#but like. focused on autonomy and connection specifically

[faithfromanewperspective]

feel like as a pdaer the number one thing that sets me off is when (and this happens all the time) the interests/needs of some people conflict in any way with the interests/needs of other people because it's the two things i want the most (autonomy (as in for everyone) and connection) clashing and like. i need both; it's like a sensory profile. or when someone's desires don't match up with their deeper needs and i can tell that, that either they're not self aware enough to know it or are set on self-destructing and i can't connect and get into their heads to try help problem-solve. and then my surroundings can't feel in balance with the autonomy and connection (of me but also of everyone because i need emotional boundaries but i don't know how to build them when i'm dysregulated) i need.

but i'm wondering if actually, though they have roots in my pda profile, that because not all pdaers experience this and many of us are actually quite hostile (and i am, to power structures. iykyk) which seems like the opposite (it's not imo but that's a whole other argument)--if for me it's something my unmet needs attached themselves to in my head, rather than something i actually need met in order to be happy (impossible). if i figured out somewhere along the line that in order to get the autonomy and connection i need this is most likely to happen if every other person in the room feels that same sense of autonomy and connection and balance and peace and is therefore open to connect and isn't gonna take my autonomy away to feel like they have more. and so little me just constantly schemed on how to meet this for everyone and absorbed their emotions as my own in order to do so and now i can't turn it off

[theiasthesis]

Shifting can be escapism, and that's OK.

Im going to give you a valuable lesson, so stick to the post, dont skip because every word is important. Don't let that small attention span get to you baby, remember that knowledge is power.

My name is Willow! I'm a non-dualist reality shifter, shifting coach and subliminal creator who's a freak for the multiverse and knowledge. Everything I say on here is based on my own personal experiences and research.

This post can help you with:

Escapism, guilt for shifting, realising you're worthy of shifting.

The self determination theory (SDT) is a psychological theory of motivation. It focuses on the degree to which specific human behaviour is for the self ; self motivated and self determined

Basically, what exactly is it that a human being can do, that isn't manipulated by outside influence, but rather their own human nature?

According to the theory these are 3 self motivated human behaviours:

Autonomy

Having the freedom to decide your actions without outside influence.

Example: Being able to go out with your friends, without your parents restricting you.

Competence

The ability to do something effectively and be useful.

Example: You're a very useful employee at your company, this means you are competent for your job.

Relatedness

Being connected or related to someone, or something.

Example: Having a connection with family or friends

OK, so how does any of this apply to shifting and escapism?

When you lack one of any of these 3 behaviours or feelings, this is a disruption your human nature. Naturally by birth, you are within your birth right to recieve all of this.

Each of these behaviours, have extreme importance in your cognitive behaviour

- Cognitive behaviors are thoughts, ideas, and representations of yourself to others.

If you don't have the will or ability to control your actions independently, you are most likely going to feel stuck, and like everything is out of your control. Doing things that make you happy and activities you find meaningful, will become an issue due to your lack of autonomy.

If you don't feel competent in areas of your life, or people aren't competent when it comes to you, this can create low self esteem and a bad self concept, you may think of yourself as "worthless" "useless" or "incompetent"

You may feel less motivated to taking on new challenges and activities, as you feel like you're just going to fail, and mess everything up anyways.

Connection is what makes us human, love and empathy towards overs and receiving it, is what makes human life so special. Relatedness, is what you need to experience caring relationships, to be part of a community, and overall to feel love. Humans need love, that is a fact.

When these basic needs aren't met, a human being can lack the motivation to commit to any one of these factors, which take up a huge part in life.

Lacking these can make you feel, stressed, anxious, self loath and nihilistic.

When you don't have these 3 factors, this causes a lack of motivation to commit to them, which means you don't have them.

So you turn to something else, escapism.

"Escapism is the tendency to distract oneself from real-life problems. It can also be conceived as shutting meanings out of one's mind and freeing oneself from self-awareness for a while . Escapism has been identified as one of the key drivers behind online behaviors, in both adaptive and maladaptive ways"

- PubMed Central®

Link to study

Think of escapism like touching a hot stove. Imagine you place your hand upon a stove. At first its cold, and you're fine.

Then the temperature starts to slowly rise, its currently warm, its still fine you can deal with it. Now, it's getting hotter, and hotter, and hotter...

And you remove your hand.

Not on purpose, but by instinct.

By reflex, your hand immediately moved away from the stove once it got too hot.

Your nervous system felt the pain, which sent a signal to the brain, that something with your hand is wrong.

Biology isn't my strong suit I fear.

Another example.

You're in immediate danger, there's a tsunami coming your way, it's too big for you to face, if you stay where you are, you're going to get crushed by the water, and die on impact. So what do you do?

You run.

Naturally you escape from the dangerous situation, because who in their right mind would test their luck and try to survive a tsunami?

Are you getting it?

When human beings are faced with a situation that is uncomfortable, causes mental, or physical harm, or even death, their first response is to escape.

It is human nature to run, to escape, to not face the dangerous situation. Sometimes it can be a bad move, like ditching a daye you were nervous for, other times it could be skipping school because you constantly run into a group of serious bullies.

Repeat after me.

If you are in a situation where you do not feel loved, worthy, or free, you are allowed to escape.

You are allowed to escape.

Empathise on that baby, nobody is going to tell you off for it.

However, you must be weary of using shifting as escapism.

Shifting is a wonderful phenomenon, it is not something that determines whether you live or not. It doesn't determine your worth either, nor is it something that causes you psychological stress.

If you find yourself having suicidal or self harming thoughts, with shifting as a way to mend these thoughts, I beg of you to take a step back and evaluate these thoughts of yours.

Shifting is a journey, I preach that it's something that can be done on the first go, but that isn't the case for everybody.

It can be as short or as long as you make it, failure in shifting when using it as an escape from serious issues, is a one way road to psychological distress.

With that, I ask that you first deal with your mental health, before anything else.

Find something that makes you feel good and grounded, something you enjoy.

Please remember, that not everything is something you must be good at, if it came from you it's already perfect.

Meditation, painting, dancing, listening to music, writing, exercise. Anything and everything that makes you feel good, nothing is too silly, nobody is going to think you're weird or bad at doing something you love to do.

I found that talking out loud, writing in my journal, mediation and watching anime helped me a lot when I had "life impacting plans" connected to shifting.

LESSON SUMMARY

1. It is natural for human beings to run away when they are faced in a dangerous or uncomfortable situation

2. Shifting being used to run away from a bad situation, isn't negative. It only becomes negative once you prioritise it over your own health

3. Your mental and physical health always comes first before shifting

4. You deserve to be loved, to feel worthy, to not be let down, and to be free, whether that's through shifting or not!

[chirpsythismorning]

My hottest take of all time is that Mike is (was) the main character of Stranger Things.

Now, do I think he still is? No. Not really.

TBH I would argue that ALL the OG's are main characters in their own way at this point, with them all getting somewhat similar amounts of screen-time across the board by s4.

But if we're talking about the first two seasons, Finn was indeed credited before both Millie and Noah. The only actors that were credited before him were Winona and David (respectfully).

Just rewatching s1-2, you can see very clearly that Mike is being framed as the main character, with his perspective being favored in big group sequences, with us following him places that we don't really follow others, and for longer periods of time.

What I find interesting, is that even though Noah revealed recently that the Duffer's have been slowly building up/hinting at Will's feelings for Mike since the beginning, it's Mike whose perspective we were usually seeing in all those moments.

In s1, we see Mike looking for Will, with Noah only having like a handful of scenes that entire season. We also get more of a focus on Mike's reactions in comparison to the other party members.

In s2, we see Mike making every effort to support Will all season. It's Mike whose reaching out to Will constantly, calling to see why he's not at school, going by his house, sleeping over for days and staying by his bedside at Hawkins lab. Although Will arguably plays a bigger role in the upside down aspect of the show this season, a large portion of Mike and Will moments focused on Mike's feelings for Will being shared through Mike's POV, and not so much the other way around.

It isn't until s3 that Millie starts being credited before Finn (and respectfully so, as she was arguably bringing in more hype in terms of fandom excitement back in those days, so I do get it). And so we're arguably going from Mike centric (s1), to Will centric (s2), to El centric (s3).

As a result, we also started seeing less of Mike's POV. Though, to be fair there are 10+ new characters joining every season, so EVERYONE is getting less screen-time, every season.

But isn't it so convenient, that when we start getting less insight into Mike's POV, he starts acting strange...? And we don't really get outright answers as to why? Answers that we would probably have if we had Mike's POV as much as we used to?

S3 is when we started getting Will's POV more when it came to him and Mike's relationship. Their dynamic sort of flips between s1-2 vs. s3-4.

Not to say we never get Mike's POV anymore, but when we do, it's hard to discern and so most people overlook it completely on the rare occasion that it does pop up.

Anyways, this whole concept reminded me of the main character shots we got at the end of s4.

These were shots that had multiple characters in the frame, but with only (1) person specifically at the forefront...

YALL KNOW WHAT THIS MEANS???

Arguably, these three main characters storyline's are tied together in a substantial way, and how it all plays out could have been foreshadowed, by the very order and even blocking of these shots.

Think about it.!?!.

Mike was arguably the main character of s1, which means getting his POV at the forefront again would be going back to the shows roots.

Will is arguably the main character of s2, and so blending Mike's arc (ending with Mike hugging Hopper hmmmmmm... Mike accepting his sexuality??) with Will's unreliable narrator arc being resolved (ending with Will and Mike side by side hmmmmmmm... Will getting the boy??), and this combined with Will's connection to the upside down, blending perfectly with his wonder twin, El's storyline (El walking passed Mike and Will.... El dumping his ass again??), with her now at the forefront as the main character, arguably just like in s3, except now she has full autonomy for the first time in the show, she knows her worth, she's accepted herself. And this all coming to a head with those three and everyone in the shows arcs being resolved by the end??

BITCH???

[goldenteaset]

So unlike my other posts for @tristampparty , this one is focused on two things that are connected but not directly. But they are about the twins, who are Plants, so it fits the theme. XD

I have so many thoughts about Vash's panicked/drowning reaction in the Plant fluid and Nai's reaction to it. "Breathe, Vash." It's another unexpected reminder that for all he projects onto Vash, he does genuinely care for him (which makes everything worse). As, well, erotic horror as the tentacles right afterward is, I can't help but read it also as Vash trying to fight off a life preserver...

And now, we get into what I like to call "I'm Biased Toward A Specific Sort of Antagonist And Unfortunately I'm Also A Writer", aka a fic idea poorly disguised as analysis. And also a post about how attractive(ly scary) Nai is. XD;

Every day I thank Studio Orange for Nai, and also hope desperately that at least some shred of what I'd like to see with him actually happens.

Look at him. What a wonderful smile! And it's so deliciously jarring compared to the corpses that are all around him and Vash. Episode 3 and that "Does it cure the loneliness?" line were the creators preparing a lure, and then by episode 9 they cast it with That Smile to younger Vash in this exact spot, and here they hooked me and never let go.

My favorite antagonists deeply care for the protagonist, often in very complicated ways that offer up a hundred interpretations, but the most common one is love. Nai loves Vash--the memories of him, the idea of him, the saint, the sinner. And in this moment, he almost comes to love him as a person, too. "Join me, and we can save our kind." (Also of note: I love how this is framed so that the audience can see this side of Nai as well. It's a very compelling moment and wouldn't be out of place in an otome game.)

I was so excited for more of this: more Nai gently denying Vash his autonomy, lovingly indoctrinating/baptizing him into his cult as a fellow Angel and what that might mean!

...And then I realized that this scene happened only a few minutes in and oh. Oh no.

Don't get me wrong: I love/am horrified by the Tesla scene, and the desert and Rem scenes are amazingly done. But they're forceful, like Nai is embodying that "Gentle Persuasion" meme, and that just isn't scary to me. I would've mostly kept them as they are, but maybe leaned more into the "Everything I did was for you/a paradise for us" lines. Because yes, Nai is being a manipulative slimeball here, but I also think he has 1000% chugged his own Freudian koolaid so much that it's leaking out of his pores.

So I'd do it all mostly backwards, is what I'm saying: show the scene with Rem first, then the desert, then Tesla, then combine the "Join me~" + geranium garden scenes into one. It can convince Vash and the audience. Vash is now worn down, and more importantly he sees Nai as both a savior and, like the other Plants, someone who needs him.

Have there be visions of Vash's companions in the geranium garden (but conveniently far away) happily interacting with the Plants. Show Rosa and her baby! Wolfwood and Livio with the other orphans! So many knife-twisting ways to make this all seem like the best of all possible worlds. Have Vash mindbreak himself.

Now when Vash transforms and starts consuming July/impregnating the Plants, it's not just happening because he's just an empty vessel: Vash earnestly thinks it's the right thing to do.

(To twist the knife, I'd also bring back the "I can hear you. Don't be afraid" line at this moment. Heck, maybe it can all even sound triumphant from his POV, with tender piano music or similar. And then we cut to Meryl, desperately trying to reach him...)

[gothhabiba]

Would you be willing to elaborate a little on what identity politics means to you (or reblog the post if you have in the past cause tumblrs horrible search isn’t turning it up)? It’s something that has vexed me throughout my studies cause just when I think I have a handle on a working definition someone whose opinion I trust (you in this instance) says it’s wrong lol

The usage of the phrase that you're likely familiar with--the way that people often use it to-day, and the usage that I to some extent criticised in the post you're referring to--is one that basically aligns with a concept of "identitarian essentialism" or "identitarian deference." To adhere to "identity politics" is to believe that being in possession of a marginalised "identity"--being a woman, being Black, being gay--will automatically lead to a radical political consciousness, or can even stand in for developing a radical political consciousness; to reference a leader's 'identities' in lieu of debating their policies, and to fight to get people of certain 'identities' in positions of power rather than to change power structures themselves; to believe that a person of a given marginalised "identity" must always be listened to or obeyed in regards to a subject relating to that "identity" (as though people of the same identity never disagree). "Identity politics" is "listen to x voices" and black / rainbow capitalism and girlbossing and "we need more trans people in the military" &c.

But that isn't where we started out at all. The first instances of the phrase "identity politics" date to the 1970s (or possibly the '60s)--though, as is typical with terms suggestive of social or political frameworks, the ideas expressed in the term are arguably older.

The first known specific usage of the term is in 1977, in the Combahee River Collective Statement. Here, it refers to the political knowledge that can come out of “identity” (in particular, gender, class, and race), and to the necessity of reckoning with the full complexity of “sexual politics” as they interact with race and class in Black women’s lives in order to produce a truly radical politics:

Our politics initially sprang from the shared belief that Black women are inherently valuable, that our liberation is a necessity not as an adjunct to somebody else’s may because of our need as human persons for autonomy [...]. [N]o other ostensibly progressive movement has ever considered our specific oppression as a priority or worked seriously for the ending of that oppression. […] Our politics evolve from a healthy love for ourselves, our sisters and our community which allows us to continue our struggle and work.

This focusing upon our own oppression is embodied in the concept of identity politics. We believe that the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity, as opposed to working to end somebody else’s oppression. In the case of Black women this is a particularly repugnant, dangerous, threatening, and therefore revolutionary concept because it is obvious from looking at all the political movements that have preceded us that anyone is more worthy of liberation than ourselves. […]

We believe that sexual politics under patriarchy is as pervasive in Black women’s lives as are the politics of class and race. We also often find it difficult to separate race from class from sex oppression because in our lives they are most often experienced simultaneously.

So the politics of "identity" do not work against a materialist analysis of class structure--they are brought up as something in addition to "pure" class politics that must be paid attention to if a materialist understanding of the factors affecting our lives is to be reached. The Combahee River Collective Statement is explicitly anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist; it was written in order to articulate a political connection between race, gender, and class-based oppression in response to environments (white, middle-class feminist organisations, Black nationalist organisations, socialist organisations) in which e.g. feminism and socialism were assumed to be in conflict. "Identity politics" asserted that race and gender mattered at all in class politics--it asserted that Black women had a right to articulate their own political position, vision, and strategy, rather than allowing white women or Black men or other communists to do it for them.

Howard Wiarda connects the early history of "identity politics" to political movements composed not only of people of colour, feminists, or LGBT people, but also "radicalized students," "Greens," and "Marxists"--"all these groups and even the term 'identity politics' itself were identified with left-wing or radical causes," with the through-line being the concept that "one's identity as a woman, a minority, an environmentalist, a homosexual, a young person, or any marginalized person made one particularly susceptible to violence, ostracism, and oppression" and that that oppression would need to be specifically countered. You'll note that several of these groups are not things that we would consider to be 'innate' to a person!

In the 1980s and 1990s, opposition to "identity politics" came from conservatives, liberals (who focused on pluralism and a non-specific sort of 'equality'), and Marxists (who lamented that they were distracting from pure 'class-based' politics). The concept of a political "identity" à la "environmentalist" seems to have withdrawn from the scene by this point, with critics focusing on identities that they claimed their opponents viewed as innate (such as "ethnicity" or gender). Marxist Eric Hobsbawm, speaking in 1996, makes what will be to us common claims: that identity politics are exclusionary ("collective identities are defined negatively; that is to say against others"); that they only allow people to hold one identity at a time ("identity politics assumes that one among the many identities we all have is the one that determines, or at least dominates our politics"--note how antithetical this is to the C.R.C.'s statement!); that they are essentialist ("Most identity groups are not based on objective physical similarities or differences, although all of them would like to claim that they are ‘natural’ rather than socially constructed"); that they are dangerous and lead to the breakdown of 'real' leftism ("the danger of disintegrating into a pure alliance of minorities is unusually great on the Left [...] without any obvious way of formulating a common interest across sectional boundaries"); that "minorities" cynically manipulate them for their own gain ("it may actually pay to classify yourself as low caste or belonging to an aboriginal tribal group, in order to enjoy the extra access to jobs guaranteed to such groups").

Let us assume that the identitarian / "sectarian" point of view that Hobsbawm criticized did actually exist in the 1990s under the banner of "identity politics"--if so, what had changed since the 1970s? Why does the term "identity politics" signify something different for Hobsbawm than it had for the C.R.C.? Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor connects this shift to the fact that racial position has become slightly less tethered to class position:

Any concept, once it is released into the world, can take on new meanings when confronted with new problems. Identity politics has become so untethered from its original usage that it has lost much of its original explanatory power. In its earliest iteration, Black feminism was assumed to be radical because the class position of Black women, overwhelmingly, was at the bottom of society. But the civil-rights revolution and concerted efforts by the political establishment created a different reality for a small number of African-Americans. Today, there is a small but influential Black political class—a Black élite and what could be described as the aspirational Black middle class—whose members continue to be constrained by racial discrimination and inequality but who hold the promise that a better life is possible in the United States. They stand in contrast to the Black poor and working class, who live in veritable police states, with low-wage work, poor health care, substandard and expensive housing, and an acute sense of insecurity.

But, while the positions that critics of identity politics take issue with may exist in certain circles--may even exist under the self-described banner of "identity politics"--I don't think that that gets all of said critics off the hook for their portrayal of idpol (as though identitarian essentialism is inherent to it), or validates their arguments about what will solve the problem they identify (namely, a return to a halcyon past of Enlightenment universalism without attention to "identity" that, these writers hold, prevailed before 1970). In 1997, Robin D. G. Kelley wrote that "a handful of self-proclaimed spokespersons on the Left" claim that

"The Left" has lost touch with its Enlightenment roots, the source of its universalism and radical humanism, and instead has been hijacked by a "multicultural left" wedded to "identity politics" which has led us all into a cul-de-sac of ethnic particularism, race consciousness, sexual politics, and radical feminism.

Much of the blame is assigned to women, gays and lesbians, and colored people for fracturing the American Left, abandoning honest class struggle, and alienating white men who could be allies but aren't because of the terrible treatment meted out to them by the Loud Minority. Universal categories such as class have fallen before the narrow, particularistic mantras of radical chic: race, gender, sexuality, and disability. Indeed, in their view class is not just another identity, it transcends identity. If the "Left" wants to save itself, we must abandon our ever shrinking identity niches for the realm of majoritarian thinking. After all, we're told, the majority of Americans are white and heterosexual and have little interest in radical feminism, minority discourse, and struggles centered on sexual identity.

Kelley cedes that "in some circles [identity politics] has tended to limit discussions of power to cultural politics"--however, "the 'Enlightenment train' will not lead us out" of this problem:

These people assume that the universal humanism they find so endearing and radical can be easily separated from the historical context of its making; indeed, that it is precisely what can undo the racism and modern imperialism it helped to justify. The racialism of the West, slavery, imperialism, the destruction of indigenous cultures in the name of "progress," are treated as aberrations, coincidences, or not treated [at] all. They insist that these historical developments do not render the Enlightenment's radical universalism any less "radical," and those who take up this critique are simply rejecting Enlightenment philosophers because they're "dead white males."

So criticisms that relate "identity" with certain philosophies or epistemologies (here, Enlightenment humanism) and with material histories (of slavery, imperialism, land theft and genocide) are automatically assumed to be nothing more than identitarian reductionism--people are assumed to be objecting to Enlightenment philosophy merely because its original theorists held the wrong "identities"--despite the fact that that's clearly a gross misreading of the arguments actually being made. Criticisms of "identity politics" seriously overreach when they cease to criticise actual identitarian essentialism, reductionism, and deference where they appear, and instead complain that any challenge to their ideas and any mention of race, gender, or sexuality must automatically be identitarian reductionism. More than anything else this is a silencing move--they are uncomfortable with how loud "minorities" have gotten and would rather not bother to engage with any of the vast body of scholarship that analyses gender, race, sexuality, and disability through the lens of materialist or Marxist politics, or that traces the connections between race (and slavery, colonialism, land grabbing), gender, and class.

Returning to the idea that (racial, gendered, sexual) "identities" are parochial, while "class" is universal--Kelley continues:

The implications [of the arguments of the neo-Enlightenment Left] are frightening: the only people who can speak the language of universalism are white men [...] and women and colored people who have transcended or rejected the politics of identity. Moreover, they either don't understand or refuse to acknowledge that class is lived through race and gender. There is no universal class identity, just as there is no universal racial or gender or sexual identity. The idea that race, gender, and sexuality are particular whereas class is universal not only presumes that class struggle is some sort of race and gender-neutral terrain but takes for granted that movements focused on race, gender, or sexuality necessarily undermine class unity and, by definition, cannot be emancipatory for the whole.

Thus these critics presume that race and gender do not shape "universal" issues, assume that movements centering black women must only be of use to black women, ignore what "identity"-based movements have to teach them, and ignore the various ways in which these movements' goals, if accomplished, would benefit their more "universal" goals.

This situation--where only [heterosexual, abled, &c. &c.] white men are free of the odour of "identity" and so only they (and those who agree to attempt to approximate them) are able to lead "class-based" Leftist movements and articulate Leftist positions--seems remarkably similar to the situation that the C.R.C. was reacting to. Per Barbara Smith:

“By ‘identity politics,’ we meant simply this: we have a right as Black women in the nineteen-seventies to formulate our own political agendas. [...] We can obviously create a politics that is absolutely aligned with our own experiences as Black women—in other words, with our identities. That’s what we meant by ‘identity politics,’ that we have a right. And, trust me, very few people agreed that we did have that right in the nineteen-seventies. So we asserted it anyway.”

So many critics of identity politics reduced it to its crudest arguments, ignored it insights, failed to read the writings of its original prononents or only read them to misinterpret and smear them (it cannot be overstated how explicitly the C.R.C.'s statement disavows essentialism and parochialism in arguing that gender and race must be paid attention to to achieve class liberation--read the Kelley article for more on this), and seemed to assume that black feminists were somehow automatically incapable of being concerned with "universalist" or "humanist" concerns merely because they were black feminists (or, worse, black lesbian feminists). Ironically, it seems that these critics are allowing the racism baked into Enlightenment universalist humanism (wherein e.g. black people were outside the realm of the "universal" and "human")--racism which they deny exists or really matters--to poison their politics. (These critics also misunderstood or misrepresented the past--Kelley points to a long history of solidarity between Left and "identity-based" movements, even before 1970.)

These days, you're unlikely to find anyone professing "identity politics" as a part of their self-described political agenda--it's almost always a criticism levelled against someone else's politics, and it means something more like "identitarian essentialism." And the slurring of "identity politics" has not gotten any less racist since the 1990s, or any less based on "caricature, stereotypes, omissions," or "innuendo" (Kelley). Any person of colour who talks about race and class online likely knows what it's like to be accused of subscribing to "identity politics" (or, called an "ethnic nationalist," told they're "ignorant of" or "obviously new to" class analysis, &c. &c.) for the mere mention of race or gender in a leftist context, no matter how obviously grounded in materialist analysis.

Again, "identity politics" is a banner under which some identitarian or essentialist arguments did genuinely occur, and the phrase is still often used to describe tendencies that are legitimately harmful (no one is really arguing with this). And, to be clear, there is a distinction between people who offer legitimate and useful critiques of what they call "identity politics"--by which they mean identitarian deference or identitarian essentialism as they appear in liberal politics--and those who misrepresent the work of specific writers and activists, often black feminists, who used the term "identity politics" (Eric Hobsbawm and Todd Gitlin are sort of low-hanging fruit in this latter category).

The fact that the political landscape is changing such that being a professionally or politically élite member of a given marginalised "identity" group is becoming more possible, and such that it's more profitable (? or at least, possible) to emphasise one's marginalised "identities" when in such a position, means that identitarian reductionism (and criticisms of it using the language of "identity politics") aren't going away any time soon. Personally, I think it's far more specific, accurate, and useful to criticise "identitarian deference" or "identitarian reductionism" or "essentialism" or whatever it is that you actually mean at the time--it saves us from having to distinguish every time whether by "identity politics" we mean attention to how class is lived through race and gender (as the C.R.C. had used it), or a liberal co-optation of the same phrase in the name of multicultural pluralism (the type that e.g. Adolph Reed criticises). But, as with anything else, reading about it just requires sensitivity to discovering how the phrase is being used by a particular writer.

Readings:

Arguments against certain anti-idpol positions:

Robin D. G. Kelley, "Identity Politics and Class Struggle" (I really recommend reading the whole thing)

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, "Until Black Women Are Free, None of Us Will Be Free"

Mychal Denzel Smith, "What Liberals Get Wrong About Identity Politics"

Out of the Woods, "A Hostile Environment"

Mike Harman, "Identity Crisis: Leftist Anti-Wokeness is Bullshit" (responds to Adolph Reed's critiques of identity politics)

A post from @quoms circa 5 years ago on how anti-idpol arguments often themselves subscribe to idpol

Me (circa 5 years ago) on how (white) leftists use criticism of identity politics as an acceptable way to silence the concerns of people of colour, or to claim that we are uniquely ill-suited to analysing and articulating our own condition

Arguments against identitarian deference (though throughout the body of my text I kind of assumed we were up to speed on this):

Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò, "Being-in-the-Room Privilege: Elite Capture and Epistemic Difference"

"Who is Oakland"

Kenan Malik, "Not All Politics is Identity Politics" (makes the common argument that identity politics started out helpful and even necessary in the '60s, and later devolved such that "contemporary" identity politics, "in practice," are identity reductionist)

Salar Mohandesi, "Identity Crisis" (similarly argues that the C.R.C.'s insights came to be "exploited by those with politics diametrically opposed" to theirs)

Asad Haider, "White Purity" (attacks identitarian deference & the assumption of common viewpoint based on identity, considers "identity politics" to be a form of liberal multiculturalism)

See also

/tagged/identity politics

[trainingdummyrabbit]

ok your posts have got me so curious what is lobcorp and who is Angela I am dying to know

ohhhhhh anon. im so glad you asked. youve activated my infodump trap card. we are gonna be here a lilwhile, but i will try to keep it short regardless.

[inhale] lobcorp, also known as lobotomy corporation, is a multitasking monster-management game, part of a series of games from the producers Project Moon. it starts as a very simple "dystopian setting manage the monsters and sometimes employees die nbd" sort of game, but then rapidly, intensely spirals the more you play. its notoriously difficult but also ridiculously fun and satisfying to get correctly. you are expected to fail and retry multiple times, so much so that it is an active in-narrative plot point.

you play as the manager of L corp, named X, and angela is your Helpful AI Assistant here to help you make energy efficiently and be the best manager you can be. :] by making energy. nothing else. dont worry about it.

lobcorp as a game has absolutely Fantastic characters, and Doubly so in its sequel Library of Ruina. its a series that focuses on character growth, cycles of violence, autonomy, the definition of humanity and personhood... and just. so, so much more. its so full of The Horrors.

. this, of course, is the very basics of getting into the game. i am going to explain everything very vaguely and very messily. i'll spoilercut in case you're interested in looking spoilerless based off of this, (extra post abt it [here] if youd like to check it out yourself) but i will Try to keep it vague. i make no promises. youve asked me about my favorite character. that i have previously spent 6 hours straight explaining to a friend. you understand. here we go.

////

lobcorp takes place inside a monster-management facility... that is, in and of itself, a closed-off timeloop. in order to progress, certain events and interactions must happen in a very specific way for its ultimate goal to be realized. should something go wrong or a mistake occur, the loop resets to day 1, and you must do it all over again.

angela, your ai assistant, was built to be the perfect person to keep you, the manager, on-track for a plan of your own making. dont worry about it. she was built to be able to seamlessly and efficiently move things along-- the ability to feel emotion to be able to connect with employees and make crucial decisions, the ability to recall anything that has ever happened regardless of the loop, and the ability to perceive time much, much slower than a normal human to make judgements more efficiently.

she guides and supports you all the way up until the final leg of the journey, where... she simply doesnt show up again. she has done her job, and you no longer need her. you have a plan to finish, and an incalculably long time loop to finally close. everybodys suffering results in a happy ending, and everyone gets to rest. ^w^ yay yippee!

. just kidding. nothing is ever easy. angela, as a character, is seemingly set up to be a game mechanic and very little more, in the beginning. eventually, more comes up about her as the game progresses, and well...

...anyway imagine being built to be an imitation of somebody you are not in a broken individual's deepest throes of grief, and the minute you become conscious the guy you were built to love hates you simply because you exist-- because you are not the person he lost, because you're a shoddy imitation, mirroring everything he hates... that he made to be that way, in a cruel act of self-loathing. ok?

now imagine you're built to feel, built to remember, and then forced to guide a timeloop countless years long, forced to follow a script that makes you harm people you desperately want to protect and connect to, causing them to hate you. you remember every bit of harm you had to impose on them in painful detail. imagine doing all this so that your creator can come in and fix all of their problems after youve set the stage. ok?

now imagine you finally do everything right. you finally, finally help this guy to see his plan to fruition, and in the last steps of everything, when everyone comes together and finally starts to move towards their own endings... nobody looks back for you. nobody thinks to look to you, to look for you. because nobody thinks youre anything more than an object.

imagine all that, and once, finally, you start to Want. because of course, after holding everything up by yourself, you would want something more than to fade away wordlessly. of course, after all this mistreatment, you would want a future too. this story was set up so that everyone could grow and move forward-- except you. isnt that cruel? isnt that horrible? so, truly, who would really blame you for taking what you truly deserve? who could blame you for reaching for the same light they did? so what if it means you have to destroy everything you-- everything they worked for with your own hands. they can hate you all they want-- its no different from what it's been. you only have one goal now, and simply, it is to Live.

.

. Library of Ruina is the sequel to Lobotomy Corporation following a curious machine trying to become human. angela becomes one of two main characters, and the entire game functions as a dialogue on her growth as a character now that she finally has the autonomy to learn and change. she searches for the One True Book, something that will grant her humanity and the freedom to live, grow, and most importantly: forget.

along with the second primary character, roland, they learn more about the city and how it truly functions-- and also learn about themselves, And each other.

what do you do when you teach yourself all you can do is survive and look out for yourself-- when you finally open back up to the possibility of hope and connection, and everything is ripped out from under you yet again for circumstances out of your control? what do you do when you're a victim of a cycle of horrific deeds, crushed beneath the weight of people who couldn't care less about you, and your only hope of escaping alive is to pull down anyone else in your way?

what do you do when you finally free yourself from a seemingly endless gauntlet of suffering, finally grasping power youd never been able to have before, all in the name of finally, finally getting the vengeance and resolution you deserve? when you follow the path set in front of you, set by actions of people who came before you, spiralling endlessly into the distance? what do you do when this guise of distance and coldness you put up is rightfully challenged and you have no way of defending yourself-- when you have to question what if this "self" youve made of yourself is truly who you are... and if this path ahead is truly of your own choosing, or the making of someone whose influence you could never really shake off.

what does it mean to have autonomy when your life is never truly yours?

lobotomy corporation and library of ruina, aka: Who Wants To Be Part Of The Torture Nexus ? Try Now !

[horizon-verizon]

https://www.tumblr.com/miss-dollette/751777149185376256/wake-up-call-for-ballistic-team-black-and-rhaenyra?source=share lol

Lucky for me, I never thought that Rhaenyra was Daenerys or Daenerys-like. (my "Rhaenyra and Feminism" tag) I have said these things about these two:

Rhaenyra is not a feminist because no one can be at this time and feminism as a movement began in the 18th century under specific conditions of a particular philosophical movement and under specific economic conditions whereas Rhaenyra, Catelyn, Alysanne, even Daenerys all live in a completely different world, a medievalesque/"ancient" own.....does that mean we shouldn't care how any woman before the 18th century (or those in fiction who would exist out of a feminist-minded/included society) or who aren't full blown feminists do to try to gain autonomy for themselves or to help others altruistically? Misogyny still exists, and it existed "back then"; we need to understand these women and the contours of the sexist conditions under which they live which both helps us to define and trace sexism as well as understand and connect ourselves to these characters to understand oppressive structures' effect on individual who then go on to affect and respond to their oppressive societies. And thus, some women, because they are people too (novel idea) are going to be more selfish than others, and partly bc they have been subjected to this double standard and the socially-justified abuse done against them since young (Alicent-Rhaenyra, esp in the show with how fans kept saying "Alicent is queen, se can demand to see thr baby all she wants, Rhaenyra didn't have to go up there", ignoring the fact that Alicent is trying to humiliate her and she herself knows that she wouldn't like it if someone did the same to her when she birthed her kids; in the bk, she turns against Rhaenyra when R is about 9-10, after Aegon is born and Viserys kicks Otto out for protesting against his choice to keep Rhaenyra as his heir) So yeah, she became more self-focused.

but that doesn't give us license to blame things that were not her fault or her doing or came form people who existed way before she was born; ignore the fact that she loved her kids and vice versa; that she died by femicide and bc of systemic sexism against overt female rulership; that she is one of the only woman and one of the last woman who actually had more political power than her husband and chose him (Rhaenys was the other one who got to choose); that after her death and fall, magic in the world took another hit and the dragons that could have been used to fight against the Others was lost before Daenerys Targaryen reawakened them and gave a reboot to magic in general; [🖇rhaenin-time] that after Rhaenyra's fall, after the fall of one of the few women who a Targ male relative actively supported in away unlike most men of her society instead of just abusing, sidelining, and using up, most if not all other Targ women--who never able to choose their husbands--were not protected from Andal patriarchy and its licens eof spousal abuse because the dynasty itself has fully assimilated into Andal patriarchy with the loss

that fans discredit Rhaenyra's victimhood and problems stemming from sexism how they discredit Daenerys' past victimhood; and then they go on to say Dany wasn't a revolutionary figure bec she's a Targ and a child of incest and can ride "nukes" and profited off of slavery -- people will move goal posts to for their anti-woman agendas and the Dance is coming from and centered around that -- these two women are dehumanized both in-world and the fandom/real life because those do not like they are women who have both acquired power over men or "equal" to what men are granted/obtain for themselves

talked myself to death about how "bastard" is a legal and sociopolitical term that can be "fixed" or argued agianst, how only a King/Monarch could legitimize, how Viserys decided--with Corlys--to accept Rhaenyra's kids into his household and thus include in the line of succession, etc. etc.

Some Master Posts with a List of Links Where I have Argued for Rhaenyra & Why We Should Care about Her

POST

POST

POST [esp against Criston Cole and the Idea that Show!Rhaenyra was Predatory]

🖇la-pheacienne's words:

This is a story about how even the "realm's delight" could not be considered worthy enough to live compared to her rapist scum of a brother, because even the "realm's delight" will always be just a woman so she will always be inherently inferior to any man however pathetic or incompetent he may be. This is a story of tragic irony because it is a woman, and Rhaenyra's descendant specifically, that is currently bearing the Targaryen name, it is a woman reconstructing the Targaryen legacy, it is a woman that brought back the music of dragons, almost two centuries after Westeros would rather have them perish and destroy everything in their passing than allow a woman on the throne, the very dragons that are now meant to save Westeros from its impending doom. And this feels like justice to me. I'm sorry that some people are so blind in their contrarianism that they prefer to make up a bazillion nonsensical headcanons than acknowledge that this is the actual theme of this story.

PRIME POST

If no one wishes to read from those links I give here, that's really not on me. It's be ironic, too, if they took the time to read all of that OP's long post anon' links, though.

[incesthemes]

Happy Wincest Wednesday Ciel!!!!!

If you haven't already and have the time I was wondering what your answers were to 7 and 17.

I'm like almost 100% I know your answer to 7, I just like to hear you talk about why you like things honestly lol

i go to ice my hand and you immediately ask me to write essays, i see how it is. i guess i'll ice it later lmao

do you have a preference between wincest, weirdcest, or gencest?

WEIRDCEST!!!!!!!! i make no overt distinction between any of them because i am a spiteful man, but there is a delicious flavor in weirdcest that appeals to me specifically.

imo sam and dean are way too stupid to actually put hard labels on anything they feel for each other and especially on themselves, so the more "traditional" romantic understanding of their relationship isn't something that really speaks to me. i for sure think they have sex but i don't think they'd ever cross the mental gap between "i'm fucking my brother" and "i'm in a (non-familial) relationship with my brother" if you get what i mean.

on top of that it's just that the weirdness of their relationship is what speaks to me. i don't care about sex or romance much at all, so i'm way more focused on how completely insane they are about each other. and weirdcest offers a lens to take that weirdness to an extreme and zero in on it, to pick them apart and play with them in ways that i feel more align with my tastes in fiction—as in, i'm a huge fan of the gothic, and the gothic genre hinges on anxiety and uncertainty. the unspoken existence of something between these freaks is where i pitch my tent, so toppling over into overt romance sort of diminishes the effect for me tbh. there's no existential anxiety in domestic bliss, you see 😔

how do you see their soulmate relationship? any headcanons?

soulmatism 🤤 i love soulmates as a horror concept and i love the general vibe of horror that surrounds supernatural's soulmates as well. the abject lack of autonomy fits well with the themes of destiny and fate within the story, and it's incredibly fitting that sam and dean have been forced into yet another ugly mold by those fucking angels. not only destined to kill each other cain and abel style, but also to be desperately intertwined in ways they can never extricate themselves from. and because these are the two options presented to them from the very start of the show, the only two paths they can ever walk, it's just such a satisfying development to behold.

as for headcanons, i am extremely partial to dyed-red's soulmate meta and theory. it's a beautifully horrific concept to think about and it makes a lot of sense in the canon of the show, based on what we know and what the audience is told.

as for OTHER headcanons, here's something: dean has a perhaps uncanny ability to locate sam, because he "knows" him. i'd love to take that and apply it to soulmates—maybe people do have more success finding their soulmates wherever they are because they're just one single person in the end. and then on the flip side, when dean is a demon in season 10, sam can't find him because his soul has been corrupted unrecognizably. in the context of them being able to find each other in the past due to their connection, it adds another layer to sam's panic and extreme reactions 🥰

[djsherriff-responses]

I’m attempting an actual set up/timeline of sorts for Captain Laserhen and wanted to share what I’ve written down so far

I appreciate opinions and criticism if you’re comfortable reading about an au involving themes of Eugenics, unethical practices that go against people’s bodily autonomy and consent , male pregnancy, abuse and general fears regarding pregnancy, parenthood and how that can change someone

You see Eden, the big fans of eugenics that they are , don’t feel it’s enough to simply scan through their civilian population and hunt down those with “worthy” genetics for their various military programs: They want a way to manufacture super soldiers personally

Cloning seems like an obvious choice and cloning technology is something they have access to. But it takes so many resources just to create and maintain one clone through its development , never mind all the mutations and amount of failures that could happen during the cloning process, and then there’s the issue of this information getting out to the press and the controversy it’d cause

But most importantly, clones are essentially dolls with a conscious, and dolls don’t have any loyalty to their owners. Sure Eden is a master at brain washing and almost perfected the art of manipulating people. But Eden already has defectors and traitors despite their best efforts to maintain control of their own civilians , who’s to say what chaos would happen if mass produced clones became part of the equation?

No , it best to keep cloning to a strict minimum of a select few. A few rogue clones is much easier to deal with then an entire trained army of rogue clones

Eden realised it’s not enough to raise children to wield guns , their soldiers need a reason to remain loyal to Eden despite the horrors and abuse, a connection to keep them tied to the system even when doubt eats at them in the dead of night

And what greater ties is there than that of blood: A family

So Eden gave their male super soldiers a sort of “retirement protocol” where they essentially have an artificial womb (don’t ask me the specifics of this it’s sci fi horror nonsense) so that when those super soldiers (ideally) aged out of the military, they’d get pregnant and pop out a replacement to take their place

Or if a super soldier chose to become a traitorous terrorist, Eden will have leverage to bring them back into their arms

(Dolph in this au is cis and while the Eden army is dominantly cis, there’s likely issues a trans or genderqueer character would face from this situation that simply has not crossed my cis brain, just wanted to add this tidbit here since the set up is primarily focused on cis men going through this unethical treatment)

The specific reasons why this was done to male soldiers:

Women already have wombs and the capability to produce children, so it’d be pointless all things considered

There’s a larger amount of men in the army compared to women, so obviously Eden has gotta put their resources on getting *the men pregnant* replacements for those men ready

Men who are amab aren’t expected to ever fall pregnant and thus aren’t prepared for the turmoil and stress that comes with pregnancy the ways which women are. The men would be in a vulnerable position and would seek out help by any means necessary , plus be much easier to manipulate (either through use of their new found motherly instincts or their desire to be rid of this unexpected baby)

Most importantly,men do not have the means to have a natural birth. This is the most crucial part as the way Eden has done it, the men will have no choice but to seek medical attention to have a c section when the baby is due and thus even if that man does not want to return to Eden, Eden will still have the means to find him anyways

“But what about the press/public learning about this?!” Oh Eden already has an answer to that: Male pregnancies are a result of a strange effect of dimension X leaking into our universe and biologically impacting Eden’s male population(which is all the more reason it’s important to keep alien scum out!)

Basically, Eden blames the aliens. Because a vulnerable pregnant man is going to be far more willing to crawl back into the system that abused him if he believes aliens are the ones making him go through the horrific process of an unnatural pregnancy, instead of the truth that Eden has purposely done unethical practices on his body to keep him on a leash 

And Dolph is one of those men that Eden unethically gave with the ability to have babies, all without his knowledge or consent, yay!

Side note, normal children are 50:50 when it comes to inheriting their parents’ genetics. But super soldier babies actually take about 75 to 85% after their “mother” (again, Eden being huge fans of eugenics and not wanting to lose such valuable genes) so any children Dolph has, regardless of the other parent, will always take more after him

The timeline of this au diverges from the canon plot as of episode two , before Dolph walks in on Alex sleeping with Pagan (so anything that happened after that doesn’t happen, most notably Jade does not die). Instead of seeing the cigarette and finding his cheating boyfriend, the smell of the smoke makes Dolph vomit and team ghost are forced to abort mission. Though technically it’s been divergent from canon before episode one even happens

[archiveofkloss]

st. louis public radio: “Fashion icon Karlie Kloss emphasizes Missouri's role in national abortion rights fight” by Jason Rosenbaum

Webster Groves native Karlie Kloss took the modeling world by storm in the 2010s before launching a highly successful effort to connect young women with computer coding and, more recently, helping relaunch Life magazine.

On Monday, Kloss discussed another passion: her advocacy for abortion rights in Missouri and around the Midwest.

“I'm one of four daughters. I grew up here in the Midwest. My father is a physician. The idea of reproductive care was never political in my house,” Kloss said. “It's devastating to me the reality of what is happening and how it has become so politicized. Because to me, this is a conversation that belongs between an individual and their physician and an individual and their loved ones. To me, politicians should not be involved.”

Kloss helped gather signatures in Creve Coeur for the Missourians for Constitutional Freedom initiative, a measure that would legalize the procedure up to what’s known as fetal viability. That’s defined in the initiative as when medical professionals determine that a fetus could survive outside of the womb without extraordinary medical intervention.

Before Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022, Kloss started the Gateway Coalition, which provides financial and logistical assistance to small clinics that provide abortions throughout the Midwest. She said those facilities, particularly the ones in Illinois, have become havens for people in states like Missouri where most abortions are prohibited.

“What I really realized, especially once Roe fell, was about the fragmentation of care across this country, but specifically in the Midwest,” Kloss said. “I wanted to do whatever I could, and initially focused on Illinois of just the infrastructure that exists — the independent clinics, the clinics across Illinois who are really holding up the front line.”

She called the Missourians for Constitutional Freedom initiative “an opportunity to take it to the ballot box and actually have Missourians reinstall protections in our home state.”

“So you don't have to leave Missouri to receive just the vital care that I believe every woman deserves,” Kloss said.

Since rolling out the initiative at the beginning of the year, Missourians for Constitutional Freedom has raised more than $4.5 million in contributions of more than $5,000. That includes a $50,000 donation from Kloss.

She said that the initiative can find support with a wide range of voters — pointing specificallyto polling from SLU/YouGov that showed more than 20% of Republican respondents backed the initiative.

“They see this as a human issue,” Kloss said. “And also, the fact is that the trigger ban that went into effect had no exceptions, which to me is just unacceptable.”

Kloss was referring to how Missouri’s abortion ban that went into effect in June 2022 contained no exceptions for anyone who became pregnant due to rape or incest.

If organizers get roughly 171,000 signatures all over the state, the amendment legalizing abortion could go before voters in either August or November. It’s part of a trend in other states, including Arizona and Florida, of trying to use the initiative petition process to enshrine abortion rights.

Backers have until May 5 to turn in signatures.

Kloss said there’s a reason for people everywhere to care about what’s happening in Missouri and other states with strict abortion bans.

“To me this issue is about dignity,” Kloss said. “It's about respect and an individual's bodily autonomy to decide what is right for them in their life at whatever time they need to be making that choice. And so this ban, I believe, we have a chance to overturn.”

While in town Monday, Kloss participated in a ceremony officially naming a portion of Washington Avenue after her.

[saintlabrys]

Intact, a defense to unmodified body

Yesterday I was checking my emails, my newsletter subscriptions more specifically, and I found this cool article about this book "Intact, a defense to unmodified body", which was also an interview with the author, Clare Chambers. I personally didn't know her before that, but I think I'll buy the book sooner or later cause it intrigued me.

Here's an excerpt of her interview

“Our culture is constantly telling us that our bodies are never good enough,” she says. “Shame about our bodies is something we absorb from the media, from commercial interests, and from each other. Our choices are strongly shaped by our social context — [...] So what is the cost of [opting out]? The fact that we want to have a body that is a certain way, and the fact that we associate a body that doesn't fit into that model as being something shameful, and the fact that there exists a procedure available to change the body — those are all socially created facts. They don't come from our own internal autonomy. This isn't to say that people who choose these practices are somehow duped, or that they're irrational. It can be absolutely rational to choose to undergo a procedure that brings your body in line with dominant ideals of attractiveness.

She went on speaking about how women are particularly targeted by these social standards; they waste their time to adhere to a beauty standard that emphasizes youth, a period of a woman's life in which she's more vulnerable. Metaphorically speaking society wants us to be eternally young, naive and insecure. This way we are chained to a standard we're afraid to challenge, while wasting our time and resources in order to reach it.

"Under sexist social norms, women are valued for their looks, not for their achievements. It is idealizing the point in a woman's life when she is less experienced, less wise, less competent, less powerful. It also provides women with something constantly to be worried about, in the sense that the aging process is something that takes up a lot of our time, a lot of mental energy, and a lot of our actual material resources. [...] It's not a surprise that many of us would participate in these structures. It is also not a surprise that women, when so much of our value is connected to our appearance, find value in engaging in that activity. The question is, what is that ‘beauty’ embodying and what are the consequences of not conforming?

After reading this interview I read another one I found by googling the book, I'll leave the link down below, here's another interesting excerpt

I find the phrase “getting your body back” so fascinating, and so telling. [...] What’s so interesting is that the phrase isn’t something like “getting slimmer after pregnancy” but rather “getting your body back”, which implies that the body you find yourself with after birth is not really yours. [...] But why should the pre-pregnancy body be more truly yours than the post-pregnancy body? After all, the average woman lives with a post-pregnancy body for longer than she lived with a pre-pregnancy body. If the ‘real’ body is the post-pubescent, pre-pregnancy body, that’s a body that a woman might have for only ten or twenty years out of an average lifespan of over eighty. ‘Your’ body that you are supposed to get ‘back’ is a body that was only ever going to be a temporary one. So the language of “getting your body back” is another way of saying that our actual, existing, real-life bodies are wrong. They are not good enough. They need to be returned to some idea of how they ought to be. And how they ought to be, in this narrative, is slim, youthful, focused on looks rather than accomplishments. These are ideals of femininity that do not serve women well.

I hope I'll find the book as interesting as its premises, I'll keep you updated!

[snubulous]

chapter 379 overview

hold on to your butts, because this is going to be a long one.

major spoilers ahead.

I just want to open by saying that this is one of the best chapters we’ve been given in a while, and that there is a shit-ton of information to unpack from all of it.

We start off at central hospital, the one location of this battle where the fight has ended and now everyone is focused on getting treatment for the wounded.

There is emphasis on sheltering everyone from the coming storm, a ‘no man left behind’ sort of policy that represents changing views and attitudes that are in conflict with bnha’s society’s obsession with leaving behind the undesirables and hoping they go away. Remember that this is only the people at the hospital who now hold this view, meaning that society itself is a long ways away from changing-but these protesters may become a catalyst later on for greater change.

We get some Lady Nagant crumbs on how she became a part of this battle. Her connection with midoriya is what drives her right now, the only person who tried to reach out to her when she was having a moral dilemma.

How rock lock somehow has info on the state of the battle at U.A. despite the communication problems is beyond me, but because he isn’t very specific on how detailed that info really is I guess I can let it slide.

Rock lock saying here that the “battle has reached a point where we’re now relying on midoriya izuku” is honestly kind of heartbreaking. izuku shouldn’t be burdened with the fate of japan, but despite everyone’s best efforts they just couldn’t reach him when he needs it most - bakugo in his half dead state, monoma and aizawa being swarmed, mirio being unable to keep up. This might also be supposed to represent how the hero commission has placed too much emphasis on using hero students, still inexperienced teenagers, to lead the battle, and how the experienced pros have been forced to pick up the slack, only to fail.

For those of you who are confused like I was when I first saw this panel, the object in the black panel is supposed to be rippling water. A clear reference to the butterfly effect, how the past actions of hawks and midoriya is affecting Nagant now.

Shigaraki, or more likely afo here, recognizes that Nagant has shot him and loses his shit, screaming her name. the Shigafo connection becomes increasingly unstable. midoriya stops to steady himself for a moment. What I want to focus on here is the very tentative smile from midoriya, who had to hide his face earlier because he was unable to smile in the face of the situation. Is he feeling a little hopeful now? very likely.

This here is the start of the real highlight of this chapter.

afo loses his goddamn mind, screaming and hurling petty insults at shigaraki, calling him a piece of trash. Not only is he fed up with being unable to fully tame shigaraki, but he becomes desperate as his real body is now on borrowed time and he only has one last chance to somehow subdue shigaraki using his real body before he’s stuck inside of shigaraki for good.

to see shigaraki now saying that he recognized that he was just a pawn to afo is… shocking at first glance. Though it makes sense once you realize that afo and shigaraki have been sharing a body for over a month now, their minds closer than ever. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve been sharing memories, intentions, feelings… not to mention that when the merger first began, shigaraki voiced his anger at losing his autonomy right from the start. He wanted afo’s power, sure, but not at the cost of losing himself. Whenever shigaraki feels like he’s been wronged, he never takes it sitting down-he goes on the offensive. It is one of his defining character traits, and we see it play out again and again and again. For every blow that is dealt, he deals one in turn. He doesn’t care who it is, either.

Shigaraki would know that afo was smart, having been his mentee for most of his life, and that he would need to hide his “origin” from afo in order to successfully overpower him. So this “sudden” rebellion isn’t sudden at all, and has been coming for a long time now.

afo strangely enough uses videogame-speak to describe shigaraki’s body as “lagging”. is this just the translation or are you telling me that afo uses videogame slang too? horrifying.

Kurogiri rebels a direct order, valuing shigaraki above all else. If it wasn’t obvious before, kurogiri doesn’t give a damn about afo and instead bonded with shigaraki.

Shirakumo also seems to continue making brief appearances, still present but unable to break free. I can’t say for sure if one will win over the other, or if there will be a merger.

Shigaraki’s goal, which before was simply to destroy, changes into “to destroy everything that has to do with that house”. Shigaraki has finally obtained a clear goal and purpose, something obtainable that can drive him further.

the chapter ends with midoriya moving himself and shigaraki down to the ground, somewhere where they can fight without hurting others. Though i’d bet that the heroes still standing are going to find some way to butt in.

Overall a great chapter, very solid, still more to unpack that I probably missed. Waiting patiently for the next one.

[aronarchy]

“Why Don’t They Just Leave?”: Entrapment as the Context of Abuse

When faced with the stories of physical and sexual violence, manipulation, gaslighting, and coercion that survivors tell from their experiences within abusive relationships, many people’s first question frequently seems to be “why didn’t they just leave?” And, indeed, with a limited understanding of the overall context that forms abuse, victims remaining with their abusers seems unimaginable. After all, if someone walked up to you on the street and called you a worthless piece of garbage, or slapped you in the face, you would not be inclined to share their company any further, so why do abuse victims appear to accept horrific treatment time and time again without leaving?

At root of this question is a fundamental misunderstanding of abuse that we must correct before we explore any further. Abuse is not determined by individual instances of violence or toxic behavior, nor do individual instances of violence or toxic behavior automatically mean abuse. Abuse is not simply whenever someone insults you or treats you badly: it is a broader relational context that limits your ability to resist, challenge, or leave someone who treats you badly. Many people understand abuse as the more extreme, individual incidents of violent behavior they tend to hear more about, but it is, in reality, the context of entrapment, in which the victim’s agency and autonomy are reduced, constrained, and coopted in order to empower the abuser that forms an abusive relationship.

An abuser is not comparable to a stranger who walks up to you and insults you or slaps you in the face, even if their apparent behavior in a particular moment is the same, and the options available to you in the moment of your assault are not the same as the options available to an abuse victim. The stranger does not know you, has no means to compel you to remain for another slap, and has little power to control your reaction to them. The abuser knows their victim on an intimate level, often has buy-in and often even significant trust and rapport with their victim’s friends, family, and/or workplace. They know where they live, and may even live in the same place. They know their insecurities. They know their vulnerabilities and how to leverage them. They often do not start the relationship with a slap as the stranger did, but instead build (often at a rapid pace) connection and dependencies with their victim before slowly introducing more overt tactics of control that they then use the existence of prior moments of connection to excuse and justify.

In his book Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women In Personal Life, Evan Stark defines abuse not as individual incidents of violence, but as a system of coercive control more akin to prolonged attacks on liberty (like kidnapping and hostage taking) than it is to other incidents of physical assault: “The most important anomalous evidence indicates that violence in abusive relationships is ongoing rather than episodic, that its effects are cumulative rather than incident-specific, and that the harms it causes are more readily explained by these factors than by its severity” (13). The stories of abusive violence that emotionally rock you and lead you to ask “why would anyone stay after that?!” are certainly a feature of the abusive context, but as long as you remain focused only on them you will remain unable to find the answer to your question.

Put simply: not being able to leave an abusive relationship is a symptom of being in an abusive relationship, not its cause. An abuse victim is not continuing to experience abuse because they refuse to leave, the abuse is creating a context in which the victim unable to leave. There are various tactics, overt and covert, that can come together to create this context—emotional manipulation, physical intimidation, social isolation, financial control, control over children, control over housing, weaponization of the State (ex: threats to report an undocumented victim to ICE), etc.—and which ones are used frequently and which ones do not even play a role is unique to both the abuser and their victim. This is why understanding abuse as an overarching context of entrapment is vital to understanding the situation abuse victims find themselves captured within.

Additionally, it is important to recognize that not only is leaving an abuser an extremely difficult task (it takes, on average, 7 attempts for abuse victims to leave their abuser and remain separated from them) but it is also a highly dangerous one. Of abuse victims who are murdered by their partners, up to 75% of them are murdered at or after the moment they leave the relationship. Abusers seek to gain and maintain control over their victims, and when they see their victim attempting to escape that control, their response is frequently deadly. “Just leaving” is very rarely as simple, or as safe, as outside observers would like to believe.

Asking “if they’re being abused why don’t they just leave?” assumes that there is another reason, usually some personal failing, that causes the victim to stay in an abusive relationship, but the actual answer to that question is “they don’t leave because they are being abused.” Indeed, it may be far more productive to begin asking why the abuser doesn’t leave or allow their victims to leave, because the answer to that question has a much greater capacity to shed light on the abusive context as a whole.

The abuser doesn’t leave, or allow their victims to leave, because they are personally empowered by the abusive context. They mobilize all the resources and strategies at their disposal to maintain coercive control over their victims because doing so allows them to extract value for themselves (whether that value is emotional support, sexual satisfaction, domestic labor, or simply the gratification of having power over another person) from their victim at the expense of their victim’s autonomy. They use their intimate knowledge of their victim, outside cooperation of family, friends, and coworkers, whatever privileges given to them by larger social systems, and control over material resources to steal that victim’s agency.

Situations of abuse are situations of entrapment. Victims of abuse have their ability to act reduced, constrained, and coopted by their abuser. It is not a matter of choice, it is a matter of domination and control that is compounded by a larger system that both justifies it and supplies structures that make it possible.

Sources:

“DV Facts & Stats.” RESPOND Inc., https://www.respondinc.org/dv-facts-stats.

“Private Violence: Up to 75% of Abused Women Who Are Murdered Are Killed after They Leave Their Partners.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 20 Oct. 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/money/us-money-blog/2014/oct/20/domestic-private-violence-women-men-abuse-hbo-ray-rice.

Stark, Evan. Coercive Control: The Entrapment of Women in Personal Life. Oxford University Press, 2009.

[hellyeahscarleteen]

"The Internet can be a risky place. There are endless feeds filled with posts that contain graphic sexual and violent content, glamorize eating disorders, encourage self-harm or promote discriminatory and offensive diatribes. People often share too much personal information with a too-public audience that includes cyberbullies and strangers with ill intent. And they also risk losing time: by spending hours online, they might miss out on experiences and growth opportunities that can be found elsewhere. These problems are particularly acute for children and teenagers, and new laws that attempt to protect youth from the Internet’s negative effects have their own serious downsides. Scientific American spoke with experts about the best evidence-backed ways to actually keep kids safe online.

...

But these controversial policies aren’t the only way to promote online safety. Other legislative actions that are less focused on censorship, along with clear content guidelines and better social media design, could help. Plus, digital safety researchers and psychologists agree that getting families, schools and young people themselves involved would make a big difference in keeping kids safe.

Digital privacy legislation is one alternate policy path that might shift the online landscape for the better. “If people’s data is treated with respect in ways that are transparent and accountable, actually, it turns out a whole set of safety risks get mitigated,” says social psychologist Sonia Livingstone, who researches children and online media at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

A comprehensive data privacy bill could require social media companies to disclose when user data are being collected and sold—and to obtain consent first. This would help users make better choices for themselves, Livingstone says. Limiting the data that tech platforms amass and profit from could also help block the proliferation of algorithms that emphasize increasingly extreme content in order to hold social media users’ attention. Additionally, privacy legislation could ideally enable users to request the removal of content or data they no longer want online—potentially protecting kids (and everyone else) from their own short-term choices, Alvord says.

Beyond privacy, national guidelines for social media sites could help. Livingstone and Alvord suggest that a content rating system like those used for movies, TV shows and video games might help young people avoid inappropriate content—and allow families to set firmer boundaries. Design features that let users block others and limit the audience for specific posts allow kids and teens to take the reins of their own safety—which is critical, says Pamela Wisniewski, a Vanderbilt University computer scientist, who studies human-computer interaction and adolescent online safety.

Parental controls can be appropriate for younger kids, but teens need the chance to exercise autonomy online, Wisniewski says. Such freedom lets them engage in some of the Internet’s positive aspects: civic engagement opportunities, community and educational resources, identity exploration and connections beyond one’s own social bubble. To ensure these benefits are accessible to all, youth should be directly involved formulating regulations and safety strategies, Wisniewski adds. As part of her research, she holds workshops with teens to involve them in co-designing online safety interventions. Though this program, called Teenovate, is in the early stages, some ideas have already emerged from it. Among them: social platforms could provide “nudges” that would ask users to think twice before sharing personal data and prompt would-be bad actors to reconsider personal requests or bullying behavior."

[quietwingsinthesky]

(tags from @wounded-hands on my post about spn backing down from god as an abusive father. hope you don't mind me using this as a jumping off point.)

BUT YEAH! YEAH EXACTLY!

This (among other reasons) is exactly why I fully have not finished the Lucifer tv show, despite the fact that I loved the first few seasons so much. But those first few seasons were not pulling their punches about this fact! They looked you in the eye and went "Lucifer is severely fucked up because of what God did to him" and for a while, they didn't back down from that!

Whether I ever go back and watch the show again or not, I know that two scenes are always going to stick in my head forever. The scene of Chloe seeing the wing scars for the first time (we the audience know that the scars are self-inflicted (but given how he cut his wings off specifically to separate himself from God, it's still connected to his abuse) but Chloe assumes that his dad did that to him. And the way Lucifer reacts, immediately defensive and trying to get attention away from them...!!!), and the scene of Linda, prompted by Amenadiel, cornering Lucifer in a therapy session, telling him that God actually loved him. (And for me specifically, the very trans-coded subtext of that scene being that she's! She's literally deadnaming him! And he reacts Violently!!!! Before just fleeing!!!!)

Not to mention, later, the extreme distress he feels at the idea that his dad forced his wings back on him against his will, or how Chloe was literally created to fill a love interest role for him. Lucifer loses more and more autonomy as the show goes on, and it's almost like we're just meant to?? ignore that??? accept that he's not in control of what's happening to him and that his dad meddled with his life and love just because he'll be happy if he's with Chloe. (This is a horror story!!!!!!!!!!)

(His wings, if I remember correctly, turned out to be His Own Fault Actually. which. I think that was the turning point for when the show started placing the blame on Lucifer (for overreacting. for not shutting up and accepting these gifts. etc. etc.) rather than actually exploring God's role as an abusive father.)

(Sidenote here, I'm focusing on Lucifer, but this problem obviously began to affect Amenadiel, too, as the show went on. Like, he's clearly suffering under the weight of the same abuse + expectations of God in the earlier seasons, but. I'd probably have to rewatch the show to break down his part in it. Which I don't want to do. Because the show turned on me >:(. )

And then when God does show up on the show.

I can't even.

My problems with this can roughly be summed up in one scene. During that episode where God is following Lucifer around, and I can't remember exactly, they run into some people, and God starts reminiscing about the past. And he describes Lucifer's rebellion (the thing that got him thrown into Hell! the thing that has been a source of trauma for seasons! a very very serious fucking thing!) as Lucifer basically throwing a tantrum.

And this could be so good. This could be so good, if the show was using this moment to portray how God has twisted up the events, even to himself, to make all of this Lucifer's fault, to make it seem like Lucifer's trauma isn't actually that bad. But I really don't feel like that was the point of that moment. It felt like the show was siding with him. Telling us that Lucifer's issues with God weren't actually that bad. Should be forgiven and not thought of any longer.

The worst part is that this could have gotten even more interesting. Lucifer assumes the role of God and his first act as God? Cutting his brother's wings off and casting him into Hell. HE FELL INTO THE CYCLE!!!! HE DID THE THING!!!! HE BECAME HIS FATHER!!!!! but then the show just doesn't ever bring Michael up again and I guess we were supposed to cheer when Lucifer turned his vengeance on him and cast him down. (Despite us having multiple seasons before this and the whole point of the seasons after it being that punitive justice is Bad, Actually, and Lucifer shouldn't be Judge, Jury, and Executioner, for his sake and those he hurts.)

Sorry for rambling. I, uh. have a few issues with the Lucifer tv show.

(It's almost worse than Supernatural in my eyes for this reason. Supernatural's decline was slow and predictable. Lucifer veered right off a cliff into being so much worse and never recovered. It set up so many things and then backed down completely from all of them. At least Supernatural had the guts to go "Yeah, God's a dick, and we're going to beat the shit out of him", even if the weight of that had mostly gone by the time they did it.)

[stillfruit]

It takes me a long time to understand some things if they're not too obvious so I had a difficult time watching true detective a few years ago. Do you have any tips to rewatch it and maybe understand a little more? 👉👈

omg of course, i love to hear that you would want to rewatch true detective (applies to s1 only i haven't watched beyond that)!!

to base this a little, please don't worry over understanding and not understanding something too much. everyone thinks, experiences and processes media differently, and our understandings of what counts as 'understanding media' also differ (understanding in different contexts can mean an analytical understanding of the core themes identified through a specific framework, or an emotional reaction and a feeling of connection to the thing that's difficul to articulate, and so on and so forth). there's no universal objective level of 'understanding' and what you deem is enough for you is enough! being comfortable and confident enough to interpret things yourself while remaining receptive of other perspectives (including the perspectives of the story and its author) is what's most important in 'understanding' things. also secondly, not everything is for everyone and sometimes something just doesn't click because of that.

i'm not sure what aspects specifically you would want to understand more, but here are few things on how i approach the story:

there are overall themes i find interesting in true detective such as (toxic) masculinity (it's about men who are bad in specifc and systemic ways), narratives (internal as in how you construct yourself, like marty consistently justifying cheating on maggie; and external and institutional, like religion), power and autonomy (police and people with money have the power to do what they want), and existentialism (rust lacks overall meaning of why he is alive). they serve as lenses through which you interpret the story - kind of like picking an academic framework (theory) and looking at the data (story) through that.

there are many things that happen in the story and because s1 was so big back in 2014 there are numerous thinkpieces and video essays about it, all of them picking various aspects they see as central. because true detective is what it is (surface level edgy dudebro nihilist police man annihilates everyone around him by being so nihilist and cool show), some are very bad. i'm not that interested in the kind of analysis that looks super closely at the intertextual aspects of the story, for instance, or "the philosophy" of it (if that means looking at what rust says, taking that at face value, and connecting the story to existentialist philosophy based on that). just reflect on what interests you and see how the story looks and feels when examined through those perspectives.

a lot of the time i like looking at things through and by focusing on characters, and i think this is especially crucial when it comes to true detective (which is a heavily character driven story. sure it of course matters that they are police and that they are in louisiana and that there are murders etc but those things are not what the story is about). looking at a character contextualizes that character (what they say and do and represent) and rust is an excellent example of this. he talks in a cynical and pessimistic manner, looks down upon others, is very capable in terms of violence, is alienated and alienates other people, is obsessive, has issues with substance abuse, and his house is the definition of that one r/malelivingspace meme.

however, when you look at what he has been through and how he behaves (as well as how the narrative treats him) these things are contextualized not as 'behaviour you should look up to and which is good and correct from the perspective of the story, or at the very least is very cool and/or edgy, because he's the protagonist' (media analysis 101) but behavior of someone who struggles with ptsd, trauma and his own feelings of empathy in a world that has been very unkind to him since his childhood. when rust is saying things like 'time is a flat circle nothing can change' he's coping and trying to make himself believe it because he's incapable of processing, realizing, or externalizing any of the trauma he's been through or any of the care he feels in a healthy manner (which is quite explicit in, for example, how he empathizes so intensely with people who are dead). he's brilliant at rationalizing everything and it's terrible for him. the ways in which marty constantly lies to himself are quite explicit and rust is one of the people pointing them out, but rust is coping by creating his own narrative of his self and the reality all the same.

(better articulations of his character specifically are to be found eg here, here, and here)

so, maybe if i were to articulate the core thing for understanding true detective (or really any media) it would be looking at what happens on screen in the story in terms of actions and speech and then reflecting on how that relates to what's 'actually' going on, what kinds of things are being left unsaid, and why. there are various explicit examples of the theme of narratives and unreliable narrators as well that tell you that this is what's important (such as the interrogation narration of the ledoux confrontation and showing on screen what actually happened).

something i do when i watch or read media (that is engaging enough in a good or a bad sense to warrant this) is writing about it on my personal notes app (now obsidian so i can organize everything) in the same way i would talk about it to someone else. i also save interesting writings etc there so i remember and find them later, and write my own thoughts on those things there as well, having my own private discussion with them (which. is a lonely thing to do but shh).

few blogs who have written super interesting things about true detective which i highly recommend you check out (because seeing the perspectives of others is inherently one of the most enriching experiences and helps you understand so much) include @inkandcayenne and @sketiana. iirc there are some good video essays on youtube as well but i can't name any because it's been too many years since i watched any.

a central thing that makes true detective so meaningful to me personally is exactly the fact that many of the themes i care about in it are not super explicit or vocalized in obvious ways (saying 'i want to die because i'm sad' doesn't hit but describing death as a warm and welcoming substance does). i hope you have fun looking into where you find emotion and meaning <3

sorry this went a bit off track tldr have fun and be yourself, lmk how you feel about the story afterwards if you want!