#because we are all extremely different based on our individual experiences alone. again - we are not a monolith | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

sailoryooons · 2 years ago

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Triggering content and topics of racism, harassment, cancel culture, and media literacy are below. This is extremely long and has nothing to do with any of my works or BTS, but addresses the recent cancellation of creators on this platform and some personal statements I want to make.

For anyone who isn’t aware, once again there are people using @/chaibts to attack people. I don’t want to act as a mouthpiece for M, but as a friend and a fellow content creator, it’s really frustrating to see someone chased off of this website by anonymous users on a forum where none of the conversations being had, or accusations being made appear to be in good faith or from well-intentioned submitters.

I think a lot of what is being posted on this blog is being posted in bad faith under the guise of holding creators accountable. This blog is primarily being used by individuals who allow no room for other opinions, nuance, context or for the people accused of certain content to defend themselves or apologize and grow if needed. I do want to say that there are some submissions on the blog that have done a great drop of calling attention to issues with users in the community, but a majority of the submissions are not.

Disclaimer: I am completely aware that not all of our experiences are the same and that each individual person experiences discrimination and racism differently and I’m not negating that. I am aware that my experience as an American-born Latina makes all of my experiences with racism, discrimination, and microaggressions different than people from other non-white communities, and my entire experience and interpretation of this scenario are based on my experience. I am not, at any point, under the impression that my experiences are the groundwork for making accusations.

I say all of this to provide context for the next part, which is that the scene that someone(s) found to be written from a place of racism, I beta-read for and helped M with. When I use the word racism in this context, the original poster believes that this scene was written with the specific intent to attack Asians, and that the scene displaying discrimination against Yoongi was from a place of bad faith, as well that there is no scenario in which a white creator should depict any sort of discriminatory transgressions, as they cannot perceive racism or discrimination.

Because I beta-read it and because I helped with this area of the fic, I feel like I should speak up and take some responsibility, and I want to say that M did ask others about the scene because it was incredibly important to show the discriminatory action in an impactful and respectful way. M, from this scene’s inception, asked thoughtful questions and asked me directly if the experience made sense, referencing my time working in a hotel where I first-hand witnessed similar dealings and experienced it myself. We talked about what the scene meant, how it reflected the real-life struggles of BTS in the Western music industry, and how it felt for someone to experience this in their career. As someone who has faced micro-aggressions my entire life and career - particularly in regard to my accent - I resonated with this scene, but I realize that may not be the case for everyone.

I in no way think I am the sole vocal piece for all marginalized communities nor do I think that my experiences dictate this discourse alone, so what I did not find triggering does not mean that it wasn’t. There is a difficulty when trying to showcase the struggles of marginalized groups in media, and it doesn’t always resonate the way it’s intended.

To reiterate: I am not Asian. I am Cuban-American, and very much a white Latina, and benefit from the fact that people treat me as a normal white person until I speak with an accent, which makes my experience very different than anyone else visibly not-white. It is entirely possible that the reason I was not triggered or did not find this scene troublesome was because I am not the specific ethnicity mentioned and I 100% acknowledge that. I also did not see an issue with a white creator showing this moment, however, I also understand that not everyone feels that way and that is completely acceptable.

I’m not going to delve in and give a dissertation on how discrimination should and should not be represented in media and who should be able to write about it, but I wanted to talk about my relationship to the scene mentioned, because it leads me to what I really want to talk about on this platform.

What I want to talk about as the main issue is the cancel culture and bullying on this platform. What I have seen lately on Tumblr, including this ‘tea’ blog, is a complete refusal by people to consume media with any sort of media literacy and without any willingness to have nuance. M is not the only creator who has been bullied off of Tumblr recently for something that, to me, warrants a conversation and not a hate campaign. This is happening more and more, and I am constantly seeing anonymous users in the ask boxes of content creators calling them racist, queerphobic, sasaensgs, fetishizers, and everything in between for the most ridiculous takes.

When I say that people are ‘chased’ off of Tumblr, I do not mean with pitchforks and torches of the masses who are rightfully escorting a wrong-doer off the internet. I mean by the constant harassment from one person or a small group of people who refuse to let anyone explain, refuse to give anyone apt time to respond, and refuse to accept any sort of response whether it’s editing the work in question, someone going on hiatus to think about whether or not they feel as though they’ve done wrong, or leaving entirely so that they’re no longer contributing to the discourse. This is the way our new ‘accountability’ system works, especially behind the protection of anonymity. It’s easy to feel as though you’re doing something right when there is nothing to tie you to the responsibility of your words and accusations.

It’s incredibly difficult as a friend and a content creator to see multiple people be bullied from this platform by users who absolutely refuse to believe anything but their own interpretation, and I think we are trivializing a lot of actually problematic topics by the approach being used. Accountability IS incredibly important, but the current trend is that no version of accountability is enough. Editing or deleting the story isn’t enough, an apology isn’t enough - nothing is enough.

If we are going to be a community that holds people accountable, we have to also allow the people we are accusing to respond, and apologize if/when necessary. We also have to consider if the content we personally find triggering is ACTUALLY at its core troublesome and problematic, and consider that our opinion is not the collective. We have to consider that if the collective community being referenced is telling you that they do not see the same problem that you do, they’re not also in the wrong, but might have a different perspective.

Anything else sort of just feels like a hate campaign with no true desire to protect the community they are speaking “on behalf” of. Especially in this instance, where there are now bipoc creators being attacked for having the audacity to defend a white creator. Why can members of the community being represented not provide their opinion on it without being insulted and called names? Is it, perhaps, because you cared more about getting rid of the person than you did about the issue? That’s what this translates to, especially when the previous stance of protecting a group becomes attacking that group because they don’t agree. When you begin attacking the members of the group you were originally trying to protect because it no longer fits your narrative, you negate any type of goodwill you entered the conversation with.

Again, this is my very limited and personal experience and I am open to the possibility that my take isn’t the right take or I am in a small minority that feels this way. I want this to be a safe community for everyone but in order to do that, we also have to consume content with an ounce of willingness to have nuance and give people a modicum of time to respond appropriately.

For the record, I know that this take and conversation is not for everyone, and I completely respect it if you no longer feel comfortable interacting with me. This is an uncomfortable topic. I may not be the best to represent a discussion on cancel culture on this website. I may not be the best to represent conversations on discrimination inclusion in fics. However this was something I was involved in, and it’s hurtful to see a friend suffer from what I think a lot of people agree to be something that was not worth this in the first place.

Reblogs are turned off because I have no interest in anyone dogpiling any creators or risking spreading bad takes. I wrote this purely because I felt like it needed to be said, and I am sure there will be negative repercussions, but that is the risk of existing in this space online.

#tw racism #tw harassment #tw bullying

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ntuankhann · 9 months ago

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RMIT Design Management Sem 1 - 2024

Team 9 - IRD VN Brief 2 & 3

Week 5: Stickers ideas.

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Week 5 Reflection: As someone who has worked by myself a lot even in team projects before, it feels intimidating and fresh at the same time. One reason for it is that the chosen idea for this project is from my teammate, and as I've been doing my own stuff alone for so long, it's scary to jump straight into a totally different project with an entirely different approach from mine but at the same time it feels nice to actually working together with a great teammate on a better project proposal than mine since I can learn a lot from them. I'm assigned to do the stickers for the brief while still being involved in the video-making process which will be filmed with cameras instead of animation or illustration - a complete contrast to what I normally do or enjoy. However, I do hope my storyboard and illustration skills and personal taste in "art direction" from past experiences can have a positive impact on this video brief. Also, I think that doing completely different things from what I'm used to can be beneficial to my growth later on.

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Other notes (other notes for assignment 3):

Challenges: - What do IRD and their clients want to feel and expect in the video? - Balance between nonsensical fun and clever mockery against the corporative marketing strategies from big companies and being respectful towards the target audiences. - Having to be inclusivity with the use of socks. - Low effort but fun! - It's hard to poke fun at the corporative marketing strategies themselves instead of being disrespectful towards the LGBT community and Pride cultures.

Solutions: - "Own scripts" - 30s and 5-10s - Reuse Tam's socks idea and change it up a bit so it's more meta and popular trope for the 5-10 second video. - Directly poking fun at big corporates on pride month while including twists that are familiar to everyone today for the 30s video.

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What's been going on in week 5?

Team's organization chart: Tam - main idea guy & director, Thao - communicator and props, Ngan - props, Khanh - stickers. Other than that all participate in pitching ideas for videos, storyboarding, and making the video.

Timeline: 5 weeks - 1 week for storyboard and pitch scripts, 3 weeks for making videos, 1 week for making booklets.

Individual contribution: other informal communications between teams and clients, stickers, participates in pitching ideas and storyboarding.

Peer review: updates to come but everyone has been amazing so far. Our synergies with each other have been wonderful and I'm happy to be with them for now.

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For this week, we're all doing our own storyboard and script based on Tam's ideas of using socks as twists and jokes focusing on safe sex and inclusivity in the LGBT community.

Because the topic of the video is extremely flexible and we needed to think of something incredible for the video before pitching it again to IRD, we decided to storyboard and script on our own without influencing each other to get as many ideas out as possible before coming to the final conclusion. But that is also what we need to work on since having no communication about the script we're trying to come up with, we don't know what each other had in mind before the pitching phase. So we kinda sacrificing the possibility of everyone together working on something awesome for the diversity of what everyone can think of.

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chaoticevilbean · 3 years ago

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An (Un)Official List Of Things Only Anakin Skywalker Can Do

Originally written by Ayala Secura

Blow people up with his mind on accident

Anakin expressed concern over his lack of emotional control. He gave many examples of normal problems that can arise from this. He then casually added one that is not common, usual, or even plausible for known Jedi. From his recollection, he would often cause beings who enraged him to spontaneously and violently combust.

I did my best to reassure him that such things were considered unusual, but weren't reason for him to be fearful. At the time, I simply didn't wish to increase his worries. I did maintain that the exploding of beings is very bad, and that he should work on finding ways to productively release such strong emotions.

I apologize here for the "renovation" of the hangar. (Secura)

Hear as far as the length of the Temple (without meditation)

Amendment: Hear as far as the diameter of Coruscant (without meditation)

Anakin once again was expressing concerns over his lack of control. He also complained that it was causing him headaches. Upon my questioning, he explained that he could hear the younglings playing on the other side of the Temple. I tested this by having us stand on either end of the longest part of the Temple we could reach. I asked if he could hear me (without a comm) and he responded that he could (using a comm).

Later, when he was still within the Temple, I found myself on a mission with my Master. It was not a very rushed assignment, and I began humming. Upon my return to the Temple, Anakin asked me if I knew what song it was, humming the exact tune I had. Apparently, he had been walking with his own Master and had heard me, though he hadn't been focusing enough to identify what he was doing. (Secura)

Smell differences within water despite being a non-variant Human

Smell differences within air despite being a non-variant Human

He accompanied me to the Room of a Thousand Fountains. It was a normal walk through the gardens, until we came across one of the smaller ponds. He commented that someone had cleaned it recently. When I asked how he knew, he explained that it smelled different.

He and I were sitting within his quarters. We were simply chatting when he complained that someone had messed with the ventilation without alerting him or Knight Kenobi. He could smell the air was slightly different than before. As he put it, the smell wasn't the problem, but the lack of communication was.

Both instances, he couldn't elaborate on what exactly the smells were, nor how he knew what each one meant. He simply knows these things. When tested with some other Padawans, the only ones that came close to knowing such things were Nautolans, out of a base group of 15 species. The experiment is listed in the Archives as Liquid and Gaseous Change Detection. (Secura)

Eat death sticks without consequence

Both of our Masters brought us to the lower levels in order to fulfill a mission. Anakin and I were left in a corner booth, with instructions to remain there and cause a commotion if someone attempted to harm or harrass us.

I looked away for TEN SECONDS. Ten seconds, and he was being offered a death stick by a clearly intoxicated individual who had no sense of what should and shouldn't be given to a barely ten-cycle-old. Anakin had no experience with such things. He had no idea what he was being given, and managed to get instructions to pour the liquid into his fizzyglug within the fleeting moment I was not paying attention.

He consumed it, chugging the liquid when I attempted to order him to stop, and then take it from him when he didn't listen. The individual who gave him the death stick had the sense to begin to panic, finally realizing Anakin's youth. However, Anakin finished off every drop with nothing but a smile. I got our Masters attention, but even after taking him to the nearest medcenter and runnign multiple scans, there were no signs of any harm. I have received significant therapy for that event, and Anakin has since been informed to not take anything from strangers. (Secura)

Generate electricity on levels that a (non-variant) Human cannot perform (without a health declination)

He was making his hair do that weird static thing that Human hair does every time he got excited. He also kept causing screens and pads to glitch or turn off whenever he picked them up while in a similar state. A solution of temporary insulating gloves and frequent reminders helped him gain control. (Secura)

Communicate words through the Force with minimal bonding

Amendment: No bonding is necessary for this form of communication, and is possible within the expanse of the Temple

Amendment: Communication is possible over most distances

He asked me if Aayla was available to study (with the Force) because his mouth was full and he'd already been told off that day. (Vos)

Skywalker told me that my Padawan was experiencing a panic attack from across the Temple. No bond existed between us before or after the interaction. (Fisto)

Skywalker informed me of a mission delay over several systems. He explained later that he was attempting to prevent his Master's worry about informing the Council and knew I would inform the other members for Kenobi. (Windu)

Consume raw meat (without a health declination) despite being a non-variant Human

Nervous to eat lunch alone, he was. Asked to eat together, I did. Showed him the kitchens, I did. Ate five live frogs, he did. Proud, I am. (Yoda)

I handed him a rodent I had found within my quarters, asking him to hold it so I could call someone. I was going to call a being who could help me prevent further instances and get rid of this rodent. I needn't have worried about relocating or disposing of the creature, though. I remember hearing a loud squeal, then turning to find Skywalker trying to tear away the fur of the rodent. He had no notion that it was an unusual habit for a Human. (Ti)

Jump into the Temple vents without using the walls

Amendment: Without using any aid

Amendment: Jump in/out of the Temple vents and on/off obstacles of similar height without any aid whatsoever

He's proved this multiple times over various training excercises, and occasionally his attempts to avoid said excercises. There's footage of it from the Temple's cameras. He has no regard for safety when it comes to jumping off of ledges, cliffs, or roofs/out windows. Caution advisory does nothing. (Kenobi)

Send emotions through the Force without a bond

Amendment: Send emotions without a bond, over great distances, with extreme precision and without any meditation or prior preparation - such emotions will likely be magnified upon reception, and can cause fainting, among other symptoms

Upon the death of notable Jedi Master Pak'll Tiffn, I had decided to participate in their culture's traditional week-long mourning practices. Near the end of this, young Skywalker asked me why I seemed so "down". I explained my grief at the death of Master Tiffn, and he continued to question me on the cause of my "distress". When he discovered I had technically finished the practices an hour before, he sent such a strong wave of excitement to me that I found it hard to not smile for the following three days.

I also found myself wishing to work on starfighter engines, which I attribute to the excitement being of Skywalker's creation. (Tiin)

I had a migraine while on a mission. Skywalker sent me a wave of comfort that caused me to pass out. He has since been informed that he should not interact with Jedi in the field unless he is certain they are in a safe enough position to do so. (Windu)

Accidentally cause plants to grow at a visibly accelerated rate

Anakin fell asleep in the Room of a Thousand Fountains while attempting to meditate. Upon my arrival, I found the grass already past my knees in height, and several nearby shrubs beginning to flower. I write my apologies here to the caretakers of the Room, and express my gratitude that none of you commented on it. (Kenobi)

Accidental levitation whilst walking

Amendment: Accidental levitation whilst walking, running, and other movement in which one is not standing/sitting/lying in a singular place

Witnessed during sparring practice with Master Kit Fisto and Master Ki-Adi Mundi

Bypass shielding enough to receive a clear perception of a being's emotions

I was working through some guilt over a recent mission and the requirements to fulfill it. Anakin walked over and did his best to comfort me without any understanding of why I was feeling that way, but knowing exactly what I was feeling. Throughout our entire interaction, my shields remained firmly in place, and strong enough that he really shouldn't have been able to even know where I was.

Oh yeah. He came from across the Temple to find me. He bypassed my shielding from across the Temple, without realizing his actions, and did so with better precision than a fully trained Master. (Vos)

Carry items of any weight without strain from channeling

According to Skywalker, the only trouble he has with lifting all the furniture in his quarters is he has to focus on the act while also looking for his missing holopad. (Koon)

(regarding previous entry) Reminds me of the time he lifted all the ships in Hangar 6 in order to find a single wrench, which was in somehow within the vents. (Billaba)

Cause a building-wide power outage from a nightmare/vision

Incident recorded as Padawan-induced. (Nu)

Bite through beskar when curious

Taste the strength of metals

Skywalker is no longer allowed in the forges without someone actively supervising him and him alone. He saw a piece of beskar I had managed to aquire. He was curious about the ore, due to it being unknown to him. I caught him with it in his mouth like some youngling sneaking a cookie. Apparently it tasted really strong. I thought he meant the taste was pungent, until he said that even durasteel didn't taste as strong. (Ria)

Heal minor personal wounds immediately, within a few seconds and without discernible energy usage

Heal major personal wounds immediately, up to halving recovery time and with lessened energy usage

Incidents recorded in mission reports including Skywalker (Nu)

Accidentally mind trick crowds of 20 or more

Amendment: Untested limit of how many can be affected, although the effectiveness of the tricks varies between individuals, and can reach up to 50 beings (recorded)

Note to all those who may serve a diplomatic mission with Skywalker: he can safely diffuse mobs, protests, and other upset crowds. He will need time to calm his own emotions afterwards, as it is (theoretically) his increasing anxiety that causes such effects. (Fisto)

Learn a language after hearing it only once

Amendment: Anakin will not know this is happening. He will simply begin to speak the language back at whoever spoke it to him.

Incidents recorded in mission reports including Skywalker (Nu)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

All Jedi are now welcome to add to the (Un)Official List of Things Only Anakin Skywalker Can Do. All editors are asked to put some form of a source, even if such source is simply a page-long rant about Padawan Skywalker's habit of not checking if a substance should be poisonous to him (condolences to Knight Vos).

Please also include some sort of identifier to connect each edit to the being(s) who created them.

Sincerest gratitude and condolences to all Jedi who find themselves editing this file. (Secura)

#star wars #anakin skywalker #fanon #jedi #jedi temple #aayla secura #quinlan vos #obi-wan kenobi #kit fisto #mace windu #saesee tiin #jocasta nu #ki-adi mundi #depa billaba #plo koon #shaak ti #yoda #minch yoda

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bistaxx · 4 years ago

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“Who am I without you?” “Yourself.”

I’m thinking about how this exchange lowkey set-up some of the themes and character motives we’re seeing in season 3. How our own personal identities and self-worth are tied to people we care about- and how something that is typically seen as beneficial can be harmful.

Like in season 2 we saw several characters struggle with their internal identity, who they are, how they fit into this world, and should they act for themselves or others. It wasn’t really the focal point though, season 2 was more about sentimentality and the emotional value of personal property. Season 3 so far has been more about the deeper affects of social bonds and individuality.

Bad has sacrificed his individuality to the egg despite knowing through first-hand experience how awful being under it’s control is. His argument with Quackity implies that he doesn’t want to be under the eggs control and that his constant preaching over how wonderful the crimson is seems to be more to convince himself that he’s doing the right thing, all to help save his best friend because he doesn’t know what he would do without Skeppy. His noble devotion to saving his best friend is both selfless and selfish as he’s not only hurting himself but everyone around him by forcing them to suffer through the controlling and harmful affects of the crimson alongside him.

Bad’s situation kinda parallels with Karl’s, every time Karl time travels it becomes harder to remember what happened and he looses a bit of himself. He fears one day forgetting who he is but he refuses to stop until he’s ‘righted some wrongs’. Again, we see a character sacrifice who they are for the sake of other people, putting others over themself. Karl may be saving the SMP from some terrible fate but by doing so he’s destroying himself, which isn’t just bad for him but for the people who care about him like his fiancés who have already lost so much. The situation is made tougher by Karl deciding it would be better to keep his powers a secret, leaving him to bear the burden alone and those around him without answers to his dwindling memories. The possibility that Karl’s actions may be making things worse adds a layer of irony to his sacrifice, potentially showing that being selfless to this extreme isn’t a good thing.

Ranboo’s character struggles revolve around his ideals of putting people first over the idea of ‘sides’, and how he struggles with that because the people he cares for are all so divided. He also struggles with the concept of identity on several levels: he only knows half of what he is (enderman and something else), the half he knows is causing him to black out and ‘enderwalk’ leaving gaps in his memories, and the big one being his dilemma with the Dream voice reminding him of things he’d rather forget because he can’t cope with the reality that he’s hurting people he loves behind their backs. He keeps on trying to ignore it and while the voices stopped for awhile in it’s place the ‘enderwalk’ blackouts started becoming more frequent indicating that Ranboo is still very stress. This culminates during the “prison visit.” He’s put into a very awful position: Ranboo doesn’t want to hurt his friend and he doesn’t want them to abandon him if they find out the truth so he shoves it under the floorboards, but the heartbeat of his misdeeds are tearing him apart- making him lose his sense of self and leaving what remains of his identity on shaky insecure foundation.

Other things fit with some of these ideas too: Phil’s lingering guilt and desire to bring back his son, which may tie into Dream’s book that Schlatt gave him, Jack’s self-worth being heavily influenced by how Tubbo perceives him and thinking that by getting rid of Tommy he’s doing Tubbo a favor but Tubbo “just doesn’t know it yet” as a way to justify his need for revenge, Niki and Fundy both feeling left behind by those around them and how they are reacting to those feelings in different ways, their also may be some subtle things going with Tubbo and his lack of self-worth based on his reactions when Dream was about to kill him. I want to talk more about them but I feel like I need to catch up on their streams first so I don’t get anything wrong y’know.

Anyway I hope this all made sense of some level- I really like rambling oops-

/rp

#dream smp #dream smp spoilers #crimson arc #ranboo prison visit #Badboyhalo #Karl Jacobs #Tales from the smp #Ranboo #Tubbo #Tommyinnit #Philza #Jack Manifold #Dreamwastaken #Nihachu #Fundy #Skeppy #Quackity #this kinda went all over the place oops #long post

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gendercensus · 4 years ago

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On plural inclusivity and "plural they"

In the Gender Census feedback box and elsewhere I have frequently been asked:

to make the annual Gender Census survey more inclusive of plural participants, and

to add "plural they" to the checkbox pronouns list alongside "singular they" in order to be inclusive of plural participants.

It's a rambling topic, so I'll address them in sections in that order.

INCLUSIVITY RE: PLURAL PARTICIPANTS

I've been inviting plural people to take part in a short survey about the Gender Census, asking questions that help me get a feel for the issues involved and asking about whether people feel included in the survey (and why or why not). At the time of writing there have been 139 responses, I will leave it open for ongoing feedback, and I'm unlikely to be publishing the spreadsheet of results in full because the responses are off-topic and very personal. However, I will refer to some individual responses as well as my personal experience discussing inclusion with plural systems.

Here's a graph based on the responses so far:

I'm asking for direct feedback about this issue because over the past few years plural folks have been one of the more consistently vocal groups in the feedback box of the survey and elsewhere, which would usually be fine, but I've been finding it very overwhelming and confusing. I think that's because the advice/demands/questions have been unusually inconsistent, often to the point of being in direct opposition to each other, and the result is that I have no idea what to do.

Before now, most plural people have understood that it's quite a nuanced issue. When asked I would explain that if they felt that filling it in once for the whole system made more sense they should do that, and if individual system members felt strongly that they should participate alone then they could do so.

This year it got to the point where I had to make a decision and write unambiguous, easy-to-follow guidance about how plural people should fill in the survey, because I had one system submitting dozens of responses and giving the exact same three points of feedback, paraphrased, over and over - making it look like many unconnected people felt strongly about these particular issues, when in reality it was all this one system. I decided that, to be as fair as possible, plural people should fill in the survey once per body.

When I posted about the "once per body" policy on social media I received very little direct feedback, which leaves me in the position of not knowing whether that's because I did it right and you have no complaints or because you've all jumped ship! The statistics and comments from the plural feedback survey are very helpful in this regard:

It seems that plural participants, on the whole, are fairly understanding about it all, often supportive, and are still able to participate. ("Unknown" and "no strong feelings" together are a much higher proportion than I expected.) Some positive feedback included appreciation for the ability to select as many gender identities and pronouns as one wants. Common arguments against the policy include feeling that system members are not treated as people in their own right, which is understandable; the Gender Census is designed to present practicable data about nonbinary people for use within a system that assigns one identity per body, socially and bureaucratically. A "once per body" policy makes sense when prioritising nonbinary people, but adds to the list of crap that only plural people have to struggle through when they're not the main focus of the research.

I was surprised that only a couple of people pointed out that some systems have amnesia between members, and so some systems may participate more than once per body unintentionally. (I understand that this is unavoidable, and I certainly wouldn't be upset about it. Sometimes non-plural people participate more than once by accident, too! On the scale we're talking about, I'm unlikely to even notice it happening.)

Back when I first started to get requests to make the Gender Census more plural-inclusive, my first move was to ask people what exactly they felt excluded by. Responses to this have been continuously nebulous, to the extent that I don't think I have ever made any design changes to the annual survey at all as a result. I also asked what they would do to improve the survey and help them to feel included, but this has yielded very few viable ideas for how to move forward, just because so many of the ideas that people suggest are mutually exclusive.

As an example, I spoke to one member of a system who expressed, understandably, that their experience of themselves as plural inextricably affected their experience of their gender(s), and after some discussion they concluded that the two were so intertwined that it made the most sense for it to be included in the identity question, e.g. a checkbox called "plural" alongside nonbinary, genderqueer, trans, etc. I explained that I don't arbitrarily add things to the checkbox list, but it would be counted if it was typed into a textbox underneath, and if it went over 1% I would consider adding it to the checkbox list. They became increasingly angry. The only way this situation would make sense for them moving forward was if I added "plural" as an identity checkbox option immediately. Conversely, just a couple of weeks previously I had spoken with a member of a system who was very vocally distressed at the idea of plurality being conflated with gender, and wanted to make sure that I never added "plural" as an identity checkbox option.

As another example, in the plural feedback survey when I asked people how they felt about the "once per body" policy, a member of one system was against it and said "it feels like this policy doesn’t recognize us as separate people", but a member of another system was in favour and said "we're encouraged by our therapist to think of ourselves as dissociated parts of a whole. So we're all one person, just not directly connected like a singlet [non-plural person] would be. From that perspective, it makes sense to keep us as one person in the gender census, no matter how many genders we have." It's not possible to reconcile these two perspectives.

From the very beginning up until now, the unifying theme for feedback from plural people and their allies is "please be more inclusive of plural people." That's a really good start! After that it becomes a plate of tangled spaghetti.

Here are some themes I've managed to tease out, and my thoughts.

"Each system's alter should be able to participate in the survey individually if they want to." Some systems have literally hundreds of alters, and several systems have acknowledged in the feedback survey that this is probably both impractical for many plural people and unfair on singlets.

"We're okay with taking part once for all of us in the system, but we're just checking all the boxes that apply to at least one of us, and some of those are explicitly disliked by at least one of us. This is uncomfortable." I think that's... probably okay, actually. Other subcategories of participants whose identities fluctuate that strongly (e.g. a genderfluid person who is sometimes very male and sometimes extremely not male) or whose pronouns are context-dependent are also in this predicament. Participants often express a desire to rank their identity terms by importance, accuracy, fluctuation or frequency. The survey aims to collect broad and fuzzy data about a very large group of people, to monitor trends and let people know what language we're comfortable with on the whole. This survey just isn't looking for that kind of nuance.

"We're okay with taking part in the survey once for everyone in the system, but there should be a way to separate out responses about different alters within that one response." It's literally impossible to program the survey to have infinite subsections for each alter, but if it were possible, what would I do with the data? I think the most likely approach would be combining into a list of identities etc. "per body". The participant would feel better for being able to enter different words for different alters, but it would be more work for them, and it would be more work for me to process responses from plural people just to have them be counted like those from non-plural people.

"There should be a 'plural' checkbox in the identity list so that we can express that our gender is influenced by our plurality." I consider adding terms to the identity checkbox list when they're typed into the textboxes by over 1% of participants. There are some situations where I'll make an exception to that rule, but it's unusual and this isn't one of them. Whether you enter a term using a checkbox or a textbox makes no difference to how well-represented you are in the results.

Maybe just a question that asks if you're plural, with a checkbox? What would this checkbox do? Plurality is beyond the scope of the survey, along with things like height and eye colour. It would allow curious people to analyse the responses using plurality as a variable, but I wouldn't include it in any analysis in an annual Gender Census report.

That last one is particularly interesting, because it's what I actually did in the supplementary survey. I wasn't 100% sure in advance whether or not I would need that information for the singular vs. plural they issue, so I included an "I am/we are plural" checkbox just to be on the safe side. As far as I could tell, the survey was no more or less materially inclusive than the annual Gender Census survey. There were a couple of interesting patterns to report in the statistics, but the main things I noticed were:

Feedback saying that the survey wasn't inclusive of plural people was non-existent.

Several people thanked me in the feedback box for making the survey plural-inclusive.

Several people promoted the survey on social media by using its plural-inclusivity as a selling point.

Again, the supplementary survey didn't take a different approach. There was no particular difference in language, there was no indication that whether or not you're plural would be integral to the reporting of the results or even used at all, the only difference was the existence of a checkbox that let participants declare their plurality.

That's all it took to cause a complete U-turn in feedback. A checkbox that doesn't relate to gender or connect to any of the other questions in any way, and isn't particularly statistically useful based on the supplementary survey. It doesn't make the survey more inclusive, it just acknowledges that some participants are plural, and gives them a way to declare it.

Whether or not participants are plural is beyond the scope of the Gender Census, which aims to collect broad data about how we as nonbinary and otherwise genderly-interesting people want the world to see and describe us. It just doesn't make sense to include questions about plurality in future surveys. But I'm honestly amazed and a little confused, because until the "once per body" policy was added it seems that there wasn't actually anything about the Gender Census that prevented plural people from participating, at least not more than anyone else whose genders change significantly over time.

SHOULD "PLURAL THEY" BE ADDED TO THE CHECKBOX PRONOUN LIST?

This is something that participants often ask me to do in order to make the survey more plural-inclusive, so I decided to seriously consider it.

The first draft of the supplementary survey asked over 1,000 participants about this issue, but I had to scrap those responses and then redesign and restart it because, even though dictionaries are fairly clear on what exactly "singular they" is, a lot of survey participants who are not dictionaries seemed to be in disagreement (or confusion) about what singular they and plural they actually are. I have been unable to find any academic or reference articles online using the phrase "plural they" at all.

Here are some of the things people have told me recently:

"Singular they" is when you use "they" with singular verbs, e.g. they is a teacher.

I can't say that I use "singular they" pronouns because I always say "they are". "They is" just sounds wrong to me.

"Plural they" is when you use "singular they" pronouns to refer to a system/someone who is plural.

"Singular they" and "plural they" are grammatically identical except for the name.

"Singular they" and "plural they" are functionally the same and should be combined into one option called "they" in the annual survey.

Let's start by stating what we do know for sure.

THEY VS. SINGULAR THEY

For the record, "singular they" is defined by its purpose and context, not the specific words used.

Wiktionary says:

they (third-person, nominative case, usually plural, sometimes singular, objective case them, possessive their, possessive noun theirs, reflexive themselves, or, singular, themself)

It then goes on to specify three use-cases:

third-person plural, referring to two or more people

third-person singular, referring to one person

"indefinite pronoun" - people; some people; people in general; someone, excluding the speaker. E.g. "they didn’t have computers in the old days."

So we've got "they" (groups), "singular they" (individuals), and "indefinite they" (an "other" that is ambiguous in number).

Again, I have never found anything academic or, er, dictionarical (lexicographical?) that calls any of the forms "plural they", so my first job is to find out whether what Gender Census participants are calling "plural they" is the same as what the dictionary just calls "they", which is defined as the set used to refer to two or more people. For the purposes of this article I will call it regular "they".

WHICH WORDS MAKE UP SINGULAR THEY?

Even though most dictionaries will state which words make up singular they, and it's usually they/them/their/theirs/themself, if you change individual words within the set or even around the set it is still called "singular they" if it is used to refer to only one person. This might happen due to regional or cultural variations. So whether you say "they is a writer" or "they are a writer", whether you say "themself" or "themselves", if you're talking about only one person, it's still singular they.

In the annual survey, singular they is consistently chosen in the checkbox pronoun options by the most participants, usually more than twice as popular as the next most popular option. (I use the dictionary-provided set, and I've checked it's still the most commonly used in several polls and surveys along the way.) In the annual survey, singular they is presented as:

singular they - they/them/their/theirs/themself (e.g. "they are a writer")

WHICH WORDS MAKE UP PLURAL THEY?

I had never heard of "plural they" before people started asking me to add it to the checkbox list in the feedback box of the annual Gender Census survey, but it seemed clear from the name that it is meant to be contrasted with singular they, and I wondered if perhaps everyone else had been calling regular "they" (for referring to two or more people) "plural they" this entire time and I just hadn't noticed.

It was specifically presented to me by participants as a pronoun that a plural system could claim, and that a plural system might prefer over singular they. This tallied with my initial assumption that "plural they" may just be regular "they" referring to groups, since a system is a body containing two or more distinct individuals, so if they wanted to be referred to as a group then singular they would be inappropriate and regular "they" would fit.

I went to the pronouns spreadsheet of the 2021 Gender Census, and took every pronoun set that was named and copied it into a new spreadsheet. I ran a query to list all sets that contained both the words "plural" and "they" in the name field. There were 71 results, out of ~44,500 total responses. I ran another query to find out what these people were entering in the reflexive field, and here's what I got:

themselves - 61 (85.9%)

theirselves - 3

them - 2

themself - 2

themself (plural) - 2

theirself - 1

So I think it's safe to say that the set that people are calling "plural they" uses "themselves" as the reflexive, which is consistent with dictionaries' reporting of regular "they".

I conclude that most people do mean regular "they" when they refer to "plural they". "Plural they" seems to be they/them when used to refer to two or more people, including the plural reflexive "themselves".

As in "singular they", if you change individual words within the set or even around the set it is still called regular "they" if it is used to refer to two or more people. This might happen due to regional or cultural variations. So whether you say "they is writers" or "they are writers", whether you say "themself" or "themselves", if you're talking about two or more people, it's still regular "they" (or plural they).

IS PLURAL THEY GETTING SMUSHED INTO ANOTHER PRONOUN/GROUP?

I recently explored the (apparently unintentional) overlap of Spivak (e/em) and Elverson (ey/em). In case you've not read it, here's a brief overview: I found that it might be that Elverson (not on the checkbox list) is many times more popular than Spivak (on the checkbox list), even though it isn't being written into the pronouns textboxes often enough for it to reach the 1% threshold. Since the two sets are identical except for that one letter in the subject form, it is very likely that many of the people who use Elverson (ey/em) pronouns are choosing the Spivak checkbox option in the annual survey because they don't realise the spelling is different, or they think that they are minor spelling variants of the same set. I concluded that in order to get a fair count of both sets I will need to list both in the checkbox options next year, even though Elverson hasn't been typed in by over 1% of participants yet.

It's possible that the same thing is happening with singular and plural they. I ran a couple of Twitter polls, asking people whose pronouns are they/them which set they prefer, and presented answers like this:

a) Singular they, referring to only 1 person: they are themSELF

b) Singular they, referring to only 1 person: they are themSELVES

c) Plural they, referring to 2+ people: they are themSELVES

Here's the results, with 927 usable responses:

The results of this poll are really useful, because it allowed people to choose between singular and plural they AND themself and themselves, in combination. We can see that of the people who call their pronouns "singular they" (referring to only one person), the majority prefer "themself" as the reflexive, but a respectable proportion prefer singular they with "themselves", even when presented with the option of "plural they" (referring to two or more people).

(I have a policy of providing the most popular word choices in checkboxes, so I will continue to provide a they/them checkbox option that says "singular they - they/them/their/theirs/themself", but since singular they is consistently the most popular pronoun this is something I like to keep checking in on.)

If we apply these proportions to the 2021 Gender Census responses and imagine that everyone whose pronouns are they/them chose "singular they - they/them/their/theirs/themself" regardless of how accurate that is, this would mean that 3.7% of all respondents would check a "plural they" box, which is well above the 1% threshold for adding something to the checkbox list. Why not add it to the list, the way I'll also be adding Elverson to the list? This graph may help:

I generally consider it unwise to make big decisions based on Twitter polls, because the sample is much smaller and more biased than a standalone survey. Twitter requires membership, Twitter membership is skewed younger, and younger members are more likely to use Twitter often and see polls when they appear.

However, even I can't deny that there is a very clear mandate here for Elverson to be added to the checkbox list. When given a straight choice between the Spivak, Elverson, both, and neither/something else, participants were over six times more likely to choose Elverson over Spivak. (For context, Spivak got 4.3% in the 2021 Gender Census as a checkbox option.) Even if this poll were somehow put to the entire Gender Census participant group, it's hard to imagine a scenario where the results shift enough that Elverson gets a lower percentage than Spivak.

4.7% of a smaller sample of younger Twitter members just isn't enough to push me to add something to the checkbox options. I really hope that everyone whose pronouns are "plural they" takes the time to type it into next year's survey as a pronoun distinct from "singular they", so that if they do end up being over 1% of participants I can add "plural they" to the checkbox options.

IN CONCLUSION

As far as I can tell, the Gender Census doesn't particularly exclude plural participants. Systems are still able to take part, so it is at least as inclusive as any other survey of a similar nature, maybe even more so thanks to the ability to choose multiple gender identities and pronouns "per body".

There isn't sufficient evidence to support adding "plural they" to the list of checkbox pronouns at this time, and systems can be represented in results by typing any plural-inclusive terms and pronouns that are not on checkbox lists into some of the many textboxes provided, as any other participant would be expected to do.

The "once per body" participation policy is uncomfortable for a significant number of plural people. However, due to the intensely varied experiences of plural people, any policy on that issue that I impose would make some plural people uncomfortable - and it turns out that I chose the "side" that plural people are more likely to agree with. The survey isn't intending to collect or convey the more nuanced information that plural people (and others) have said that they would like to provide.

A separate question that specifically asks participants whether they're plural makes systems feel seen and acknowledged, but is beyond the scope of the project and doesn't add value to the data or analysis.

So, I will not be making any changes to the Gender Census at this time, based on the information I've gathered so far. However, I welcome further feedback in the plural participants' feedback form, which will remain open, anonymous and private.

Edit: Follow-up.

#plurality #multiplicity #meta #FAQ #plural they #pronouns

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nerdygaymormon · 3 years ago

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Hi, Uncle David! I can't express how happy I am that I found your blog and how helpful it has been in to me as a gay teen living in the heart of Mormon culture. My ward started doing second hour once again a few months ago. Every single time I go to Sunday school, our teacher ends up going away from the lesson and going off on a transphobic rant instead. 1/

Even though I'm cis, it hurts me a lot to hear him say horrible and mean things about a topic he clearly doesn't understand and has definitely never researched, especially when he spends the entire hour on this topic and never mentions the Savior once, which has happened a few times now. I can tell it doesn't just make me uncomfortable. 2/

I finally worked up the courage to talk to my transphobic parents about it hoping they would recognize how inappropriate this is for a Sunday school class, especially one for teenagers. (This was really difficult to me because they're very conservative (growing up, 'gay' was treated as a swear word) and I'm still in the closet to them and so bringing up anything related to the LGBTQ+ community has the possibility of outing me and I'm already walking on thin ice.) 3/

They didn't care and took my teacher's side, saying it was something kids my age needed to hear. I can’t just skip class and I really don't want to leave and let my classmates deal with it, but I don't want to talk to my teacher about it alone. My only friend in the ward is a closeted bisexual and he isn't willing to help me because he's afraid of ruining his reputation as the priests quorum first counselor. I don't blame him. I don't know what to do. 4/

I guess this isn't really a question, but I'm wondering if you have any advice or thoughts? Sorry that this is all over the place! Thanks you for all you do for the queer youth of the church. I hope you're doing well! ❤❤❤5/5

————————————————————

Thank you for the nice things you wrote about my blog!

I have found that people who think no one in the room might be tempted by a ‘sin,’ or if it’s something that won't affect them personally, they really go off on that ‘sin.’ It’s safe to make a big deal about it, to get even more extreme than the church’s position.

Gay and trans people are sometimes put into this category, they assume no one in the room is queer and they rant against these ‘sinners.’

I once went to my bishop and asked why we spend an hour lesson every year in Elders Quorum talking about gay people, when I’m the only gay person in the room? Why don’t we spend an hour talking about pornography, or adultery, or the Savior’s teachings on divorce, or something else that would be applicable to other men in the room, not just me.

I have a few ideas for you that I hope are useful

1) Speak to a leader you trust

Speaking to your parents was brave and a good move. It’s too bad they didn’t care and took the teacher’s side.

There is a ward Sunday School president. You could talk to him and explain that the teacher isn’t sticking to the lesson but instead is sharing his personal views about trans people and it’s really uncomfortable. You could point out there are LGBTQ people in the ward who are closeted and having a teacher rant and rave like this makes church feel really unsafe for them.

If you don’t feel comfortable talking with the Sunday School president, you could create an email account and message the Sunday School president anonymously. Obviously he’ll know it’s someone in the class, but he won’t know which of you it is.

If you feel comfortable speaking with the bishop, you could go to him instead of the Sunday School president.

2) Speak up in class. You could do so as an Ally

I know this is a very uncomfortable to do, and especially as someone who is closeted you may worry this directs a lot of unwanted questions about why you care about this subject so much.

When we speak up and challenge what the teacher is saying, we don't attack them and don't make it personal. Just because they're inflicting harm & trauma doesn't mean we want to do the same.

There's 3 ways to challenge the teacher. Point out the humanity of the people he's talking about. Speak of your own feelings & experiences. Ask him for sources that support his opinions.

“Hey, these are real people you’re talking about. You should be nicer. I have a trans friend and the way you describe them does not match reality.”

“You do know that trans people are allowed to join the church and be members, right? And we can use their pronouns and they can wear the clothes that match their gender identity. It’s in the online Handbook.”

“What did Jesus say about trans people?” “What revelation is the Church’s understanding of trans people based on?” (hint, Jesus is silent unless you count what he said about eunuchs not having to enter male-female marriages; we have no revelation to support the Church’s position about gay or trans people. If he says “Family Proclamation,” that’s a summary of our teachings, not a revelation, plus it says “other circumstances may necessitate individual adaptation.”)

“What does this have to do with today’s lesson on…?”

3) Ask a question when a leader is visiting or in a different class/setting

Sometimes leaders from the stake will visit a class and you can ask them a question and get them to speak. Granted, I’ve rarely seen visiting leaders come to Sunday School, but if this topic of queer people or trans people was brought up in another class or at a stake activity, you’ll have a different answer which you can then bring up next time your teacher starts talking about trans people.

If you get an answer in a different setting, you could comment that "This is very different from what Brother so-and-so says, thank you for providing a different point of view." It may cause someone to ask your teacher what it is he's saying.

4) Affirm yourself and push back against negative messages

Even if you don’t speak up, there is power in pushing back against negative messages, and replacing it with a positive message. Speak or think to yourself that queer people are loved by God, that we experience the world in unique and wonderful ways. We’re a blessing to the church and the world. Trans people are collaborators with God in their creation.

Negative messages affect us, we need to push back against them and replace them. Queer people do not get enough positive affirmations and reinforcements, particularly at church and other very conservative spaces.

#long post

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itsclydebitches · 4 years ago

Text

Hello, everyone! Can you believe this is the third time I've started the recap for this chapter? Between a dying computer and a mass edit during my monthly state of, "Oh my god get rid of everything we can't let people know that we wRITE!" this project is cursed. This is the version though, I can feel it. Be positive!

Now, where were we? It's been some months (RIP) since I last posted, so I wouldn't be surprised if everyone's forgotten what's going on in this insane novel. A quick recap before the recap then: new teams have formed, no one is happy about it, Sun and Velvet went off to a shady club run by The Crown and — shock shock, surprise surprise — got themselves into a heap of trouble. That's the long and the short of it. We have to wait a while to find out what happens to them though because this chapter is focused on Coco.

We learn that Professor Rumpole has sent Coco and her new team — Team ROSC — out into the desert to take care of the grimm around the city's borders. To say that Coco is disappointed in this assignment is an understatement. We learn that they've been at this for a week straight and have gone without showering or a change of clothes that entire time (no one packed a bag?), so for a second I was hugely sympathetic. You know this vine?

youtube

I feel this vine in my soul. Give me hot water and hot coco or give me death. Besides, work is work and dangerous, physical work without a break or basic comforts is incredibly taxing. Toss in the extreme heat of a desert and I'd be pissed at everything too, no matter how important my work was. That's human.

Yet instead of humanizing Coco like this, it turns out she doesn't care at all about the hardship involved. It's fighting grimm that she's annoyed by. She thinks that "Searching for the person or persons kidnapping innocent people for some unknown but dark purpose was way more useful than fighting Grimm far from the city" and I'm just like, Coco, honey...

Do you know what your career path is?

IT'S TO KILL GRIMM.

Okay, there's admittedly a justification here, but it's a stupid one. Coco goes on to say that "This area was called the Wastelands for a reason." She's snarky about it, saying that it wastes “her time, her talent, and her patience," but the real takeaway is that it's, you know, a wasteland. Deserted of grimm and of people. What's the point of defending an area that doesn't need defending? A huntress' job might normally be to fight grimm, but when those grimm aren't around and kidnappers are, that's a whole new set of priorities.

The problem with all this is that the Wastelands is definitely not deserted and it's definitely not as far from the city as Coco would like to imply. In just a few paragraphs an alarm is going to trip and Coco will find six grimm roaming in a pack. Then she finds a person. Then that person says she needs to get back to see someone in the city within half an hour. So there are grimm, there are people about, and this area is apparently close enough to the border that you can get back to the city proper, on foot, and then get wherever it is you’re going in a bustling metropolis... all within half an hour. By that logic these grimm aren't out in the boonies, they're right outside everyone's door.

Yet Coco isn't convinced, saying that "Post Beacon [killing grimm] had been for a noble cause, but this just felt like … busywork." I cannot possibly emphasize enough that this is the job she signed up for. Not to be a detective specializing in missing people, not a war hero always on the front lines of a battle, but one of many huntsmen who perform the daily, routine, very necessary task of protecting the people from grimm. With "protecting" covering both immediate threats and preparatory work that ensures more threats don't come about — like taking care of grimm outside before they become a larger threat. You know what would have happened if Beacon had a daily chore of students killing grimm within a few miles radius of the school? There would have been far less grimm charging a mass of unprotected students when negativity unexpectedly skyrocketed.

And, as always, I am aware that Rumpole is the likely villain here. From a writing perspective, this is very much presented as her getting Coco out of the way so that she can go about her nefarious deeds in peace... but that doesn't erase the fact that the task itself is a sound one. Rumpole's motivations don't matter here, only Coco's annoyance that she... has to do her job?

I mean yeah, everyone complains about their job to one extent or another, but can you imagine if you stumbled across a firefighter complaining about all the kitchen fires they've had to put out lately? "It's so boring! There are much better things I could be spending my time and talent on. I mean, that inferno that took out a city block last year? Putting that out was noble. But routine fires? House fires? Giving lectures on how to prevent fires in the future? Ugh, I can't believe the department expects me to do this grunt work." Meanwhile, you're sneaking off, hoping that this firefighter is never called to your house, nursing mild worries about how much they're romanticizing the recent tragedy that took so many lives...

Complaints about the job turn into complaints about the teams, which makes far more sense for Coco's character. Anyone's, really. Despite my insistence that it's a good thing they're learning to fight with people other than their three besties, that was absolutely a sudden and rather traumatizing change, just given how attached the teams already are. I'm not at all surprised that Coco is struggling to cope.

She says she misses her friends, obviously, but also "surprisingly, Coco missed being in charge."

...That's supposed to be surprising? Coco, you love being in charge! How is this in any way a revelation?

Apparently it is though, stemming from how bad Reese is as their leader. As with so many things in RWBY, I find myself disagreeing with a perspective that's presented as a fact: "She liked to lead by group vote, which wasn’t leading at all." Yes... it is? We could go down a rabbit hole of literal definitions — to lead is to direct, to direct is to regulate, to regulate is to direct again — but ultimately our understanding of a word does not adhere to the dictionary alone. It's a knowledge built on experience and I would hope that everyone's experience with the term "leader" includes that person considering multiple perspectives before making a decision. A leader doesn't impose their view on a group without due consideration of their preferences and needs — that's a dictator — a leader guides the group based on feedback and their personal knowledge. If that feedback and knowledge results in a standstill, or if their knowledge outweighs preferences, they are the deciding vote because the people have previously said, "We trust your decisions" through the act of making them leader in the first place.

Asking for a group vote isn't avoiding leadership, it's an act of leadership. Reese decided that these situations warranted a majority rule. She further decided that whatever they settled on was indeed an appropriate course of action. Leadership skills are required to assess a situation and determine whether it's appropriate to vote on in the first place. If I announce to a group that we're voting on whether we go to the movies or the museum, I've done the work to determine that both of these choices are of roughly equal value and roughly equal availability. I haven't hit on any snags like, "The only movies playing are mindless blockbusters and I want this to be an educational outing" or "The museum is too far away. We'll never make it to dinner on time." Figuring out that a group can vote is its own kind of work. This avenue is particularly useful when the group is of roughly equal standing. With a few exceptions (like Ruby and Jaune) huntsmen classmates are all the same age, underwent the same training, and have had the same combat experiences. This isn't a case of one elite huntsmen lending their knowledge to an otherwise green party, it's a school randomly pointing at a somewhat outgoing individual during orientation and saying, "You. You're leader material, I guess, even though you've done little differently than the person standing beside you." Someone has to lead and Vacuo's switcheroo proves that anyone can be the leader if they're just put in that position. Coco claims a group vote is just "passing the responsibility off to your team" and yes! You want to share the responsibility because you are a team. They are a group of four equals working together with one person to guide them, they are not a boss with three subordinates. Why wouldn't Reese utilize the skills and ideas of those teammates? When making a decision, why wouldn't she see if everyone believes it's a good idea to do Thing A as opposed to Thing B? Unless Reese is outright ignoring her own ideas, beliefs, or gut feelings to cater to the others — which there's no reference of — this is good leadership. She's assisting her team in making decisions as a whole, rather than arbitrarily imposing her view on three others of similar skill and experience.

Yet Coco acts like because Reese doesn't go, "We're doing Thing A! End of discussion!" it's not leadership. Which, frankly, says a lot about how the RWBY-verse sees leadership as a whole.

I realize I'm rambling a great deal, so let me quickly provide a different media example. I'm currently immersed in Star Trek: Voyager and in season two, episode 14 "Alliances," Captain Janeway is faced with a difficult choice: align herself with a violent and so far untrustworthy species, or risk traveling through this quadrant of space without any allies. At first she's entirely against the idea of an alliance, going so far as to say that this isn't a democracy. She's the captain, dammit, she makes the decisions! But her first officer begs her to reconsider. Then the crew express disappointment — even disgust — that she won't consider this alternative. Then her chief of security, being a Vulcan, provides a persuasively logical argument for why an alliance is worth the risk... Long story short, Janeway finds herself in the minority and changes her decision accordingly. She attempts to garner an alliance and the fact that she was right — the species wasn't trustworthy and the alliance fails — is entirely beside the point. She realized that the majority voice matters. As far as we know, Reese is already practicing what Janeway learned.

ANYWAY the point is none of it matters because these characterizations are a mess. Coco also throws out that Reese "dressed like she was a twelve-year-old hanging out at the mall" and supposedly acts like one too. We're not given any examples of what that behavior looks like and, sorry, but I'm not personally inclined to judge someone based on their fashion sense. It would be great if this story actually engaged with some of the flaws the characters demonstrated, rather than just throwing them out to exist in this unacknowledged void.

Not that Coco's fashion-focused personality is really that important. Truly, the best thing about all this is how contradictory Coco's own thoughts are. She also listens to her teammates... except when she doesn't. She know when to go with their ideas and when to dismiss them for her own... except when she gets it totally wrong. As with so much in RWBY, this doesn't feel like the author giving Coco deliberate flaws that the story will grapple with down the line, it just comes across as a nonsense philosophy about leadership we're not meant to examine too closely. Coco gets to make references to the fact that her own, supposedly superior leadership is filled with holes, but heaven forbid she engage with that.

She ends all this with the thought that no matter what she might decide, she trusted her team to "do what she demanded of them” and is now extending that courtesy to Reese. This I'm inclined to praise Coco for. No matter what she might be thinking, it doesn't appear as if she's tried to undermine Reese (well, not yet. More on that at the chapter’s end), and she doesn’t appear to be refusing to listen to that leadership, even if she doesn't like how it comes about. As we're about to see, Coco has her team's best interests at heart, no matter the challenges they're facing.

Her thoughts turn back to her old team and we get... this.

Velvet was with a team that didn’t recognize her awesome capabilities. Fox was withdrawing, having lost his family for the second time. Yatsuhashi was going mad with worry about Velvet and his teammates, knowing that he couldn’t be there to protect them, and worrying he would accidentally hurt someone on his new team.

This is so unnecessarily dramatic. First, how does Coco even know any of this? Because it's been heavily implied that the old teams are barely in contact with one another. See: Velvet refusing to loop anyone in about the club and Coco stuck in the desert for a week. Second, why aren't they in contact, at least those who aren't on away missions? The entire group is acting as if changing teams means they're no longer allowed to be friends — family, as Coco puts it — when the relationship between Team RWBY and Team JNPR creates the opposite expectation right at the start of the series. Clearly, people from different teams can be close. Yatsu's worry that he might stumble using his semblance with new people is the only conflict that holds up here. Everything else has fairly straightforward solutions. Velvet needs to prove herself to new people. Yatsu needs to text Velvet if he's that worried about her. And Fox "having lost his family for a second time" is a pretty ridiculous exaggeration. You're attending the same school! Your family is still living down the hall if Vacuo has dorms like Beacon! In what world are these students unable to interact largely as they did before? They're acting as if the school has outright barred them from hanging out, rather than doing what will no doubt occur the moment they graduate: force them to work with different people. Just catch up with Fox over dinner!

Honestly, this chapter is pretty short, I'm just continually bewildered by this story.

To get back to the actual plot, something trips a sensor the group has set up and Coco responds to the situation in what I think is both a smart and empathetic manner. Previous experience has taught her that it's likely just a lizard, so she doesn't want to wake up her team for no reason. Disagreements aside, she cares enough to let them rest — "They’d probably appreciate the extra sleep." However, if it's a "rare case of something she couldn’t handle alone" she'd immediately call for help. Great plan! It's not often in this novel that I feel like I enjoy the characters, but this little moment actually had me liking Coco. Which, yes, I realize is a complicated claim. Characters should test the reader to a certain degree, mirroring all the personalities we see in real life, including biased, mean, or contradictory people. It's often a good thing to write a character that your reader is frustrated with. That can be the point! The problem with Myers' writing is that it isn't the point. Coco, as the former leader of our heroes in this tale, should be someone we enjoy spending time with and her flaws should be the basis for growth, or an acknowledgement that she is an imperfect, but well-rounded person. As it stands, flaws in this novel just sort of... exist? They bop around in the RWBY universe with almost no acknowledgement from the narrative or other characters, leaving the reader with little to nothing to take away from the text. Is Coco correct in her judgement? Is this a bias she needs to work on? Is she putting on a facade and her natural instinct to care for her team is the real Coco hidden underneath? Who knows! She’s just frustrating to read about most of the time and nothing comes of that.

Regardless, she heads out into the desert, using the night vision glasses Velvet made her.

Now see, this would have been the perfect thing to introduce before Velvet was fixing relay towers after the expert was injured. Remember how I said the novel didn't do enough to establish Velvet's own expertise? Not that a pair of goggles is really comparable to fixing a communications issue, but it still would have gone some way towards convincing me that Velvet is this super impressive tech gal, capable of handling any and all situations that might come her way.

But no, we get this impressive display of skill after Velvet's knowledge was needed in a pinch.

The glasses help Coco navigate the terrain, allowing her to both see in the dark and zoom in on things in the distance. This allows her to spot the six jackalopes that tripped the sensor, as well as the woman currently fighting them: Carmine, a villain from After the Fall that I know nothing about. Ah well. Note though what I said at the start, that Coco's dismissal of this assignment is based entirely in its supposed uselessness. Yet now here we have a pack of dangerous grimm and an enemy to content with.

Also, this is where Coco moves from kindly teammate to overconfident fool. She said she'd call for backup if she needed it... and she clearly needs it! From what I can gather, all of Team CFVY lost to Carmine last time they met up. But now she wants to risk fighting Carmine alone? Go get the others!

She doesn't, of course. Carmine doesn't notice Coco at first. She's talking about how she has to get back into the city. "He’s going to kill me if I’m not back to the Mirage in thirty."

As said, this also implies that Coco isn't nearly as far out as she initially suggested. If Carmine can feasibly finish this fight, cross the desert, navigate who knows how much of the city, and meet up with the mysterious "he" all in under half an hour, then Coco is patrolling pretty much right at the walls. AKA, the area that absolutely needs to be grimm free.

Luckily for those of us who are reading the books out of order, Myers gives a quick recap of Carmine's significance. Last book she had kidnapped Gus and "held off the combined might of Team CFVY in the desert” (oh hey, I was right), presumably escaping afterwards. Now here she is again, likely up to some new, nefarious deed.

Our of curiosity, I googled to see what she looks like and...

WHAT IS THAT OUTFIT?

Coco watches as she works to keep on top of the six grimm, debating whether she should help or walk away, but when Carmine is taken unawares, Coco acts without thinking, throwing herself into the fray.

Sometimes decisions were like that—your body already knew what to do while your brain was still processing the situation. Only in this case, Coco’s body wasn’t necessarily the clearest judge of character. Her brain would have said that Carmine didn’t deserve her help.

Now see, this is a scene I can get behind. The entire RWBY-verse is based around a type of superheroism: people with unnatural abilities, fantasy weapons, and extensive training devote themselves to protecting the people from various threats. Yet too often RWBY fails to convince me that these people are actually heroic, taking the standard flaws of a character and unknowingly exacerbating them to the point where I think, "Is this meant to be a commentary on the anti-hero? Or a critical look at these fantasy formulas? Because we've got the elements of that here, but no indication that the authors realize they're writing something other than that standard story." But this? This works for me. Coco, as a huntress, is so conditioned to help others that her body responds instinctively to someone being in danger, regardless of who that someone is. She outright admits that if she'd had the chance to think about it she would have decided against helping Carmine. The fact that she recognizes this and move anyway says a lot of good about her. Well done, Coco!

We see later that Carmine probably didn't need the help, but between the two of them the grimm really don't stand a chance. What's interesting though is how chummy the two are while defending themselves. Coco comments on Carmine's tendency to talk to grimm (like she does) and Carmine freely offers information about her movements, the fact that she lost her other sword, and that her partner, Bertilak, needs to "recharge a little" before getting back in the game. Carmine asks Coco if she'd like to team up with her instead (she does not) and the two have a number of flirty exchanges to top things off:

“I’ve been dreaming of a rematch with you,” Coco said.

“You’ve been dreaming about me? I’m flattered.” Carmine winked.

***

“Hot date with the Crown?” Coco asked.

“Don’t be jealous, darling.”

I bring all this up not as a criticism of the buddy-enemy dynamic (it's a favorite of mine), but simply because of something that happens next. Before we get to that though, I admit that I am on the fence about the flirting. Given that I haven't read After the Fall (assuming this characterization exists there), I know that Coco is a lesbian mostly via RWBY cultural osmosis, rather than through the text. This is one of the few (the only?) times that I've gotten a hint at her sexuality, yet it's associated with predatory behavior. Carmine, her enemy, is the one who turns an angry dream into a flattering one, the hot date with the bad guy into something to be jealous of. I'm honestly struggling to remember what, if anything, Coco has had to say about women in this book — this is what comes of such slow recapping and I acknowledge that this is entirely my fault — but I'm nevertheless discomforted by knowing Coco's canonical status, knowing RWBY's struggles with queer rep, and then reading a scene where the most overt representation thus far is the bad guy twisting Coco's words into something sexual.

I'm no purist. Give me a good enemies-to-lovers fic any day of the week, but that doesn't mean that kind of dynamic is the best to pull from in a franchise already facing heavy criticism for its queer rep.

Especially since the moment the grimm are gone Carmine turns her sai on Coco.

This is the "something that happens next" that I referenced above. It's weird to have them attacking one another after a whole scene of pretty genuine companionship. Coco doesn't help Carmine as a consequence of defending herself, she willingly gets involved. They tease one another. Carmine appears to answer her questions honestly. There's both implied and overt references to how well they work as a team. Then, suddenly, Carmine is outright trying to kill Coco, not just with her sai but by burying her alive. It's not the sort of banter that Ruby and Roman used to engage in, trading fake compliments and, in Roman's case before his death, legitimate feelings while attacking one another. Nor is Coco prepared for an attack the moment the grimm are gone, and she's not surprised by it. It’s just this sudden change that feels rather jarring.

Though it's far from the first time BTD has failed to convey the emotion of a scene. Here's another example rnow. As said, Carmine is attempting to bury Coco alive by moving the sand with her semblance. That's horrifying enough on its own, but remember that Coco is claustrophobic. Yet none of that panic shines through here. She comes across as indifferent throughout the attack, thinking back to summers when her brother tried to bury her while she sunbathed, amazed that she could ever consider this fun. You know who Coco sounds like in this scene?

At no point during this attack did I get the sense that Coco believes she’s in serious danger, let alone that she's struggling against a long-term phobia. The only time I even remembered that claustrophobia is meant to be a challenge for her is when she throws out the oh-so casual line, "One of her worst nightmares was being buried alive." Oh really? Because it doesn't seem like it! Coco is calm enough to remember that she used to be able to hold her breath for exactly three minutes and forty-two seconds. That doesn't feel like a character fighting against her worst nightmare.

So this scene isn't exactly compelling. Which is too bad because, as said, Coco as some other nice moments in this chapter.

However, during all this we do learn a little more about Carmine. Prior to getting trapped in the sand, Coco comments on how shockingly strong she is. "Carmine should have been at least a little bit worn down from fighting Grimm," but she's not, "She seemed nearly unstoppable now." Coco hits her full in the face, but she doesn't seem fazed. Earlier in the chapter there was that comment about how she previously took on Team CFVY alone and at the end of the battle Coco observes that Carmine "still seemed as fresh as she had at the beginning of the fight. How was she even doing that?" My basic reading comprehension skills tell me that this is setup for something, likely some change enacted by the Crown. Surely the text wouldn't put so much emphasis on Carmine's strength — have Coco questioning it to this extent, framing it as unnatural — unless we were going to get an answer, right?

But this is RWBY, so I'm not inclined to count my chickens before they hatch.

The rest of Coco's team arrives and it's then that she decides to pull the super dangerous stunt to free herself. Yeah, yeah, I get that she's suffocating and needs to do something now, can't wait to be dug out I suppose, but the timing is pretty ridiculous. The cavalry has arrived, yay! Time to blow myself up.

Seriously. She blows herself up. Using her own semblance, Coco focuses on one of her gravity dust bullets and detonates it, causing all the others in her arsenal to detonate too. It gets her out of the hole and "knocked her Aura down to a dangerously low level."

So... let’s see. Coco can literally detonate a bunch of explosives on her person, after suffocating under stand, after fighting Carmine, after fighting grimm, after a week long mission, and her aura doesn't break... but Yang's does from a single Neo slash?

Okay, RWBY.

Reese and Olive try to attack Carmine together, but end up eliminating one another's attacks. I like that a team actually has some realistic difficulties for once. Coco, however, is internally an asshole, calling them "idiots" and saying that they need to learn to coordinate their attacks. Thing is, she apparently hasn't done anything over the last week to help with that. She's been too busy complaining about Reese's clothes.

Carmine runs off as more grimm show up, drawn by Coco's non-existent panic. To her credit she does thank the others for saving her... but then immediately tries to downplay that. “It wasn’t a fair fight,” Coco spat when Reese (correctly) points out that she's the one who was ambushed. She also starts giving orders and when Reese (again, correctly!) goes to point out that she's the leader, Coco talks over her, saying they can't waste any more time out here because she has reason to believe that Shade has been compromised. She needs them only because she's out of bullets and low on aura, but they definitely need her because "let’s face it, I’m the best strategist around for miles."

Coco's a strategist?

And why does she sound like a villain trying to convince the heroes to work with her? She’s already part of the team!

Putting all that aside for the moment, we're back to this prideful characterization. I liked the well-rounded Coco from a few pages ago who balanced caring for her team with the likelihood of needing backup. Now she's flinching from the idea that she'd ever need help (hello, Sun characterization too) and snatching Reese's role the moment she's given the chance. So much for respecting her position. If the book wants me to believe that Reese is unfit to be leader and this is a golden opportunity for Coco to right a wrong... how about we actually show Reese being a bad leader?

Regardless, yay working together? The chapter ends with them presumably taking out the grimm before heading back to Shade, along with an important revelation. Prior to leaving, Carmine asked Coco why Yatsuhashi and Fox weren't rushing to her aid. It's only now that Coco realizes she didn't mention Velvet. Why? Perhaps because Carmine already knows where Velvet is, which obviously doesn't imply anything good.

And that's the end of Chapter Ten! Can you tell I never know how to finish these recaps? Describing cliffhangers doesn't have quite the same punch as, you know, actual cliffhangers. You all just have to suffer through my mediocre endings with me.

But would you look at that! Turns out the third attempt at writing this was the charm! :D

See you for Chapter Eleven! 💜

#rwby #BTD #Before the Dawn #BTD Recaps #mymetas

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ineffable-endearments · 3 years ago

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Okay. Now I'm going to submit some theories about how I think Crowley and Aziraphale specifically are going to go in the future of Good Omens.

Again, this post is not really...specific theorizing about plot events. It's big-picture stuff.

With that said, this post will get a bit heavy at times, in the sense that it will contain opinions that not everyone will like. It drifted into rambling about queerbaiting and all that stuff. I'm not going to spam anyone's dashboard with drama over it, but it's very possible someone else might try. It's also not really a negative post, depending on what you want to hear, I suppose. But if you're only in the mood to read fluff today, you'll probably want to pass it up.

Oh! Also it's very long, and sexuality is discussed in a vague way that doesn't involve any story elements or body parts.

For starters, I don't think Good Omens 2 - or even 3, if that comes about - is going to have anything explicitly sexual or romantic between the two of them, where "explicit" is things like the characters giving outright definitions of their relationship or outright discussing exactly what goes on between them, either on or off-screen. I also don't think there's going to be kissing or "hooking up" (come on...that person on Twitter shouldn't have even asked). Those actions are too blatant for what Neil has already said about the series. While they technically leave some room for interpretation, they probably don't leave enough.

I DO think it's quite possible other characters will continue to define the relationship FOR them and Crowley and Aziraphale will continue to not deny it.

As far as the queerbaiting debate, "is Good Omens queerbaiting"...it's gonna depend how you define it. I always learned that queerbaiting was basically where the creators intentionally make it look like a character is gay or otherwise queer but then swap that character development out for a cis identity and hetero relationship at the end. The point is that the "bait" leads to queer audiences being actively hurt. That's the behavior that seems awful to me, and I don't see Neil and company doing that.

However, I think it's far and away the most likely option that it will be left up to interpretation whether Crowley and Aziraphale are, you know, a buddy duo or a romantic couple or some sort of ineffable queerness all their own off-screen. So if your definition of queerbaiting is "the characters seem gay to us, but homophobes can tell themselves they're not," then yes, I think that debate will follow us to our graves if we let it.

I am a cisgender, possibly straight (?? demi/bi? I might never find out) woman. There is absolutely no way I could ever tell anybody, ESPECIALLY not gay guys and nonbinary people - the people Crowley and Aziraphale tend to resemble the most - how to feel about their treatment in the story. All I can offer is that I'm one flawed individual and there are things I have the emotional capacity to handle and things I don't. Crowley and Aziraphale as both a canon construct and a fandom pairing mean an absurd amount to me, and I can't hang around in spaces where people are constantly talking about how my own interpretations of them are not enough, or how the story is written with ill intentions. I don't want to stop anybody from venting about it, but I am going to be removing myself from those situations.

I like to imagine 1990 NeilandTerry, or TerryandNeil, as a sort of two-headed God who came up with Crowley and Aziraphale, set them loose on Creation, and now are watching them get up to way more ridiculous stuff in the brains of their fans than they'd ever imagined in the first place. I like to imagine them watching, amused and bemused, as their creations fall in love in thousands of universes, and saying, "Well, we didn't specifically Plan for this, but we did promise free will."

This is psychoanalytical toward a public figure and is therefore a bit dangerous, so please take it with an entire mountain of salt, but I sometimes think perhaps Neil sees some of his and Terry's friendship in Crowley and Aziraphale, and suspect that he wants to reserve the possibility that they could be platonic because he and Terry were platonic, while at the same time leaving room for the fans to have their own interpretations, too. Because if there's one thing that comes up really frequently with Neil, it's his belief in imagination and how much stories matter to people. He can have his little corner of the universe where A and C reflect himself and Terry, and we can have...literally anything we want, as long as we're willing to extrapolate just a little bit from canon. It's not even that much extrapolation! It's just "Yes, they love each other, so what exactly does love mean to you?" and if love means kissing, well then, if we can think it, we can have it.

Given that Neil has written LGBT+ characters before, I think he has non-bigoted reasons for wanting Aziraphale and Crowley to remain undefined, and given even the small chance that those reasons may involve the grieving process for a dead friend, I believe it is unkind to argue with him about it or hold his reputation hostage over it.

With that said, do I want canon kissing/hooking up/all that stuff we put in fics? Listen, I can't deny that I do! Personally, I'd be over the moon. I'd probably be so happy I'd have to go to the hospital to get sorted out. Even the thought of it makes me giddy and light-headed, because that physicality is a part of my own experience of love.

However, there are a lot of people who would feel left behind if that happened. Ace and aro people in the fandom whose love for their friends and partners is just as strong as mine, but who are sex-repulsed or just don't want to see kissing on-screen. The loss of Crowley and Aziraphale as a pairing who are extremely easy to interpret as queerplatonic would be hurtful to them, and I do not want to see them hurt like that. I don't think Neil does, either.

So, once again, the "best for everyone" option becomes a really strong canon relationship based in both narrative function and profound affection, which has genuinely thoughtful queer undertones and leaves open the logical possibility for romantic or sexual encounters but does not insist that they must happen. People, especially fans who are super invested, tend to have an easier time imagining scenarios that take place off-screen (e.g. kissing, sex) than they have erasing scenarios that they've already seen in canon (e.g., if someone wished they could continue viewing it as an ace relationship but they were shown "hooking up"). Also, while relationships are super emotional and extremely subjective, I'd argue that in a long-term adult partnership, the non-sexual connection is more important than the sexual one. As a fan, I'd prefer to extrapolate "they love each other so maybe they'd have sex" rather than "they're sexually attracted to each other so maybe they'll intertwine their whole existences together."

It probably isn't necessary to add, but I will anyway: I'm aware that Good Omens is sort of sacrificing social leverage - the ability to whack homophobes over the head with canon if they try to deny the show's queerness - and is thus not really contributing to making specifically gay relationships more widely seen and accepted. However, I don't think all stories have to invest heavily in every social issue they touch on for them to still be meaningful. I also do think Good Omens is an excellent example of a relationship that is extremely profound without being heteronormative.

I don't think the next season is going to be a rom-com. It will likely not even be a "love story," where the definition of "love story" is "a story that follows the development of a relationship and employs certain plot beats to make its point." Remember that conflicts and breakups are key to love stories, so if it IS a love story, then we're going to have to watch the relationship get challenged in ways some of us might have thought were already resolved in season 1! And while that could be thrilling and ultimately very good, it would also be likely to undercut some of the careful headcanoning and analysis we've already done. Any sequel is going to do that to some degree, but a second love story would probably do it a lot, with interpretations that people are even more protective of.

I'm sort of thinking the next season is likely to be a fantasy-heavy mystery, only because those are the two concepts Neil's introduction led with - an angel with amnesia who presents Crowley and Aziraphale with a mystery. Crowley and Aziraphale's connection to each other can still absolutely be a major theme! It can still be the thread stitching the plot together! It just probably, in my opinion, won't escalate and escalate and escalate like it did in season 1. And it will probably be woven in there among a lot of other plot threads that are, in many moments, louder. Still, I'd love to be left with the impression of these two existences, the light and the dark, subtly becoming more intimate, subtly growing more comfortable in this shared place they've chosen in the universe, gradually starting to behave like they know they aren't alone in the world anymore, all while other things happen to and around them.

Nonsexual physical intimacy - a really great hug, or leaning together on the sofa, or a forehead touch, or something like those, something that could happen in a lot of different kinds of relationships but is undoubtedly based in deep trust and affection and a desire to be close...that's the dream, for me. Oh, how lovely it would be.

Of course, I could be just absolutely, embarrassingly wrong about all this. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

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dwellordream · 3 years ago

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“…Since the deaths of individual women during actual battles or sieges were rarely mentioned, accounts of massacres offer some the best evidence as to why women were killed and also serve to illustrate the problems encountered in medieval depictions of violence. We might begin by considering the comparatively high number of massacres perpetrated by the army of the First Crusade, which has led to this crusade being perceived as a particularly notorious case of Christian brutality and religious intolerance.

At first glance, much of the killing seems to have been very indiscriminate and ruthless in nature, affecting men and women alike. Upon the crusade army’s capture of the Muslim city of Ma‘arrat al-Nu‘man in 1098, for instance, it was written that the Christians ‘killed anyone, man or women, whom they met in any place whatsoever’. Again, after the capture of Albara that same year Gilo of Paris wrote that old women and young girls were among the ‘thousand [who] were slain in a thousand different ways’. Although these accounts emphasise the slaughter, Hay has argued that chroniclers had reason to exaggerate the extent of the slaughters in order to present the crusaders as purifying and cleansing the Holy Land of the Muslim influence, and that they sometimes failed to distinguish in their narratives between the killing of adult men and non-combatants such as women, when in fact the latter were often held captive instead.

The sources for the Jerusalem massacre of 1099, for instance, describe the brutal and indiscriminate slaughter of its inhabitants once the city was taken and emphasise the extreme nature of the slaughter. This massacre is not itself surprising given that it was standard medieval military practise to kill the inhabitants of any cities which fell by force after a siege. Where the confusion arises is Albert of Aachen’s assertion that another massacre occurred three days later, in which prisoners who had been spared previously for the sake of money or pity, including women of all ages, were executed ruthlessly in order to prevent them rebelling if an external threat to the city emerged.

Although Albert is the only source for this second massacre, his testimony nevertheless suggests that the first instinct of the crusaders may have been to spare the inhabitants rather the kill them outright, despite what the other sources say of the crusaders’ zeal for blood; moreover, it is known that there actually were some captives ransomed at Jerusalem. Similarly at Albara and after the fall of Caesarea in 1101, Hay contends that while some sources ostensibly suggest a total slaughter, the language used by the chroniclers suggests that they were in fact referring only to adult men who were killed, and while some women probably did meet the same end, most of the women and other male non-combatants did not suffer the same fate.

Furthermore, Strickland has suggested that the First Crusade army must have been aware of the concept of non-combatant immunity that was taking hold in Western Europe at that time (as set forth in the Peace of God legislation), as well as chivalric conventions developed among the Franco-Norman warrior aristocracy which stressed, amongst other things, the taking of captives rather than the outright slaughter of defeated enemies. He does not, however, speculate on whether this had any moderating influence on the actions of the crusade army toward enemy women. In any case, while women undoubtedly made up some of those massacred on this crusade, it is worth keeping these factors in mind when considering the chroniclers’ depictions of wholesale killing.

Nevertheless, even if massacres were sometimes exaggerated, there is no doubt religious differences were still used on occasion to justify the killing of women. Women in heretical movements, such as the Cathar movement that flourished in southern France, were among those massacred by the armies of the Albigensian Crusade after they captured the cities of Béziers in 1209 and Marmande in 1219, as part of efforts to root out the Cathar heresy, although the number of people who died at either city, let alone the number of women, is unclear. Marvin speculates that the number of people killed was in fact not as large as other historians have made out, though he concedes that hundreds, if not thousands, may still have died. Again at Montségur in 1244, women were among the roughly 200 perfecti (the leaders of the Cathar hierarchy who were allowed to preach) massacred by yet another crusade army – gender again being no protection, since all who embraced Catharism were seen as heretics.

Perhaps the clearest statement of religious intolerance, however, can be found in the account, given by the Rothelin continuation of the chronicle of William of Tyre, of a French attack on the Muslim camp at Mansourah in 1250, during the Seventh Crusade:

Our men charged in through the Turks’ quarters, killing all and sparing none; men, women and children, old and young, great and small, rich and poor, they slew and slashed and killed them all. If they found girls or old people it did them no good to shriek and cry and beg for mercy, they were all slaughtered...It was sad indeed to see so many dead bodies and so much blood spilt, except that they were the enemies of the Christian faith.

The author here stresses the brutality and indiscriminate nature of the killing and almost appears to sympathise with the victims due to the scale of the slaughter. Lest he feel any compassion though, the author reminds us of that the victims were not Christians, thereby justifying the slaughter of women as well as other non- combatants. This justification, which simultaneously excuses and explains the violent nature of the attack, suggests that in fact numerous women were killed, particularly as it provoked the Turks into an equally ruthless counter attack on those Franks involved in the massacre after they later became dispersed.

Religion thus appears to have offered one basis upon which the killing of heretical and non-Christian women could be rationalised whilst also avoiding any ecclesiastical censure for not protecting non-combatants from the violence of war (since the Peace of God legislation only applied to warfare between Christians). Aside from religious intolerance, the desire for retaliation against perceived injustices seems to have been another reason why gender offered women no respite from the killing. Pope Urban II’s inflammatory speech at Clermont in 1095, for instance, which sparked the First Crusade, included remarks designed specifically to arouse pity as well as anger for the suffering endured by Christians in the East at the hands of the Muslims, and can, as Asbridge has suggested, help account for the general brutality displayed by this crusade towards the enemy.

In a similar manner, the killings witnessed during peasant rebellions in the fourteenth century did not discriminate based on sex, and were also motivated by the desire to address perceived grievances. Following the Battle of Cassel in 1328, which marked the end point of the peasant rebellion in Flanders against French rule, French cavalry apparently put men, women and children to the sword on a wide scale as revenge for their disastrous defeat at the Battle of Courtrai in 1302. Similarly bloody was the Jacquerie uprising in northern France (1358), vividly described by chroniclers who struggled to come to terms with the violence that was directed against the noble class. Jean Froissart, for instance, included horrific scenes of peasants capturing, killing and sometimes raping the wives and daughters of knights, simply because they were part of the noble class. Froissart clearly had little sympathy for the plight of peasants, and his account was undoubtedly coloured by his class bias, but there is little doubt it was a violent event.

Even in the work of Jean de Venette, who came from a peasant background and generally displayed more sympathy towards the lower classes in his account, peasants are still described as having ‘killed, slaughtered and massacred without mercy all the nobles whom they could find...and, what is still more lamentable, they delivered the noble ladies and their little children upon whom they came to an atrocious death’. Notwithstanding Venette’s obvious disapproval of the slaughter and the likely exaggeration in his descriptions, it is clear that noblewomen were specifically targeted by the rebellion just as much as noblemen.

Finally, women were sometimes simply massacred as part of a broader military strategy of indiscriminate slaughter and general devastation of the land. Such actions were designed to cause economic damage and strike fear into the enemy populace. The Scottish raids on northern areas of England during the twelfth century fit this category; many men and women were killed as a result of these raids, although again in such cases it is hard to separate out the experience of women from that of men. What is evident, however, is the hysteria generated by English chroniclers who saw the Scots as merciless in their treatment of English women. Henry of Huntingdon, for instance, claimed that the Scots ‘ripped open pregnant women’ and killed their children by throwing them on lances.

Similarly, Richard of Hexham, writing around the middle of the twelfth century, asserted that the Scots ‘murdered everywhere persons of both sexes, of every age and rank... [including] women pregnant and in childbed, infants in the womb, innocents at the breast, or on the mother’s knee with the mother’s themselves... [as well as] worn out old women’. Though certainly graphic, passages such as these must be treated with care, for many of the Anglo-Norman chroniclers who wrote of such events seem to have regarded the Scots as little more than excessively cruel and savage barbarians, barely above the level of beasts.

This xenophobia undoubtedly influenced the sensationalised (and most likely exaggerated) descriptions of women shockingly mutilated along with their children. Nevertheless, there is probably some truth to reports of Scottish cruelty in war, for both Richard of Hexham and others such as Jordan Fantosme, who described a separate indiscriminate Scottish massacre in the village of Warkworth in 1174, receive confirmation from other sources. Regardless of how many women were actually killed though, the point is that gender alone was no barrier to a broad strategy of slaughter, just as gender did not prevent women suffering from acts of revenge or religious intolerance.”

- James Michael Illston, ‘An Entirely Masculine Activity’? Women and War in the High and Late Middle Ages Reconsidered

#warfare #james michael illston #history #crusades #cw: islamophobia #cw: rape #peasants #medieval #high middle ages #late middle ages

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scripttorture · 4 years ago

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I have a weird scenario and i want to ask about its implications, mostly focusing on soliditary confinement aspects. So I am writing about this all powerful being who is immortal+eternally youthful (with a human like mind) who gets trapped in basically a big snowglobe created by his powers. Its a big mostly open space set inside a forest with a magic mansion to occupy him and provide him basic needs and the limits of the globe are very defined. {1/4}

{Weird anon} After some time alone he comes to create a friend to accompany him and make sure everything goes well during his absence using his powers. This friend can and does leave for periods of time to fullfill his duties but comes back. The being also realises during his imprisonment his powers dwindle with time and the globe starts to get smaller as he starts to age, meaning he will either die from old age or the globe shrinking. {2/4} {WA}After what he thinks must be a long time, his graying hair biggest indication, kids who knew about his legend come to discover him. They then bring him their older sibling, then their parents to talk and after some plot he gets to get some of his powers back and be free. (Posting my questions in the last part) {3/4} {WA} I was wondering if the confinement area being comfy and big, him having this friend would help during confinement? How could he react to aging/idea of dying? Although this isnt very possible in RL, could the fact he had to create this friend ,but mostly the fact he would have no one else if he didnt, get to him? How could he interract with kids/people who found him, i know people tend to have difficulty with interractions after time. Ty for your help! {4/4} {WA EXTRA} Forgot to mention these but 3 kids are 10 to 12, older sibling is 14-15, parents are mid thirties . Again, thank you for your time.

That’s an interesting fantasy scenario (and not even close to the weirdest thing I’ve been asked) thank you for sharing it :)

I think the first thing to grasp is that this character isn’t constantly in solitary confinement here and that’s a smart writing choice. You’ve got the character creating at least one companion and even though that companion isn’t always present that means it’s likely they’re both getting at least 1-2 hours of contact most of the time.

That doesn’t mean this isn’t a stressful situation and it doesn’t mean there are no periods of solitary confinement.

But it gives you leeway to make the effects of this fairly realistic even with the fantasy concept.

Having a big, comfortable space doesn’t really make a difference to how well people deal with isolation. Socialising is a physical need for social species like humans. But the presence of a companion makes the world of difference.

I think the first thing to decide is exactly how long it takes him to make his companion. A lot of people really overestimate the time we can withstand isolation.

For reference the safe period is about a week. After that most people will start to show symptoms and the symptoms are a lot more likely to persist after release. A month is more then enough time for the character to be seriously effected. A year is a really extreme amount of time. And by the time you start getting to multiple years the chances of suicide attempts are… significant.

With the kind of story you’re describing I get the impression you want long term effects but don’t want symptoms etc to take over the story. I think 1-3 months is a perfect time frame for that. The character would develop long term symptoms but it’s still in the realm where it’s survivable. Which means it’s less likely to take over the whole narrative.

You’ve probably seen my masterpost on solitary confinement but here it is again just in case :) I really recommend Shalev’s Sourcebook on Solitary Confinement which is linked as one of the sources on the post.

As with the symptoms of torture more generally you’ve got some scope to choose symptoms because not everyone will experience every single symptom. There’s still some debate about how common individual symptoms are. However broadly depression and anxiety seem to be very common and hallucinations are less common (though they seem to become more likely the longer someone is confined). It’s a good idea to pick a mix of physical and psychological symptoms.

If you choose insomnia as a symptom remember that sleep deprivation also causes problems which you can read about in the masterpost here.

If this is your first time writing something like this then picking out symptoms can be daunting. I try to think of it in terms of what adds to the story. I try to consider the characters, plot and overall themes. Symptoms that give you opportunities to show aspects of the character’s personality, change their relationship with other characters, highlight themes in the story and/or create interesting problems in the plot later on are all good picks.

It’s also important to consider what you’re comfortable writing and what you feel able to write. If you don’t want to write self harm for example that’s a perfectly good reason for ruling out that symptom.

I have a post that outlines my process for picking symptoms that might be helpful for you. :)

I think that brings us round to the more fantasy side of the questions.

I’ll be honest and say that I don’t know how people generally deal with the idea that they’re going to die soon. I suspect that there’d be a lot of individual variation. I think you’ll get the best answers by looking up charities that support people with terminal illnesses.

I found a couple of links at Marie Curie that might serve as a starting point. There’s this page on palliative care. This general page (with lots of links and first hand accounts) of living with a terminal illness. You might find this page about emotionally processing a terminal diagnosis helpful.

I would treat the emotional issues around the created companion the same as a character who is reliant on only one person for their social needs. Which can put a lot of weird strains on a relationship.

I’m not a psychologist and what I say here is based on impressions I gained from interviews with people who are very isolated. If you see a mental health professional or someone who studies isolation more seriously saying something different take their word over mine. Because my reading and knowledge is broad rather then deep.

Relying on one person for all your social needs isn’t healthy. We all have different needs and it’s a lot easier for those needs to be met when we’re interacting with more then one person. Being entirely reliant on one person puts a lot of pressure on that person. It can make it seem like any problems or issues the more isolated person has are the other person’s fault.

Because they’re not magically meeting all of someone’s needs. And I say ‘magically’ because it’s almost impossible for one person to do the ‘job’ of a dozen people.

There can be a lot of guilt, resentment and anger floating around in this sort of dependant relationship. Even when both parties are genuinely trying their best and trying to be healthy.

Any depressive period or severe mood swing on the part of the reliant character might be interpreted as failure by the companion. As if it’s their job to ‘fix’ the mental health problems he has. And that can lead to a lot of internalised guilt and shame.

Conversely being aware of how dependant he is could make the confined character resent the comparative freedom of his companion. They get to leave. They’ll survive the end of this snow-globe. They’ve never had to be alone as he was.

The companion has a lot of power in this scenario because the confined character is entirely reliant on them. They also have the power to leave. Knowing that can breed resentment, whether it’s rational or not. And if it’s irrational and ‘undeserved’ that can lead to a degree of self hatred and guilt.

For both parties anger at each other and the situation seems likely. Not necessarily all the time but I think it’s likely to come up over and over again.

The companion has their own desires and wants. But the confined character is entirely dependant on them and may well expect them to drop everything to help him/meet his socialisation needs. And the thing is that’s unfair on both of them, because the situation is unfair.

That’s not a critique of the story. It’s unfair for the confined character to expect the companion to be able to meet all his needs and to drop everything to help him. But it’s also not unreasonable for the confined character to grasp at his only option for fulfilling a fundamental need.

I think that if you wanted to treat this ‘realistically’ then it would lead to a pretty unhealthy co-dependant relationship however much both characters tried to avoid that.

But you do have the ability to reduce or avoid that in your story. Because you choose the rules for how this companion feels, acts and behaves.

The confined character may be human-like but in a lot of ways the companion does not have to be. A realistic human-like person would not be able to support all the social needs of another person. But there’s no reason the companion has to be that human.

If you do choose to deviate from a more human-like character I think my advice would be to think through any changes you make logically. And be consistent. If for instance the character can’t feel angry or resentful towards their creator think through what that might mean.

Which leaves the final question about interacting with others and how difficult that can be after periods of isolation.

The exact way this effects interactions depends chiefly on the symptoms you pick out and the character’s personality.

Generally mentally ill people do not want to be assholes or upset other people. But we do tend to have greater difficulties interacting with people and our social interactions can go badly in ways that healthy people don’t tend to experience.

For instance say we have a character who has a severe anxiety disorder and this disorder is often set off by noises they don’t expect. That’s a fairly common symptom and a fairly common trigger for it.

That means that kids running around, shouting or just talking loudly about something that excites them, could set off an anxiety attack.

Some people would get angry in that situation. Because they’re in pain and, even though they did not mean to, those kids ‘caused’ that pain.

Some people would abruptly remove themselves from the situation. Which could leave the kids wondering why/how they upset their new friend so much.

Some people would stick around and not blame the kids. But they might have visible signs of their anxiety attack that could be very frightening for a child who doesn’t understand what’s going on. If an adult they care about suddenly starts shaking and breathing hard and needs to sit down and looks pale- Well worry is natural. And it’s difficult to explain triggers/mental health problems while you’re in the middle of an anxiety attack.

So there’s a set of issues that are symptom driven and around the extra difficulties interacting while mentally ill. There’s also a set of issues around… basically forgetting how to socialise.

This doesn’t necessarily mean being age in-appropriate.

I think the best way to think about it is a combination of finding it harder to interpret other people’s emotional cues and being less aware of the cues they’re sending out themselves. It might take longer for the character to realise they’ve upset someone or they might misidentify the other person’s emotional response.

They might also think less before they speak. Which can mean things like- I guess not moderating what they say to account for other people’s feelings? They might come across as blunt or thoughtless or scatter brained as they jump from one topic to another. They might also have less of a grasp of when to give the other person space and let them speak.

The biggest thing I see survivors of solitary report is that normal social interaction makes them much more anxious/nervous then it did before they were confined. Socialising has a bigger ‘cost’ then before, in terms of energy and emotional impact.

And this often means they withdraw from it more quickly. They need to take breaks. Or they start getting more stressed and frustrated.

I think the main thing to navigate here would be how to explain these conditions and needs to children in a way that doesn’t seem like it’s blaming the kids. Which is certainly possible, but can take some time and care to get right.

I think I’ll leave it there and if you’ve got any further questions drop them in when the ask box reopens. I hope that helps :)

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#writing advice #tw torture #tw suicide #tw self harm #tw cancer #fantasy ask #solitary confinement #effects of solitary confinement #isolation #writing survivors #torture survivors and relationships #unhealthy relationships #terminal illness #writing symptoms

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ariparri · 4 years ago

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MC Patronus

I was tagged by @carewyncromwell on a post for MC patronuses! I, sadly, don't really talk about most of my characters because I'm hyperfixacted on mostly one character 😅

I'll only do this for my Hogwarts Legacy and Hogwarts Mystery MCs. Anyways, let's get to it!

I can't find the original docs I made for my MCs' patronus so majority of this was a copy paste from the site I use to figure out their patronus.

What's My Spirit Animal?

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McQuaid/Mac Uaid

I mentioned in the Mac Uaid family crest that the wolf is part of the emblem and how every McQuaid's patronus is a wolf.

As a spirit animal, the wolf comes to support and teach us about matters of personal power, balance, self-control, and our animal instincts.

Wolves are misunderstood by many to be aggressive, vicious animals who attack with no provocation. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, wolves go out of their way to avoid fights. However, when they want to be heard, when they want to stave off or deter an attacker, they will stand their ground.

Wolves are incredible examples of standing in the seat of your own power. They let predators know that they can fight to the death and are prepared to do so but they rarely initiate combat.

The wolf sometimes appears when we face challenges for which we feel less than prepared. The wolf reminds you that you have all the tools in your spiritual treasure chest to handle this effectively.

For seekers who feel afraid or threatened, the wolf reminds us of how those feelings put our entire psyche off balance. Yes, fear plays an important role in personal safety unless it becomes all-consuming or is baseless. Don’t let the darkness consume your spirit.

Sometimes the wolf calls on us to become the Lone Wolf, who breaks away from the pack to discover the Sacred Self. During times of aloneness, you rediscover your dreams and passions. You also start uncovering the true self and voice that howls at the moon with abandonment!

Humans are animals, and sometimes we overlook the gifts from nature that are already within us. Life has an order and rhythm. When you run with a pack, there is a sense of community, and when you’re alone – liberation.

Those who walk with the wolf sometimes don’t trust themselves as much as they should. When you find yourself falling into that emotional pattern, rely on your keen mind and logic to renew balance.

The key caution for wolf people is your predatory nature. Now, here’s the thing about a wolf’s “predatory” nature – they mostly focus on taking down the weak, sick, and elderly.

Rarely will a Wolf prey on a strong, mature adult. Surely nature has a reason for this, but in terms of symbolism for humans, the lesson here is to make sure that you do not choose to prey on those who are not able to stand against you.

Rohan Mac Uaid (Hogwarts Legacy)

The Gray Wolf is Rohan's patronus. As his patronus is the gray wolf, he is constantly transforming himself, improving himself as he encounters the lessons and challenges of life.

The gray wolf is the wolf who stands at the Western Door. The winds of change will gently flow through the life of the gray wolf soul, stirring him to greet the change with the knowledge of the lessons that such transitional times will herald. The gray wolf soul understands that change is merely growth, an essential part of life, and thus, embraces change easily.

McQuaids with the gray wolf patronus doesn't strain to see what is not yet visible on the other side, merely acknowledges that the changes will surely take place and that the choices he/she makes, will fashion the path they take.

The individual with the totem of the gray wolf understands the importance of protecting and nurturing life in all of its varied and brilliant forms. He is the soul that desires to be of service to others and thus enters a profession which will be in alignment with these principles. She is the soul who desires to nurture the spark of soul awareness in the other members of her society, so as to ensure the survival of the species. In whatever form this urge of guardianship manifests itself, the gray wolf totem will always strive to be of benefit to the whole.

The wolf soul is one who understands the depth of connection with another, be it mate, friend or family member. These individuals will tend to be monogamous in nature. If a mate is not found that shares this same sense of loyalty, then the wolf totem will choose to live as a solitary wolf yet will still have deep and abiding bonds with friends and/or family.

The gray wolf totem is drawn to individuals who possess the ability to employ rational thought coupled with intuitive understanding. As he walks through life, wolf soul uses his keen intelligence to assess issues and situations which demand resolution. He then follows the prompts he receives from his own higher sense of knowing to achieve necessary growth and learning.

Rohan has quite a fierce temper and often scolds others for their incompetence. After meeting Avis, her gentle nature melting his heart of ice, Rohan shows more self restraint in terms of his emotions. He cares little about status or tradition, and merely judges others solely based on their knowledge, skill and loyalty.

Coby McQuaid (Hogwarts Mystery)

Coby's patronus is the Arctic Wolf. It is said that at the door of each of the Four Winds, a wolf keeps silent vigil, each bringing change to the life of those who walk the good Red Road and with the change, a lesson unique to that wind.

The arctic wolf is the Wolf of the North Winds. He stands quietly in rigid determination, unyielding at times, much as the barren landscapes of his home appear to resist the beginning of Spring. She is a soul that is comfortable with her surroundings and therefore sees no “reason” to change.

Yet the promise of the North Wind is wisdom unfolding through gratitude and acknowledgment. This is the direction in which wisdom is sifted from the sands of experience and then fashioned into a red staff of manifestation that wields personal potential. Therefore, if the white wolf soul can accept change when it appears, yet remain true to his/her values, then the higher vibration of wisdom and truth can emerge from beneath stubborn resistance like shoots of sweet summer grass bursting forth from a blanket of winter’s snow. Thus, personal power can be embraced, understood and ultimately, the soul’s individual potential manifested.

The individual with the arctic wolf as their power totem is one who is capable of withstanding numerous challenges and setbacks, only to emerge stronger than before. It is little wonder that these souls will often face adversity in their lives in order to build the resilience with which to overcome obstacles? Paradoxically, they are also gentle souls with a great deal of emotional sensitivity . . . and this is the area in which they are likely to encounter their greatest lessons. Yet by calling upon the inner strength and resilience of the arctic wolf, they can triumph and raise their heads with gratitude to the loving rays of the sun.

The arctic wolf soul is an individual who is capable of performing nearly miraculous bouts of stamina that would weary other souls as he travels the good Red Road. He possesses within him the ability to push his body and mind to the limits, and in fact, can appear to even derive pleasure from doing so.

With each new goal that has been met, the arctic wolf individual will then set his/her sights on the next task at hand. Preferably the new goal will be even more challenging than the one just completed, as this engenders the acknowledgment within their own reasoning that they are worthy of that which has been given to them, yet the truth of the matter is that anything they have received, has been honestly won.

Veruca McQuaid (Hogwarts Mystery)

The Arctic Wolf is Veruca's patronus. Although she shares the same patronus as her brother, the patronus takes on a different meaning. The Arctic Wolf patronus Veruca has, is the shadow to the alpha Arctic Wolf. So even with her patronus, Veruca is still in Coby's shadow.

When manifesting as a shadow totem, the arctic wolf brings lessons in life experience that will tend to build up a defensive wall around the shadow wolf soul. These individuals enter onto the Red Road with a good deal of vulnerability, in many instances a higher degree of sensitivity to their environments than most. Yet, as time goes by, extremely painful circumstances are met that will either construct a fortress of solitude or a friendly barrier that keeps others at a “safe” distance, thereby decreasing the chances that the individual may once again be hurt.

McQuaids who have the arctic wolf patronus are stoic and resolute individuals who appear to bear any storm with a spirit of strength and perseverance. And indeed, they are quite capable of enduring many hardships, yet the true lesson for the arctic wolf is the act of maintaining a certain measure of vulnerability in the face of the brutal lessons they encounter.

Though those with the arctic wolf patronus are naturally geared toward a mostly solitary existence, they will have a couple, to a few close & trusted friends that will be more like family members than their own biological family. The reason for this is due to the fact that the shadow arctic wolf soul will often grow up in a family that is either highly dysfunctional, or in circumstances where one or both parents are absent, be this as in the sense that the parental figures are deceased, or where the mother and father are emotionally unavailable.

Veruca isn't as close to her mother as she is with her father. Though she loves her just as much, she can't help but feel like a second thought compared to Coby. Carson is a close friend to Veruca that they consider each other siblings. Veruca even refers to the Iveys as her second family and addresses Mr. and Mrs. Ivey as mom and dad.

Again, trust is hard to earn from those who own an arctic wolf patronus, and bonds once forged in trust will rarely be broken unless there is an extreme betrayal on the part of their loved one. The ultimate challenge of these individuals is to learn to be open, vulnerable and trusting in the face of a lifetime of lessons in rejection, disillusionment, and betrayal. Yet it is interesting that these people will often be the ones to break off relationships, and are seldom the one to be “left behind.”

Right after graduation, Veruca leaves everyone behind to find her own peace and come to terms with everything that has happened. After finding her peace, she comes back to reconcile and reunite with everyone else. While on her own journey, her patronus ends up changing to match Diego's patronus.

Carson Ivey (Hogwarts Mystery)

Carson's patronus is the owl, specifically the Brown Owl. The owl cannot be deceived, which is why this spirit animal reminds us to remain true to ourselves, our voice, and our vision. The owl spirit does not tolerate illusion or secrets.

Being Veruca's best friend, it's a given Carson knows what's truly going on with her. Though it's pretty easy for him to read the moods of someone, he's not one to pry into someone's personal affairs.

The owl is a symbol of being able to navigate any darkness in our life; this spirit brings clarity, prophetic inklings, and a strong connection with the mystical world.

Those with the owl patronus have the opportunity to become far more observant. Being able to notice a lot of important details that previously eluded you. The world is filled with layers of symbolism and meaning, and the owl gives you “new” eyes with which to see those.

As a spirit animal, the owl often calls on us to release the past and put down burdens that hold us back. You have to face your shadows and fears, then move beyond them to find true happiness.

Owls don’t just honor us with the ability of “Second Sight." These majestic birds have hearing that is quite literally “perfect stereo." The owl as a spirit animal guide can aid you in hearing what is really being said despite the words and emotions coming from the messenger.

The owl spirit can help support you when the time to speak your truth has arrived. Remember, owls are birds of prey, and little stops them when they set their sites on “the prize.” What or whom do you have your heart set on? Focus, patience, and stillness can win the day.

Invoke owl energy when you need to see all the details of what or who is coming toward you and what is right in front of you.

Carson may be chaotic with his personality, but he can be patient to analyze and assess a situation. He's quite stubborn, might be because his childhood friend is Veruca and he picked up on her own stubbornness, but he will continue to push for what he stands for.

In Celtic mythology, owls knew the way to the underworld and were fierce defenders of truth and honor. The owl has no tolerance for deception, even when we are deceiving ourselves.

The Celtic Owl was tied closely to the ancient Goddess of fertility. It frequently appears in knotwork and bestiaries, being revered for its ability to see in the dark and acting as a messenger between humans and the Divine.

Avis Ni Conraoi (Hogwarts Legacy)

Avis' patronus is the butterfly. Those with the butterfly patronus means it's time for personal growth and greater awareness of mental, physical, and spiritual rhythms. Change can sometimes be challenging and daunting because it moves us out of our comfort zone.

You cannot embrace a “new you” until you release the old. With the butterfly spirit, you’ll find that you can fly gracefully above the barriers that would otherwise hold you back.

The Conraois are quite a spiritually oriented family one can say. They don't appear to worry over minor things that can cause someone to stress out to the point of exhaustion. Avis, herself, lives her life freely with no worries. Life is too short for her to take a slow path and be cautious of everything. She simply goes with the flow, following where the wind takes her on a new journey.

The butterfly as a teacher puts great emphasis on movement: Be it blossom-to-blossom, home-to-home, or one state in our spiritual exploration to another.

An old Irish blessing says,

“May the wings of the butterfly kiss the sun, and find your shoulder to light on.

To bring you luck, happiness, and riches today, tomorrow and beyond.”

Throughout Celtic regions, the butterfly represents prosperity, joy, good fortune, and honor. Butterflies also symbolizes the soul. So much was the case that harming a white butterfly was against the law in Ireland because of the belief it bore a dead child’s spirit.

The butterfly often turns our thoughts inward to review elements of our character, morals, and habits that weigh us down, keeping us stuck in a mire of negative energy.

The goal of the winged ally is restoring lightness in your being so you can dance life’s dance with unbridled joy!

People with a butterfly as their patronus have a natural lightness of spirit! They love the beauty of nature and are guided by the greatest good when it comes to maintaining balance with the environment.

Avis is normally against violence, opting to be an advocate of peace. Though if that peace has been disturbed, she will take on a more passive aggressive attitude to protect that peace.

With the butterfly patronus, you’ll find that you’re better equipped to look at difficult situations from another angle. As you fly on her wings, your perspective becomes more global and hopeful.

Butterfly people are naturally social, colorful, and vibrant. They endeavor to live each moment to the fullest.

#veruca mcquaid #carson ivey #coby mcquaid #rohan mac uaid #avis ni conraoi #mc patronus #patronus challenge #hogwarts mystery #hphm #harry potter hogwarts mystery #hphm mc #hogwarts mystery mc #harry potter hogwarts legacy #hogwarts legacy #hphl #hogwarts legacy mc #hphl mc

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culturedsociety · 4 years ago

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Culture Talks with Carolyn Blackmon

Carolyn, in English meaning Joy and Song of Happiness.

Over the last decade she’s been on a journey of healing and transformation. It’s been Incredible to look back and see how beauty does actually flourish through the ashes. What happened in her life; most definitely was birthed out of struggles, hardships, loss, depression, despair, and hopelessness. Looking back at her experiences and being In complete awe because of it. Her faith and belief in God changed when she realized that “the Creator Is ultimately in control and has the ability to take what Is broken and make It brand new.”

Her life verse Is Isaiah 61:1-3 “The spirit of the sovereign Lord Is upon me because the Lord has appointed me to provide for those who grieve, to bestow on them a crown of beauty Instead of ashes, the oil of gladness Instead of mourning, and a garment of praise Instead a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the lord for the display of his splendor.”

In her early twenties, she was extremely lost. Battling a severe eating disorder, alcoholism, depression, and sadness. She worked and pursued many things to distract herself from reality and to try to fill voids. The more destruction that she caused to her body, mind, and spirit’ the harder life became. One day after a big awakening, she had to make the choice and ask herself the hard question “Carolyn Do you want to live?” She knew at that very moment; she was not living, she was just surviving.

She made the bold decision to pack her car and move alone from WI to AZ. The land of the sun became a place of healing for her. She found yoga there. She began her vegan plant based eating, and learned to nourish her body again after starving it for so long of vital nutrients it needed to thrive. She found joy through volunteering and serving. She found god again and was re-baptized. But most importantly, found her self again.

Reflecting back to Fall of 2015 when she lost her best friend and mother to Cancer. It was as though her entire world and perspective changed about the value and gift that each day offers. She started to travel more and continued doing mission work that her mother supported the few years before she passed. She began seeking more and wanting more lead to healing the parts of her that were still broken.

In 2017, she traveled to Hawaii for her first yoga teacher training; which led her to step into a more passion and purposed filled path. This became a daily mission and allowed her the ability to circulate her gifts more responsibly. Her hope is to bless lives and help others heal, love, grow, and live their best life. To inspire them to live a life that brings an Abundance of joy, fulfillment, and higher purpose.

Take a deep dive into Carolyn’s mind:

RM: What is your Life’s Philosophy? CB: (Philosophy is an overall vision or attitude toward life and the purpose of it. Human activities are limited by time and death). I believe that we were all created in the image of God and we are each placed on Earth with our own individual and unique purpose. We are here to connect with nature, humans, animals, and to enjoy all of what God has created. We are here to not only soak in the beauty and light and spread it to others but to also use the darkness (whether it be our own struggles, lessons learned, trails, pain, suffering, etc) and use it to Glorify God? What does that mean? To use the wisdom gained, lessons learned, and the power of our testimony and story to shine the light of awareness upon all giving birth to Hope and helping others receive the healing power of Forgiveness.

RM: How has that philosophy evolved over the years? CB: Yes. I tell people that there was a line I drew that separated my old life and my new life. My old life included a long season of walking down the wrong path that ultimately was leading me down into hole. When I fell on my knees and surrendered and “woke” up. It hit me that I wasn’t living the life God planned for me. I was doing many things that I do believe helped me grow and get educated and led me to where I am today. I was drowning in depression, shame, low self esteem, and I didn’t practice self love.

Moving to AZ was the acceleration I needed to begin my rebirth process. I began serving others and finding joy in giving back for it made me realize that others had it harder than myself. I had a lot to be grateful for that I took for granted. Fast forward a few more years and I lost my Beloved Mother to Cancer. It made me realize that there is no time to waste. We are not promised tomorrow. We have a responsibility. Going through that loss changed my perspective on life and our time here on Earth.

I felt urgency. I felt my calling knocking on the door. I had to loose to gain so much more. I feel that my philosophy included being a good person, and working for what you want was so general….but over the years it’s evolved and things have been added and my life’s philosophy has gotten so complex. Creation. Calling. Service. Travel. Community. Collaboration. Healing. Purpose Filled Life

RM: How has your upbringing and circle of influence impacted the way you live and think about life today? CB: I grew up in a loving Christian home. My family members on both sides had good morals in their and the way they lived their lives was simple and consistent. I spent a lot of time in the Church. My parents Marketing business taught me so much as a young adult and I really absorbed a lot of it. My Grandpa Bood was my giver of Wisdom.

My circle of influence has really shifted in the last few years to be non-family members. Those that are where I want to be and who are doing what I am doing in their own way with their own talents. My circle of influence has been students, strangers, people I have met on travels, social media, and those that are in my tribe. It’s interesting to see how my relationships have changed and the type of people I have attracted and also been gravitated towards has changed as I have evolved and transformed and grown. My inner work has changed the way I function in relationships and I am still exploring how to have healthy boundaries as one who tends to be naïve, vulnerable, and who pours her heart and soul into everything.

RM: Do you believe that your line of work infects our society with positivity? How so? CB: When I am doing my work as a yoga instructor I try my best to step into the spaces where I am Leading classes and spread good energy that is uplifting and positive but I also know that people arrive on their mat with all different things that they are struggling with and going through and I never want to diminish that. I try to share themes that are relevant and helpful and inspiring because I really want everyone who interacts with me to leave with something that they can take with them. When they gain and grow and are blessed then so am I.

When I nanny and work with kids they give me an abundance of Joy and so I always try to pour back into the parents and thank them for the opportunity to enter into their home and spend time with them. I’ve worked jobs where felt like at the end of the day I was complaining about what I had to deal with or contend with and then I would wake up in a bad mood and that’s really a horrible cycle. I am thankful grateful that I am now an Independent Contractor and get to choose who I work with so that makes it easier but aside from that we all have a choice to make in regards to our attitude!

RM: How do you stay relevant, unique, and true to who you are as a person? CB: Let go of Comparison. It’s interesting because over the years as I became more at rest and confident in who I was and accepting of who God created me to be it made it easier to accept my path which is a lot different than many as well as accept my timeline which was not what I anticipated. I have started to become more of my own person….my tendencies and quirks have come to the surface unapologetically. Yes I am still Single…Yes I get excited over the Big Bowl Of Greens I eat everyday. My music selection changes drastically with my Mood. I could care less about TV and Material items….and I could go on and on.

The morning ritual I do sets the tone for my day. I tap into a passage or quote and scripture that I need to tell myself it’s like a treasure hunt and I get my coffee fix and take the time I need for myself and that way I’m more grounded and not shaken up or swayed or torn up by whatever may come at me and I feel that has given me the opportunity to respond better and hold my ground and keep healthy boundaries. I use to operate on not enough sleep and being stressed and hurried and then I would cave in to many things that ultimately didn’t serve myself or others well.

RM: Do you believe that the work you do everyday is aligned with your calling and higher purpose? CB: Absolutely and I want more and I am committed to continue to learn and grow and gain a deeper understanding and have more knowledge in the realm of yoga. The more spaces and places I enter and the more people that I connect and collaborate with the more lives I can touch and the more inspired I will be. This last year I started to share my content on a podcast and that was something I never imagined I would do and for a girl that use to be incredibly shy I never thought I would be on the stages I am on. It blows my mind and I am soooo appreciative.

What practices do you implement to stay grounded and divinely connected to self? CB: Guided Meditation. Yoga Nidra. Yoga. Nature. Travel. Writing. Music. Sharing wisdom with the world. Dancing. Music. Balance Healthy Clean Eating. Sharing Feelings and openly communicating with my support system. Spending a lot of time alone, while remaining connected with others.

Connect with Carolyn: Facebook Instagram

Collaboratively Written by: Carolyn Blackmon and Rebecca Muñoz

Grow this Channel & Circulate the energy of LOVE by donating: Paypal Cash app Venmo

#podcast #veganism #freedom #lifestyle #conversation #nomad #alignment #humanitarian #goodhumans #faith #mindset #empower #womeninspire

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bingleycharles · 5 years ago

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First off, I don’t spend a lot of time on tumblr any more, and this blog was mainly meant to be a reference blog for wuxia/xianxia genre, which has been my favorite genre for a long time. My main intention was to provide some information that might be helpful (I think MDZS becoming so popular so quickly due to the tv drama came a bit unexpected to us who have loved the novel for a long time) and not really engage much beyond that. But, the more time I spend here, the more I feel that some things need to be said.

There’s been a lot of talk about the MDZS novel dubcon/noncon elements and I definitely had no intention of engaging with that to any extent, but the mentality of this particular group of people (and I use that term generously because it’s mainly the mentality of extremely sheltered children) on tumblr is so unbelievably wild that someone needs to say something, and I guess that’s going to be me. I am going to warn people in advance, that I am going to make no attempts to be nice about this, because after some of the discussions I’ve seen recently, even if niceness was deserved, I certainly am no longer capable of it.

Now that the disclaimer is in place, let’s talk a bit about where this hatred for mxtx and her sex scenes comes from.

1. People who believe that nothing problematic should exist in fiction, because nothing problematic should exist in the world.

Sometimes, this is based on a simple inability to recognize how fiction and real world are not, in fact, the same thing, and this inability can be more commonly found among those too young to understand complex subjects (see great majority of the above children, who have already caused a great deal of damage to vulnerable communities by misusing and misrepresenting terms like pedophilia, incest, etc, etc). More often however, it is based on the inability to understand how real word and fiction are actually related, an inability that is unfortunately found among many people who should be considered adults. It is a fundamental misunderstanding of both, rooted in a belief that real world problems exist because they are normalized in fiction (but not all world problems because no one is trying to get rid of murder mysteries, just the icky problems they don’t actually wanna think about or do anything to solve, but would still like to never see again. All this while simultaneously getting to say “well, I’m against incest in fiction so that’s my contribution to the issue,” so they can then feel good about themselves).

This belief, by the way, that real world problems exist because they are normalized in fiction, has been proven as a false narrative many times, but like “Bible says all gay people are evil” or “climate change isn’t real” doctrines, it refuses to die even when faced with facts. “Fiction does not exist in a vacuum” they keep saying, as if those capable of critical thinking have not addressed this subject so many times, that you could practically walk your way across the Pacific Ocean on their responses alone. The real world problems do not exist because someone once wrote them down in a piece of fiction, and that should be abundantly clear to us all. Instead, problematic subjects exist in fiction precisely because they existed in the real world first, and we, the human beings, find writing things down to be one of the many ways we process information, problematic or otherwise.

There is also an insistence on seeing every piece of fiction as an instruction manual for “bad things,” and honestly, I don’t know what happens in these people’s heads, nor do I want to. Again, according to them, any underage fiction is an instructional manual for a possible pedophile, but tens of thousands of murder mysteries are just entertainment. If you read/write underage fiction, you must be a pedophile, but by the same logic, if you read/write bloody murder mysteries, this logic either doesn’t apply, or murder is just fine. So inevitably we go back to the fact that a lot of these issues are only raised by people who just don’t think anything they personally find “icky” should exist, and that’s rooted mostly in white privilege (and we’ll get to the white minority individuals later) and ethnocentricity (and we’ll get to that in a minute too). Basically, when I hear “people will learn that rape is okay from fiction,” I automatically think you’re either extremely immature or extremely ignorant, or both. Please take a psychology/sociology class or seven, throw in Moral Development 101 in the mix, and get back to me in like ten years, when we can both try and have an adult conversation. In the meantime, arguing against this is like arguing with climate change deniers. More likely to make me dumber than them smarter.

In short, you will never be able to get rid of problematic fiction, because you will never make the world not problematic, nor will stopping the people who choose to reflect their problematic world in writing fiction accomplish absolutely anything, except them having no way to process their reality, and you being considered an immature child (which most people who think like this already are, so no news there, let’s move on).

2. They believe things are problematic because they believe that their particular experiences are common to everyone else. If they see it as problematic, then everyone else should to see it that way too.

This should be self-explanatory, and a thousand of these discussions have been held in the past, by people more eloquent than myself, about every subject from rape fantasies and bondage (go back a few years to 50 shades), to experiences that are unique to specific minority groups, like trans individuals, refugees, rape survivors, those with disabilities, multi-national and multi-racial individuals, and so on and so forth. Even among the hundreds and hundreds of these vulnerable groups of individuals, there are hundreds of different subgroups, whose experiences are all wildly different, wildly subjective, and all completely valid to them, regardless of how they differ.

None of us have the ability to understand each and every one of those unique experiences. At best, we may be able to somewhat understand a few people who have had similar experiences, but our opinions on a variety of subjects have been shaped by the smallest differences in those experiences, and are likely to never be exactly the same.

What I’m saying is this: the little white girl from Iowa, regardless of her minority status as disabled/lesbian/bi/queer female, will never understand what drives a young/disabled/queer/multiracial/2nd gen. immigrant girl, to write 55k of rape fantasy fiction between two multiracial men, and she doesn’t have to understand it. Neither her disability nor her queerness should give her a single iota of moral high ground over the other individual, or vice versa. Her personal understanding of what is morally right or wrong in fiction does not give her the right (nor should it ever) to pass judgment on anyone else’s experiences, or their method for processing those experiences. There is no sensitive way I can say this, so I’m not even gonna try. You don’t get to be automatically right because you’re gay, disabled, or a minority of any kind. Like, I know this is uncomfortable to hear, but people around here often use their status to invalidate others and to get them not to engage in any type of discussion that would prove their opinions wrong. I’m literally watching children on tumblr going, “I don’t need to know about oppression, I’m gay,” like holy shit. The only oppression you know is your own. That’s it. Please tone down the arrogance and realize you’re not alone in the world, minority or not.

I get that if you were raped, you may never want to see rape in fiction. But in the same vein, there exist people who were raped, and want to see rape in fiction. I get that you’re gay and offended by certain type of fiction, but there are also people who are gay and prefer the same type of fiction you find offensive. This is exactly when words like “pedophile” and “incest” get thrown around a lot, for things that in no way meet the definition. Because there is no factual or valid argument that exists here, and people are browbeating other people by saying “Well, I’m gay and oppressed and I just don’t like it so it has to be wrong.” But when the dissenter is also gay and oppressed, and you have to admit that based on the status you’ve used to validate yourself, you also have to admit that their opinion is as valid as yours, then the only fallback is to point a finger and say that there must be something wrong with them. “Well, your opinion is not valid because you read underage fiction so you’re a pedophile,” and this is literally what keeps happening over and over again.

At the root of all this is a twisted, sick belief, that those who process their issues and their problematic environments in the morally pure and acceptable way are the only valid voices in every community, and that everyone else’s experiences are immediately invalidated by default. It’s a pretty fucking gross rhetoric, and it’s been going on here on tumblr for a very long time now, but it’s only gotten worse, and it’s especially prevalent among the new influx of mdzs “fans.”

3. They believe things are problematic because their culture considers them problematic, and they have no concept of the fact that theirs is not the only culture in the world.

This is particularly nasty proclivity, commonly found in Western consumers of fiction. The Western audiences like to think themselves enlightened, despite the fact that most Eastern cultures have carpets in their government buildings older than the entire Western culture, system of law, morality codes, or their Constitutions. This is mostly true of U.S. in particular because their ethnocentrism keeps self-validating itself through ignorance, poor education, and other evils of capitalism. But it’s also true of other white European consumers of fiction, who have a long history of colonialism to thank for their continuous insistence that their morality is more enlightened than everyone else’s (oh, the irony of that). But not to go too far from the subject at hand, if I had a dollar every time a white girl from United States said “Ew, this rape scene this Chinese author wrote is really gross and I find it to be offensive to my entire existence,” I could pretty much overthrow the entire capitalist system that produced this ethnocentric fucking nonsense in the first place.

In short, there are many individuals in the West, who might be minorities in their general community, but have no concept or understanding of other cultures, other minority communities, or other individuals that have life experiences drastically different from their own, so they judge everything they see from their own perspective, because it is the only perspective they have, and unfortunately, it’s a pretty narrow one. There is an important lesson to be learned here, and it’s the one I’ve already mentioned above:

Being queer, or being any kind of a minority, does not automatically save you from being ignorant, being ethnocentric, being unable to understand other people’s experiences (minority or otherwise), and it most certainly does not mean that your queer culture is the only right queer culture in the world. If you doubt my words, I highly suggest consulting some native-Chinese male queer individuals, who have also read that rape scene by that Chinese author who has upset you so much that you can’t stop crying about it (although it wasn’t written for you, and you were under no obligation to read it), and maybe ask them what they think, since their opinion is the only one even close to being relevant to this particular conversation. I guarantee that their answers will shock and amaze you, and you may even learn a thing or two along the way.

(And if you immediate answer isn’t that their opinions will all be wildly different as well because them all being native-Chinese male queer individuals still doesn’t mean they’re all the same fucking person [because hello? China has 56 ethnic groups alone] and that each and every one of them is a unique individual with a unique perspective based on their particular upbringing, social environment, sexuality, etc, etc, then you’re fucking missing the point, please go back up to the beginning and try again).

In the end, the answer to never having to see anything that upsets you is pretty simple and straight forward. If it’s bothersome, do not engage. If you don’t understand something, if it seems alien to your experience, if your very existence feels utterly repulsed by it, consider the fact that it was probably not written for you in the first place, and simply remove yourself from its presence.

Do not assume that you know why it was written, do not assume it is a personal attack against your existence, do not assume that you understand (or ever could) the culture that gave it birth, the history that formed it, or the shared experiences of those who happen to like it. Do not assume that you are the authority on problematic when it comes to anyone else’s work except your own, because you are a unique individual, your moral beliefs and expectations are your own, and no one else is required to share them. The world does not have a common morality, and if it did, it certainly wouldn’t be a common morality of a white girl on fucking tumblr who isn’t gonna take an intercultural competence class unless she’s in her fourth year of college, and even then, the exact privilege that allowed her to take that class is gonna make it pretty unlikely that she’ll understand it. It’s a tough life I know, but you’ll get over it tolerably well I’m sure.

In the simplest words possible, please try and turn a mirror towards your own propensity to think that your viewpoint is superior to all others, quit making excuses that amount to your particular minority status somehow making you immune to rampant cultural ignorance, because it’s literally been centuries of this bullshit from white colonialists countries for the rest of the world, and everyone is pretty fucking sick of it.

People are simply asking you not to be a dick to other unique individuals on the sole basis of the fact that you are incapable of processing their world, their culture, or their experiences, in the same exact way that they have, and frankly, it’s really not a lot to ask.

#mdzs #mxtx #mo dao zu shi #racism #ethnocentrism #xenophobia #white privilege #cultural ignorance

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obviouslyelementary · 4 years ago

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Family - Data & Picard

Summary: After First Contact, Picard goes to check on Data and assure him that they can talk about anything, now that they both share the feelings of being assimilated by the Borg.

Warnings: light angst and heavy hurt comfort; dad and son feels;

-----------------------------------------------

First contact was successful. The Borg had been destroyed in the past, and would not assimilate the humans until way later in the future. The Borg Queen had been killed, at least the one they had encountered. And now, they were back home, to the 24th century, everything somewhat back to normal.

The main difference was that Picard was now sure he needed way more therapy before he could actually engage in any Borg related missions again. Star Fleet had been right, he was not ready to be face to face with the Borg again. Hadn't it been Lily, he would have destroyed humanity for vengeance, and probably got everyone killed in the process.

But now that everything was back to normal, now that they were home and heading to to base 001 for repairs and a well deserved vacation, he found himself with one more duty to fulfill.

"Will, you have the bridge" he said, standing up from the chair, and Will immediately took his post with a nod. Deanna watched as he moved away, standing up for a moment.

"Sir?" she asked, always concerned, probably feeling how he was feeling, but Picard smiled at her and nodded.

"Don't worry counselor. I will be back shortly."

She gave him an uncertain nod and allowed him to leave the bridge. He took the turbolift, heading down to sickbay, and made his way through the hallways, paying no attention to the officers and civilians walking around him. They had had several casualties, and the medical team was working on the double to get the few crewmembers left out of the Borg machinery.

But that was not why Jean-Luc was heading there.

He made his way inside sickbay and towards the recuperation isle, where he could see some familiar faces. Geordi was there, working double with some nurses, and on the table laid Data, now almost completely fixed. Jean-Luc approached the group, watching as Geordi attached the last patch of skin to Data's face and smiled.

"You're good as new friend" he said, and the nurses were quick to move away and help the other patients. Data slowly sat up again, blinking and touching his own face, with a slight discomforting expression before looking up at Geordi.

"Thank you" he said, and Picard could feel the honesty in his words. Geordi nodded.

"You're welcome. I should go back to work" he turned, and was surprised to see Picard there. "Captain!"

"At ease" he teased, smiling at his chief engineer. "Go back to duty. I came here to see our patient."

"Of course sir. I will leave you two alone" Geordi said, smiling at Data and then heading out of sickbay. Data looked at Picard, seeming confused, and tilted his head.

"I was about to return to the bridge sir" he said, but Picard shook his head.

"Could you accompany me to my quarters? I wish to speak to you in private" he said, and Data gave him a nod, following the captain out of sickbay so they could leave the nurses and doctors alone. The walk towards Picard's room was completely silent, even though he felt as if Data wanted to say something. He didn't indulge it until they were safely inside the captain's quarters, and with a nod, they both sat down on the couches, facing each other.

"Would you like some tea sir?" Data asked, politely, but Jean-Luc shook his head.

"No. And don't address me as sir or captain while in here... this is a very personal conversation, I don't want ranks influencing our talk" he said, sighing and crossing his legs. He did it when he was relaxed or very uncomfortable, and this time it was the latter.

"Of course" Data agreed, and then tilted his head. "May I ask why we are here? What is the subject of our talk?"

"The Borg are the subject of our talk" Jean-Luc said, and Data gave him a nod, accommodating himself on his seat. It could be a sign of discomfort, one Picard knew very well. "As you probably know, you and I had similar experiences with the Borg, and I want to talk to you about... that."

"You mean because both of us were assimilated against our will, and seen by the Borg Queen as more than just pawns?" he asked, unsure, and Picard nodded. "I see."

"Data... I don't know if our experiences were the same, or even as alike as I am thinking them to be" he admitted, and then sighed. "But it is clear that despite years of constant therapy, I still have not fully... gotten over what happened to me while in the Borg collective. I believed I was past it, but I was wrong. And now I want to make sure you don't make the same mistakes I did."

"Captain... I mean, Jean-Luc. Believe me when I say that our experiences were far more different than you imagine" Data said, in a calm manner. "Despite having human feelings, such as fear and happiness, I do not experience the same responses as does human psyche. Individuality, for example, is valued to me, but not inherent, nor maddening. It would be much more difficult for the Borg to integrate me in their collectiveness, and indeed it was, because I was not fully integrated at any moment. The only way they could have me was if I agreed to, the reason why the Borg Queen appealed to my human wishes. So I can assure you that I am not, in any way, traumatized by what transpired."

"Forgive me Data when I say... I find that extremely hard to believe" Jean-Luc said, looking at Data, his bright yellow eyes and his now completely android-like complexity. "I too believed I was fine the moment I was released from the Borg collective, and it took me months to admit that I was not, indeed, fine. I am not here to tell you to feel bad, not in the slightest. But I would like you to know that first, you should seek a therapist, and second, if you ever need someone to talk to, someone to share your thoughts and feelings with, I will always be open to listen. No matter how dark or upsetting they might be."

"I see... I must extend the offer to you as well" Data said, softly. "You are always welcomed to talk to me whenever you need."

"Good" Picard smiled, and Data smiled back. "If there is anything else you wish to talk about, ask... before we return to the bridge, feel free to do so."

"I... do have a few questions about, well, this mission in general" Data admitted, and Picard nodded, holding his knee with his hands. "First of all, the auto destruction sequence. You were not the one that had the idea, were you?"

"No. Worf was the sensible one" Picard admitted, with a dry chuckle. Data gave him a nod.

"Why did you come back for me?"

The question was sincere, quiet but not hesitant, but made Picard freeze on the spot. He looked up at Data again, finding his yellow eyes fixated on his own, with a curiosity that seemed to hide something underneath. The question itself was so offensive to Jean-Luc that he needed a second to process it, to perhaps understand it better.

"What do you mean, why I came back for you?" he asked, still somewhat incredulous, and Data tilted his head.

"For all you knew, I was assimilated. The ship was about to explode, you wouldn't have enough time to get into one of the escape pods. Not only that, but I heard you. You were going to sacrifice your humanity, your individuality, to save me. You were going to assimilate into the Borg collective as the Queen's equal. Why? I was the only one on board, and you could have found another way to stop the Borgs in case the plan failed. Why would you sacrifice your wellbeing for me?"

Jean-Luc stared at Data, waiting for some kind of joke to come out of his mouth, or an apology for such an absurd question, but it never came. His mouth opened and closed several times, a bubbling anger filling up his blood vessels together with a feeling of extreme sadness he never felt before. Empathy was never his strong suit, but seeing Data question his own worth for rescue was a bit too much, even for him.

"You... don't see any value on your own person, do you, Data?" he asked, because he was still baffled, and didn't know how to answer such an absurd question. Data seemed taken aback at the question, leaning away and looking to the floor.

"I... of course I do sir. I know I am the most advanced type of technology humans have ever made, and I know I have a place in this vessel, but-"

"Would you be questioning me if I had sacrificed myself to save Will? Deanna? Beverly? Geordi? Worf?" Picard asked, his voice now showing the signs of anger he was trying to push down, and Data shook his head like a shy boy.

"No sir."

"Then why are you questioning me when I sacrificed myself to save you?" he said, his voice deeper, angry and upset. "Don't you see any value, any worth on your own being, commander?"

Well, back with the ranks. That was how Picard showed he was mad.

"I do sir" Data said, and then slowly looked up at him, looking like a boy who had just made something wrong and was now seeking forgiveness. "I am sorry captain."

"No... stop" Picard said, shaking his head with a sigh and reaching out, taking Data's hands on his own. "Don't apologize, Data, I... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get angry. But that question is absurd and even a bit revolting. You are part of the crew, Data. It is obvious I would do anything to save you."

"I saw what you did while I was in the collective. You killed one of the ensigns" Data said, his hands holding onto Picard's firmly. "Should you not have killed me too?"

Oh guilt. What a delicious feeling to have.

"I killed him because I was blind with rage and want for revenge. Because I only saw Borg when there was an ensign. I was wrong to do that to him" Picard admitted, and it was harder than he made it seem. "But I would have never killed you, Data. You are... you are family."

Family.

That was it.

Data was silent for a moment, holding Jean-Luc's hands on his own while he thought, tilting his head until a smile showed up on his face, a shy one, small and gentle but honest and happy. He gave Picard a nod, and a squeeze on his hands.

"I... believe you are my family too, Jean-Luc."

"I'm honored you think of me as such" he whispered, giving Data's hands another squeeze. "And my offer remains. If you ever need to speak to someone about what happened while you were being kept with the Borg, while you were in the collective... don't hesitate to talk to me."

"I will not. In fact... if I may" Data said, and Picard nodded, leaning back and letting go from Data's hands. "I believe that... one thing happened while I was locked up with them that bothered me deeply."

"What was it?"

"Did the Borg Queen try to... copulate with you, sir?" Data asked, shyly but loud enough to hear, and Picard stared at him with his eyes wide in surprise, before narrowing down in anger.

"What did she do to you?"

The rest of the talk was, well, uncomfortable, and although Jean-Luc knew he was no specialist, he made sure Data was comfortable to talk to him about anything at all, including... that, while also making appointments for them both with Troi, once a week.

Once the talk was finished, and Picard felt himself a little less angry with the Borg for hurting Data, he allowed them both to go back to duty, but not before a very human ritual.

"Mister Data, have you ever had a hug?" he asked while they got ready to leave his quarters, and Data gave him a look.

"I have sir, a few times. Why?"

"Well, I was wondering if you would like another" he said, smiling, and Data looked at him surprised but clearly interested.

"I have never been hugged by a man before. And specially not one I consider do highly as you, sir" he said, and Picard nodded, walking closer to him and chuckling.

"I am awful at this... but you know, I will give it a shot" he admitted, raising his arms and wrapping them around Data's middle. He pulled the android closer, despite his initial hesitation, but soon the android's arms were wrapping around his shoulders, and his head found a comfy spot on Picard's shoulder to lay upon. Jean-Luc felt himself calming down almost immediately, never expecting a hug from his android officer to be so warm and inviting, but finding that he would not mind hugging him more often.

When they finally broke apart, probably after a way longer time than most hugs were kept, Picard looked at Data and smiled upon seeing the relaxed expression on his commander's face.

"Your hugs bring me a high level of happiness and comfort, Jean-Luc" Data said, softly, and Picard gave him a nod.

"I have to agree, Data. We should do it more often. Now let's go back to work."

"Yes sir."

Data walked out of his quarters, and Picard smiled as he walked after him, delighted by his reaction.

Data was precious, and if he could, Picard would never allow anyone to hurt him again.

#my fanfic #star trek #star trek first contact #first contact #data tng #tng data #data #captain picard #jean luc picard #family feels #family #found family #star trek fanfic #star trek the next generation #tng

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