#especially curly???.

[kixidust]

@zexalmonth R - Ruins I love yugioh's past life drama but I hate yugioh's lack of new character designs for said past lives when it really doesn't make sense for them to be the same. So Rae and I came up with an alternate look for Nasch that keeps his hair and eye color but doesn't look like the exact same person. And we wanted him to be in his 20s or early 30s. So here's a drawing over a screencap and a different pic I drew earlier in my own style.

[zonkdiggitydog]

happy halloween!! did an anya cosplay for the occasion because this game wont leave my mind... bonus makeshift curly doll :] 🦷💊🧿

[discard-celestia]

USE MOUTHWASH / DO NOTHING

[pangur-and-grim]

I saw a post not long ago that you were looking at getting a devon rex & are on a waiting list. I got my new baby, Smidge, 3 weeks ago. She's the sweetest little bean who follows me around the house meowing & needs to be included in everything.

she looks like a baby lamb!

[catfishofoldin99colours]

something something the main cargo of the tulbar being mouthwash and its main advertising slogan being 'kills 99% of germs without leaving a bad taste'

something something Jimmy desperate to remove the rest of the crew and his mistakes, so far as to try and crash the ship so he doesn't have to face what he did to Anya, killing 99% of germs and bacteria everyone and himself so he won't have to face the bad taste in his mouth consequences of it all

something something eating curly to survive, feeding curly to himself to survive, the fact that human cannabalism infects you in a way you can't heal (prion disease), something something mouthwash will rinse it out, something something have your terrible actions and the consequences they bring without feeling guilty if you just wash it down with delusions mouthwash

something along those lines

[churchyaoi]

to nobodys surprise heres my favorite

[arinmoss]

i painted Astarion hehe :3c prints here

[yrsonpurpose]

long haired george villiers appreciation post

[verdantwyrm]

The Steam Trading card Descriptions for each crew member

[retourpresdetoi]

hey mouthwashing analysts, do we maybe want to think a bit before comparing a full grown man, who is just heavily disabled, to a baby? like a literal infant? especially when there's a stronger metaphorical/psychological/symbolic avatar for the baby and pregnancy already present within the narrative? (multiple even!)

[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.

[paintexe]

BYSTANDER

[proxolagist]

i really got it bad (the hlvrai resurgence in me)

[sewerratzz]

the moments of jimmy acting like he understands what curly was trying to say.

being crushed by responsibility. curly had to deal with actually captaining the ship, leading the crew, being someone they could safely come to, all his captain duties along with his own personal issues and feeling lost/unfulfilled, while jimmy had to what? do a few tasks? help out when his crew occasionally asked for it? and he took it all out on Anya, yelling at and berating her when he decided it was too much and it was unfair.

curly wanting his life to be something he didn’t feel the need to escape from. jimmy assuming curly wanted to run from him, not only making a scene at his birthday, but acting like it wasn’t only him that was feeling like that, saying “we’re the ones you’re trying to escape”. acting like curly’s the bad guy when they’re all being fired.

curly not wanting to be on this ladder. jimmy viewing that as curly looking down on him. the better man, staring down his nose at the weasel trying to follow him.

curly’s feet in cement. wanting to leave, but too afraid to change anything. wanting to help, too afraid of the risks. jimmy’s feet in cement. he’s forcibly impregnated Anya, and if he doesn’t do this, he’ll face repercussions for his actions.

and curly just. letting him believe he understands. of course he can’t do anything otherwise after the crash, but before it. every time this has probably happened that we haven’t even seen. he tried his best to explain, jimmy’s misunderstood but thinks he’s got it right. curly’s just too tired to try again. he never takes action, and it has catastrophic results.

[the-game-spirit]

this game has consumed my every waking moment, have a sif

[dandeyrain]

there's something really frustrating that happens in the fandom when discussing anya, particularly when discussing her personality. in-game, she's portrayed as neurotic and sort of helpless, but also ultimately kind and forgiving, and fandom very much takes that as the unfiltered and unedited truth of her — to the point that people get angry or call it OOC when fanart or fic has anya being violent or even just kind of mean to either her rapist or her rapist's best friend who's covering for him (or, at absolute best, willfully ignoring straightforward evidence that his violent bestie has been violent to the only woman on the crew). anya is mean to curly in some art and the fandom crows "she's not like that! she's sweet and nice and powerless! she isn't gonna take agency! she loves everyone and gives everyone grace! you're mischaracterizing her!!"

but like. how are you characterizing her? we only ever see anya through two men's eyes, and one of those men is her rapist, and the other is the rapist's bestie, and neither of these men take anya seriously at least in some major ways, so how they view anya should absolutely be called into question. but even if we take their views of anya as 100% real and correct representations of how she acts on the tulpar, like...she is the only woman on a ship full of men that includes, again, HER RAPIST AND HER RAPIST'S BFF. she outright says that she knows curly won't help her when it matters — "i knew you wouldn't give me the gun to defend myself" — and even of the two men remaining, one is a kid and one is also wildly rude and dismissive to her (though i think in actuality swansea means it less). she is trapped here, aware that at least one member of the crew is capable of horrible violence towards her and that another member of the crew refuses to take that threat seriously. anya has every reason in the world to make sure that the men see her as dependent on them and polite and forgiving and incapable of anger, because if they see her as a threat they will hurt her.

it's wild to see the fandom correctly identify that anya is fawning with jimmy, pretending to like him more than she does, in order to keep herself safe — and then refuse to consider that she might be putting on a front for curly as well. everything we see about anya from curly has to be 100% real, because curly's a Good Man and Anya Trusts Him. it's impossible that she might be hiding anger or hurt from him. but i would argue that it's JUST as possible that anya is putting on a front of a nonthreatening sweet endlessly empathetic trusting nice girl and hiding other feelings. women are ALWAYS pretending to be nonthreatening and sweet and endlessly empathetic and trusting to the men who hurt them to avoid further harm.

let's look at what she actually does — she doesn't just let but outright ASKS jimmy to give curly his painkillers, knowing that jimmy will hurt him very similarly to how jimmy hurt her. is that kind? does that not suggest that she feels, if not outright anger at curly, at least a willingness to abdicate her responsibility as the nurse to care for him and put him in harm's way for her own sake? she kills herself by downing the last of curly's pain meds, freeing herself at the expense of curly's continued agony — if she truly wanted to help him, couldn't she have taken him with her and saved them both from jimmy? i think you can absolutely read these actions as benign, but it's also a valid reading to say "maybe these actions are indicative of anger or capacity for cruelty that she simply doesn't verbally express for whatever reason (like keeping men from hurting her)."

like, if you want to read her as 100% angelic and kind and sweet and incapable of anger or violence towards jimmy/curly/the rest of the crew, that's fine! my personal read is that it's a little of column a, a little of column b. but it's also worth considering that anya has every reason to put up a false front to these men. it's worth considering that we see anya through the eyes of men who don't take her seriously. and it's worth remembering that for a lot of women, it's a hell of a lot safer to let the men around you believe you're sweet and fragile and helpless than it is to let them know you hope they rot.