#does he accept them as part of himself

[dykedvonte]

You ever just see a Mouthwashing take that makes you want to bang your head into a wall? I literally just saw someone claim Curly couldn't have been emotionally abused by Jimmy before the crash because he was in a higher position of power than Jimmy.

-Shrimp Anon

The mouthwashing fandom has shown me that people genuinely do believe that certain types of abuse are not as detrimental as other types especially when they deem those immune/resistant, ergo, believing one is objectively worse no matter how it affects the person nor the intersections of power, history and dynamics at play.

Get ready cause this is a yap session:

Cause like it's heavily implied that Curly and Jimmy's friendship was toxic and abusive, pointedly in the direction of how Jimmy uses Curly's belief/comfort in him. Curly wasn't forced to enable Jimmy but he was emotional and mentally on edge around him in almost every scene in some way. Mental and emotional abuse are not contingent on what positions you have at work. Yeah, he's Jimmy's boss but he was Jimmy's friend first and it's like getting into Psych discussion to talk about how social power tends to overshadow any perceived organizational power in the human mind. People are concerned about their jobs ofc but they tend to hang onto and put more value/investment into their personal relationships, hence why there tends to be laws and restrictions around mixing the two.

I always see the sentiments that "Curly is a grown ass man", "Curly is bigger than Jimmy", "Curly is Jimmy's boss", "He just needed a backbone" as criticisms of Curly and while I do agree that on the surface level all of these to be true and viable ways Curly could've taken more control of the situation, I often look at the parallels of Anya and Curly as victims of Jimmy pre/post crash.

The way Jimmy talks to Anya post crash is how he talked to Curly in the pre-crash segments. It's hard to pin-point mainly because we know he hates and wants nothing to do with Anya compared to his contrary but similarly handled obsessions with Curly. It's a weird sort of "honey-moon" effect of abuse Jimmy does in terms of emotional and mental victimization. He is always horrid to Anya, always talking down or questioning her abilities and thoughts in a situation, this of course includes the harassment and assault. However, he has a moment of attempted gentleness/conditioning when he question her about the mouthwash when she's contemplating drinking it at the table. The key difference is he has no personal investment in Jimmy outside wanting nothing to do with him, meaning there is no sort of romanticized version of him that he can condition her off of. He knows this, hence, why he always reverts to trying to make her to scared to oppose him.

This sort of give and take of "kindness" doesn't work on her because she knows he is just doing it to take more from her than whatever he could possibly give but it reflects even the "softer" scenes between him and Curly where he always rewords or rephrases Curly's sentiments and concerns to sound more shallow. He is feigning a deeper understanding by reworking Curly's emotions into something bad and needing to be hidden. Everything is laced with envy and resentment, an outburst just around the corner, I mean he even slams the table in the birthday party scene, a tactic in emotional manipulation to set the victim on edge and cloud their ability to respond. Even if Curly knows Jimmy won't get physical in that moment, the physical actions is intended to make him back down in the confrontation in case it does. This is something that is just not person specific. It ingrains itself into how you interact with the world and life and it shows in major and minor ways with Curly.

Post-crash, the abusive nature is more in tandem to the physical victimization Anya went through and the stripping of voice and autonomy we see take place. Like the parasite in HFIM, Jimmy speaks for Curly most of the time and puts words in his mouth, similarly to how he takes Anya's plans as his own. He very commonly, with the both of them mind you, supplements the worst aspects of himself into them; pettiness, selfishness, lack of understanding... And tries to cover himself with their best qualities; kindness, planning, initiative, etc...

These parallel are just to say that positional power has little to do with if a person can be abused and how it can even be flipped to further the abuse. There is no doubt that Curly could've picked up on Jimmy's envy of his position hence another reason he never confronted him as a Captain but as a friend as doing so would immediately put Jimmy in a space to be confrontational/combative.

I think the disdain some people have when they talk about the heavily implied if not implicitly stated emotional/mental abuse Curly experienced being Jimmy's friend is when treating it as an excuse to why he didn't do more. I can understand that completely because it is not an excuse to why he didn't do more but is a very real reason people in his position in these scenarios can experience whether in the context of a work or social environment. However, I also think the way people talk about it really does demonstrate a bigger problem when talking about abuse when somehow who is/was abused is either part of the issue or enabled it.

Harkening back to the sentiments about Curly's inaction regarding Jimmy, I think the exact phrases I used/have seen show how there is an inherent belief that it is easier to overpower the effects of emotional/mental abuse that go in tandem with the perception of Curly as someone who should be able to. There is not an age you suddenly stop being susceptible to abuse nor a set point or low where you realize how it has affected you. You don't suddenly know to stand up or put a face on to face your abuser nor admit that you inadvertently enabled them to subjugate someone else to the same treatment. Maybe it's my psych brain but their is this growing belief that direct action is somehow easy or always the best method with the game shows you instances where it is not always the case. In real life that rings true too. He should have done more, but it's not impossible to see why he struggled to find a way or didn't even if it makes us mad.

It's not easy to suddenly gain a "back-bone". You don't immediately want to resort to aggression, especially if it mirrors the type you were a victim to. You don't want to believe you allowed yourself to be treated this bad, let it get that bad or allowed something bad to happen to someone else. It is easy to be in denial, to retreat to your thoughts or make excuses to avoid the painful truth. It's frustrating but in a way we know is relatable. It why we both hate and love Curly for it. We know we'd be better, we think we'd be better, we like to think we wouldn't falter in the same ways but it's always easier to say that from the outside looking in. It's easy to see what he was doing wrong because we are seeing it, not him, but the game really does make you picture what you would do if this was your raw reality and it's why this debate about Curly seems so never ending/contradictory. We can all say what we'd do but bottom line is that's much different when you're in the moment with all the emotions and human feelings attached.

I personally think Mouthwashing tackles the themes of rape culture, enabling, toxic masculinity, types of abuse and patriarchy in ways that are meant to deconstruct the typical straightforward views we mostly have of these concepts and how little subtilities of them are just as, if not more, detrimental than the overt/obvious parts. The game deals with the idea of little details and bigger picture in a way to show that sometimes the bigger picture is not the issue but the little details that make it up. It's why I have a personal dislike of depictions of Jimmy as the typical horrible person who would of course do something like this because the game is about noticing the little warning signs, the foreshadowing and foresight.

It's why I dislike the typical discussion of "bro code" and "boys will be boys" for the game because the game makes a point to avoid the standard depictions of such. It is about the type of men who still enable despite not condoning, agreeing or even perpetuating harmful beliefs because they can't see the little details or the ways it seeps into their everyday. The severity is not obvious to them as it was not obvious to Curly, Swansea or even Daisuke the way it was to a woman like Anya. There are little details about Jimmy that should ring alarms but if you are too naive like Daisuke, too distant like Swansea or too conditioned like Curly, they are just off markers.

There is 100% more constructive/concise ways to say "Curly was a victim of Jimmy's abuse on an emotional and mental aspect that clouded his judgements and perceptions in the scenario" while also critiquing on the side of "Curly still had a responsibility to protect Anya as a crew mate and Captain that he failed to do due to biases and stigma's he failed to surpass" without the weird condemnation people give him about should've knowing better than to let himself be manipulated by a person he considered a close, if not family/best-friend and had his own reasons to trust initially. Also stop being weird about victims of abuse in general with this fandom, like sorry not everyone has a like social epiphany the moment someone's nasty to them. People are treating it like you immediately know when you are in a toxic relationship immediately or comprehend when a person is actively dangerous and either it's your fault for not knowing how to leave/cut them off or you deserve it. Like the hypocrisy of people believing how certain fans treat the story reflect their irl views but not their own is crazy.

End statement is: I honestly don't even know man, I've been writing this too long and just like no man on that ship was perfect or really helped Anya when it mattered and I feel like pitting them against each other in discussion on who did the least or most or how it was justified sucks cause in the end Anya always did the most and best thing for herself.

[s0fter-sin]

(cw non-sexual kink, cis male tiddy sucking)

nikolai takes one look at ghost - at the stiffness he holds himself with, arms held rigidly at his sides as he glares ahead, each breath carefully measured to make himself unnoticed - and knows it’s been too long since he’s checked on his boy

all it takes is a single look, catching his bruised and tired eyes, and ghost all but slumps. nikolai turns, heading towards the 141’s private rec room and he doesn’t need to hear the near-silent footsteps to know ghost’s following. he pulls him down onto the couch, bringing him into the circle of his arms even as he weakly tries to pull away

“don’t need it, nik; don’t have time…” ghost argues but it’s hollow at best

“hush, sweet one,” he soothes his halfhearted protests and thumbs his mask up above his lips. “always so nervous; so lost...”

he tugs his shirt up, showing off his belly and the heavy swell of his hairy pecs; nipples already pebbled. he cups the back of ghost’s head, his thumb brushing over his exposed jaw and ghost is helpless to follow as he gently leads him to latch onto his breast

“i have you,” he promises

no matter how big he is, in presence or in stature, nikolai is bigger; encompassing his whole body in warmth and safety, the familiar scent of cologne and motor oil filling his senses just as the heat of his tit fills his mouth

ghost’s eyes roll back and he nuzzles deeper into his chest, sinking into him and lets his mind empty as he suckles

-

soap didn’t mean to. he didn’t mean to walk in on something not meant for his eyes. he just wanted to check on ghost; he’s been so distant lately, different from his usual bad days and he doesn’t know how to help him but that doesn’t mean he isn’t going to try

but he didn’t mean for this; for guilt and a heated, confused want to chase through him as he enters the rec room and realises nikolai got to ghost first

realises they’re not just necking on the couch; that ghost’s lips are pressed tight to nikolai’s furred breast and not moving away, a gentle hollow thinning his exposed cheeks as he sucks, his throat softly bobbing as he swallows

nikolai’s cupping the back of his head, fingers drifting through the blonde hair at the nape of his neck and he looks so fond; like there’s nowhere he’d rather be than on their broken in couch with ghost curled around his body, sucking what must be a deep ache into his tit.

then nikolai looks up at him, frozen in the doorway and soap-

soap runs

-

nikolai gives soap a few days before he tries to talk about it; gives him a chance to come to terms with what he's seen. it's almost adorable; how deep soap’s flush grows when he sees him, how he stumbles over his words and can’t quite make eye contact

but it also tugs at him that he feels the need to shrink, to brace himself from whatever punishment he thinks is headed his way; shoulders hunching in, arms wrapped almost defensively around his body before finding whatever excuse he can to run from him

run from himself

he wishes he could wait for soap to come to him but he knows lost boys and their fear of coming in from the cold

nikolai keeps himself gentle as he uses his bulk to corner soap; stopping him from running but also using it to show how easily he could hide in him if he just let himself give in. if he let him take care of him the same way he takes care of ghost

"but... but it's wrong," soap whispers, fingers tangling with a gold cross at the hollow of his throat (a cross so similar to one he’d melted down all those years ago), but he speaks with such clear longing; eyes wide where he stares up at him, all but begging to be told otherwise and it almost breaks nikolai's heart

"no, lovely boy," he denies softly and soap shudders as he cups his face and backs him up against the corner; hugged by both walls and nikolai himself. "there is nothing more natural."

he caresses soap's cheek. he feels him shake under his touch, his eyes already growing dewy, and chances drifting his fingers over his bottom lip. soap's breath hitches and he looks up at him with so much fear - so much trust - and hesitantly opens his mouth to let them sink inside

nikolai doesn't press them too deep, doesn't threaten his throat, but they are thick and wide; filling his mouth and comfortably weighing down his tongue

with a small, involuntary moan, soap closes his lips around his fingers and nikolai catches him with his body as he goes limp. he coos as he starts sucking; wrapping his other arm around his head and brings him into his body, hidden and safe and small

"my good, lovely boy," he whispers and soap lets out a cracked whimper. "you are not wrong."

he isn't ready yet, much the same way ghost wasn't ready at first. but feeling soap tremble and suckle at his fingers, nikolai knows he'll soon have another boy tucked safe to his breast

[toddtakefive]

thinking about todd and his resolve toward… not quite isolation, but being alone in a room full of people again. he goes along to the study room to sit on his own and do his homework, he sits at the poets table and follows along with what’s being said while keeping quiet, he goes to the meetings at all but doesn’t necessarily contribute (in fact, if you watch him when cameron is telling the story ‘from camp in sixth grade’, you can see that he recognizes it before any of the other poets but doesn’t voice it until they all have). he’s not alone, necessarily, if you want to get technical about it, he’s just lonely, and he’s generally okay with that. he doesn’t have friends and that’s fine, he doesn’t participate in class and that’s fine, he doesn’t have a relationship with his family and that’s fine—he could live without any real connection and he’d have been, more or less, fine.

the thing about when he says “i can take care of myself just fine!” is that he isn’t really wrong, you can infer that he’s been doing it his entire life anyway, it’s that ‘taking care of yourself’ isn’t the same thing as really living or being happy. todd’s an introvert, certainly, and even as he gets closer to the group he defaults to sitting quietly in the background, but he’s also denying himself community out of fear not introversion. todd isn’t friendless because he’s an introvert, although that definitely plays a part, he’s friendless because he pushes anyone that might want his company away. if anyone has every wanted for his attention in the first place. (neil’s unwavering interest in him is unique (even when it comes to the rest of the poets, who are fine with todd coming along and joining the group, but aren’t really hellbent on him being there in the beginning) and his refusal to accept it is a direct result of being so lonely growing up.)

there’s obviously something to be said about the implications of his parents neglect, and the more than likely fact that he grew up friendless, and how those both play a part in in him being so skilled at dodging social interaction/being so avoidant of it, but by the time we see him in the movie he’s all but accepted his fate as being alone his entire life. he’s already accepted being the family disappointment, and he’s already accepted he’ll never amount to anything, and he obviously doesn’t like it, but he’d have managed living with that knowledge without the confirmation that it was all wrong. would he have been miserable? almost certainly. but he’d have managed. he’d done it for that long already, anyhow.

[lovrbooy]

i feel like i have very unpopular opinions on dennis within this fandom. i am scared of fandom spaces so. to the tags i go

[x-v4mp3y3lin3r-x]

if you're deconstructing your ideas of binary gender and binary sex— you also have to deconstruct your ideas of binary sexuality and romantic attraction, too, fyi

[rotinthedark]

It rly is depressing how Seb's perception of himself has been so deeply damaged by the emotional neglect/abuse he experienced growing up.

He knows it was wrong and he'll carry that anger and bitterness to his grave, but the scars are so pervasive that he subconsciously continues that treatment on himself.

[thecoolerbrother]

i think something moonage daydream was really good at doing was capturing a vibe

[beloved-child-of-the-house]

for the most part I actually don’t see Harry and Draco as being the get married types or at least not the have a wedding types but it’s also fun to just. Have them do it anyway. Weddings are fun and fun to write and read about!

[lisbonsteresa]

i'm going to SCREAM

[dykedvonte]

I think the most baffling thing about the Tulpar as a vessel to me is the fact that the ship really did only have a one way communication system.

I know it was cheap but even the most basic of vessels regarding major transport would have some way, shape or form for outside communication. Not only that but there was absolutely no form of innate emergency signal to show they may have been offline or in trouble despite clearly having a system to dock credits if they went off course. It's another factor that really shows that bad situations are made to get worse by design. One person who is required to relay all information to the crew and make all the choices without feedback. No way to update or call for help in case of a dire situation. No way to inform of inner personal conflicts and acquire procedures accordingly.

It really is like they are all in some sort of fucked up solitary confinement. They have their own world with strict roles that are meaningless in the end, as long as the cargo makes it, it doesn't matter what happens on that ship to the company. They don't want to hear anything and will come to conclusions on what happened based on how much pay they can withhold from the workers. Even what they do send is short, sterile and corporate to the extent it was likely written and sent out with a command by some random unmanned computer in an office.

There's something to be said about how unfair it is to force absolute power and control onto one person when you as an entity could do so much more to offload it but I've said it many times before so I won't again.

[fogwitchoftheevermore]

man sometimes i think about life series bigb and his abandonment issues. man.

[imminent-danger-came]

Do you think that -in the inevitable MK vs. his friends confrontation- Mei will accidentally seriously hurt him with the Samadhi fire? 🤔

Since strong emotions can cause it to run haywire, and there is nothing that would make her more afraid than having to fight her best friend.

There is NO way that they are completely done with the Samadhi fire. (Unless she lost it?? Subodhi did say she 'once' wielded it. So not anymore???)

But yeah- I bet it would come back into play during the MK/Mei battle. Especially if LBD mistook MK‘s destiny for her own. (Since that one vision she showed made it look like MK was burning before the world exploded. And she wanted everything he ended up having; the staff, his own powers, the Samadhi fire -indirectly, and well, a new title that implies destruction on a reality shattering scale.)

My view is that post the Embrace Your Destiny special, they resealed the Samadhi Fire (unsure if Mei still has her piece with her or if they successfully resealed it into 3 rings this time). We at the very least know she doesn't have it in s4 (MK has to save her in 4x01, she's worried about losing her sword in 4x05 which she didn't need with the Samadhi Fire in EYD, the Subodhi quote you mentioned). But, I don't think Mei using the Samadhi Fire again is completely out of the question. There are things that have come back that I never expected to be acknowledged again (The 1x01 seal being the same as the 4x01 and 4x14 flower fruit mountain seal was a huge shocker for me).

So the Samadhi Fire coming back into play with the MK/Mei battle? That would work super well! Especially with the way characters tend to reach for power and endanger their loved ones. It's a huge risk to take again, but if they feel they don't have any other choice it's something we know they're willing to resort to.

[bumblingbabooshka]

T’Pring/Michael could be everything 

[clefaiiiry]

Khada “I have a compulsion to commit atrocities as a way of coping with feelings of inadequacy and nihilism because there is no beauty in the world so I must create my own twisted version of it the only way I know how” Jhin

vs

Lukai “I see beauty in all things no matter how ugly or dark they might be, and I want to see the best in everyone and help them reach their fullest potential like I never had the chance to even if they don’t deserve it” Hwei

[ziracona]

I know I say this every time I read my own work, but Speak for the Dead really is the best chapter in ILM.

“Well, you know for the first time in a long time this actually feels like fall?”

Jane Romero was smiling at him, sitting propped up against a tree in what had sort of become her usual ‘therapy’ corner in the past almost two weeks. And she was right, it did feel like fall. The air wasn’t as sharply cold as normal, and honestly ‘sharply’ cold was a nice break in and of itself when it happened—usually the weather here was somehow just cold—cold with no adjectives attached. But today it was nicer. It was the kind of waiting fall cold that came when it wasn’t biting outside yet, and it was almost pleasant. A promise of a change in the seasons. Tapp wondered why.

The trees hadn’t started to change color with it, or fall in piles, and as far as he’d gathered there weren’t seasons in here. Everything looked the same. Tall, thick woods, undergrowth and moss and rocks and fallen logs, a slight breeze on and off. Dark sky overhead, full moon, at this point long since throwing off everyone’s idea of what day and night were supposed to mean. All the usual. Except, somehow, the kind of cold in the weather. Who knew, maybe nothing had changed. Maybe they had just started to feel better.

LIKE. Those opening lines mean nothing but environmental flavor when you read them. But they’re a lead in for the thesis of the entire chapter.

“Well, you know for the first time in a long time this actually feels like fall?” - A promise of a change in the seasons. - Who knew, maybe nothing had changed. Maybe they had just started to feel better.

Like that’s it. Speak for the Dead is about a lot of things, but at its heart it’s about healing. It’s about forgiveness and healing, that exists between the living and the dead. It’s about how you can only speak for them, by speaking for them. Not how you want to punish yourself or live for them, but by how you know they would forgive you, or would ask you to live. Very little other than exchanges of information happen, but so much happens at the same time. All of it significant. It’s hope. It’s about how Tapp (and Meg) have spent every day here fighting in their own way to cope with the agony and failure of their lives, and the loss of people they couldn’t save, and have only dug their wounds deeper. About love. About nothing stoping the lambs from screaming except accepting that they want to let you go.

[kurikorso]

bro idk if I'm gonna be at all coherent about this but like. when a character has a power or a trait or an ability or something that makes them cool/beautiful/special but it's also indicative of something wrong with them or something they hate about themselves or something that needs to be given up that will make them happier. like this was a part of them for so long, a defining trait, and now it's gone and they've changed irreparably. it was for the better but you still feel loss and grief and you're guilty about it because it's a good thing. that's so transgender to me. i dunno