eden.)

However, Ace is challenging that belief that Levi has. Can he really change so much just because he’s acting on his best behavior? Besides, it doesn’t really matter; if people think he’s a murderer, what difference is there in how they treat him?

To me, that’s what Levi’s “Why do I even bother?” means. He’s realizing that, with Ace, at least, but also maybe in general, if someone believes he’s a murderer, that’s as good as him being a murderer. In combination with his secret, that means that anyone who learns his secret will treat him as a murderer, immediately burning any relationship they have with him.

It kind of makes me think of the concept of Thought-Action Fusion, which is the psychological term for the belief that thinking about doing something wrong is just as bad as doing that wrong thing. It’s not quite the same, but it’s that kind of idea. Who cares if Levi kills someone or not? If people think he has, he might as well have. 

That, obviously, is a bad thing. It’s an even worse thing when you consider that DRDT seems to be a TV show, and MonoTV is threatening to reveal everyone’s motive secrets to everyone in the whole world if no one kills!

This then creates a bit of a paradox for Levi. The only way to prevent everyone from finding out that he’s a murderer is to murder someone on national (?) television. 

However, there is one out for him in this situation. If someone else kills before the motive timer is up, Levi gets out of this situation clean. And that’s where Eden comes in.

(For clarity’s sake, I largely think this scene is a joke. I do not think Eden is actually doing anything sinister by “blackmailing” Teruko here, nor do I think either Teruko or Eden would actually think anything malevolent of Eden because of it. However, I’ve noticed that DRDT is very good at slipping relevant ideas or information into jokes, which is why I want to look at this.)

Eden doesn’t need to blackmail Levi, per se. At least, she doesn’t have to actually put the threat out there directly. 

What I’m envisioning is basically that, after helping bandage Ace up, Eden goes and checks in with Levi and sees how he’s doing. Levi explains his frustrations with the fact that Ace is treating him like a murderer even though he hasn’t done anything, and it seems like Ace’s belief that he’s a murderer is good enough to condemn him. In response, Eden lets Levi know that she knows what his secret is.

Arei is the one who received Levi’s secret, but I’d be, like, 0% surprised if Eden knew it. Arei said she’d do anything to prove her loyalty to Eden, and especially considering how Arei overheard the secret Eden received, it would make enough sense if she told Eden about the one she received to “even it out.” 

So, let’s say Eden says, “but aren’t you a murderer? Your secret says so.” Or something like that. Levi is now obviously in a tricky position, because the answer is, yes, that is his secret, but people aren’t supposed to know that. Eden would then loop Levi into her plan to kill Arei, and they would come to a mutual understanding.

Levi has to cooperate with Eden and do whatever she says when it comes to the crime, because if he doesn’t, Eden could easily reveal his secret. To Levi, that’s a fate worse than death, because it means that he will never be able to escape his past. Conversely, Eden can’t throw Levi under the bus and spill his secret, because then Levi would easily throw Eden under the bus and reveal she’s the blackened in turn. By giving Levi a severe secret of Eden’s own– that she’ll be the blackened– the playing field levels out into one of mutually assured destruction, where both of them respect each other enough to take the other’s secret to the grave if they’re the one who fails.

Eden, I think, would be willing to take this risk in the first place, because Levi is reliable. If she understands how his internal logic operates, she can trust that he’ll see it through to the end. Having an accomplice could make it much harder for people to find out she's the blackened, which is a huge advantage.

For Levi, if you follow my read of his character, this makes sense. His best bet is to help Eden out from a neutral perspective, helping her commit the crime but not dying on the hill to help her win. If Eden loses, she can respect the fact that he didn’t out her and tried to help her. Then, Eden dies, taking everyone’s secrets and the motive to her grave with her. Obviously, the secrets ended up being more or less revealed anyways, considering Arei’s body wasn’t discovered until after the motive announcement, but David is proof enough that the students didn’t know that was how it would be ruled. 

Hopefully this makes enough sense! To summarize, I think Levi’s motivation to help Eden is to protect his own secret and survive the motive. The only way to avoid being known as a murderer is to help facilitate a murder without the fact that he was an accomplice ever being exposed. To have his secret revealed is basically death anyways, so risking death if Eden is the killer isn’t the biggest deal in the world. 

INTERLUDE 2.5: Arei’s Glove

So, this isn’t part of the narrative defense, this is me repairing part of FF’s theory. Because, Arei’s glove is missing from her body, and FF’s reasoning ended up being “Levi can drop the glove to frame himself as the culprit mid-Trial if needed.” However, because in my world, Levi is still hoping Eden loses (even if he can’t contribute), that seems a bit far fetched. So, I tried to come up with an alternate explanation of why Arei’s glove might be missing.

One of them kinda sucks, which is that Arei was wearing her glove when the water jugs broke, drenching it. Because the turf is weird, you can count on the turf not being wet by the Body Discovery Announcement, but the glove could still be too wet, giving away part of how the crime was completed. Thus, someone hides or pockets the glove so that it doesn’t give something away. This seemed halfway viable to me before I rewatched the investigation, but between the fish being entirely dried out (non-turf that was definitely very wet at one point) and the positioning of the tape marks on Arei’s wrists (which I think would mean the glove would have to be off her wrists when you taped them), I don’t think it’s especially viable.

There’s FF’s original reasoning from a while ago as to why it could’ve been missing, which is that to get a better grip on the spinny thing (carousel), Levi may have put on Arei’s glove. It could’ve gotten scratched up or stretched out as a result, making it key evidence. This is a bit presumptive, but it works enough.

The weirdest thing to me is that it does seem like Arei’s glove was taken off before her wrists were taped. I’d think taping Arei’s wrists would happen fairly early, considering it makes it harder for her to struggle. But, getting her glove off while she’s struggling seems pretty hard.

The third explanation I have is just that Eden asked Arei to take her glove off at some point before Levi showed up, because it would be annoying to tape her wrists with the glove on. Then, Arei’s glove went missing in the shuffle, or they didn’t have a good place to put it because it would be difficult to put it back on once Arei is hung up. They couldn’t throw it in the trash, because Eden planned on the class reconstructing the note they left in the trash. So, instead, Arei’s glove gets stashed somewhere and they hope no one notices it, because if people stop to think about how Arei’s glove was taken off before her wrists were taped, it could point to Eden.

I don’t love any of these reasons, but combined, I think they’re good enough that it’s not a dealbreaker for this theory, at least. Pick whichever one is your favorite and we can go forward from there.

TOPIC 3: Character Arc

If Levi’s relationships have set him up for this, and he has a viable enough motive, what does it mean for Levi that he’s the accomplice? What is his individual story telling us?

I think Levi’s character is meant to center around the concept of what makes a person good, and what allows a person to properly repent. It really seems like Levi has a not-so-good past, something that’s only heightened if he does have the murderer without remorse secret.

There’s also the secret quote, which talks about “excuses” for “heartlessness.” Levi is trying to put his dark past behind him, but it’s incredibly difficult. He wants to move forwards from it, but he doesn’t know how.

If Levi is the accomplice, it provides a really interesting opportunity for his character arc: Levi will then be exposed as an accomplice and be publicly known as someone dangerous and possibly, to some, unforgivable, but he won’t die for it. He’ll have to figure out how to navigate the fact that he does carry the burden of his past actions with him, and he’ll have to learn to cope.

If a character is meant to ask how possible it is to repent, doesn’t it make sense to give an extremely concrete in-universe thing that they need to repent for, and that everyone knows they need to repent for? 

I’m not sure exactly where Levi would end up from there. A lot of it depends on the other characters, the motives, and the kill order. I still think it’s definitely possible for Levi to take on the classic Chapter 4 buff curse/sacrifice killer mantle with this, if he decides that the only way to repent properly is to put everyone else above him. However, I do think it’d be interesting to see him fill any slot. 

He could be a victim, if his time runs out. He could be a killer, if he decides that he can’t repent, and his only option is to once again try to outrun his past. He could be a survivor if he figures out that the only thing he can do is try to move forwards, accept his past, and try to do better in the future. I’m actually quite partial to the survivor interpretation, but it’s hard to make survivor cast predictions this early.

Either way, I think this totally makes sense as a direction to take Levi’s character in.

TOPIC 4: The “Murderer” Rule

This is my Wildcard slot for this narrative defense. I don’t know exactly what it’ll amount to, but I think it’s worth discussing. 

Rule 14: All murderers must be held accountable for their crimes. 

If Levi is the murderer without remorse, I wonder if this rule will apply to him. I also wonder exactly what it means. “Held accountable” doesn’t necessarily mean that whoever is a murderer will get executed.

I honestly think a really interesting way for this to go is if Eden gets found out as the culprit on her own, but they don’t realize that Levi is the accomplice. Then, in accordance with Rule 14, MonoTV reveals that Levi was also involved in the crime, and is also functionally a murderer. This forces Levi to be held socially responsible by those around him.

Another option would be that, whenever his secret comes to light, he’s at risk of some kind of execution. I doubt Levi would actually get executed there, considering a lot of the reason I like Levi accomplice theory is because of how interesting it’d be to further pursue Levi’s character post-murder, but it’s certainly possible.

It could also be something that comes up in Chapter 6. This rule feels like it’s a direct result of the mastermind’s worldview or something. If Levi is a survivor, it’s possible that, at the end, the mastermind will try to execute him or something because he’s a murderer. Hell, maybe every survivor will have a claim to be a murderer in some way or another. That’s when the characters will rise up and say that people deserve a second chance, no matter their past. Or something like that, I don’t know. Again, it’s really hard to theorize about the whole game when we only have, like, 1.75 chapters so far. 

Anyways, onto the last point:

TOPIC 5: Story Arc

Oh boy, time to theorize about the whole game!

Because figuring out the moral messaging and final result of the last Class Trial at this stage is nigh impossible, I’ve been reading the Story Arc category through Teruko. How would it impact the way we see the story through her eyes if Levi is the accomplice?

Well, an obvious point is that it emphasizes how much you can’t trust anyone. You can’t even trust that there’s only one person with killing intent per murder! I’m sure Levi would be somewhat outcasted if this does all play out, and that would likely tie into a greater feeling of distrust. Between David’s heel turn, the sweet and helpful Eden tearfully being the blackened and facing an execution, and the stoic but previously reliable Levi being both a murderer (secret) and an accomplice (crime) out of nowhere, trust throughout the group would be at an all-time low. I think that’s a good thing; as I’ve said before, at this point in the story, I think we’re still validating Teruko’s worldview. It’s too early for a major shake-up, and to Teruko, these patterns are repetitive. They have to repeat at least a little bit for the audience to truly understand why Teruko acts the way she does.

But, even more than that, I think that DRDT has the makings of a central message surrounding fate. 

Everyone’s fate is already sealed, according to Teruko. The Lucky Student cannot die, no matter what. All murderers must be held accountable. There are a lot of big picture makings of the idea that people’s fates are already set in stone, no matter what they do.

Levi is, in many ways, “fated” to be a bad person. He’s fated to be a murderer. Whatever his past was, it seems like he was set up for moral failure no matter what. Seeing Levi fall into that trap of his destiny, being a murderer yet again after being deemed a murderer, also validates Teruko’s worldview that everyone is doomed because they’re already locked into their slots. Even if Levi didn’t die today, he will eventually.

Except, if he doesn’t die immediately, he also has a possibility to invalidate that worldview later. Levi’s survival to a point and (presumed) attempt to repent again, even after everything, could be something that shakes Teruko’s beliefs in future chapters. I’m not saying Levi would be the catalyst for Teruko’s entire character arc, but I think it’s going to take a lot of instances of Teruko being “wrong” to actually change Teruko’s mind. This is one way that we could set up Teruko being wrong, dating back to Chapter 2, so that when we get the payoff, the seeds have been planted all along the way.

 CONCLUSION

Hopefully this made sense! It’s been a long time since I’ve fully watched the series, and I only had time to partially rewatch Chapter 2 before writing and posting this. But, I remember a lot of the thoughts I had back when I was in peak DRDT brainrot, and I still believe Levi being the accomplice would make a lot of sense and open up a lot of doors narratively.

Obviously, this is what I currently believe, but even if you disagree, I hope you still found it interesting. I think it’s important to remember, going into these next few episodes, a core principle that pushed me to write the Eden Narrative Defense in the first place: we shouldn’t call something bad writing until we see it executed. Please remember to respect DRDTdev’s writing decisions and creative autonomy, no matter how you feel about the result. I’ll do my best to do the same as well.

With that being said, OH MY GOD I CAN’T BELIEVE DRDT IS BACK WE’RE GONNA GET ANSWERS AAAAAAAA–

[maxdibert]

These are the comments you received on the James defense post. I’d love to see your responses to them if you’re interested in answering.

what i don’t understand is how someone defending a 15yo james potter (thus apparently making them a classist which u think is tantamount to death lmao) is better than y’all defending snape? like. how is That not fascism considering mans was a literal DE who agreed w the ideals from a young age and also created torture curses that he used frequently enough to become his ‘signature spell’ and also became an adult who went on to bully literal children from his position of authority (and even becoming a kids boggart as well as actively harming other kids) whereas james was a kid who was a bully and went on to die at the age of 21. snape lived til his mid 30s and never stopped being an asshole. so. being a fascist defender of a racist bigot, how are you throwing stones at classists? also. if you’re talking ‘european cultural context’ pls remember this is not post-industrial britain and is a society of its own separate from the trad class system of the muggle world. money might play a role but so does blood politics and james was considered a ‘blood traitor’ which would’ve been a stroke against him during voldy’ speak war era. snape, on the other end, actively supported and endorsed the rhetoric. that’s just one layer to it. u can’t just juxtapose any theory to any context without considering the difference in that society from the one marx envisioned. that’s just lazy work.

You really talk a lot about class and aristocracy and brag about your experience and education and how much of an intellectual you are, but you still don’t understand that classes in the wizarding world are not the same as classes in our world. You use big words, brag about your experience, and clearly assert your moral and intellectual superiority over others, yet you don’t understand the meaning of “eat the rich”, the concept of class, the accumulation of capital, or even what capital and the means of production are. Or, most likely, you understand, but you just manipulate with these words to defend Snape thinking that no one can see it.(If you want to debate more substantially, I can send you my meta about classes from a Marxist perspective in the wizarding world. ( though you’ll probably say I don’t have enough neurones to write anything coherent😄)

Regarding the first person, I’ve already talked about this many times, and they’re mixing up concepts. First of all, I don’t understand what adult Severus has to do with James, because the relationship between James and Severus is limited to their teenage years. It makes no sense to bring adult Severus into the debate because we’re not talking about that Severus. We’re talking about the teenager in a teenage context with a teenage bully.

And, even so, if we were to talk about the adult, we could discuss how the violence inflicted by James Potter probably influenced his character as he grew up, precisely because it left him with a host of unresolved traumas. These include an inability to manage his emotions or deal with stressful situations as a functional adult, due to a significant developmental delay directly tied to his experiences at school and the importance he still places on them as an adult.

In any case, that’s beside the point. On the other hand, these people seem to be willfully obtuse. Rowling didn’t create a world out of nowhere; her world is the British Wizarding World, and throughout the series, she uses analogies for real-world political and social issues (like discrimination against Muggle-borns, which is supposed to be an analogy for racism but comes off as ridiculous, or Voldemort being a sort of Hitler figure but not even reaching the level of a nationalist terrorist party leader, or the werewolves being a disrespectful metaphor for HIV victims). So, it’s based on the real society she lived in, which is specifically post-Thatcherite Britain. For these people to claim that Severus was some kind of fascist racist and then have the audacity to deny that Rowling’s world is connected to the real world—when it’s closely based on real-world social dynamics and constantly shaped by her bourgeois, reactionary perspective—is as contradictory as it is ridiculous and even shameful.

And I’m sorry, but class is something that permeates everything. Class is the trunk of the social structure from which other branches of intersecting social issues emerge. Homophobia is also tied to class; feminism is tied to class; racism is tied to class. All the problems and axes of discrimination in our society have a class-based foundation because the social pillars on which it is built were based on class castes that date back to pre-Medieval societies. The Roman Empire was a class society; ancient Egypt was a class society. Our cultural references are strictly linked to class. Ignoring this and claiming that Rowling somehow created a completely isolated bubble uninfluenced by the politics of a world closely modeled after ours, and with issues she constantly alludes to in her work, is basically not understanding a thing, having the reading comprehension of a monkey on amphetamines, or simply refusing to acknowledge the obvious to avoid re-examining personal prejudices or deconstructing their neoliberal perspective.

As for the second message... Yes, I mean, I would tell them that not only am I an intellectual, but I also studied Law + Political Science, have two master's degrees, and have worked in unions. So, it’s not a matter of what I think; it’s that I literally have qualifications in this. I’m a criminal lawyer and political scientist. It’s not like I’m drawing my conclusions from a handful of Tumblr posts I came across.

They’re telling me I don’t understand the concept of means of production or capital accumulation to defend a character who literally lived off the wealth of his ancestors and used that economic and social capital (because there are various types of capital) to maintain a position of power over others during his school years. A character who, precisely because of his accumulated capital, managed to sit at the top of the social hierarchy without lifting a finger and who had nothing to lose by acting like a tyrant because he had an economic and familial safety net (another type of capital) to fall back on. All this while the character he attacked was on the opposite side: working-class, with no resources or financial support, and zero accumulated or generated capital.

I don’t know what the hell they’re talking about, and it seems quite incoherent to start posturing as a Marxist intellectual while defending abuses of power by the magical equivalent of an aristocrat against someone from the working class. And I’m sorry, but the social structure of the wizarding world functions exactly like the social structure of any society that still maintains class-based castes rooted in aristocracy. Pure-bloods are basically nobles, aristocrats, members of families with great lineages—they’re essentially lords. It doesn’t take much insight to find the parallel, nor does it require much knowledge of British culture; just a glance at how modern European monarchies work makes it evident.

But anyway, what do you want me to say? They can bring whatever meta they want, but I’m not going to change my opinion. My issue with these people is basically this: one knows what their strengths are, and I’m not pretending to be an intellectual or acting like I know it all. It’s just that I literally have experience in activism, paid work, and university-level studies (master’s level) on these topics.

I’m not going to share my opinions about physics, theories on how spells or magic might work, or whether certain things are plausible from a logical point of view because I don’t have the faintest idea about those things. I don’t know math, I don’t know physics or chemistry, and I don’t know engineering. I’m an absolute illiterate when it comes to equations. But I’m not when it comes to political theory. I’ve earned honors in political theory.

So, as you can understand, these people are hardly going to change the mind of someone who not only has expertise but also has a damn university degree. And frankly, I don’t think degrees are everything, but aside from that, I’ve spent 10 years actively participating in Marxist union activism, leading the university union, and I also worked for a year in the field of labor law after finishing my degree. So, I don’t know—they can say whatever they want, but I don’t care.

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

(Submission) Why do people feel so sorry for JGY and NMJ again? I enjoy both of their characters but it’s so plain that they both made their bed (the coffin) and must lie in it.

---------

Hello there. I think because many prefer to approach works and characters less from an analytical and outward standpoint,and more of a "well this is what I would do if I were in this situation instead". Which then of course leads to where I can sympathize with these men, despite the surrounding context from the story that lessens that sympathy, very much on purpose.

Yes, Jin Guangyao had a very difficult childhood due to the cruelty of classism, yet he still had a mother that loved him and wanted the best for him, and tried within her means. His love of her though did not mean he had to torture older women still living in brothel life and killing them, he did not need to condemn an entire clan to death because they called him the same as Wen Ruohan and use them once again to claim they killed his son out of hate, when it had been his own hand because of his own obsession of appearing saintly kind and untouchable to the masses of gentry he wanted to be part of fully and idolized.

He is not a working class hero that his fans try to say he is. He didn't do a thing to help civilian life within text, that is actually still pointed to be something only the Lans participate in, and Lan Wangji's own students even more so. He wanted to erase everything about his beginnings because he was ashamed and thought lesser of them, he states that he is better than those he came of.

He also manipulated his own friendship with Lan Xichen to start poisoning Nie Mingjue into Qi deviation and on page confirmation of true demonic arts. Whatever prior to his rise to power, is not an excuse for his continued desperate hold for more even after he was on top especially when he very much tried to kill his nephew who he had raised from birth twice on page. And through all of this displays no remorse for these actions other than miming very weak reasons that even a very naive Lan Xichen can see with nothing but terror at this lack of taking claim for one's actions from malice and manipulations.

As for Nie Mingjue, there is another idolatry with the idea of a strict, but kind righteous brother. When he is not even that. His own traditionalism blinds him from the actions of sympathy and he condemns an entire group of people based on hate of people that have already died, while hypocritically he sits in the same room of those that once had it. While he is proud of his own name, he does not allow the surviving Wens even that because of his hate that has no place after the war he won. He is not even kind to his own brother who he doesn't understand and mocks for not wanting to be anything like Nie Mingjue, partially out of yes, love and worry, but also because his own way of life is the only way of life. That is not tolerance and he wouldn't be even if there was some change to the external plot details.

His hate is the reason he is a mindless dumb corpse unlike Song Lan and Wen Ning, who at their core were always kind people that were strong because of their faith in kindness. Nie Mingjue did not believe in kindness but righteous zealotry and when he thought one was not adhering to his form of righteous zealotry, they were unworthy of basic humanity.

He himself has no qualms with calling Jin Guangyao as he is due to being born from a whore as if that's why Jin Guangyao is evil and cruel. He is a hypocrite in his own words as he is offended that Jin Guangyao views himself as better than lesser class individuals, yet is quick to say it's the reason Jin Guangyao is what he is. That is classic classism in verbiage. It also isn't due to the cruelty that Jin Guangyao exhibits that he cares about, it's what he views as a disgrace to any sort of "righteous" tactics that should be employed instead.

Yes, these men are very nuanced and very deeply layered, but nuance does not mean they were well meaning, kind, tolerant in action, especially when the text implies they are like many many politicians that exist in the world, and even get these same long winded metas cooing over them and making up reasons as to why they're men to be admired, loved, and coddled. Ironic really, from a sociological look into the ways of fandom speech and underlying bias from world wide isms that permeate societies.

[fatehbaz]

what does your username mean?

Cat ghost.

As child. Would go to library, to look at books about creatures, with a pen and notepad. Or sit before a television watching "nature" documentary stuff, with a pen and notepad. Was fixated on habitats. The context. Did not like to isolate an individual creature from the wider ecological community. This led to interest in geography, distribution range maps. Was aware that, in popular perception, some creatures were strongly associated with a particular place. "Lion is an African animal. Tiger is an Asian animal." Allegedly. And other stereotypes (many of them, I would later come to learn, due to chauvinism, exoticism, Orientalism, colonialism, etc.). Came across a kind of large textbook on wild cats. Saw the historical distribution maps. Only a few centuries ago, tigers were in Anatolia, the Caucasus, near the shores of the Black Sea. Was intrigued. From the middle of the twentieth century onward, the lion and cheetah were so closely associated with Africa, where like over 99% of their range was located. And yet. There remains a small remnant population of nearly-extinct Asiatic lions far away within India''s borders. And there remains a small remnant population of nearly-extinct Asiatic cheetahs within Iran's borders. And all that space, in between, where both cats were now extinct. Only 100 years ago, tiger, lion, leopard, and cheetah all lived generally near each other, still, in eastern Anatolia, near Mesopotamia, etc. And now, only a few dozen wild native cheetah remain on the entire continent of Asia.

"Cheetah". The word for this cat is from South Asia. Through Hindi, from Sanskrit.

"What happened?" I read on. Cheetahs were present within the national borders of what is now India, along with tigers, lions, and leopards. By the 1500s, there was a tradition in South Asia, where some in the Mughal aristocracy enjoyed using cheetahs as companions in sport hunting. The cats would be captured in the wild, and then trained, and then brought along on royal hunts. The cat was the star athlete, goaded into chasing down prey, for the entertainment of the hunting party. There are elaborate paintings, commissioned by Mughal courts and some now displayed in collections of European museums, depicting trained cheetah hunts. It has since been popularly said that Akbar was particularly fond of cheetahs. (Akbar the Great was the "emperor" who is credited often for consolidating Mughal state power across India, solidifying regional power by building administrative systems/structures in India ["forging an empire out of fiefdoms"] that would later eventually be manipulated and overtaken by the British Empire. According to some tellings of the historical narrative.)

Accurate or not, it was said that at any one time, Akbar possessed one thousand cheetahs. A vast royal menagerie. The names of several of the most celebrated cheetahs are still known. In some stories, when he was still young, Akbar was presented with a gift. His very first cheetah: Fatehbaz.

This disturbed me. A child, reading this book, I was upset by the idea of such a vast menagerie of wild animals. Large wild animals, with great need for food, space, enrichment. I was upset by the exploitation of captive wild animals as displays of aristocratic wealth, not just in the Mughal state(s), but also those menageires and exhibitions elsewhere, both earlier and later in time: the royal hunts of Assyrian kings, the Roman arenas, Charlemagne's elephants, European circuses.

So, as a child, I imagined that Fatehbaz resisted the captivity. Like in a daydream, a fantasy. I imagined a royal menagerie breaking free from restraint. I imagined elephants and rhinos and tigers and lions and leopards and jackals and crocodiles. I imagined the beasts attacking an emperor's court. But there are now less than one hundred cheetahs which survive in the wild in Asia. And when Mughal statecraft gave way to European statecraft, when Britain moved into South Asia, the bounty hunting specifically targeted big cats. And, meanwhile, the cats were confronted indirectly with habitat destruction, commodity crop monocultures, industrial-scale resource extraction. So I came to imagine the ghosts of cats. The ghost of a cheetah like Fatehbaz on the Indus plain. The ghost of a jaguar in the Sonoran desert. The ghost of a lion on the Mediterranean coast. The ghost of a tiger on the Amu Darya shore beyond Bukhara, where even the Aral Sea itself has vanished.