#but realize that actually this is wrong this system just hurts ppl and you don't want to be part of it

[thornsent]

putting off watching wicked even tho I reaaaaally want to because I know I will ugly cry and my entire personality will shift out of sheer love for and vibing with elphie 3:

[anachrosims]

cw for thoughts on cycles of abuse. I'm ok, just a bit "what" at people rn.

Why do so many people want to put abuse survivors up on a pedestal when so few people actually want to do the legwork of helping those same people get the help they need? is it because the left leaning social sphere has a problem with using performative behavior for social currency? MAYBE! /s.

also, as an abuse survivor, and as someone who has gone through the mental healthcare system, I feel like people are way too "uwu" over how to actually help people who have been hurt by others. like. y'all do realize that sometimes, abuse survivors can go on to hurt other people, right? y'all do realize we should hold shitty behavior accountable, instead of waving away toxic bullshit because "OmG bUt ThEy WeRe HuRt uwu if u call out ppl abt abt abt abt their behavior then UR ATTAKING ABUSE VICTIMS UwU" like. fuck off, first of all.

second of all, being in pain is never, ever a good justification for turning that pain onto others. yes, trauma and learned behavior and emotional programming SHOULD be considered--that is a basic part of using empathy to examine the circumstances of others, their behavior, and gaining context to better grasp their point of view in order to rise above simply having our own emotional reaction to them. however, too often people never go beyond "tragic backstowwy uwu :(((((( don't attack the pwecious smol bean :((((( I'll doxx u if u do :((((("

protip: being a survivor doesn't absolve you of being held accountable for your actions.

protip 2: survivors who happen to also be toxic people often use their past circumstances to gaslight people into letting them get away with less than decent behavior. this is the perpetuation of the cycle of abuse.

protip 3: it is VITAL to try and understand the context in which a person exists, which is unfortunately, never easy. none of us will ever know any one person's complete story. still, you can and should temper your own responses to toxicity by using empathy.

protip 4: having empathy doesn't and shouldn't involve letting people who are being shitty get away with (figurative and/or literal??) murder.

protip 5: sometimes holding someone accountable by drawing healthy boundaries with them will yield....... really bad reactions. the thing is, if someone cannot respect your personal space/privacy/autonomy, you have every right to withdraw from them. they might screech about how hurtful/mean it is, and other people may try to gaslight you into sticking around/putting up with that shit... but they're wrong.

BEING IN PAIN DOES NOT GIVE YOU THE RIGHT TO PASS THAT PAIN ONTO OTHERS.

it's not fucking rocket science but with the lack of emotional consideration the average person seems to have, it seems like it is.

[seven-eleven-slushie]

Hey man, im sorry that post hurt your feelings. It's understandable to feel upset when you're on the receiving end of discrimination, I know white ppl are esp sensitive to it bc you aren't used to it. But that's also just the thing- like, you can be prejudiced against white people, but white people only benefit from the systemic oppression of racism. You will never experience racism. White is not a marginalized identity. So no, people hating on margo getting with miles (a rhetorical relationship thats not even a central part of the movie. It's weird that people feel so attacked by her to write callous posts for shipping them) is Not comparable to people disliking the actual relationship between gwen n miles. Also, snowbunny can mean white woman who fetishizes black men, and can Also mean white women who simply date black men. Regardless of whether she respects him. Sure its not a nice word, neither is bleach demon, but neither of those are slurs. Or bigotry. So suggest such is to be ignorant of the difference between bigotry and prejudice.

Thanks for taking the time to write all this and being nice. I apologize for the mistakes in the post. First i want to say that i'm not a white american (i'm all over the place genetics-wise, but mainly arab and blakan). Also, i absolutely understand that hating on Margo for being shipped with Miles is wrong and i agree. I was just mentioning the specific post that i think the anon is mentioning, which was just analyzing why Flowerbyte was very unlikely to happen, but i do think that specific post could have had nicer wording, now that i think about it. Regarding the use of 'snowbunny', i only knew the first meaning, so thanks for letting me know. I also didn't realize 'bigotry' wasn't the appropriate word to use in this situation, as i don't live in an english speaking country and it's not a word i have to use in context very often. I'll edit my post to make it more correct. I hope this all didn't sound too much like a Youtuber apology because that's not really my intention.

[bellamyblake]

HI! I've read some of your meta and headcanons and because I love them I have to ask, do you think Bellamy would've still been made bad even without Bob asking for time off? What are your thoughts on it? I saw you didn't chose the easy way out like most ppl and simply call him OOC but you understood some actions in a different way.

aw, hey! that's so kind, thanks for checking out my stuff. i haven't posted meta recently cause even when i have thoughts i don't always share them but debate about it in my mind so i wont be annoying.

the short answer to that is-yes. i absolutely think bellamy would've been made the villian of the story no matter what bob asked for.

i think the season 7 storyline absolutely copies the season 3 one where the same thing happened and i think that the path here was the same.

he would've gone through what he did in Etheria just like he went through everything he did in s3 A's episodes-something painful would've happened, he would've accepted the idea of transcendence and then after making a few mistakes in which I still think, no matter how much Bob had filmed, the other characters would've acted absolutely the same-

because guess what-

we've already seen in s3, absolutely the same thing.

so they would've still hated him the same way and blamed him for everything instead of reaching out to him. and then ultimately he would've seen things from within this broken system and realized Cadogan was wrong and this is bad and made the decision HIMSELF, then helped the others out, perhaps gotten hurt (like Levitt was in that finale episode, I remember i read somewhere it was supposed to be bellamy) and then ultimately maybe ended on the beach.

that's exactly what would've happened, i have about zero doubts about it cause as i said, we've seen it already.

the problem with bellamy was never that he was OOC. that is why i see things differently-it is the way the OTHER characters see him. or more specifially, how the writers write those characters seeing bellamy.

jroth has always admitted he had a hard time writing for bellamy. that his wife often asked him about it and questioned what he'll do with him and the thing is i dont think jroth always knew what to do and when he didn't, he opted for making him lean into his darker thoughts and trust his heart when he is hurt and alone otherwise making him bad because it was easier and because he knew bob wouldn't mind playing a bad guy as he had stated he liked that in earlier seasons.

the season 3 storyline follows the absolutely same path to the season 7 one (or the one it should've been had it been developed absolutely in the way jroth wanted it to be).

bellamy is a little lost and confused, he's trying to protect his family but then instead of doing things the right way, more death follows, so he decides to trust in to those who offer another option-PIke in s3 who speaks into his grief and absolutely into the guilt he feels.

the reason why pike wins bellamy over is because unlike Kane who keeps saying none of this was bellamy's fault, because he simply cannot read bellamy the right way and clarke isn't there, pike tells him the thoughts he falls asleep with every night-it's your fault, you killed those people, you didn't save gina.

a similar thing happens in s7-deucette and the others offer a way out. if we have to be honest with ourselves, clarke and bellamy's *doing better* never actually worked and especially not in s6.

bellamy is seeing more and more that the more he tries, the worse it gets, even when he's doing his best.

seeing his first sin-his mom, who was the death he didn't want to cause but did because he let his feeling show and wanted to make octavia happy, just speaks volums to him.

i also want to mention here that there are two more people who definitely play a role in his choice to trust what they're talking about here and that are Jasper and Monty.

Jasper because he saw there was no way out of their violent ways and opted to leave the world and Monty who too, separated himself from the clarke and bellamy world and decided to live a quiet albeit lonely life with harper because he realized that IS doing better or at least living better. partly both their reasons were selfish and ultimately don't help the entire group.

what deucette and cadogan offer, do. they safe everyone. that is what bellamy wants-to help them all, it was always his goal from the moment he adopted those kids on the ground. frankly, clarke lost that somewhere, but i dont think he ever did, especially not after season 4 when he spent all those years up on the ring with the others.

i dont find him OOC. i find the story shitty, yes, absolutely but i think and i will get yelled for that but that the City of Light storyline in all honesty wasn't at all that different from the lights and finding another form of eternal life-it was just underdeveloped and ofc jroth couldn't do something like CoL again in 7 as it already existed so he made it these weird beans of light.

do you know who the only character who never was invloved with CoL or that SL from the hundred was?

Bellamy.

Do you know why? Because I don't think Jroth knew how to do that at all. he had that chance here again, to try and indulge a SL where he could perhaps put bellamy into this world. the only problem was that he doesn't know how to write bellamy into a major storyline without making him a villain or making his actions a part of some redemption ark (e.g s2 and s4).

and in all honesty, the problem was never with bellamy. it was with clarke and everyone else. because the same thing that happened in s7 had already happened in s3.

no one, not a single soul, tried to undrestand what was happening with bellamy then. clarke argued but she wasn't there and didnt see him suffer-in fact she left him and said-they are your responsibility now, something he has lived for his entire life and now repeated for 48 kids he barely got there. octavia lashed out and just wanted to leave with lincoln, have her own life, miller, harper, kane, sinclair all worked against him without understanding him. kane preached the entire time how he's making a mistake but he never once tried to speak into what he feels the way pike smartly did. monty was somewhere in the middle, ultimately turned good.

in s7, clarke, o, raven and everyone else argue with bellamy. he tries to explain himself, tell them what he saw, how it all happened, that his mom was there, that he saw something. do you know what happens?

nothing. they bash him and tell him he's nuts.

let's see some examples of the opposite:

in s 2 ep 16 clarke says-I have no choice, I have to do this.

What does bellamy do?

he covers her hand and turns the lever with her.

in 3x16-she says i have to go into CoL after taking the chip.

what does bellamy say-I trust you.

in 4x01-she says ALIE said the radiation is coming for us all.

Bellamy said-we're looking into it, I trust her.

in 4x03 Clarke says-I don't deserve to live, not after everything.

Bellamy says-Yes you do and writes her name on the list.

in 4x13 Clarke says-I think I may be dying, mom had a vision of me dying.

Bellamy says-so what? You will be okay. AFTER SHE ALMOST SHOT HIM IN 4x11 MIGHT I REMIND YOU ALL.

the problem was never with bellamy. not in s7, not in any other season. yes he is flawed that is without saying, he did make mistakes, and that is why i love him and clarke and octavia because they make mistakes.

but don't let us make the same one-that the way he sees everyone else is the same they do because it isn't and never was.

and

that is the tragedy of bellamy blake.

[kirie-mitsuru]

First of all, I love Luo Binghe with every fiber of my being and I just want him loved so thoroughly that he can't, not even for a second, doubt that he is loved.

Which is why I need to know if Shen Qingqiu is explicitly banned by the system to tell anything to LBH? I read through the novel twice, but I don't remember this being a thing. I am too emotionally damaged by how traumatized my pure LBH is by everything SQQ did to him and them not talking about everything that happened between them at all even until the very end. Unless they did and I missed it??

By things, I mean:

1. Why LBH has to go through the Abyss

2. Why SQQ assumes LBH is the cause of everything going wrong to SQQ during Jin Lan arc

3. Why SQQ keeps rejecting LBH presence even after knowing tht LBH loves him as a lover

4. Why LBH lost all trust in SQQ after the many lies and rejection LBH went through

5. Why SQQ restrains his affection even when they are already a couple

6. Why SQQ still lets the rest of the sect and the human realm people bad mouth LBH despite knowing how wrong they are abt LBH

(Warning: The rest is just my word vomit on my frustration over their nonexistent communication and why I feel they need it, so don't read the rest if it bothers you! Read the tags before you read the rest at least.)

I love BingQiu only because I can't see LBH truly happy w anyone else and I know tht SQQ actually loves all of LBH, the good and the bad, throughout the novel. It's just his denial and so called God's POV blinding him from seeing LBH as himself instead of what SQQ expects from LBH.

It happened, I get it. Teen angst (from both of them, SQQ is in his early 20ies too), realization, character growth and all that, but it does not change the fact that probs ard 90% of LBH trauma is caused by SQQ.

Like being put, going through, and surviving this universe ver of Hell (which I think Shang QingHua glazed through w convenient time skip in PIDW?) because of and for SQQ. Watching the love of his life die in his arms for him and because of him (even though LBH is equally clueless on what even happened during Jinlan arc until he tortures the truth out of the Old Palace master)(and multiple times too). Believing that he is being hated and feared by the love of his life because of his genetics or gender, which he have 0 say on and painful coz no one else seems to care about gender for couples in the novel besides SQQ so how else would LBH translate tht as nothing but an excuse for SQQ to reject him.

Oh, of course, not forgetting Xin Mo, the mind corrupting OP sword that constantly tries to take control of LBH's mind, which SQQ was looking forward to for LBH to acquire to be OP despite knowing what it does to its user.

(Personally, the scene where LBH secretly watch SQQ, who just ordered him to go away, laugh and say nothing as everyone bad mouth LBH before agreeing to stay for these people after treating LBH like a shameful secret that he don't want anyone to know was the most painful betrayal SQQ had done. Because, at this point, SQQ knows LBH loves him and has been pursing him all these time instead of wishing SQQ harm, yet he never even try to clarify this to his sect siblings, laughing instead when they insult LBH. This scene hurts me so much because how can SQQ eff up so quickly after acknowledging that he had broke LBH's heart so so many times into thousands of pieces just a few minutes before. Does the realization mean nothing at all to SQQ? I hate SQQ a little bit here even tho I know he didn't mean anything and is just too lazy too correct these many ppl and hates confrontation. At least he knew he eff-ed up when he knew LBH was listening)

I get why SQQ does the thing he did which he does w the underlying intention of 'helping' LBH get all the good things he deserve (nevermind that SQQ's definition of best is never what LBH wants for himself) (a painfully perfect example of the path to hell is paved with good intentions), but LBH doesn't know and he deserve to know if only to help him overcome or minimize his trauma.

I'm also sad that the main reason SQQ misunderstood LBH so much and expects the worst out of LBH is not even because of what LBH did. It's mainly the result of him reading abt Luo Bingge, punishment from the system, and his own cowardice to stop denying the truth. The only part LBH eff up is the blood parasite torture in the water jail thing, his blackening to the point 'lets end the world so there is only me and shizun' (which technically is due to the myriad of trauma caused by SQQ) and the last dub con scene which technically is orchestrated by the system due to SQQ's choice... why don't SQQ even expect it tho, all of his choices via the system prompts always led to him seducing LBH or in compromising situation w LBH and its the deluxe scene smtg...

... Yet the ending is just SQQ declaring he will always go wherever LBH go from now on (which he broke soon after coz LBH has to go to the demon realm and SQQ stays in the sect in the extras, which led to Luo Bingge showing up). Also, the extra just shows LBH acting pitiful to get affection and attention from SQQ (which is sad that he needs to be like this to get affection from SQQ, especially when internally SQQ 100% wants to pamper and love LBH already), their abrupt and private marriage.

Please, if I miss any scene they actually talk about their issues, do enlighten me.

(If there is any fanfic of them actually communicating w SQQ acknowledging his mistakes outloud and comforting LBH, or of SQQ 100% spoiling LBH, or going balistic when LBH is hurt, or dead LBH -especially considering tht his halo means near 100% his death caused by some form of suicide- which leaves crazy SQQ suffering and regreting everything he did to LBH, tell me too! I may or may not love yandere-for-LBH SQQ hehe. .)

[patchdotexe]

So, I have a character who is a system, and I wanted to know before I develop them further, how does DID work, from a personal account? I really really really don't want to accidentally create yet another TOXIC misinterpretation of a real condition (because I know how horrible that can feel), and I hope I'm not saying anything wrong even now. (P.S. I love your blog, but I'm too shy to come off anon.)

hey anon!! it means a LOT to me that you sent this message :D theres a lot of really messy-bad potrayals of DID in the media so seeing people actually going to the effort of asking systems abt their experiences is really heartwarming for us. (plus the fact that ppl keep asking us in specific abt system stuff omg,,)

im gonna preface this by saying that, in the end, i can only really talk about my own experiences with full confidence. systems can work pretty differently from each other, but this is how we function and also some details ive noticed from system friends + general discussion over the years

so, to start off: Dissociative Identity Disorder is, at its core, your brain trying to respond to trauma in a pretty severe way. that being said there ARE systems that didnt experience severe trauma and still developed, and im not really sure about the mechanics behind that but i find it really cool and it totally exists. im gonna focus on trauma-based systems bc that’s our ~tragic backstory~ and also tends to be what most people opt for when creating system characters anyway, but the only real difference from what i can tell is, uh, a lack of trauma.

I HOPE YOU’RE READY FOR ME TO SAY THE WORD “TRAUMA” A WHOLE LOT JFC

(system friends are welcome to reblog with corrections or added info!!)

anyway. the way your brain responds to things is really weird. if something happens where you’re just, like, completely unable to handle it, like you dissociate yourself so hard because there’s no way you can manage this, your brain has a chance of going “uh… well, fuck, uh” and generating somebody who can manage it. or it might decide to be a dick and take all of the fucky internalized garbage and turn it into a person whose sole existence is to be an asshole. (they have the potential to get better, i think… ours didnt.) honestly theres a bunch of reasons and a bunch of “roles” that could lead to an alter/headmate* forming.

* we use the terms interchangeably depending on mood and whos fronting. i think its supposed to be “alter” is DID, “headmate” is implication that theyre non-traumatic? we like using “headmate” because it brings this fun mental image of us being a bunch of roommates constantly starting shit with each other and goofing off which is pretty accurate about 75% of the time

i keep getting distracted bc my cat is here. this is gonna be fun to go back and edit.

whatever the original situation is, you’re suddenly not alone in your own brain. and it’s REALLY WEIRD. communication was VERY hard. Icarus, our system original, used to do a very “cliche” thing of sharing a journal with their early headmates, where theyd write a sentence and then theyd write a reply (although back then they didnt realize that was a system-related thing and just thought they were having a fun conversation with their ocs. which… they were, just. Actually Talking.) they didnt have any inward perception of themself or their headmates either, so that kinda built up over time (with some help) along with the appearance of our headspace so that there was… actually a location for people to interact in. once they had a better awareness of things, mental communication got a bit easier– its sort of like background chatter really, when everybody’s awake. sometimes i get weird out of context things from Mae yelling at somebody, or sometimes ill be talking to a friend and someone’ll butt in.

when talking out loud, this usually leads to us suddenly stopping and then laughing or going “no!!!”. when on discord and around people who know who we are… well.

speaking of Mae, she’s pretty much my sister. not like… biologically? because i don’t think thats possible for me, but shes kinda literally my “other half” which ill get into later. headmates can have strong attachments to other alters! friends, best friends, family, dating, whatever. they can also do that with people outside the system, and itll be different for each headmate. there’s like 4 people dating Jorb but i just see him as one of my best friends. we’re people and we have complex social interactions that can get to be kind of a nightmare when you’re around a bunch of people who don’t know that you’re Not Leo and that youre suddenly not super up to existing around people in general.

plus even if like… so Jorb’s dating 4 of us like i said, but his relationship w/ each of them is different? Ica is very clingy and likes rambling to him, Summer’s pretty much just always happy to hang out, Mae makes fun of him a lot but in a loving way, and Leo is… kinda “all of the above” because that’s his gimmick. plus even tho a few other alters have a sibling-ish relationship with Mae like i do, usually its just me and Mae that do the “chaos siblings” bit.

the basic system.. thing… is that there’s “front”, which is being in control of the body– so, like, i’m currently fronting/in front, because im the one currently active and using our computer and staring at our cat.– and then theres the headspace, where everybody hangs out when theyre not in front. the headspace itself can differ in style & functionality for each system, and i think theres some systems that dont really have a location at all? but for us its like a full on location where we have individual rooms, places to visit if we get bored while away from front, etc.

theres also like, being at/near/away from front? so currently im in front, but Leo is pretty much always lurking nearby if he’s awake (we have individual sleep schedules that dont always sync up to the “irl” one, Trust is almost always sleeping), Ica’s somewhat in the back talking to Rookie so i cant really make out what theyre saying (its probably about either a youtube thing they both like or about a comic they want to do), and everyone else is either asleep (in which case they could be nearby but i cant currently “ping” them, so id have to actually take a sec to ground myself in headspace more) or in a different room. communication is easier if im in front and somebody is nearby, or it can be like with Ica rn where im like “well, theyre talking, but i have no idea what theyre saying and am making a guess based off their usual interactions”, or i could pass off front to go talk to Ica and come back (in which case my memory would be kind of vague and weird because information doesnt always properly translate), oooor i could actually go bug them while still in front. which.. im not gonna do rn bc then id get super distracted.

switching front differs between systems a lot! and even varies from day to day. like there are days where we wake up and we have absolutely no idea who we are bc we went to bed as one person and woke up as another. or we could be talking to somebody and then realize “wait, i stopped being Leo a bit ago, who am i”. or we could pass off front to somebody, like if Summer really wanted to front sie’d run up to me and let me know and we’d swap. or if something critical happens (usually a breakdown), Leo or one of the other headmates that’re more built to handle stressful situations will literally drag somebody out of front to make sure they dont hurt themself. or sometimes we throw front at people unexpectedly, like either mid-breakdown where we go “okay i dont wanna be here anymore, tag youre it” or sometimes because we think its funny because its the metaphysical equivalent of getting clonked in the head with a dodgeball, except the dodgeball is “being in control of our shared physical form”. usually mae’s the one that does that lmao

there’s a couple major categories of how alters come about. there’s “walk-ins”, where they kinda just… appear externally? like they just show up. sometimes we get a feeling of “huh. i think somebody might be here? or somebody might be showing up soon.” and have to rummage around for a while until they approach us or we find them. our walk-ins aren’t like, inherently aware of system stuff at first, so they usually get a crash course before they first front (if they choose to front at all) and it can be kinda entertaining. Rookie’s a walk-in! also Hiro, from a couple years ago. most of our walk-ins are fictives (fictional characters, usually appearing in response to us getting extremely attached to something or somebody) but a couple of our trauma splits are also fictives so that’s not like, a Rule or anything. i think these are mostly associated with non-traumatic systems but we get em fairly often so man idk

theres also… uh, i dunno what theyre actually called? we used to call them “constructs” but that sounds kind of mean. these alters exist to fill a specific role! and we usually dont talk about them on here with the exception of one major one, they just kinda hang out. Dhe exists to keep the system stable and manages the “backend” so to speak. Imp is kind of a mix of our intrusive & impulsive thoughts that came about from us trying to separate ourself from them so that we had an imaginary entity to go “nope!” at, which… stopped being imaginary, and is now a gremlin that lives in my brain. they can show up in response to trauma but arent split off of somebody, they kinda just pop into existence to help manage things.

the more… well-known, i guess? alter origin is “trauma splits”. rather than “just showing up one day with no real connection to the system origins”, trauma splits are formed when somebody in-system, uh, splits. it could be in response to a single situation or something built up over a long time, but somebody just kinda breaks and somebody new that has a bit of the original alter’s identity (if kinda influenced by the situation) shows up.

this can vary. All is a trauma split off of Leo himself, who got saddled with all of our brain hell about our ex and their insystem appearance is influenced more by eir than by leo which is… something they struggle with. Mae has a trauma split from a similar situation that is “Mae but from 2 years ago”, so basically her old identity before she reworked herself after getting put through total hell. and then uh… then there’s me and Mae! Icarus quite literally exploded into several people, with Pat (me) and Mae being the most distinct ones. we’re STILL finding out alters used to originally be a part of them that later evolved into their own people, like Summer and Toby. my identity is shaped pretty heavily not just by who Ica was at time of splitting, but also what they wanted to be jumbled together with trying to rationalize what was happening to them (they’re a pretty big fan of megaman star force, which has a media-typical system in it, so they leaned into hard “its like pat and rey from mmsf! i like pat, i wouldnt mind being like pat, its scary but im like one of my current favourite characters” and so i ended up being like, half-weird shapeshifter, half-green-haired prettyboy. and yeah thats where my name comes from!)

(Ica got put back together w/o anybody needing to integrate, which we were all very scared about, and it’s still kind of surreal to me because… me and Mae used to be able to stick ourself back together and thats how we found out about what happened to Ica in the first place? and we havent tried that since bc we have no idea what would happen. Ica 2: Ica Harder?)

despite their origins, trauma splits can be way more than… being a split. :V;; Toby’s not just a tiny splinter of Ica, he’s a quiet guy that gets stressed out and isn’t totally sure how to interact with people. i’ve existed for like 7 years at minimum and im a totally different person than i was when i thought i was still Ica, ‘cause ive had time to grow and change (and a problem Ica keeps running into now that theyre back is… they kinda Didn’t change because they were MIA for 6 years.) like everything else though this is variable– there can be “temporary” splits that dont develop properly and might get integrated back in, which has only happened to us when we were at the lowest point in our life where we were stuck constantly splitting to try and cope with whatever the hell was going on.

so Ica was gone for 6 years, which meant our system was without an original or main– there wasn’t anybody to be head of the system, basically. for a while i was operating under the assumption that i was Ica, so i filled in that role for a few years before i made the realization. eventually i kinda… stopped being able to, though, bc of stability issues, and then we were back to not really having a proper main anymore. to make up for it, we started going by Leo collectively and kinda… trying to pretend to be a single person? and so that ended up creating a construct to fill the role of “system main and the person we pretend to be when passing as singlet/not a system”: Leo himself! he’s kinda the most prominent traits we all have in common rolled into a single guy, which means that not only is he a pretty good system representative but we can also pretend to be him pretty easily (unless it’s someone like Toby who acts totally different). i dont know how common this situation is, i think normally it’s just “if system original is gone, another alter steps up” like originally happened to us before i had a severe case of problems disorder.

uhhh this is very rambley bc there’s a Lot to cover and now im trying to figure out how much of it i HAVE covered. systems are complicated and weird! OH WAIT okay i have one last bit.

so like, for us, first realizing we were a system was total hell. we fought a lot. as more alters showed up through various means, there were times where Ica felt like they were completely out of control of their own life bc of having to manage everything. there were a lot of panic attacks of people fronting and not being sure they were even REAL, despite… being in front. but we still felt like we were deluding ourself. this was in, like, late 2011, so systems weren’t a THING. they were a very fringe community that everyone hated. we got constantly harassed, which only fed into Ica’s panic hell and our identity issues. interpersonal relationships became a nightmare, especially because we have BPD as well which varies in severity for each of us but… for me it’s pretty bad! there were times early on where every day was another fun new breakdown from us arguing with each other or our friends or not being understood or… etc.

so… how are we holding up ~7 and a half years later? pretty well, actually! we talk to each other. we do things for each other, like buy food or games we know specific headmates like. Ica is back and way happier than they were in 2011, and is thrilled to get to hang out with everybody that’s showed up since. we help each other through problems, because at the end of the day our system ended up being a support network. Ica couldnt function on their own, so we’re like… 10+ people working together to try and be a single functional person. and we feel pretty okay with that! we still fight, and we still start shit, but we’re not in constant crisis anymore. we’re still working through all of our trauma, especially the more “recent” stuff that kinda broke our system for a while until we were able to start rebuilding, but we’re doing it together. :D

so… yeah, it can start out as a stereotypical “nightmare system”, with constant infighting and toxicity and self-sabotage and etc. but we worked through it! it took a while, but we’re overall more stable than we were before. we got out of the bad environment that was fucking us up, we got mental help for our other brain hell (we havent been able to bring up the system to our therapists bc its literally a non-issue now and we focus more on other things like our depression, anxiety, PTSD, etc), we found people that support us for being us, and we were able to like… figure things out. and it was a mess! i still have issues about my own identity because of literally thinking i was someone else for two years. Ica’s still trying to figure out how to adjust to things, especially bc they missed our entire “cringe culture” phase so they came back to find that i’d dismantled a lot of their middle-school settings. and, uh, some of their friendships as well.

systems are fuckin weird

[scourgethewhorehog]

long post abt social spaces specifically online and offline, unrelated to any recent events so don't put words in my mouth it just is part of me reflecting on trauma shit+ journaling + understanding why i lacked boundaries for so long and trying to sympathize with why other people may Also lack boundaries even if it doesnt , excuse certain shit

man does anyone else realize that condemning people as evil or dismissing them or insisting they are inherently bad to continue existence in a way they feel doesnt align to their worldview for things that dont actually cause harm on other people and are actually decent outlets to redirect traumatic experiences n passing judgement on them to the point theyre isolated to an incredibly small group of people to seek acceptance actually makes everyone worse off

and makes people question themselves and their morals to the point they eventually give up on trying to be a good person and actual bad people use this to infiltrate these groups of rejected traumatized people because of this us vs them mentality that comes from being rejected by wider society both by virtue of a lot of these ppl experiencing irl oppression 98% of the time and also have to deal from rejection even from any support group they may have to help them deal with very real life issues because everyone is inventing online problems and reasons to ostracize people more for like what for power for feeling like theyre better themselves in the face of all they also face in real life...

anyways this is just me thinking of how many people i see from a distance that have so much common ground with me and otherwise would be fine to be around but would hate me for being like a dirty evil queer with the kind of autism that isnt cute enough for tiktok who doesnt understand social cues or having the wrong kind of system or too bizarre of an identity as it is so when someone who comes along that checks so many of the boxes of just at least not fucking hating you you put up with So much shit. and thats what lead to like half of the abusive close relationships we've been in babey!

and when you talk to people outside of these circles, trying to get away from all the people who hurt you in them, there is subtle victim blaming, recovery spaces admonish you for having been in these spaces in the first place, insisting if you hadnt been who youve been you wouldnt be around these Inherently Bad people....

it doesnt help that in real life we did Everything right to not be the Bad Child, never dyed our hair until recently when we had enough, and never spoke out and paid all our bills on time and most gay people are disgusting perverts but youre quiet enough and never come out to your parents friends and never are too loud about it even if youre dying inside and want to cry when you have to say your partner is just your friend whose coming over because its a death sentence, god forbid we get into gender because even if we're trans in the end its just some sort of dykefag anyways and nothing gets acknowledged except the same imagined scenario of like. being a dirty depraved sex pervert even if you struggle to touch other people and are terrified to tell anyone about that.

being an assumed danger to other people no matter how harmless you are sucks. its like, i come online to all these people where, at surface level expression, maybe would like me, because physically everyone near me wouldn't if i was half honest, but i'm still too much for them too now and i'm left feeling exactly like i do day to day. the internet isn't really escapism anymore its the same shit with a new coat of paint. i go through life thinking these people are good people and would be cool in any other circumstance, and i wish them the best, but the minute i am me i am a problem and something is wrong and all the kindness and good will they have and their favorite dessert and birthday and the things i recognize of them and love and care about wont matter anymore because i stopped being a person to them, and it happens to me online now too! and that sort of blows but at least i actually have real friends now who are like family and ill count my blessings on that.

[g0dtier]

sth that really pisses me off - which ppl on here simply don't acknowledge- is that Dada has such a deep-rooted connection to anti-capitalism, anti-bourgeois movements, it's highly critical of society and popular aesthetics. Dada was a movement that was highly political and critical of society the classic art scene. These "shitposts" aren't just random 20th century memes, they were created in the context of a movement against modern society&economic systems that - to them - created WWI.

YEP. ok i cant believe im writing this entire essay on Dada vs. Memes or that this essay even NEEDS TO BE WRITTEN i cant believe people are actively comparing memes to fucking dada art i just cant but

i wasnt gonna go into that, bc it also reflects on like..the problem i have with todays activism, but taking dada away from its political roots makes sure youre left with nothing

honestly, comparing dada to memes already makes sure you’ve basically killed dada because dada was so against the goddamn popculture shit and memes are solely based on popculture. theyre two entirely different things.

theyre both products of their time, and it shows. dada was an action against capitalism and the oppressors, it was activism, while memes (im gonna reach very very far here and fucking…….art critique memes) are “born” out of the hopelessness (i guess, ugh it hurts for me to talk about this) young people feel against this system. dada was an active fight while memes are more and more nihilistic and “who gives a shit right??? lmao give in” and the two are obviously different

when people compare dada to memes they often act like dada was “a shitpost because they felt hopeless about the future”, which literally couldnt be more wrong. after WWI artists were anything BUT hopeless. they’d seen what people could do and strove to better the world. the hopelessness people are referring to didnt happen till that bettering of the world failed (after WWII), where it grew and is still growing today.

you can see it in activism today too. most of it is done the easy way, and internet activism is a goddamn joke. we all live in a bubble, the algorithms make sure of that, like 85% of left wing people are liberals and not comfortable with the idea that the people they come into contact with is calculated by computer being bad, and 99% of the so-called activists today describe activism as writing and angry article or blog post, which is only gonna be seen by the people who already agree with you anyway.

as much as i hate the “millenials amirite” shit, there IS a problem with our activism. and when i ask people about it, they theorize about “ohhh its because we dont think its gonna work anyway”, “idk im kinda tired of politics” and “it doesnt matter anyway”. when it comes to activism for the current left, just “realizing that things are bad” is enough, but actively protesting against it isnt done because its easier to click reblog on a tumblr post and feel like you made a change in the world when you really, really havent.

i see it in my own country more and more, a while ago someone bitched about how students and millenials were lazy, people actively made a facebook event about protesting against it, like 30k people were gonna be there, and there were less than 1000 people on the day itself. everyone else was sleeping in bed.

theorizing about why this hopelessness and lack of trying to change things is here is fine, but if it ends at that youre basically giving up, and thats exactly the opposite of what Dada is, but it IS EXACTLY what the new nihilistic meme trend is about.

i cant believe i went in this deep on memes, but yeah, people on tumblr acting like memes are some radical form of art activism are fucking ridiculous and know nothing about the history of activism or dada. or art. just, theyre people who like to imagine themselves as the activists of our time and because they dont wanna actually go out and be activists, they find some dumbass fake connection between memes and art and pretend that memes are somehow a way of fighting the system.

i cant believe im going this hard into memes = dada tbh but i also cant believe so many people UNIRONICALLY buy into the idea 

[cerullos]

You don't have to answer. Reading the responses to that reblog about ace struggles made me really sad. The way you talk about the ace thing in general makes me sad. And I really like you, actually. I know some in the ace community are homophobic fucks. And a lot of ppl in the gay community are transphobic. And a lot of trans people are biphobic. And a lot of bi people are sexist. Ad infinitum. This doesn't have to be the oppression olympics. Intersectionality is the only way out of this mess.

And it’s true. Ace people have not faced systemic oppression. It’s hard to systemically oppress someone when you systemically refuse to acknowledge their existence. Is that as bad as being electrocuted? No. But is that the point here? Why say that? Why amplify that kind of divisive message? We just want to belong somewhere. You can believe this or not, but we’re dying here. The LGBT community has been the only safe place I’ve known my entire life. To figure out years later that I was labeling..

myself wrong? It was the most terrifying feeling I’ve ever experienced. It still is. It’s like we don’t exist. One person was shitting on people who say they’re ‘gay ace’. Why? Can’t I still fall in love with women, despite not experiencing sexual attraction? Don’t you think I would rather enjoy sex with my partner? Being able to give her what she needs? Not being left again and again? Loneliness is a very real pain. And gay ace people exist. I exist. And let me tell you, we’re lonely as fuck.

Straight people see us simply as gay, and treat us that way. So we’re getting electrocuted too. Sexual, gay people tell us we’re ‘cis/het’ liars trying to steal their community. So we have no safe space. We can’t find partners. Our friends, family, and fellow LGBT ppl don’t understand us or even believe in our existence. We are constantly questioning out own existence. I don’t mean to flood you. I realize that’s what I’m doing. But I’ve seen this kind of post coming from your direction a few…

times now. And I feel like maybe this will make you think a bit about what it might feel like to not ever experience the thing EVERYBODY is talking about. Building their lives around. To feel like your broken. Like you’re gonna die alone. Being constantly told you’re not real, your feelings aren’t valid, your struggle is silly. You’ve got a lot of followers. And being ace has made me full on suicidal in the past. So just. Think about it. Gay ace is a real thing. Can you see how you might have…

privilege over a person like that? everyone in my life sees me as gay. I fall in love with women. and yet here we are. can’t you see how I might want to be in your shoes? At least you’re real. At least you have a community. At least you have *some* representation that rings true to your experience. At least you could get a girlfriend that loves you and build a life without either getting dumped for not putting out or subjecting yourself to sex when your body doesn’t want it.

Anyways. I’m not writing this because I want you to answer anything. I’m just hoping you’ll read it and think about it a bit, maybe. If you have, thank you. I really like you Christine. Not trying to be a bitch. But I doubt I’m the only one whose feelings get hurt when you amplify the ‘ace people are cis/hets trying to crash the LGBT community’ noise. - With love in my heart, from a long time follower.

okay, this is long but i’m going to try to keep my answers as succinct as possible. i don’t know if this was your intention, but elements of this message feel vaguely guilt-tripping, despite the fact that none of what you’ve mentioned here presents an argument i haven’t already seen and strongly disagreed with.

“ I know some in the ace community are homophobic fucks. a lot of ppl in the gay community are transphobic. And a lot of trans people are biphobic. And a lot of bi people are sexist […] This doesn’t have to be the oppression olympics. ”

two things: one, you’re referring to lateral aggression in every instance but the first. what i mean by lateral aggression is that it occurs between two people–within the same community–who experience oppression along different axes (e.g. a straight trans person and a cis gay person). in contrast, a cis straight ace man who engages in homophobia and/or transphobia is not “laterally aggressing” his victim, he’s oppressing them. the reason LGBT people have become so vocal against inclusion of cis straight aces is because their oppressors are now gaining entrance to their exclusive spaces, and speaking over them. and whereas a lesbian can voice her discomfort with this on tumblr, she’s forced to stay silent at her local GSA for her own safety.

two, this isn’t an issue of a “handful” of violently homophobic people in the ace community. the founder of aven–david jay–was a homophobic white cishet man, and the platform on which he built his activism was homophobic. moreover, oppression against (straight, cis) ace people is not enforceable, because who is and isn’t ace depends entirely on the decision to identify as such! there are (as the ace community has been told many, many times) plenty of LGBT people (if not most) who have a complicated relationship with sex and sexual attraction due to abuse/assault, compulsive heterosexuality, dysmorphia, etc. none of these people can be considered “allosexual,” even if they (for perfectly valid reasons) decline to share this information publicly! these people deal with many of the same issues you’ve mentioned here (e.g. choosing between getting dumped or engaging in sexual acts when they would rather not), although they would likely attribute this to homophobia, misogyny and rape culture, not aphobia.

also: the “oppression olympics” is nonsensical and offensive and i wish y’all would stop passing that term around. yes, the LGBT community’s history is absolutely rooted in oppression of same-gender attracted and trans individuals! and yes, the community exists to actively oppose legislation that exists to oppress them, and to provide resources for those affected. the community was not founded in order to provide comfort to people who feel outcast from society for [x] reason. when you make this claim (or when you sarcastically liken the community to an exclusive “club” one gains entrance to by virtue of being oppressed) you miss the point entirely. it’s watering down the mission statement and end goal of this community, plain and simple.

“And it’s true. Ace people have not faced systemic oppression. It’s hard to systemically oppress someone when you systemically refuse to acknowledge their existence.”

i find this argument (which is repeated often) to be ridiculous when the LGBT community has years of coherent history, and AVEN (and the popularization of identifying as asexual in the first place) has only gained prominence within the last decade or so. on top of that, as any oppressed individual will tell you, (and, again, something that has been repeated very often and rarely acknowledged) hypervisibility is dangerous to the oppressed! black and latinx trans women and gay men are the most endangered members of the LGBT community because it is impossible for them to “hide” themselves.

this alone should make it clear to you that what the LGBT community want and what the ace community want are two very different things–so what exactly would their shared goal in activism be? what purpose would expanding the community to include straight cis aces serve other than comforting individuals who resent being excluded? LGBT people may share the ace community’s desire for representation in media, but visibility–within the context of their everyday lives–is exactly what’s getting them killed. the pulse shooting is obviously the most recent example of this, but it’s one of many.

“One person was shitting on people who say they’re ‘gay ace’. Why? Can’t I still fall in love with women, despite not experiencing sexual attraction? Don’t you think I would rather enjoy sex with my partner? Being able to give her what she needs? Not being left again and again? Loneliness is a very real pain. And gay ace people exist. I exist. And let me tell you, we’re lonely as fuck.”

you’re introducing a very different argument here, and one i obviously don’t agree with. if you’re a gay ace, you belong in the LGBT community. i’m sorry you’ve been told otherwise. but if this entire passage (and the several paragraphs following it) are meant to convince me of this, i don’t know what to tell you? i’ve said before that–based on my history and  relationship with sex and sexual attraction–i could easily identify as an ace lesbian. i don’t, for some of the reasons listed above, and personal reasons of my own–and i don’t benefit from failing to identify as ace in any material way.

“And I feel like maybe this will make you think a bit about what it might feel like to not ever experience the thing EVERYBODY is talking about. Building their lives around. To feel like your broken. Like you’re gonna die alone. Being constantly told you’re not real, your feelings aren’t valid, your struggle is silly.”

i’m genuinely sorry you’re feeling this way, but again, if you think this is an experience LGBT people (ace or otherwise) don’t share, then i’m not the one turning a blind eye here.

“At least you’re real. At least you have a community. At least you have *some* representation that rings true to your experience. At least you could get a girlfriend that loves you and build a life without either getting dumped for not putting out or subjecting yourself to sex when your body doesn’t want it.”

you need to consider that you are making assumptions about what i want from a relationship based on the fact that i don’t publicly identify as ace. this is another thing we’ve been repeating constantly: you cannot do that, and therein lies one of the issues with asexuality as a framework for oppression. also, even on the off chance that i had a perfectly healthy relationship with and desire for sex (which–as i’ve said–very few people in the LGBT community do) none of us can just “get a girlfriend.” to suggest it’s more difficult for ace people is ridiculous when LGBT people have had to resort to dating apps and LGBT-exclusive spaces in order to find people to date in the first place. and before you say that similar spaces don’t exist for aces: they need to be built, just like ours were. the onus is on adult aces, not “allo” LGBT people.  

and, again, what an ace person would potentially want from an ace-exclusive space is not what an LGBT person (provably, historically) would want from an LGBT-exclusive space. ace condemnation of sex and sexuality is valid at the individual level, but it can be suffocating (and, yes–oppressive) to LGBT people who have fought long and hard to take pride in their sexuality. telling LGBT people that their love and “PDA” is “dirty” and “impure” is nothing new or progressive, it’s textbook homophobia, and those attitudes are damaging to us.

“Anyways. I’m not writing this because I want you to answer anything. I’m just hoping you’ll read it and think about it a bit, maybe. If you have, thank you. I really like you Christine. Not trying to be a bitch. But I doubt I’m the only one whose feelings get hurt when you amplify the ‘ace people are cis/hets trying to crash the LGBT community’ noise. - With love in my heart, from a long time follower.”

look…i hate to tell you this because i don’t think you mean any harm, and i’m not trying to attack you–but, as i think i said earlier, none of the arguments you’ve presented here are new to me. these are arguments that have been addressed and derailed by LGBT people (many of them ace themselves) multiple times, to no end. what you’ve mentioned here highlights an important point, and that’s “hurt feelings.” those are the stakes for straight cis aces–those are not the stakes for LGBT people (and i include LGBT aces in this statement). but i haven’t “learned” anything from these messages–i’ve never plugged my ears and ignored the arguments of straight cis aces, i’ve listened to them very carefully. and they’ve informed my opinion on this matter–an opinion that hasn’t changed and will not change. if that’s upsetting to you, you can unfollow–i won’t hold it against you!