#he’s afraid to get help because he’s afraid of being institutionalized but at this point

[weyrleaders]

hhh

[skaruresonic]

"Yes, Woolie, you can win any argument if you just change what words mean."

Apologies for bringing up an old debate, but I feel the need to clarify my stance on this topic. Twitter character limits will not allow the space needed for explanation.

There's a reason I mentioned the Erazor Djinn and not Shahra. It's because, unlike the Erazor Djinn, Shahra has done nothing wrong. Sonic helps her because he wants to, not because she's earned it by performing regret to a "sufficient" degree.

"The concept of freedom and redemption is neutral."

No, it isn't. That's a culturally Christian view. Some cultures emphasize rehabilitation instead, which differs from redemption.

Not to mention that morality is, to some extent, culturally defined and will vary on that basis.

"Some people deserve it and some people don't."

Yeah, no, I have Problems(tm) with this mindset.

The reason the idea that anyone particularly "deserves" anything - in this case, punishment for crime - doesn't sit right with me is because some external force must define the crime and impose the punishment. I take umbrage with the very idea that we must relent the onus of our problem-solving to an authority, which is naive at best and dangerous at worst.

In other words, at some point you must defer complex moral decisions to an authority. Historically, these punitive frameworks rarely serve justice and usually leverage their power to target the oppressed.

At best, the "criminals deserve to be punished for hurting people" mindset assumes the just world fallacy is true. Good people ought to be rewarded, but more importantly, bad people ought to be punished. On top of other potential pitfalls and opportunities for abuse, this fallacy assumes victims can never exploit their own hurt, real or fabricated, to facilitate oppression.

What this results in, more often than not, is a culture of anxiety that stunts one's moral growth. People become afraid to speak out, make the normal range of mistakes expected of being human, and sometimes even do the right thing upon pain of being branded a Criminal(tm) onto whom punishment is justified and equally little grace afforded. And since "bad people" and "criminals" are categories upon which cruelty for catharsis' sake is considered more justified than rehabilitation or justice for victims, this system can, has been, and will be exploited.

This is why humans rights exist and are called human rights, not "fuck up hard enough and get your humanity revoked" rights.

At worst, it can feed into an authoritarian mindset that paves the way for fascism: dominant cultures enforcing their bigotry through institutionalized violence. "Undeserving" is a severely loaded term especially given this context and this risk.

The wording of "But the fact [Shahra] wishes to make things right for herself and ultimately regretted her mistakes shows that she is more deserving of redemption and freedom than Erazor" implicitly frames her as someone who, under Sonic's supposed moral authority, must be screened or vetted. It risks lumping abuse victim with abuser. If she did nothing wrong, only suffered being a victim of circumstance, why must she "earn" Sonic's grace where the Erazor Djinn does not?

What did she do that would require punishment otherwise if Sonic had found her regret wanting? Lie out of necessity? How could he deign to exercise the authority to punish her for such a thing?

Add the fact that she defers to Sonic as the master of the ring, and this whole power dynamic becomes horribly problematic incredibly fast. That Sonic insists on seeing Shahra as not only an equal but a friend is the whole point the game was attempting to make about their dynamic. It would have been beyond fucked for him to have exploited his power over her in such a manner, and I'm glad the game explicitly avoided that implication right out of the gate. Shut that shit down before it even had a chance to start.

Ironically enough, we see this framework fail when IDW!Sonic is confronted with an abuse victim in the form of Surge. He callously treats her with the same flippant disdain as with other irredeemable villains (barring Eggman, but we'll get to that in a second) even though Surge makes it clear that she's suffering.

The fact that his solution is not to listen to her, but to instead preach his values and say "I'll just kick your ass until you magically start Acting Right(tm)," as if hurting people who are already in pain ever taught them a lesson other than "never trust anyone," means IDW!Sonic is less interested in harm reduction than in appearing "good" and merciful. He winds up reinforcing his status as the moral authority of this world, which is ironic for a character who supposedly values freedom for all.

But maybe not.

Freedom includes the freedom to fuck up, yes. And what I'm certain IDW!Sonic meant to add was the caveat "...but not freedom from consequences." However, his selective hypocrisy in who deserves what and when is so obvious that it winds up warping the message into "Do what Sonic tells you or suffer the consequences he decides are fit."

Again, this loops back around to my original assertion that the "what you deserve" mindset is authoritarian. Who is Sonic to establish himself as the arbiter of freedom?

At least in SatSR, when he condemns the Erazor Djinn to the lamp, it's for pragmatic reasons as much as it is for moral considerations---perhaps the former even more so than the latter.

Sonic knows beyond the shadow of a doubt that letting the Djinn go free will result in the events of the game happening again. Shahra has told him that the Djinn abused his power once before, and he's seen the evidence for abusing it a second time throughout the course of the game. To say nothing of how the Erazor Djinn basically hammered the nail in his own coffin through his callous disregard of Shahra.

The Djinn's actions determine his fate. If we left it at "he's just a scumbag," that reduces him to an identity that may or may not be permanent and shifts focus away from his choices.

Likewise, Shahra is not a good person simply because she regrets her mistakes hard enough, but rather, Sonic knows her hand was forced because she winds up doing the right thing in the end, even at a high personal cost.

Hence Sonic takes concrete steps, such as tossing the lamp down a furnace where no one would be inclined to look for it or even accidentally stumble upon it again, to diminish the threat the Erazor Djinn presents.

It must be emphasized that he also makes an equal effort to comfort a grieving Shahra. Not because she's a good person who "deserves" comfort after all she's been through, but because it is a good thing to alleviate suffering. Also because Shahra is his friend, and Sonic doesn't need a reason to want to help out a friend.

What concrete steps has IDW!Sonic taken to reduce the harm his villains present?

1.) Convinced Shadow to step down from killing Mr. Tinker by leveraging Shadow's traumatic past against him, rather than argue that Mr. Tinker should be given a chance to live as his own person.

2.) Made a promise to check up on Mr. Tinker to make sure things continued to go smoothly, only to later break that promise by assuming Eggman will remain Mr. Tinker forever with no real evidence.

3.) Decided to let Metal Sonic go regardless of Tails' warnings, on the reasoning that Metal was his own person whose autonomy needed to be respected (despite Metal admitting that he essentially had no free will in a previous issue, and despite Tails later pointing out that Metal remained dangerous as he still had his jet engine and claws). Eggman even calls Sonic out on this, explaining that Metal is programmed to obey his master. Yet Sonic still gets chuffed at Metal for having "chosen wrongly."

4.) On top of exacerbating the metal virus and nearly destroying the world for personal gain, Zavok killed people in the Zeti hunt arc and very graphically threatened to flay Sonic alive while storming Restoration HQ. Yet he's shuttled back to the Lost Hex without any real guarantee that he won't do it again.

5.) Nothing against Starline, except to eulogize his death as "big oof," despite having told Surge that he (Sonic) was willing to give even him (Starline) a second chance.

6.) Eulogized Surge with "That's the real problem with freedom: you can't stop people from making the wrong choice."

[chalkrevelations]

So, I had to go back and watch the forehead flick and Sailom’s little admonition of “no Thai” with his wagging finger about five times before I could move on, and part of that is because the comedy was on-point, but part of it is how much weight that moment carries. It really is so very reminiscent of correcting a recalcitrant puppy, while at the same time being very casually boyish horseplay and one-up-manship, and I think those things combined do a ton of load-bearing as we start moving into the next stage of their relationship. On a meta level, the comic aspect of it breaks some of the tension we’ve been carrying around about them and the previously established tone of the relationship between them. And it also really establishes that - despite the way what’s happened between them in the past can reverberate for Sailom – he’s not afraid of Kanghan, he’ll treat him casually, he’ll take the lead, and there can be some balance of power in this relationship, despite outside power disparities. This is an interaction of equals, and both of them are fine with it.

Kanghan has all his previously established socioeconomic power, sure. But here, Sailom has a kind of institutionalized power, as the tutor in the relationship. But also, that’s only because Kanghan has allowed it, has ceded power to Sailom. All Kanghan has to do is say he doesn’t want to do this, and it would be over, and there would be zero consequences for him - and on some level, they both know that, already, even though Sailom still doesn’t really know anything about Kanghan’s dad yet. Kanghan has clearly demonstrated that he could walk away, and the only reason he’s showed up – as far as Sailom knows at this point - is because Sailom insisted, and he maybe wants to make his Grandma proud of him, he guesses, shrug. Meanwhile, sure, Kanghan dragged Sailom into unfamiliar territory with the steak-dinner date, but he also demonstrates here that he’s perfectly willing to follow Sailom into Sailom’s own territory, onto unfamiliar ground, lit. and fig. He puts himself in Sailom’s hands, he follows Sailom’s lead – explicitly, he follows Sailom’s lead, instead of bribing the bouncer to let them into the bar/restaurant. Sailom just kind of casually takes Kanghan into his own world, into his own life, to the open-air market in an area where he’s done a lot of helping people with their English, and Kanghan just. Follows him. Doesn’t even think twice about it. (Except for complaining that he’d’a dressed up if he’d known this was a date.)

Plus, he then completely humiliates himself for no real reason other than to get Sailom’s approval. Come on, do any of us really think there would be any real consequences if he performed badly on his English exam? (NO.) But Sailom has set him a task, and by god, he’s going to do it, no matter how hard it is for him. (PRAISE KINK ENGAGED.)

And my god, Kanghan. Ohhhh my godddd. Nobody’s stomped on my embarrassment squick this hard in a long time. I’m literally cringing watching you try to pick up strangers get strangers’ Instagrams. I realize part of the bit is that your English is supposed to be bad, but could you not come up with some kind of cover story here, like, “ha ha, I made a bet with my friend, who could get the most Instagram connections, he’ll owe me a beer” – something, anything so you look the slightest bit less like you’re inappropriately hitting on every single person you approach? Or at least try to talk to them a little bit, first? MY GUY. PLEASE. You do approach this whole thing with the same determination and lack of reservation you used when you pulled a gun on the goons who were beating up your boyf bullying target, so I have to give you that, I guess – once again, your feckless, reckless rich-kid confidence carries you through. Or are you just determined to do a good job for Sailom so you can continue to get praise and belly rubs? Because I think that may be a big part of it.

[joonasslut]

I got inspired of the previous ask, this might become long text possibly but i’ll start with how i see Joel being in a relationship with you. 👀 (I am basing this on the stuff he has said and also some stuff i have heard but can’t also confirm that are 100% true so don’t take this too seriously)

Let’s start with the fact that he has been cheated on in the past and he has himself also said he has big trust issues to get in a relationship in the first place. So getting in a relationship with him, you have won. He has jealousy issues, and would most likely be suspicious and paranoid sometimes because he just can’t help it. (Patience and reassurance needed for this poor boy) So if you are hanging out with other males he most likely would get paranoid about it because he isn’t a home lot. :( (I can see him constantly asking where are you and with who etc.)

He is always on his phone so he’d be texting and videocalling you a lot. He has also stated in the past that if he indeed falls for someone he halls HARD. So especially when you are physically together he’d be physically close to you as possible. I can see him also actually really loving skinship with you and just hugging/cuddling/kissing/making out, anything just to be close to you and feeling you.

Even though people might think he is just awkward and grumpy (which he is a bit but it’s cute) he would give his all for you. I think he’d be really thoughtful, caring and loving, he’d do anything he can for you, as long as you understand that his career does come first. He needs someone to support him, and he definetely would support you, as your number 1. fan/hypeman. (If you have social media he’d be the first one to like everything and hype you up) Also him hyping you on his IG with couple photos of you two. (the ”love doesn’t exist” joel would be gone and turn into the most lovey dovey man on the planet with you)

Also based on how i have seen him being defensive easily about the smallest things, he would definetely be there to defend you for anything. He wouldn’t be afraid to confront anyone and fight for you. In general i see him also as protective (he let’s you do anything but is watching over you still)

He most likely does have hard time speaking feelings / anything in words but he’d make songs for you and it will be just so… ❤️ everything would come straight from his heart.

This become so long and could go on even more :D Tell me what you think!

first of all i love you. second i love joel hokka. third he should give me a chance.

i bet he would be extremely clingy, he’d almost be annoying if he wasn’t that cute and awesome.

i bet that when he’s grumpy it is impossible to crack what’s wrong (maybe he doesn’t know either) so you’d just have to let him be, give him his space but while also checking on him every once in a while. and maybe at some point he might crack and ask you to stay close.

his career does come first!! besides it being obvious he would make it clear from day 1. it might seem harsh but it’s the truth and it’s a great thing that he’d be so honest. either support him or leave.

tbf i get just as defensive and grumpy over the tiniest things so i totally get him but imagine him being so protective that even if you’re like him you’ll have to ask him to let it go because it’s not that important.

and yes!! he would have a hard time talking about his feelings but he would be good at expressing them via songs and gestures.

bestie this was so nice and well done and now all i can think about is how similar i am to joel, and how i’d be the perfect gf, i might need to lay down or get institutionalized

[emptymanuscript]

Ah, that guy, Desguin, got it :)

So of course he was forced out.

It’s easy to say but he was supposed to arrest neo-nazis, that’s a good thing.

And that’s where the rubber of principle meets the road of reality.

Frankly, I HOPE all neo-nazis have painful life lessons to either force them into understanding the error of their ways or end up being lethal. But that’s exactly why it is so important to be governed by laws and protected by rights. What I WANT, no matter the reasoning, should never be the measure of justice.

If my desires or fears are the measure of justice, what protects you from my anger? Nothing. What punishes the guilty person who I favor? Nothing. What hope does anyone who I hold a grudge against have? None whatsoever. My feelings become your fate.

The purpose of rights and laws are to protect neo-nazis from my hatred. They exist specifically so I can’t follow my impulses to say, run them down in my truck and get away with it. Which example I use because that is what landed me in the mental hospital the second time. I slammed on the gas because that fucker who I objected to deserved to die because I hated him. Luckily, my truck has slow acceleration, so I had enough time to think, hey, maybe I don’t want to kill anyone and maybe I need some more mental help. Because the emotional impulse of the moment isn’t a good way to make these kind of decisions.

I still dream about killing neo-nazis. I still wanna. And as long as I wanna, they deserve protection from that desire.

Why?

Because Star Trek was right. No one has more rights than the citizen with the least rights. Anything that can be taken away is a privilege waiting for the excuse to be taken away.

I’m not a nice person. You may have guessed from the fact that I have constant fantasies about murdering people. But most people actually don’t get that. I get a lot of compliments in my offline life about being a nice and good person. And no, not really. I’m a mean, selfish son of a bitch who honestly thinks that simply deleting more than half the human population would be a vast improvement.

What I am is polite. I believe that rules and principles are important. Especially when I don’t like them. That doesn’t mean blind support of whatever rule is given. That’s just a different emotion ruling things. Laws and customs can absolutely be wrong. Those should be fought, destroyed, and broken. A rule isn’t good because it is a rule. Fuck that noise. But good things need rules to protect and enforce them. They’re the lubricants and fasteners of civilization. They make it run when that’s not our first impulse.

What I am is afraid. I know that the law and custom is all that protects me from the neo-nazi. Those evil bastards would kill me without a second thought if it wasn’t forbidden by our society. They might do it anyway. But the more safeguards the better.

And the most dangerous of them aren’t the evil silver shirt kids who show up with bats, bottles, and guns. They might kill as many as a few hundred, which is viscerally appalling, but that’s because it’s easy to see. The jackbooted killer is the amateur hour pawn of the murder cult world.

The kings who command the board will kill millions. They will do it with no weapon but a pen or a keyboard or a viral video. They construct the apparatus for killing people and getting away with it so they can kill some more. The key to their murderous success is making it perennial and institutionalized. And the first key to that, to making sure that there is always an excuse to kill the undesirable is to turn rights into privileges and privileges into permissions and permission into exceptions BUT then turn exceptions into rights.

The point is to give the other as few rights and protections as possible while giving US as many rights and freebies as possible.

So the second you can say that I can kill someone just because they’re a neo-nazi is the second that all they need to do is prove that I’m actually the nazi while they’re just the alt-right. If the label determines your rights then you’re just a shell game of labels away from having your rights taken away. They aren’t really rights anymore. You are never safer than the least well treated person. Because society can always turn on you. The worst person ever that you hate the most must have the rights you believe you deserve. Otherwise you don’t really have them.

So, if you believe that you should have the right to free speech, then you have to protect the neo-nazi’s right to free speech in the same way you believe you deserve it. Otherwise bye-bye free speech.

This is not incompatible with saying that free speech is exactly equal to being able to say any damn thing you want without repercussions or consequences. That’s well established. You can have both the right to free speech and limits on what speech is protected and what is not. You just have to make sure that the limits and protections can be applied universally.

It’s entirely acceptable to say that you have the right to free speech but cannot advocate for the physical harm of others. Then it doesn’t matter what you label the speaker.

You can make exotic and complex tests of legality. That’s fine. As long as it doesn’t matter who the test is applied to.

And that’s what this guy got. That he was ordered to illegally target a politically convenient group. It doesn’t matter if they’re a terrible group. They are. What matters is that if you can target a group illegally for political convenience then it’s only a matter of political convenience until someone who doesn’t deserve it gets targeted.

[xaracosmia]

ꕥ — WELCOME TO EXO COSMIA, AMIAS ZHENG. 🌑

ꕥ  — OOC INFORMATION:

name / alias: lusala / lucian age: 22 pronouns: he/they other characters in xc: ahmed

ꕥ  — IC INFORMATION;

name: Amias Zheng age: 21 pronouns: he/him series: OC canon point: N/A app triggers: murder, physical assault

personality:

Determined

Amias is determined to have a good ending. If something really matters to him, he can't be discouraged easily and pursues things to a stubborn degree. He really wants to believe, so he will. This also means he's very loyal to any cause that he devotes himself to.

Earnest

Amias means well. They don't lie often, to the point that they frequently embarrass themself when they get nervous and talk too much. They're really an open book, and it doesn't take long for one to pry out even their darkest secrets out of them if you show that you care.

Gullible

That also means they're less likely to doubt someone who's lying to them. It's not uncommon for them to get tricked or taken advantage of because of the heart on their sleeve, but they try not to let it get to them.

Paranoid

He gets scared easily, although it isn't likely that he'll run away-- just that he's prone to making up scenarios based on his fear. He wears multiple locks on his doors and makes sure to reinforce his walls, doesn't step on cracks if he can help it, overthinks normal conversation...

Institutionalization has changed the way he handles himself. Truthfully, he pushes his "positive" traits more than they actually are. If he is just a clumsy, goofy guy, people are more likely to forgive him if he messes up. Any wrong instance where it may seem like he could be painted as the aggressor, he's deeply afraid of. Better to not be taken seriously than to be painted as something he's not.

Obsessed

When Amias gets fixated on something, he won't be able to pull himself away from it.

Fragmented

Amias' identity, to him, feels split between multiple things. Fighting his curse and other mental issues, he often struggles to know where he begins and ends. The curse makes him violent, haughty, aggressive, entitled, all things that he tries to overcompensate for by acting the complete opposite at all times.

something your muse struggles with: self-control

your muse’s greatest strength: determination

history / background:

Amias Zheng has always known that he was different from everyone else. Not in the conceited way, but in a way that tears him apart. Being the child of a prolific serial killer and being raised by her for the first decade of his life, there is a wall between him and other people that he feels anxious breaching. There is nobody that can relate to his story or his curse.

The curse that he's been afflicted with is hereditary; a curse placed on one of his ancestors for a selfish wish, the Ellwood family is destined to only survive off of the life of others, falling into depravity & solipsism. But Amias is, at his core, a good person. That's the most important part of his story. He won't play any cruel games foisted on him, if he sees an injustice, he acts. It's his biggest strength and his biggest weakness in a world that wants to chew him up and spit him out.

It also allows him to see the monsters that are hidden to the human eye. An entire plane of evil exists that takes advantage of how they can't be seen, preying on whoever they happen to find. He's dedicated himself to the cause of finding a way to break the barrier between humans and this plane, giving humans a fighting chance against them for once; he is searching for the impossible shot, something that will undoubtedly prove their existence.

powers / abilities:

Record: When Amias films someone, he can “feed” off of the information from the recording and sustain himself this way. It’s an extremely broad ability with a few caveats.

Wolf Visage: When in the curse's depths, Amias adopts wolf-like features. This can range from being more anthropomorphic in nature to being more related to the actual animal. In this form, he benefits from increased size & strength OR increased agility and speed.

Decaying Touch: Touching something can cause it great harm, which heals Amias in return. This is something he can control, but he can lose control of this with uncontrolled emotions.

Playback: He can perfectly mimic the audio of whatever he records.

inherent abilities:

Cursed Line: The family on his mother’s side was cursed by a devil to fall into depravity, a consequence of his ancestor attempting to revive his daughter. He is able to see past things hidden on the human plane of existence, but is at the same time haunted by these things and forever has a pull towards violence inside his head. A part of him is sustained by the life of things, which can be rejuvenated through various means; through blood, flesh, their soul, the very act of violence, or by absorbing information from the living. He’s like a very flexible vampire.

Link: Amias is linked to his Camcorder. Through it, it acts as a sort of gateway into the opposing plane, and allows him to feed & hunt. Everything that he records he can feel.     

items / weapons:     

Winchester Model 94: An old-fashioned, bolt-action rifle. This has been "passed down" as an heirloom from his mother. It has “Ellwood” carved into its stock. The spirit of his ancestor is trapped inside, which supposedly possesses whoever controls it— but since Amias is related, he can wield it with no problem.

HD Camcorder : Amias’ pride and joy, and also his lifeline. Despite its age in comparison to modern Camcorders, it works perfectly well.

starting ability: Record starting item: HD Camcorder

extra:

he’s like a modern bhaalspawn. if you care

he kins samarie from fear & hunger

girl who still says ROFL and watches invader zim:

discord id: impossibleshot passcode: do you trust me <- ummm...

[lambentplume]

alright i’m literally going to save this for when i go see my therapist again so um. no one needs to read or respond at all i just can’t sit up or grip a pencil rn so i’m laying in bed writing this. lol. please god i hope readmore works i am so sorry

it’s getting really dire out here. so i work part time at a cafe which is dying due to managerial neglect/chronic overstaffing/being under resourced and that pays me $12/hr plus tips. i’m still recovering from the time our espresso machine (which is. a major source of appeal for a fucking espresso based cafe) broke… the job that USUALLY ensures i have enough to live is now not enough. i also have two internships that total 25 hours per week and they’re both in separate but not unrelated fields that i’m Thinking about going into. both of which are relatively easier on my body and i like the work so far.

the issue is that i’ve been in my head for SO LONG about what kind of job i should be working. i was going to have a full spiral earlier today but thank god the shift ended lol. bc my coworker is a polisci/ethnic studies major, we were talking about positionality and the ways that academia, eapecially the western idea of “social sciences” (which is . what i study) exploita the communities it studies when not done with careful critical or community-based methodology. and as someone who wants to potentially join investigators studying the social ramifications of labor done in the specific context that i grew up in, from a worker’s and also generational and also academic jargon perspective (side note: i genuinely think there is a case for connecting the modern exploitative tourist hospitality industry to underserved communities’ ability to seek help and thrive like STRUCTURALLY in terms of the way these schedules are fucking built) i’m kind of… working my way up the ladder. learning research methodologies by doing that ground-level work and pushing paper for the PIs who actually do the Cool Work. AND ALSO STILL WORKING ON MY BACHELORS WHILE BEING A RENT PAYER … i also finally admitted to this coworker that i dropped out of the US east coast PWI i went to in order to come home bc i couldn’t handle it socially and i feel like. being a poc who has living relatives who worked on plantations and who is CONSTANTLY reminded that i have far more privilege than i could ever grasp etc is making me feel a little insane. like my dad Doesn’t talk to me about it because he does Not feel like articulating it and i’m Never going to understand which is true. like i will Never Understand. i should be a bit happier that the internships are paying me more just to sit and do brainwork instead of busting ass and people pleasing all day but i’m so afraid. of . being . incompetent. that i just work because i’m happy to work i need to feel useful i need everything to add up so bad. i need more than one full day off from responsibilities but i can’t afford it. i’m going to fall behind and not be good at anything and forget big theses if i can’t even pay rent. like what IS the point!! other more eloquent and better-equipped and driven people who know what they want should have it! i will just shrink my presence until i shrivel away!!!!!!!! god.

and then i feel the need to legitimize my hobbies and interests like bro 😭😭😭 who fucking cares if i miss the OT 5th anny people are drawing pieces bc they feel like it!!!

this is WHY i can’t chase clout this is why i didn’t go to risd this is why i dropped out of brown. so why am i still attached to the idea that i need to be institutionally validated (THERE IS MONEY IN INSTITUTIONAL VALIDATION. END UNDERPAYMENT I WANT TO KERMIT!!!!)

[anonil88]

YELLOW JACKETS S2 FINALE LIVEBLOG 🐝 🐝

Warning spoilers ahead.

-Rest in Peace Dolores. (A fitting song now that I think on it.)

-R.i.p Javi, I really wanted my fellow art kid to survive. I really did.

- Someone knock that fucking table with the Jonestown tea over please. Lottie is doing the absolute fucking most but also Shauna is correct for doing this. When your friends are paranoid you do have to talk them down, but you also need to not make them feel like they are wrong or insane. Because then they may get a little more than upset. I say this as a person with paranoia.

- Personally I think as teens they should gave never fully believed Lottie even if faith was all that was keeping them alive. They could've used that faith to be more resourceful and hop skip their asses to hike. Just like now they should use that faith to call a doctor and NOT do this faux hunt. Maybe a little belief is okay but nothing where a child is seen as prophet who helps everyone survive. Thats pressure that will crack even a non mentally ill person.

- They are all partly responsible for Charlotte being as bad as she is now and as bad as she got. She didn't start anything she just interacting with whatever force may be out there coupled with her mental illness, they all just wanted an excuse to satiate their hunger. Now the way Lottie looked at Misty when she showed up at the camp makes even more sense, she was afraid of her.. These girls, starting with Shauna, rationalized their eatting of Jackie based on their hunger. Then they rationalize it with Javi by using Lottie's belief and mental illness, even though she doesn't want that weight. And now as adults they rationalize their bad behavior and fuck ups by saying "trauma fucked me up" or "this is fine I'm just a little stressed." They know the right thing but age regressed trauma, no talking about their trauma, and pretending to have happy lives or placate it with drugs is just more rationalizing of we did that because something happened to us.

- I was right about the masks and Shauna with the rabbits from season 1. I said in my s1 watch that the masks have always been so they didn't feel as bad about what they were doing, even though it was clear some of them enjoyed it.

- A GUN???? A shotty???

- Awww look at these cute theatre kids.

- Tai is sick very sick but not ward sick, woah lets not do this Van. They both don't need to be institutionalized but they do need proper therapy and medication.

- Shauna is hot with knives I'm sorry Melanie lynsky is my weaknes.

- Is Lottie gonna poison her followers?

- I hope that smug bitch of a cop is the sacrifice.

- I want all these purple clothes and whatever dye they are using. I bet Walter poisoned the tea.

- Well I called that, damn I liked him. Should have been that smug bitch yelling in the background.

- Whoever made that theory about coach simply not making it to the rescue point because he's in that hole, I love you because I think you're correct. Also, the transition from striking flint to light in the cabin wonderful choice TV editors.

- They could at least idk bury the heart, have a little funeral for the boy or create a new tradition with it. Come on now.

- Well okay then Daenerys, but also the metaphor similar to Shauna eatting Jackie's ear. Those lost to the cold are now a piece of them inside them, making them a little colder everyday from the inside out as time goes on. Their trauma with time grows but so does all of the guilt they carry from the inside. Both of them coping with the fact that they both, Travis and Shauna, gave everyone permission to eat their closest person.

- I adore the things they are doing with the audio and Buffy Sainte-Marie's song. No matter what happens i really appreciate the sound and music direction of this show. Oh Charlotte.

- Van not calling the facility wellness crisis team is so fucking stupid. NATALIE!!!!?!?!??? At least they all admit its their fault.

- This is so beautiful and so fucked up. I want them all to hug Lottie so badly, why don't they just hug her and hold her? Why don't they just be there for each other in moments of stress. They don't need to do this, I think that could be the whole tagline for this show. NO ONE NEEDS TO DO THIS.

- Callie!!!!?!?!? GET OUT OF THE WOODS, GET OUT OF THE WOODS.

- SHE PROBABLY FUCKING POISONED THEM ALL. Nooooo lottie nooooo please someone stop this.

- Van was pulled back into this cult of the wilderness fast as fuck, this is what happens when you have nothing to loose. Dark Tai is about to come out to play, so is everyone else's dark side. This is so damn tense and yet Lottie is still even as an adult wishing for it to be her. Her own form of self harm and relief would be to be the queen.

-Oh this all just got very very real.

-"IT WAS JUST US" and Lotties "does it matter?"

- Fuck. They know what they did deep down and why it scares them isn't because its trauma and hunger, but because it was their own choice. And that is a deep deep trauma that only survivors can experience, a guilt that will never go away.

- The storyteller, the sleepwalker, the priest, the doctor, the hunter, the butcher, and the antler queen.

- Oh Lottie, she HAD to separate herself from this wilderness construct just so she wouldn't completely loose her mind. Then she passed it to the next person and they passed it to the next and the next until there wasn't anyone or enough to pass it to. And then they had to look in the mirror and realize it was just them when they were rescued. A group of kids with a false religion they created to justify the actions they made in their hunger and desperation.

- His heart. The tension is grows please stop everyone just stop..

- Oh Nat. Oh Misty.

- She was finally sober, that card finally checked in. The wilderness is just death. It follows us all. They came so close to it in a final destination way that it just looms behind and in them, waiting. Waiting for Tai to embrace it with open eyes and the rest when their eyes finally close.

- These girls make me so angry because of their starved or childish actions, they are so the same and yet different from before the crash. Yet still, seeing them as grown women who simply reflections of young girls and kids that are damaged and near death makes me want to hug them so tight. Misty fucked up all of their lives by smashing that black box in a juvenile attempt to be loved.

- Coach you are so fucked up for that but I get it. Those girls took everything they could, he knew they would tear eachother apart even without survival. So he left them to the cold. Any humanity and hope they had is now gone with their shelter. But it also now will provide a giant signal that may get them home in....10 months?

- I need a drink or one of nats cigarettes.

Final thoughts: These writers know how to do a red herring right! Of course the pacing gets better in the last episode of the season but I desperately need them to work on middle of the season pacing and getting down the timeline flipping to a science. Great finale with some misses but a good wrap up if this strike lasts a long while. Imma miss my leather jacket baddie. Heavens gate honey should be the NOT cult's new flavor. Also, I think in the future the group can lie to cover up the Kevyn connection by saying that he and Nat reconnected and were doing drugs together and that's how it got into both of their system. The toxicology won't lie but they might get away per se if they say the drugs were laced. Damn her whole non soccer highschool friend group is gone.

Edit: HUGE FINAL POINT I REALIZED, all of them except Van, she is ready to die, had hidden weapons in their final hunt. Tai became sleep Tai, Natalie had her shiv, Misty had a needle with fent, Lottie brought an actual sharp knife, and Shauna had unknowingly Callie with a gun. None of them trust eachother enough to think they won't murder eachother in a *faux* hunt. What does that say about what else they did out there? Also this mimics what Shauna said last episode that she would murder their spouses if they did what Jeff did. She also left the circle terrified because they may chase her but they also might not, and she can't be sure if its because of the past or her recent fuck ups. The risk that they might have actually killed whoever pulled that card no matter the rouse to save Lottie or not was present to all of them. They are still those girls.

(Insert Gif of Natalie smiling)

[lokisilvertongueshipsvictuuri]

Don't think this is gonna happen but...

I would love a fic about eddie having a complete breakdown and needs to be institutionalized and we get to see eddie properly going to therapy not little snippets like we see with Frank (what are you afraid of) and get more insight to eddie as a kid and his sisters /cousins/niece&nephews and just eddies character as a whole

Bonus points is if buck now as christophers legal guardian due to eddie being essentially incapacitated moves into Eddie's to take care of Chris and taylor's pissed because shes just moved in with him lmao (Which leads to buck breaking up with her) and seeing how chris would handle that and the team rallying around them both in support

And then eddie is released but buck is going to stay a while till eddies back on his feet (he never leaves) and the three of them heal together

And eventual buddie lol

Oooh like a time skip fic this could all happen and then when eddie is finally ready to accept help and heal he continues to see Frank and that ties into the next canon episode scene we see with frank (what are you afraid of)

[sofreddie]

Stashed Away

Summary: With their biological clocks ticking, the brothers set out to find their True Mates, before it's too late.

Characters: Alpha!Dean x OC!Omega!Reader, Alpha!Sam x Unnamed!Omega

Warnings: A/B/O Dynamics, Angst, Fluff, Smut, Mating, Marking, True Mates, Institutionalized Reader, Heavily Medicated Reader, Implied/Mentioned Sterilization

Word Count: 2,876

A/N: For @spnabobingo 2021 - Free Space. This is my first square on my first ever bingo card. Let me know what you think!

Sam and Dean - Winchesters, Alpha hunters - for years they dedicated themselves to the life. But now that they're getting older, and still without mates, they're starting to go feral. Ruts happen more often, are stronger, and last longer. If they don't find mates soon, they will go feral, hurt a bunch of people, and die. So they do a spell, with Cas's suggestion, to find their true mates. They've always acted like they didn't want it, weren't interested, but there's no pretending anymore.

Following the tracking that the spell gave them - they track down Sam's True Mate first. Dean's more worried about getting Sam right than himself at the moment. The tracking leads them to a small town - a case is here, they quickly learn, vamps - by the time they figure out what's going on, they head to the nest, only to find a woman there, taking the head off a vamp, two other bodies at her feet. She’s a hunter - and a badass one at that, taken three vamps down on her own.

Dean's a little agitated, he needed some blood to help balance out the feral rut that's been burning him alive from the inside. Sam however, is speechless. His blood roars in his veins, pounding in his temples as his eyes lock onto her form. He knows - he can feel it with every fiber of his being - she’s his…his True Mate.

"Mega," he wines, taking a step forward only to fall to his knees in weakness, "Need you," he groans, before falling to his side and promptly passing out - the fever too high and rampant.

After quick introductions and explanations, Dean convinces her to come back to their motel. It just happens that she's in the same one, a few doors down. Dean drags Sam into the room, dropping him on one of the beds with a growl. He's getting too old to be dragging his giant of a brother like a sack of potatoes.

“I’ll get another room,” Dean offered, trying to move around her so as not to set Sam off, “I’ll check in with you in the morning,” he offered with a tight smile, nodding at her before leaving and closing the door behind him.

The next morning, seeing Sam’s much improved condition, Dean smiled before entering the motel room and seeing the Omega sat on the bed, a fresh claiming mark at her neck.

“Well, welcome to the team,” Dean joked, still keeping his distance from her as he knew Sam would still be testy over anyone coming near his Omega, “So listen,” he added a bit abruptly, “I figured you and her could snag a car, make your way back to the Bunker,” he explained to his brother, “I know you two need some time. Fresh bond and all. And I still gotta…you know,” he added sheepishly. Now that Sam’s rut had cleared, he could see how bad Dean was in it.

It was time for him to find his Omega.

Dean sighed as he put the Impala in park, looking through the windshield up at the large facility in front of him. When he and Sam did the spell to locate their mates, they looked up the locations to plan out their routes. That’s when they discovered that Dean’s True Mate’s location - was a psychiatric hospital. He couldn’t imagine why, but he hoped that maybe it was something he could help with.

He tried his best to compose himself, feeling weak and barely holding back from losing himself to his biology. Using his FBI credentials, he was led to a common room, the nurse pointing across the room to a woman sat along, staring out the window. Dean nodded to her and the nurse returned to her duties.

Dean gulped down the hard lump in his throat that threatened to burst into a growl. From the other side of the room he could smell her scent, climbing in and flooding his brain. He tried to shake it off, sweat forming on his brow from the fever, and he urged his body to move towards her calmly.

His scent hit her as she gazed aimlessly out the window. A warmth flowed through her and she closed her eyes, humming in content. She opened them once more, her gaze still outside, as she started gently rocking.

“‘Mega…” Dean breathed quietly, his eyes fluttering closed in small intervals as he approached and her scent got stronger. It was driving him crazy, but he had to be wary of his surroundings, wary of her. He had to stay calm. With long controlled breaths he finally reached his goal, pulling a seat opposite the Omega and huffing out a shaky breath.

She turned her head to look at him, her eyes gently rolling over his face and body before meeting his eyes once more. Her face was blank, but she looked pale and tired and afraid.

“W-who are you?” she asked, eyeing him warily.

Now he was here he didn’t know what to do. His brain was too full of other ideas. His cheeks had grown slightly pink from the quickly growing fever. “M-my name’s Dean Winchester,” he said quietly, “I…you…” he had to stop and clench his eyes for a moment, swallowing another hard lump in his throat, “You’re my True Mate.”

She looked him over once more, taking a deeper breath, before her eyes turned sad, “You’re dying too?” she asked, emotionless in features and tone.

Dean tilted his head at the question, frowning slightly, “Do you mean turning feral?” he had to gulp again, shifting in his seat as his body ached.

“I guess so,” she shrugged, “Too many meds to really know the difference.” She suddenly lurched forward, her elbows on the table as she looked at him intently and wide-eyed, “They say I’m crazy, you know? That what I saw wasn’t what I saw, but I saw what I saw!” she nodded manically along to her words, “You don’t need a crazy Omega.” she shook her head emphatically, looking down at her lap.

Dean jolted back in surprise at her small outburst, but his rational mind kicked in. He’d seen these places before and the meds they give patients, “I’ve seen a lot of things,” he offered, “So why don’t you tell me what you saw?”

“I didn’t do it,” she whisper-hissed, leaning forward on the table and glancing around the room before looking at him again, “He did, he came in and killed her, not me!”

Dean frowned again, his head jumping to ‘potential case mode’, “So, there was a guy?” he pressed her for more information, “What did he look like?”

“He was just a guy,” she shook her head, “B-but his eyes were weird,” she exclaimed wide eyed as if it was happening before her once more, “He killed her and he said I had to come with him because my Alpha was a very bad man. A-and then his eyes…” she trailed off, shaking her head and fighting back tears, “I got away, went to the police…b-but no one believes me.” she whispered sadly.

Dean’s body almost trembled with quickly growing anger. Someone or something knew what he and Sam had been doing. They hurt his Omega.

My Omega.

Mine.

“You’re not crazy,” he growled, quickly rising from his seat and looking down at her, “Omega, we’re leaving.”

She looked up at him in confusion, shaking her head, “I can’t leave,” she stated simply, “I’m scheduled for sterilization to stop my heat hurting me,” she explained as if it were a simple, everyday activity, “Doctor’s orders,” she nodded, turning back to look out the window.

The next thing Dean knew, he had his Omega in his arms and was standing beside the Impala. He was panting for breath and felt exhausted. He had some vague memory of a lot of snarling, roaring and punching Doctors directly in the face.

And now they were here.

“I’m gonna take you somewhere where you’ll be safe,” he breathed, looking down at…uh… “W-what’s your name, Omega?”

“Y/N,” she answered reflexively, still in an emotionless haze through it all, but relinquishing to her Alpha. “You shouldn’t have taken me,” she added, “The man with the eyes, I’ve seen him outside the window sometimes. And my heat is killing me. I’m a disposable Omega.”

“No,” Dean said suddenly and harshly, his arms held her tighter - his splayed out palms squeezing her. He bit back another growl, the scent of her heat crashing into him like a brick wall now his adrenaline fueled outburst was simmering down, “Never say that. You’re my Omega,” he pressed his forehead onto hers, gasping for breath as his body threatened to buckle as he grew weak, “Please…l-let me take care of you.”

She looked at the man, the stranger, the Alpha who had suddenly come in and tore her from her prison, like a knight rescuing a maid from a tower. She wanted to laugh at that, but she’d long ago lost her ability to emote.

They had kept her constantly medicated, to control her heat, her scent, her mind, her actions, anything they possibly could. But for some reason, something about him broke through her constant haze and made her want to just let him take charge.

“Okay, Alpha,” she agreed, just looking at him as she waited for whatever came next.

“‘Mega…” he breathed, voice breaking slightly from restraint. He held her so close, but not close enough at the same time. He could feel her warmth as he held her, her breath fanning across his lips. Some of that restraint slipped. He pressed his lips firmly into hers, the hairs on his neck standing on end as he hummed hungrily.

She pulled from the kiss, her hand gently cupping his cheek and turning his head to see several personnel searching the lot and searching for him, before one of them pointed at him and shouted for his companion.

“Right,” Dean stared wide-eyed before shaking himself back to reality. After ushering Y/N into the car, he quickly climbed in, the loud tire screeching of the Impala tires shortly following as Dean tore the car out of the lot and sped down the road.

When he said ‘somewhere safe’ before, he had meant the Bunker. The way his body was reacting right now however - aching, yearning, pleading to just touch her - he was ninety-nine percent sure he couldn’t last.

There was that motel just a few miles out though…

Y/N said nothing during the drive, her eyes out the window as before at the facility. She seemed still and calm, but also fragile and numb. But inwardly she felt trapped in her own head and unable to break free. She had dreamed about her Alpha, her True Mate, many times as had most people. And now that he was here, she was unable to even really experience it.

The next thing she realized, she was waking up in an unfamiliar room. She was somewhat dazed but her mind and body felt clear for the first time in a long time. She opened her eyes, sitting up slightly to two men at the foot of the bed she was lying in. One was the Alpha from before, the other a new stranger.

“I’ve healed and cleansed her,” Castiel explained, “But Dean-”

Dean had stumbled back, leaning against the wall as he eyes remained on fixed on Y/N. Castiel’s words were like white noise to him, he knew she was healed. If he thought her scent was powerful before, now with all the suppressants - and fuck knows what else - out of her system, it was like it had been turned up to eleven.

His head dropped back with a thud against the wall, his eyes clenching with a restrained growl. “‘Mega…” he breathed, his chest heaving and sweat forming on his brow.

She whimpered as her eyes set on him. She hadn’t felt a full heat in a long time and this one was especially bad. She knew it was him. She could remember their words, his touch, his lips.

“Alpha,” she called meekly, tentatively reaching up a hand in invite from her position on the bed.

“-Sh-she’s still in full heat,” Cas finished his sentence, taking a wary step back as he eyed the duo cautiously.

“Out,” Dean ordered, not even turning to address the Angel.

And Cas vanished.

Before Y/N could blink, Dean was there. His hands bunched in the back of her hair as he hungrily devoured her lips.

She moaned as they connected, his heat and weight soothing her ache and need. Her heart swelled, but a part of him also felt familiar, as if she’d known him all along. She pulled from the kiss, gazing into his eyes, frantic with need but also wanting to savor every moment. When she noticed how far gone he really was, she decided to let him take what he needed.

“My Alpha,” she whispered, kissing him once more.

There was a small rumble in Dean’s throat as his bloodshot eyes gazed directly back into her. He breathed, “Mine,” before his eyes fluttered closed and his mouth attached to her neck. He kissed and sucked a trail down to her collarbone, pressing his body into her as he fully mounted the bed and towered over her. He wanted to smother himself in her scent, every touch sending waves of need through him.

His hips rolled into her, his brain fogging as he quickly pulled at her shirt, ripping it clean off in one swoop before he hungrily mouthed at the swell of her breast.

She could feel the tremble in his muscles as he fought to keep the beast at bay, trying not to scare or hurt her. But she knew he needed more and she wanted to prove she could handle whatever her Alpha gave her.

“I won’t break,” she pleaded, pulling his lips from her body, “Take what you need Alpha, please,” she whispered desperately.

Dean’s eyes darkened, staring at her half-lidded before his hands moved fast. As he hungrily devoured her mouth once more, he quickly stripped them both of their clothes. His hands roamed her with need, quickly moving down to her center before two digits swiftly dove into her core.

He growled as he felt her slick, curling his fingers and pressing firmly into her g-spot, his eyes rolling back as she moaned in surprise. He quickly withdrew his fingers, moving to grab her hips and flip her onto her stomach. He hoisted her hips up to meet him, letting out a low moan as he rutted his painful hard erection through her folds.

She moaned wantonly, arching her back and presenting for him obediently. She purred, rutting back into him, desperate for her Alpha.

He moaned out, mouth hanging open longingly. “My Omega…” he growled lowly, positing the head of his cock between her folds and gripping her hips tightly, “Wanna knot you…” he growled again - hungrier - before slamming his hips forward with a loud grunt. She was perfect, tightening like a vice around him that he hissed blissfully, quickly pistoning his hips with choked huffs and growls.

She moaned loudly, panting hard as Dean set a brutal pace. His grip was tight, his cock filling her completely, slamming hard into her cervix on every thrust. She reached her arms above her, grasping onto the end of the bed for something to hold onto. Using the leverage, she pushed her hips harder back into him, lifting her head to groan out.

Dean leaned forward, his breathing quick and erratic as he pounded her. His lips grazed and sucked on her neck as he moaned, feeling the muscle at the head of his cock begin to swell. His grunts became strained as fought to keep his pace. “Cum on my knot, ‘Mega,” he demanded, releasing one of her hips to rub hard circles on her clit.

Feeling his knot swell she knew she was close to losing her mind. When his fingers found her clit, she stuttered and screamed as her orgasm washed over her, her walls clenching his throbbing length within her. Dean seemed to draw it out as her pleasure seemed to never end.

As her wall clenched him impossibly tighter, Dean roared through one final harsh thrust, holding himself as deep as possible as he finally came, his hot cum shooting deep and filling her. The hand still holding Y/N’s hip gripped bruisingly tight as Dean suddenly bit into her skin.

As her mind finally broke free of the haze of bliss, she realized he had positioned them on their sides spooning. Dean was nuzzling into the mark on her neck and humming, his hands grazing over her skin.

“Who was that man from before?” she suddenly asked, remembering feeling free of the medications and seeing a man there before he just wasn’t there.

“‘N Angel,” Dean mumbled, breathing in her hair and holding her tightly to him, “Cas. Healed you.”

Y/N smirked to herself, rubbing a hand over his forearm that was wrapped around her, “I see you’re still in caveman mode,” she teased.

He smirked with a small hum, not letting her go, ever.

Forevers:

@sis-tafics

@lyarr24

@calaofnoldor

@hobby27

@spnbaby-67

Dean Winchester:

@akshi8278

@jerkbitchidjitassbutt

[realm-sweet-realm]

Repeating the Cycle

I thought I’d write a little story about ink infection, as well as Sammy’s role after he was transformed. It’s inspired by Shazzbaa’s theories (I’d say which, but we don’t want spoilers, now do we?)!

I’ll tell you guys later tonight about the future writing projects I have planned.

---

Sammy awoke in his sanctuary, as he had many times before. He hadn’t been to his apartment in... well, days anyhow. He felt better when he was near the ink. He tried the door to exit his private sanctuary, and it was locked. “Is this a sign?” he asked his lord. “Is it time?”

Yes, his lord spoke back.

Sammy smiled- smiled rather weakly, as the pain from his ink infection had been wearing on him heavily. “Finally.”

All the waiting. All the sickness. All the fear. It was time to see what it was all for. And his lord had assured him, with the comforting voice of a father to a young son, that it would be worth it.

Sammy dragged himself over to the leaking pipe that hung from the ceiling of his sanctuary and turned on the ink supply. Ink sputtered down onto Sammy’s face and clothes, and he fell to his knees, hands outstretched and mouth open as though he was staring into heaven itself. His heart was pounding. He was shaking from adrenaline, and not even being surrounded with, covered in, and consuming the ink that normally numbed his symptoms seemed to be helping. This had to be fear instead of withdrawal.

Do not be afraid, the voice comforted, you will have ascended in mere hours. I promise, you will be safe and healthy. I promise, it will be better than anything you’ve ever experienced.

“Thank you! Bendy, hear my praise! I want what you have for me! I crave your embrace!”

Sammy took a long suck of ink from the pipe, then laid down on the floor. He was weak. so weak.

That’s it. You’ve made it. You need only wait now.

Sammy trusted Bendy. Bendy told him that everything he’d done and experienced in his life- even the nightmarish last few years- was leading to something. It told him that everything was okay.

Sammy didn’t know how much time had passed when he felt Joey tying up his ankles. With some struggle, he sat up and tried to push Joey off of him, but it had little effect. Before long, Joey had finished on Sammy’s ankles and was straddling his chest to tie up his hands. The last thing he saw with his biological eyes was Joey’s knife slitting his throat.

When Sammy woke up, the voice of his lord was gone. By trying to make a toon out of him, Joey had robbed him of his ascension and severed his connection to him.

---

Grant awoke in his office to the horrid ticking of his Bendy clock and the array of whispering voices that had plagued him since early in his infection. The clock’s small hand pointed to six, but Grant had no idea whether it was morning or evening. Months of ink infection had ruined his sense of time. He tried the door to his office and found that it had been locked from the outside by chain and padlock. Grant laughed at the absurdity of it all- his life had spiralled into a nightmarish fever dream.

“Does this mean it’s time?” Grant asked.

Yes. Your time is almost up, the voice answered, and for once, Grant trusted it. He felt almost too tired from illness to care.

“I’ll do anything you ask to stop it.”

No response, except for those muttered voices. Grant hadn’t expected one- the voice rarely had his best interests in mind. He shuffled over to his desk and pushed aside some papers to go back to sleep- possibly for the last time.

And then he saw it- a report from Joey that he’d received mere days before his symptoms had started- ending with the words “Fix this or I’ll have your head!” angrily scrawled at the bottom.

That was it. Joey had done this to motivate him. He just had to figure out how to keep the studio from bankruptcy and he’d be cured!

Yes! Yes! You’re right. Fix it! the voice yelled.

Adrenaline flooded Grant’s system as he jerked open his filing cabinet with shaking hands in search of the necessary files to fix the budget. This was his one chance to survive. The muttering voices were screaming in his head- ear-piercing. His head felt ready to explode.

“Shut up and let me focus!” he screamed.

Ink will soothe your symptoms.

That was something that the voice had told him frequently. He hadn’t given in to it yet- not much, anyhow- because common sense told him that ink was inedible. It was also his sincere belief that the voice wanted to kill him. The voice had told him, back before the physical symptoms had become obvious, that he was merely losing his mind and needed to hide it from everyone, lest he be institutionalized. Then, as soon as the physical symptoms had taken root, it had changed its tune- he was losing his mind, because he was ill with an incurable, supernatural disease, and no hospital could help him, and going to one would only guarantee that he would be a test subject for the limited time he had left. Listening to it then had gotten him into this position, and he wasn’t eager to listen to it again.

But this was life or death. He opened the supply on the ink pipe that Thomas- for some reason he didn’t understand- had installed in his office, and drank deeply.

The voice- the muttering- the headache- it all stopped. Silence. Finally.

Grant’s hands were covered in ink now, and were sure to soak any paper he used. I can’t let that stop me. He dropped to his knees and started painting calculations on the floor.

The numbers didn’t add up. Not a single one. Was his mind was too frayed to do basic mathematical functions?! How could he fix anything, let alone this insurmountable debt, while he could barely think straight?! Calm down. Stay calm. Try again. Life or death. Time is money. What will Joey say?!

From the cracks within the wall, Sammy watched as Grant spiralled into panic and tears, and turned his office inside out trying to find anything that could help, expressing his fears through wall-writing, and attempting escape the room. Poor thing, Sammy thought, remembering the pain and uncertainty of his own ink infection, but soon I’ll be able to teach him the truth.

It had been years since Sammy’s sacrifice. Not only did Sammy still work for Joey now that he was a failed toon, Joey had him on a schedule. Every day at 11:00 AM, Sammy would ooze through the walls of Joey’s office for their morning meeting. Sammy wasn’t particularly happy about doing anything for the man who had turned him into a failed Boris just as he was about to fulfill a higher destiny, but the voice had once told him that to follow Joey was to follow his lord, and now those previous words (which Sammy had recorded and studied every day) were all he had left as a doctrine to follow. Sammy hoped that with enough obedience and service, his lord would see past his ruined body and grant him his destiny.

Joey’s demands were often difficult, but they were simple: sacrificing specific people into specific toons, and looking after the infected. Joey rarely sacrificed people on his own anymore, and instead relied on Sammy to do the dirty work of knocking people out, killing them on pentagrams, and then dealing with the resulting dead body, blood and ink-stains on the floor, and whatever abomination came out of the ink machine. Looking after the ink-infected was easier: keep an eye on them, and once they become too infected to be useful, lock them in their offices or in infirmary rooms and take them to their prison in the basement come night. Sammy had overseen the infection of nearly thirty people by now and had sacrificed dozens.

Thankfully, Joey’s demands were not very time-intensive, and he had plenty of time for his passion: teaching the lost ones about their lord and saviour, Bendy.

The lost ones lived in a prison in the very basement of Joey Drew Studios, along with the failed toons. Sammy’s sermons were some of the only times they were allowed out of their cages, and so they were always happy to see him.

Some agreed with him. Often, these were the same ones who had heard a comforting voice as they were infected- generally those with a religious background. Others thought him insane. Their voice had been different- wrong- hallucinatory- and quite often threatening. Sammy had these lost ones do penance in order to find their way to Bendy. Some found him, leaving Sammy feeling accomplished, but also jealous that he could never have what they had. Hopefully, his lord would see the wonderful work he was doing and one day ascend him along with the rest of them- because surely, that was not their final form.

Today’s meeting was like any other. Sammy waited in the walls until Joey’s 10:30 client left, and then slithered out before him.

“Anything to report?” Joey asked casually, as he looked over some paperwork. These meetings were usually uneventful.

“Two people are currently under quarantine. Three more are infected but still able to work for now. Everything is fine- except for one small detail. One of the people under quarantine is destroying his office out of fear. If you’d like, I could tie him up snug until he transforms, or force-feed him ink to speed the process along.”

Joey considered this. "Hmm... well, I do need an Edgar. He would work as well as any. Are you sure he’s close to transforming?” All ink-infected people had strange beliefs and delusions (except for Sammy, of course- his visions were absolute truth), but by this point in their infection, they were generally too tired to do anything destructive- especially ones like this one, who had increased the duration of their infection by resisting the urge to drink ink.

“It will be a matter of hours,” Sammy assured.

“Well, that’s not convenient, but I do have lunch right after this. I’ll get the Charley down to the basement, and you get the Barley and Edgar. The Barley’s name is Lacie Benton, and I’d suggest you knock her out before taking her anywhere- she’s a tough one. But the Edgar shouldn’t be a problem, right?”

“No... I suppose not.” Severely ink-infected people were, without exception, very weak, and Sammy was stronger now than he’d ever been as a human.

“Alright! See you down there as soon as possible.”

Sammy nodded, slunk back into the walls, and cursed everything, especially his order to obey Joey Drew. A severely ink infected person had never, and would never, produce a good toon- part of their souls had already been connected to the other lost ones. Joey must have known that, but he still insisted on stealing the people that were meant to be Sammy’s to guide, probably because in Joey’s mind, killing a person was murder but killing a lost one (or someone who soon would be a lost one) was not. Joey didn’t see his people as equally human, and it sickened Sammy. Nonetheless, he slithered through the walls until he came upon Grant’s office.

The office looked like a madhouse. The floors and walls were coated with repetitive writing. Furniture had been strewn about. Grant himself was curled against the ink pipe in his office, covered in so much ink that Sammy had thought he was already transformed before he realized he still had hair. The poor thing had tried so hard, while so sick, at something so futile. Sammy had his orders, but he wasn’t going to lay a hand on his sheep-that-wouldn’t-be until he had to.

Sammy slithered out of the wall- slowly, so as not to scare him.

“Who are you?” Grant asked. He sounded so tired of all the supernatural surprises that he barely cared.

“I’m here on behalf of Joey Drew,” Sammy began.

“I’m so sorry. I tried... but I couldn’t. I suppose you’re here to kill me, aren’t you?”

“No. I’m here to give you congratulations. The others in your department were able to use these brilliant calculations,” Sammy gestured widely at the messily scrawled gibberish on a wall, “to make a plan. The studio is going to avoid bankruptcy, and you’re going to be cured. Come with me.” Sammy offered Grant his hand. Grant took it, and Sammy helped him up.

“I-I don’t understand. I don’t understand how-” All of those calculations... Grant would have guessed that they were worthless.

“Shh... you’ll be clearer-headed soon. Just come with me, now. I can’t be out there where everyone can see me, but go to the elevator, go to the bottom floor, and I will be there. I promise- you will be fine.”

“Thank you so much. But, my door-”

Sammy slithered back into the wall. Grant heard the click of a door unlocking, followed by the clink of chains falling limp. His office door was unlocked. Do I trust him? Grant asked himself. This day kept getting stranger. If I don’t, I’m guaranteed to die. I have nothing to lose.

Sammy slithered into the wooden floor of the elevator and only reappeared once the elevator hit the very bottom.

“I’m sorry,” Sammy lamented “I want to lead you to Bendy. I want you to find peace as one of my followers. But it is not in the cards.”

The two made brief eye contact- or would have, if Sammy’s face weren’t covered in mask. Grant, obviously, had no idea what Sammy was talking about. Then, Sammy grabbed Grant’s hair, slammed his head against the wall a few times to knock him out, tied him up for sacrifice, and left to find Lacie Benton.

[arvandus]

The Todoroki Family Arc: Dabi and Representation for Abuse Victims

Something I’d like to address regarding all of this Todoroki family discourse is the importance of representation for abuse victims, specifically when it comes to the topic of forgiveness.  Many of us who are victims of abuse aren’t willing to forgive our abusers, and there is nothing wrong with taking that stance.  The concept of forgiveness of abuse is an especially hard pill to swallow when that forgiveness is for the sake of the abuser and not the victim (i.e., in this case, forgiveness for the sake of Enji’s redemption arc).  So this makes the current Todoroki family/Endeavor redemption arc so incredibly difficult to read, as all of the ‘good’ Todorokis are either already willing to forgive (or on their way to forgiving) Enji's long-term, narcissistic abuse.

It’s true that in canon Enji has explicitly stated that he’s not asking for forgiveness and that his family members don’t have to forgive him.  Whether or not he truly understands what that means is up for debate (I’ve got a lot to say on Enji’s redemption arc, but that’ll be for another post).  But for the sake of this post, let’s state that he genuinely means it, which would be great as it shows an awareness on his part of how unforgivable his actions are.  This great and all, except the words lose their weight/significance when every single ‘normal’ family member is on track to forgive him.  It would hold much more weight to show he doesn’t get forgiven by everyone, which will require him to at least to some extent, live with the consequences of his actions (e.g., being alone/ostracized from some family members).

So, let’s go through the Todoroki family members who are in the process of forgiving, have already forgiven, or are on their way to forgiving Enji, and how I personally respond to their forgiveness. Of course, all of this will be heavily influenced by my personal opinions and personal experiences, however I think that’s fair – as a person who’s endured long-term childhood abuse from a parent, I’d hope that my opinions (and others like me) will have some weight in the conversation surrounding domestic violence, even within the context of fiction.

Rei:

Rei has shown signs of starting to forgive Endeavor as evidenced by defending him to her children.

I do appreciate that she states that she’s still too scared to see her husband, and that the doctor states it’s not a good idea.  That all makes perfect sense.  But the idea that she’s willing to give him a chance to redeem himself because he sends her flowers?  I absolutely cannot identify with this in any which way.  Her marriage was forced by Endeavor, her sole purpose to bear him cold/hot quirk children.  She may have later grown to love him, who knows; we do know she was willing at least have Fuyumi with him, since she suggested it… (although there is a lot to unpack around that too, which I’ll also save for a different post). Even if she did love Enji (and a part of her may still love him, as some of us may feel towards our abusers) she went through YEARS of abuse to the point that she had a psychotic break and had to be institutionalized.  To suggest that she’s willing to begin the road of forgiveness because he sends her flowers is just completely unrealistic, and I personally can’t identify with her at all (also, as a sidenote: if my abuser and the cause of my psychosis, who I’m too afraid to see, is sending me gifts, the last thing I would want would be to see those gifts displayed in my room as a constant reminder of them).

 Fuyumi:

It’s clear that Fuyumi is well on her way to forgiving her father (if she hasn’t done so already).

Fuyumi wants nothing more than to piece her family back together, which is entirely fine if that’s what she wants.  What bothers me however, is that she’s willing to do so by sweeping the family drama under the rug in an attempt at keeping the illusion of a healthy, loving family (i.e., one that’s not broken by abuse). Why can’t she have this happy family with her brothers and her mother?  Why does she feel the need to have Enji in that family picture, considering all he’s done to them?  Her whole “it would make your sister happy” is, in my opinion, guilt-tripping and selfish. I don’t think she’s a mean person, and she may not be aware that her behavior could be damaging.  But her motivations are clearly self-focused, as she’s not willing to address her family’s issues in a way that validates everyone’s feelings. She just wants everyone to ‘play nice.’

It’s this dismissive behavior, a willingness to overlook the harm of the abuser for the sake of trying to keep a semblance of normalcy when things clearly aren’t normal, that has me label her as an abuse apologist. It’s not intended to be malicious of course; I do think she believes she means well.  But how does ignoring the abuse her family endured help anyone?  Will this ever get addressed by Horikoshi?  TBH, I doubt it, but we’ll just have to wait and see.  But one thing is for sure, she’s definitely the most forgiving out of all of her siblings.

 Natsuo:

I love this guy.  Truly.  So far, he’s probably the MOST relatable for me…

Look at that.  Beautiful.  I love it. It’s everything I want.  He’s unforgiving, holding his long-time abusive father accountable (regardless of how good of a hero he is), while still being a good person (lookin’ at you, Dabi…) all in one breath.

SO… why am I including him in this? Natsuo so far seems to be holding out, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Horikoshi writes him in the direction of forgiveness, especially after this Dabi/Touya reveal. I feel like there’s already been hints at it, and it’s just a matter of time before he inevitably gets written as forgiving his father as well.

Here, you see his mother’s words getting into his head; he’s thinking heavily about what she’s said to him.  He doesn’t like the idea of his father looking for redemption, and holds his own disbelief around his father “trying to make sense of it all.”  But clearly he values his mother’s opinion on the matter, which will have an impact on his own views/beliefs.  Plus, the added pressure of seeing his other family members forgive his father will also have an impact on his stance, either by making him dig his heels in further in resistance, or by accepting their stance on it and as such be one step closer to forgiving Enji himself.

Here, he’s hearing Enji’s words and recalling Midoriya talking to Shouto earlier in the evening. He’s drawing a parallel between what it means to be a kind person and what it means to forgive. It’s followed up by his father’s confession of atonement, which clearly has an impact on Natsuo.  His experience here is visceral and entirely relatable; while Enji’s words may sound nice and genuine, it does little to assuage Natsuo of the painful memories he harbors and the damage that his father has caused over the years.

He’s still holding stubbornly onto his anger, unwilling to forgive… but the way it’s playing out, it’ll only be a matter of time. Maybe it’ll be yet another near-death experience for Endeavor, this time by Touya’s hand.  Or maybe he’ll feel that deep cut of betrayal from Touya/Dabi that makes him let go of his own anger/darkness in his heart out of a fear of letting it consume him the way it did his older brother.  Either way, I see it ending up there.  We don’t know for certain yet, of course… but my money is on Natsuo forgiving his father by the end, so I’m holding back on getting too attached.

 Shouto:

Shouto also seems to be becoming more open to forgiveness, despite all he’s gone through (and witnessed his mother go through). There’s a lot surrounding why this may be… perhaps it was watching the near-death experience of Enji in the battle with High-End… (which, hey, watching someone you care about nearly die, even if that person is your abuser, would be rough to watch).

Or watching his father be a badass hero (because let’s face it, Enji is an excellent fighter) that the public looks to for hope. Keep in mind, this happened after Enji had told Shouto he wanted to be worthy of the #1 position and  of being Shouto’s father; so Enji has just shown to Shouto that he’s (at least by Hero Society’s standards) worthy of being #1, and now he’s trying to make amends with his family (mm, check out that need for validation…).

 Clearly, Shouto is giving his father a chance to redeem himself.

And, of course, we have this page as well, which draws the comparison of being a kind person also being a forgiving person (which, quite frankly, isn’t true - you can definitely be a kind person and still not forgive someone who’s done long-term harm to you).  Regardless, it’s clearly being shown that Shouto is obviously heading into forgiveness.  Once again, the forgiveness itself isn’t bad… it’s how it’s being portrayed.  As someone who’s been abused by someone who’s supposed to take care of them and love them, I can say with certainty that you don’t really care that much about how good that person is at their job. It shouldn’t matter that Enji is a great hero; he’s always been a great hero (that’s why he was second only to All Might). What matters is how Enji is as a father, and it’s well established that he’s failed his entire family, by choice, for years. Shouto states as such to him, saying he’ll watch to see what kind of father he becomes.  But this follows immediately after the battle with High-End, which implies that Shouto is basing his willingness to forgive his father off of Enji’s heroics and public acceptance as the symbol of hope.  Why this would sway Shouto’s view of his father enough to consider forgiveness for years of physical and psychological damage escapes me.

Now, let’s be clear that forgiveness of an abuser isn’t impossible, but it’s certainly not an easy task.  Additionally, the decision to forgive hinges on a lot of things, including whether or not the abuser is worthy of forgiveness (i.e., are the crimes he’s committed against his family redeemable?  Is he truly genuinely feeling guilty about what he’s done? Does he understand the magnitude of what he’s done?  Is he acting selflessly, or is his quest for redemption rooted in selfishness (e.g., need for acceptance, a way to hold onto one’s power/importance within the family dynamic, etc.)?).   In many cases, especially cases where the abuse is long-term as it’s portrayed as being for the Todoroki family, and as mine was growing up, forgiveness isn’t really on the victim’s mind.  The damage done by the abuser is so long lasting, leaving a permanent imprint on how we think, act, and behave.  It shapes us, especially when it occurs in the formative years of childhood, affecting how we connect with others and how we view ourselves.

So, sharing a few contrite moments with the abuser (in this case, Enji) and seeing some positive situations (e.g., watching him kick ass on TV, be kind to his kids, etc.) do little to persuade me into forgiveness of a man who willingly, repeatedly, chose to abuse his family for at least a decade.  His abuse was physical, mental, and emotional.  Even if his desire for redemption is genuine, the quickness with which the good characters here begin to forgive him feels slightly forced for the sake of his redemption arc, and is therefore unrelatable.  And that is the crux of the issue.  Enji’s redemption should be just as much about the healing of his victims as it should be about him (if not more so).  However, that doesn’t seem to be the case.  So, what we get is a family portrayal that is in favor of the abuser.

So, all of the ‘good’ Todorokis are working toward forgiveness of their abuser.  Great. So, where does that leave those of us who aren’t on board with forgiveness? Those of us who see our own abuse, our own history, within this story and are not (and will not) ever forgive our abuser for entirely reasonable and justifiable reasons? Where is our representation in a story that, for all intents and purposes, is meant to be about the ramifications of abuse (and by proxy, victims of abuse)?

Our only remaining choice?  Dabi, of course... the psychopath who’s bent on destroying his abuser’s life and the hero society that’s, in some ways, created and supported him.

I think a major reason Dabi is so loved by some of us is that we can identify with that anger, that need for retribution/justice.  Are all of us entirely on board with how Dabi has decided to go about this retribution by doing whatever it takes no matter who it hurts or what innocent lives are lost? No, of course not.  But in a story where we’re looking for a sense of justice, where the long-term serial abuser DOESN’T get to walk away free with his abused family still by his side/supporting him, what other options do we have?  He’s the ONLY ONE who seems to be willing to hold Enji accountable for what he’s done and who sees the hypocrisy in his position as a symbol of hope in contrast to who he has been behind closed doors with his family.  So THAT is what we’re defending when we defend Dabi.   We’re NOT defending his murders, or him attempting to kill his brother, or ANY of that.  We might understand where that darkness is coming from/what’s caused it and empathize with it, but we don’t EXCUSE it.

Now, obviously the story isn’t finished yet, so there’s no way to know for sure where Horikoshi will take this redemption arc. We don’t know if all of the family members really will forgive Endeavor or not, and if Enji will ever be fully welcomed into the family fold.  The airing of the Todoroki family’s dirty laundry and its impacts on shining a light on the cracks in hero society give me hope. Also, the diversity across the Todoroki family of how each person copes that that abuse is also well done. That’s why I’m still invested in this story, that’s why I’m still reading it. But we only have what we’ve been shown to go on, and at the moment, there are major aspects of this story that are lacking.  The diversity in how each family member handles their abuse and their relationship with their abuser starts to lose its impact when that diversity is gradually washed out in favor of universal forgiveness. 

Also, where the manga is currently at gives me concern about the kind of message this story is sending to its readers.  I often see others say: “it’s just fiction, relax.”  Yes, it is fiction.  And when we read fiction, we all search for a piece of ourselves within the story.  You can’t have a story that centers around domestic abuse and not have abuse victims gravitate towards it, hoping for accurate representation.  And most importantly, even though this is ‘just a story,’ what message is it sending when the only person not willing to excuse/forgive Enji is a psychopath who’s been driven insane by his father’s abuse (and possible by his family’s inability/unwillingness to address said abuse)?  What message does it send to abuse victims? What message does it send to those who have never experienced abuse and are learning about it through this fictional representation? To say that this isn’t relevant in a real-world way is inaccurate at best and damaging at worst; and even if it may not hold relevance for some within a real-world setting, for many of us it does and as such the implications and impacts of it should be respected, even if you may not agree with it.  In short, for some of us, this is personal.

Now, do I think that every family member should curse Enji into the sun?  No, as satisfying as that would be for me.  I’d be perfectly happy if some family members forgive and some don’t.  Why?  Because it’s realistic.  It makes sense, because it depends on each character’s unique, personal experiences. Some will forgive, some won’t, and some will continue to defend and provide excuses for said abuser – all of these positions within the abused family dynamic are real and exist.  I just wish BNHA would also allow a space for us abuse victims who aren’t willing to forgive – a space that isn’t villainized.

[gayhanguangjun]

doy ou think sex based oppression is real?

I’m assuming this is code for “are you a terf?” I’ve gotten another ask in the past few months asking me if I’m a terf and it’s always after I start reblogging stuff about misogyny so here we go, I wrote this all out and saved it as a draft because it’s long but you get to see it now. If you were asking in good faith then I apologize.

i might have said this before but the fact that terfs are the loudest people who talk about misogyny as a real form of oppression is a Problem. Especially when people say not to reblog posts by terfs even if it’s stuff that’s actually correct (minus them defining “woman” incorrectly which is not stated). It just 1) makes sure that no one reblogs anything about misogyny out of fear and 2) also makes people distrust any discussion about misogyny as a “terf thing.”

This is how you lose people to terfs! I’m sorry but it has to be said. If a cis woman faces serious abuse at the hands of the patriarchy and is frustrated and scared and doesn’t know where to turn, she is going to look for discussions about the issues she deals with. And she will usually find terfs because it seems like they’re the only damn people who talk about it like it’s a legit thing to be afraid and frustrated about.

If she turns anywhere else in leftist spaces, she’ll just see people saying “not all men — gbt men don’t benefit from the patriarchy!” (despite being sexually assaulted by a mlm who thought it was okay because he was a mlm and she’s just a woman whose body is obviously the property of men, and not being taken seriously because “lgbt people don’t do that” or “hes gay it didn’t mean anything get over it,” also despite men being prioritized over women in lgbt spaces in general, etc)

she’ll see people complaining exclusively about karens (when older white men are just as, if not more violent than older white women — and when she herself has experienced abuse after abuse by older white men who treat her like something to be flirted with and then screamed at because she’s just doing her job as a cashier and they think they own her, but there’s no convenient word to describe it like “Karen,” thats just Men Being Men and we don’t care about them)

she’ll see people saying that “sex-based oppression” is a lie and talking about it makes you a terf (when she herself has dealt with the struggle of needing and being denied an abortion, when she has seen trans men deal with the repercussions of having a body that is assigned the label of “female” by a misogynistic society, when diseases that affect afab people are institutionally ignored and not taken seriously, when all of this happens because our society is misogynistic, and when recognizing the institutional abuse of the “female body” doesn’t negate the existence of trans people or transphobia in any way because misogyny is multifaceted and complex)

she’ll see people literally say that middle and upper class white cishet women do not face any issues because of misogyny and that their privilege shields them from ALL misogyny (despite them being women and therefore will always be taken less seriously than men, will always be sexualized more than men, will always have a higher risk of domestic abuse than men, will always run the risk of being powerless and totally dependent on their rich husbands who they can’t escape from without taking serious repercussions)

she’ll see people talking up a storm about how you shouldn’t say “insane” because it’s a slur but in the same sentence call a woman a bitch or a cunt, and if she points out the hypocrisy she becomes an actual laughing stock because “oh this bitch thinks ‘bitch’ is a slur!”

Also she will see people making posts responding to women’s genuine frustration with misogyny (for instance ‘ugh why don’t men help out with chores’) by saying “#NotAllMen, and actually, you’re a terf for saying this, this is gender essentialism” when it is NOT gender essentialism actually:

Gender essentialism: men [misogynistic thing] because it’s biologically innate. This CANNOT be changed because it’s Just How Men Are. We should not expect any better from them.

Just regular old “recognizing patterns of oppression”: men [misogynistic thing] because our society socializes them to do so. This MUST be changed, we need to watch out for this behavior and challenge it. We should ALWAYS expect better from them.

You always hear the stories about women who were vulnerable after facing extreme issues of misogyny being taken under terfs’ wings when no one else would take them seriously. If you insinuate that talking about misogyny is Evil and Bad, don’t be surprised when they get indoctrinated. You’re literally pushing them into terfs’ hands.

And personally I’m sick of the idea that talking about misogyny is linked to transmisogyny. It doesn’t even make sense! If you recognize that misogyny takes many different forms and should be taken seriously in all of those forms, then you should naturally come to the conclusion that transmisogyny is a form of it!

TLDR: the left needs to start talking about misogyny like it’s an actual axis of oppression and not something that gets cancelled out or only applies in certain situations. We need to stop and ask ourselves, would we say this about any other axis of oppression? Would we say ‘not all abled people — neurodivergent able-bodied people don’t benefit from ableism!’? We need to ask ourselves if we are brushing aside misogyny as unimportant, and especially if we are reducing valid discussions about misogyny to Terf Rhetoric.

[duckbeater]

Courtship, pt. 2

Writing about happiness is very difficult and boring. The below are some small attempts I’ve made to write through my happiness. My small, important readership deserves an update, says my brother, whose sensibilities have only rarely steered me catastrophically wrong.

I AM BUYING CHAMPAGNE TO CELEBRATE MY LOVER

Today’s the last day of his job and he’s throwing himself a little party. In September he begins med school and in the next month he’ll put his affairs in order, readying for the big move. I have the sense that tonight begins our diminuendo, despite his staying over last night and spit-fucking me, and I’ll surely stay over tonight, after the many champagne toasts to his prosperous life ahead. 

We’ve started sleeping as two spoons embracing chest to chest, with our faces tucked awkwardly in a neck or an armpit. Of course I wake up gasping, my mouth sucking after a less hot pocket of air, and turn, and enjoy that he pulls me tightly back to him. He’s a heavy sleeper and I’m a light sleeper, and our bedding situation resembles something like a rock in a tumbler with my rolling over and over and over again, arising too early, wildly underslept, shining with sweat, but ecstatic that we’ve touched all night long. I’m attending his celebration in a sleep deficit that I’ve covered with caffeine and a long, soulful run beside the lake. I’ve been thinking about us a lot. 

He wouldn’t call himself my lover, I think, but I’m hoping the expensiveness of the champagne I’m bringing will convince friends in attendance that that’s what we are. I’m hoping my largesse goes noticed and commented on—that it’s interpreted as my being in love with him, and that his peers compel him, by either fretting over my largesse, or pitying me for it, or anyway finding it impressive or amusing or tender or charming—that they tell this young man I’m adoring him and I’m adoring him well. That my adoration seems steadfast and considered. And despite the riskiness of the circumstances (our differences in age, the widening gulf in distance, a sometimes depleting lack of shared cultural references), when we are together I feel comfort and joy. This must be obvious to him without the expensive champagne. I’m always saying it out loud, or anyway variants on the theme of “comfort and joy,” like a seasonal blessing, a profusion of blessings, needing remarked upon. I’m seriously afraid I mother him.

“Let us take in the scene,” I have said before, “let us only observe for the moment my sitting in your lap, your hands on my neck, my constant kisses. What joy!”

He’s done something to my sense of my proportion, and also my prose style. I can’t seem to describe our relationship without slipping into the sardonic, recursive, mildly-institutionalized voice of Robert Walser, a writer I find too cute by half. I’m finding my life too cute by half, I fear. If this is what happiness feels like, I don’t really want much more of it. It’s making me stupid. “People will think that pain has made you stupid,” wrote Walser, a statement that comes back to me when I can’t distinguish between the good times and bad times making me an idiot.

AFTER THE SPIT-FUCKING

We stayed up late talking about what it means to say goodbye to people who don’t know you’ve cared for them. I don’t pretend this conversation had subtext. For the last two years, he’s worked with profoundly disabled people, first as a case worker and then, after the pandemic closed the campus and made that job “nonessential,” as a nursing assistant on the same floor. 

He spent months feeding, changing, bathing and bedding non-ambulatory children and adults. Most cannot speak, a few cannot see, and none can walk, of course. It is a world I’ve rarely thought about—indeed, a world many of us rarely consider, because in its theater of human need are scenes of unremitting hopelessness. It is a languageless suffering and it perdures. I can become very mystified, very shallow-breathed thinking about his care for these souls, however quick he’s been to dissuade me from romanticizing or elevating his ministrations. “One of my verbal residents tells me to fuck myself all the time,” he’s noted. Still, I would point out that birth defects and accidents account for a small percentage of his caseloads’ impairments, and that active neglect and abuse perpetrated intentionally by former guardians (or unwittingly by the American healthcare complex) have hobbled his charges for life. I don’t like hearing stories about choked babies and toddlers left so long in beds their soft bones grow slab-wise, so I’ve asked him, coward that I am, to please skip origins if he’s entering an otherwise benign workaday anecdote.  

His most patient complaint: using his iPhone to FaceTime parents who want to see their son, then listening to one-sided conversations, burbling, giggles, tears, even story-time. His campus closed to all guardians—a devastating precaution. “Don’t send anything xrated today,” he��d text, and I’d know he was hosting a reunion. So I’d keep my clothes on. And he’d answer the phone from an immediately weeping seventy-year-old mother saying, to her forty-year-old son, “Why good evening, Max, good evening. This is your mother. Hi, baby. Hi. I love you. I am your mother. I will always be your mother. I am sorry I cannot touch you, I cannot hold you, I cannot be with you in this time, but you are my Max, and I am your mother. And I love you always. You can hear me and I’m gonna tell you all about my week, okay? And then I’m gonna ask Scotty here how you’ve spent your week, okay?” He said he usually cries on these calls and when I asked why, he said, “Because it seems polite?” And I pressed harder and he said, “Because I get to—I get to connect these people who have missed each other so much, and it’s so sad. They haven’t touched in months. They might not touch this year. My phone sometimes runs out of battery. It’s so weird.”

I’ve asked him whether families are happy to be rid of their incredible dependents and he said that by and large families are miserable to give over members to the institution: that age arbitrates the giving. “A mother and father have a baby at twenty-five. They can care for him well into their fifties—their twenty-five-year-old, their thirty-year-old son. But when these parents enter their sixties? Their seventies? They can’t lift an adult male. They can’t bathe him or change him. Even basic nutrition gets hard. Meal prep is tiring. It’s long. They start to lose track of medications, and they have medications themselves, you know? So the situation gets very difficult and if they want to live, and if they want him to live, they feel like they have to give him up.”

We’re at the point now where intimacy is a given. He doesn’t swallow, but brings me to orgasm, taking me in his mouth and then dribbles it, I guess, my cum, back onto my stomach, apologizing with a flushed red smirk. “I hate that,” he says, “I really hate it.”

“Go ahead, eat it,” I say, joking.

He gives me dark eyes and showily palms the wad into the black pillowcase behind my head.

“Holy Christ!” I yell. “The nerve! The pluck! The audacity!”

There must be a phase in relationships when extracting intimacies—not only of the “terrible things I did in high school”-vein, or the “times I cheated”-vein, or the “unwittingly right wing ideologies I support”-vein—that close couples endeavor. Where you’re always compulsively revelatory, to seem as interesting as you did in early courtship, as erotically forward and emotionally captivating. We’re in that moment and we surprise one another with small tributes as befits that level of affection.

One of the intimacies I proffered is that I’m going through a religious re-awakening, a need for ritual and sacraments. He finds this funny. (I find it embarrassing.) Yet one of his duties has been wheeling charges to his building’s Tuesday Mass, and then helping to administer the Eucharist. I don’t think he in fact touches the host (I don’t think many in his care can safely take of the host; “I’m mostly there in case anyone seizes,” he said), but he did slip a large wafer away for me and now it’s in my apartment, among my candles, possibly growing mold. He asks me when I’m going to eat it and I tell him around Christmas. 

(That was a lie. I’ll eat it when our romance is over, to consecrate the time we had.)

“I eat it,” I say, and he glowers.

I TOLD HIM ABOUT A MYSTERY SURROUNDING MY FAVORITE AUTHOR

Norman Rush. For a decade and better I’ve wondered about the long dedication in Mating, whose last lines read, “...and to the memory of my father, and to my lost child, Liza.” The novel, set in Botswana and borrowing heavily from Rush’s time there as director in the Peace Corps, suggests that perhaps Liza died in Africa or was born still. She goes unmentioned in his Paris Review interview, in subsequent novels, short stories, and reviews. There’s no hint of Liza’s fate. (As I edit this, I recall a phrase in Mortals, the narrator’s idea that “children exposed you to hellmouth, which was the opening of the mouth of hell right in front of you.” Explaining further: “[I]t was the grandmother, the daughter, the granddaughter tumbling through the air, blown out of the airplane by a bomb, the three generations falling and seeing one another fall, down, down, onto the Argolid mountains. With children you created more thin places in the world for hellmouth to break through.” And then, in Subtle Bodies, Rush describes a wayward teen boy, whose angry and aggressive behavior corresponds exactly to Rush’s own troubled teen son. In fact, Subtle Bodies is about the decision to have children at all. Nina follows Ned to a funeral, to fuck him. So, Rush has indeed remarked on children and strife, as he has lived it. Anyhow—) Yet by accident I listened to an old Fresh Air interview where Rush is asked to comment on the aspect of family in his novels, and to clarify that inscription. 

“I have a daughter who is now thirty,” he says, “who was born with diffuse brain atrophy and has been institutionalized for many years. Um. But I think the rest is pretty self-explanatory.”

“What was her condition?” presses his interlocutor.

“She is uh profoundly retarded,” pauses, “and will be so.”

“So you feel she is lost to you?”

“Yes. There is no recognition possible between her and us.”

I reproduced this exchange from notes on my phone. Scotty replied, “I don’t think that’s right, actually. Maybe between her and—who—who was it?”

“Norman Rush and his daughter Liza.”

He said, “Maybe between Liza and her dad—yeah, maybe she was so disabled she couldn’t recognize him. I take care of men like that. But I recognize them.”

We were talking about important books at all (I mean that semi-seriously) because his co-worker had gifted him three works, including a volume of Yeats’ complete poetry.

“Why did Paco give you Yeats?” I asked.

“He thinks I need more poetry,” said Scotty.

(Frankly I have felt and still feel sexual jealousy against Paco, who recently got brilliant red and black knee tattoos of spider webs. Like, Spider-Man spiderwebs, covering both kneecaps. Every few weeks he cooks a large meal for Scotty, and they talk about life until 4 A.M. drunk on bourbon, immobilized by edibles, full and warm and caring, and it makes me mad. It makes me mad, because I can’t really see the point of staying up until the uncomfortable small hours between 2 and 5 unless there is sex involved, but Paco is straight, a father, an excellent chef, a dedicated friend, and so my grousing is a kind of unwarranted possession that baffles me into silence on the matter.)

I didn’t have anything intelligent left to say about Norman Rush. I groped along a narrow thought, however, a thin ledge. “You know—a novelist, especially a novelist as concerned with language and comprehension as Norman Rush, would feel particularly devastated by the condition of his daughter. He would see it as ironic and then as punitive and again as senseless—supporting his comforting regime of a militant atheism.”

Although very sober, I recited the first stanza of The Second Coming, tripping over two lines (but the best lines), saying, “The worst lack all conviction, while the best/Are full of passionate intensity.”

“What?” said Scotty.

“I just—that was Yeats.”

“Who?”

“Go ahead and tell your boy Paco that your hot fuck gave you a teach on William. Butler. Yeats.”

“What?” said Scotty. He grinned at me. He got up and ate a yogurt.

[maiaphaelsource]

anon’s great cornucopia of maiaphael prompts, part 10

ANYONE CAN FEEL FREE TO GIVE THEIR OWN THOUGHTS ON THIS PROMPT

Also convincing each other to go to therapy cause please

wdiahsiadha what i’m picturing here is like... a constant “no you” game between them tbh. if i’m being honest maia is more likely to be the first one to bring it up because she’s younger so she grew up with less stigma around that, you know? whereas when raphael was young there was more of a “therapy is for crazy people” + medicalization mentality. like when he was born the norm was still to institutionalize people and all kinds of terrible stuff. also, as autistic and ace and latino and trans, he has many reasons to be wary of therapy (not that maia doesn’t as well, obviously. we all know how medical professionals treat black women, and she’s also trans and queer so u kno. but she was raised in a time where there was less stigma, not to mention a growing number of black health professionals and discussions about antiracist medical practices, etc) 

so like as a whole i think she would be more likely to bring it up. just because it’s not something raphael is used to thinking about, you know? also well there is that culture of hypermasculinity where looking for help is seem as a weakness, which doubles down on any brown man because hypermasculinity is expected of them and i doubt being a donworlder is very different in that sense. not that raphael loves toxic masculinity but like... these things build deep into your psyche, so it’s less that he hates the idea and more that he didn’t consider it before. but then there’s also the fear because all sorts of bad associations and wariness (for good reason)

so it’s just lots to unpack before either of them feels comfortable with it, you know? and because they’re both absolute bastards who worry about others to the point of hipocrisy it’s just like “therapy would do good... for YOU. i, however, see no reason to take care of myself” and it’s just a constant game of ping pong bickering over that like “you should take care of yourself” “no u” “no u” “look i get what you’re saying, i guess a part of me is just scared that there’s no fixing me, you know? that it will get worse” “you don’t need to be fixed. therapy is supposed to help you understand yourself, not ‘fix’ you” “well why don’t you do it then” “because i’m afraid that there’s no fixing me” “i see”

that’s an exaggeration of course but also it’s kinda like that

eventually someone (magnus? simon? i feel like simon just because he is the voice of reason when it comes to those things imo, and he’s pretty good at disarming others without even meaning to) is just like “why don’t you settle this by going both at the same time” and they’re like I GUESS

so they go into research- to find someone suited, you know? and it’s cute because they’re both clearly worried about the other (raphael: “don’t know how i feel about this one, feel a little off” “why?” “i just didn’t feel like they’re absolutely perfect at first glance :/”). i tend to say warlock therapists because i just love the idea of those warlocks who dedicate themselves to studying about downworlders, you know? like warlocks are the only mundane-realm living ones who are born downworlders and that means they can take an interest and specialize in that. so yeah warlock therapists ftw and they find a black one for maia and a latino one for raphael because that’s what they’re most comfortable with, and go in-depth to get referrals and see their stance on trans/queer/ace people specifically as well. it also helps that magnus knows everybody so he can help the both of them with that. and he’s of course more than happy to, and he’s super proud of the both of them for taking this step in taking better care of themselves. and he smiles and cradles raphael’s face and kisses maia on the forehead maybe and spends hours discussing pros and cons with them. and it’s nice

and just LOOK let them heal, let maia have professional help to talk about her family issues and her abusive relationship and her terrible experiences with oppression, let raphael talk about his own and his guilt issues and the shit he went through with camille and his savior complex dasdaiah. like they are both finding healthier ways to cope and have been for a while, especially with taki’s and the clan/pack, but professional help is different and as leaders they are just not in a position to ask for it a lot, you know? so like daiuhsdiha let them go to therapy 2020 let the whole gang go to therapy 20forever

[aestheticritique]

For young men (Part 1)

In my latest lockdown induced depressive episode I have been meeting some new people online. They are all young, male, mostly heterosexual, very nice and extremely considerate. However, they also are often afraid becoming a burden, insecure in their appearance or social skills, and often struggling with mental health. Given this, they are also usually extremely afraid of never finding themselves having sex or getting into a meaningful relationship in the late stage neoliberal capitalist dystopia we find ourselves in. To be honest I didn’t understand them at first, especially their obsession with sex. But the more I am thinking about it, the more I realize that we are united in the same dynamic of seeing sex or love as magic verfication of... What?

Growing up, I used hookups as a way to prove to myself that I am worth something. I thought that my value was defined by men’s desire. I originally in writing this wanted to show my perspective from the other side of the same coin, but after realizing how much of an undertaking that would be, I decided to start with the two most common answers from men used as justification to why they think they won’t get laid. These are things I find will help these kinds of people out, but as a great thinker once said...

“I can’t mom you through this one, boys. You are on your own.” - Contrapoints

(I link songs I like through out btw, the underlined text are links you can click on)

Foreword: Social factors

The average age of first intercourse has been rising in the US. Teenagers have less sex than ever before. These changes will affect you. In teen movies and shows charakters often experiment with sexuality before the age of 18. Everything else is played as an abnormality. If we compare ourselves to this misrepresentation of teenage sexuality, of course we seem like the losers.

“The proportion of young people who have had sexual intercourse increases rapidly as they age through adolescence”. It’s very likely, at least from my view, that you are just going to grow out of the awkward zone of wanting intimacy but not getting it. Just like you grew out of other things, such as bad musical taste or that one gaudy outfit. Don’t stress over this one specifically either.

Adolescence is weird for all of us. Even if your first encounter is after college, let’s be real here: having such a good thing in your own place without your parents looming or having to share your room with a roommate you barely know is so much better anyway.

The Ugly fuck too

A common answer to my question why they think that they will never have sex is that they are “unattractive”. The implication being, that sex is the prize for looking a certain way.

But is it? We are so used to the perfect, porn-ready bodies in the media that we forget that the Ugly fuck too. We never see the foldes of fat and skin, never see acne warriors or moles, never see people who actually look like us.

In the movie “The Parasite”, there is a scene where the husband of Gook Moon-gwang, the former housekeeper, is implied to have sex. (the clip, starts at 3:00) It gave me weird feelings of discomfort, as the illusion so stereotypically found on the silver screen was not present. These two characters are not pretty. They look old. She is fat and he is a balding skeleton. They are not special, and that’s okay.

Being fuckable does not equal beauty. Being fuckable does not equal beauty. It was a terrifying thought initially for someone like me who defined their value over beauty & their beauty as being fuckable. It might also be a scary thought for someone who doesn’t think that they deserve love and intimacy because of their looks. I promise you that you still deserve love! Sex did not cure my problems with my appearance, or the fact that I based my self-esteem on the way I look. It will not make you feel normal. It will not make you feel better, prove your worth or even give you more self esteem in the long term beyond the initial rush of dopamine. It is not a caravan to fulfillment.

Beauty is a concept that is based on exclusion. Allow yourself to feel the pain of being excluded, of not reaching the impossible beauty standards and the disadvantages that come with it. Allow yourself to feel the fear of not being “man enough” and be happy in spite of it.

“Patriarchal masculinity teaches us to control our pain, but it can block us from experiencing the grief that is part of a full life. Chasing pleasure and controlling pain is patriarchal. Opening ourselves up to joy and grief is to be fully human.”

”Those of us in that skinny nerd category are especially prone to thinking that we aren’t “man enough.” [..] But the more I talked to men, the more convinced I became that almost all men at some point in their lives don’t feel man enough. Even the men I thought were the “real men” were scared.

That’s not surprising. Masculinity in patriarchy—that is, masculinity in a system of institutionalized male dominance—trains men to be competitive, in pursuit of conquest, which leads to routine confrontation, with the goal of always being in control of oneself and others. But no matter how intensely competitive one is, no matter how complete the conquest, no matter how many successful confrontations, and no matter how much one stays in control—men are haunted by the fear that they aren’t man enough, that they can never stop proving their masculinity.” - Robert Jensen

Stop comparing your appearance to other men’s. Start talking and bonding with them over your undoubtably shared insecurities rooted in society’s relentless toxic masculinity. Unlearning the things you’ve been indoctrinated into since conception is damn hard. I am still in the middle of it personally, but I promise you it is worth it. It will improve not only your relationships with other men, but also with yourself and that one girl you’re pining after.

There are a ton of resources targeted at women about self acceptance, but not many for men. Robert Jenson comes from a tradition of critical men’s groups. Even though I don’t agree with him on everything, he manages to scare most men (especially the kind I mentioned in the first paragraph) to their core, but also improves their lives drastically with his kindness and radical ideas. I implore you to look him up, and try your best to keep an open mind.

“A person who functions normally in a sick society is themselve sick.”

The other most common answer  to the initial question was “being socially maladjusted”, implying that sex is something you earn by behaving a certain way. It is ingrained in the way we talk about love. “Deserving love” is the best example. Neither love nor sex is a product of work. Love and intimacy are a lot like sleep. It is a slow but unconscious process. You slowly work into it, with no idea of what comes next, and then, after an agonizingly long moment, you’re there. The fall is not often expected or easy, is always exhilarating, but never the product of conformity to anything except comfort with who you are.

I do acknowledge that social settings can be weird, existentially unsettling, and full of unseen complexities. This is especially true if you are neurodivergent and / or struggling with mental health.  Being neurodivergent or struggling with mental health goes against the impossible, hegemonically masculine standard of always being in controll. It’s a common cause behind feelings of emasculation. Disregard that feeling, and remember that you deserve love, no matter how manly you are or are not, no matter how you behave.

Learning social settings are lot like learning to skate. In the beginning you will be covered in bruises, but with enough effort, you will be better at it. The chance of mistakes will get lower, but never zero. You will always have awkward situations, but that doesn’t mean that you are bad at them. It just means that you have room to improve still. Maybe consider getting lessons or joining a skate crew.

We tend to hyperfocus on the accidents. Think about how many nice conversations you had over the internet, text or otherwise. I ask you to value them. Value these positive experiences, value your friendships and acquaintances, value the people supporting you, online and offline. We tend to hyperfocus on meaningfull longterm friendships, just like we hyperfocus on love. Value your social enviroment, value someone who just made you feel ok for a moment. You are socially adapted, because you have a social enviroment you feel comfortable in, where you have relationships with people. The depth of a relationship is not messured by time, nor by physical touch. Being mindful of your feelings for the people around you can make you realize that you are less alone than you thought.

Some Tips

If you want to make friends additionally to that, here are some tips from someone, who is bad at social clues:

Join a group with a common interest or struggle: Book clubs, activist groups, selfhelp groups, they are great settings to meet new people and you already have a topic to talk about :)

If you feel save about it: Being open about your issues can help other people adapt to you and understand you better - especially in early on in relationships.

People sitting at the bar or smoking outside are generally more open for conversation

Don’t be afraid of getting rejected: They don’t reject you, when they reject a conversation with you. The reasons people don’t want to talk to you is very diverse. Stay respectful and polite.

Don’t expect to much: No one owes you a long conversation. A smalltalk is perfectly fine.

Learn to make compliments casually and learn to compliments that aren’t based on appearance.

Find a common ground (politically, a interest ect.) and talk about it

Take a improv class, seriously TAKE A IMPROV CLASS! (there are online ones, and sometimes it’s even free)

Here are some youtube videos by Anna Akana with more tips. (1) conversations, (2) how to be a better friend, (3) overthinking

Here are is a piece about being bad at relationship I liked.

Footnote: Trophies and muses

“We do not want to do the work of helping you to believe in your humanity. We cannot do it anymore. We have always tried. We have been repaid with systematic exploitation and systematic abuse. You are going to have to do this yourselves from now on and you know it.” - Andrea Dowkin

Behind the whole obsession with sex is often a distorted perception of women. Just remind yourself that women are human? Access to female bodies is not a human right. We are not trophies to push your ego. We are not there to inspire you or heal you. We are humans with agency. We desire love and being loved, just like everyone else.

I am tired, but I believe in your humanity...

xoxo,

aestheticritique