#he's talking about the manosphere

[midnightcowboy1969]

[lilaccatholic]

Man, I feel like every clip I see from Pints with Aquinas lately Matt Fradd is demeaning women. Really sad to see it, I used to love his interviews :/

[lackadaisical-lesbian]

This may sound crazy, but it literally does not matter what a trans woman says or does, you do not have a pass to be misogynist towards her. Argue with her points, call her out for misdeeds, whatever, but the second you start diminishing her personhood or calling her a bitch or literally any other fucking off topic thing, then you're instantly in the wrong. Crazy, I know, but you do actually have to be aware of what you say even when angry, even when you've been wronged. There is no excuse in the world to start calling a transwoman a predator or throwing out whatever deranged dog whistles you can think of. Whatever marginalized identity you hold is also not an excuse to this, btw.

[allstrangeandwonderful]

This is implied in earlier posts, but I think it’s worth saying explicitly: make it feel safe for them to express and discuss their feelings!

The manosphere does not excel because it has great logic and unarguable points; it excels because it targets boys and men who feel awful and don’t know what to do about it. It tells them that they are welcome somewhere, that they are valid and valued just as they are, that they don’t need to do any uncomfortable introspection or growth, that their feelings of loneliness and inadequacy are not their own fault, but someone else’s. It preys on their emotions, and is very effective at doing so.

You gotta teach your boys good things, yes, but they are still going to have uncomfortable feelings sometimes; a boys first encounters with feminism and classism and white privilege can be super uncomfortable, and before they’ve developed a deep understanding of them, it can easily feel like everyone hates them and wants them to answer for the crimes of others — which is compounded by the fragile self esteem most young people have, and the shaky concept of masculinity that boys almost certainly have from getting mixed messages from inside and outside of the home, and can bring up a lot of difficult and complicated feelings! And if bringing those feelings up is met with ridicule, accusations of ignorance and privilege, and making them the butt of the joke, they’re going to bottle those feelings up, and look for an alternate release valve. The manosphere does not have to be logical to attract these boys; it just has to make them feel better, and they’ll do all the re-programming themselves.

Essentially the same reason any cult works, right?

So yeah, tl;dr: if you don’t talk to your boys about their feelings with compassion and understanding, predatory influencers will prey on those unmet emotional needs.

[tevanbuckley]

I try not to get into RG discourse because I’m wary of it turning into some kind of “well your guy said the n-word,” gotcha game.

but, in this specific case, it’s becoming increasingly clear RG is falling/has fallen down the right wing manosphere pipeline. parroting talking points about how women are denying their natural differences and aren’t open to understanding the male perspective™ isn’t ignorance or poor judgment, it’s indicative of a pretty specific ideology with very clear roots.

the reason this has me going 😬, is because unless he has someone irl pulling him back from this shit, we're potentially only seeing the tip of the iceberg and it could easily get much worse.

[homunculus-argument]

In the brief moment in Lord of the Rings, when Sam carries the Ring, the Ring can't figure out how to corrupt him because hobbit desires are simply beyond its comprehension. Money? Power? Vengeance? What the fuck does this critter want? What does a hobbit want, other than to fuck off to a distant little corner of the world, to tend to a garden and mind his own business, forgetting and becoming forgotten by the outside world. Okay, what about a huge garden? Nah, that's too much work.

In unrelated news, TikTok algorithms are doing their damnest to radicalise my boyfriend into something, but just can't figure out an extremist group he'd be interested in. He doesn't want to hear about politics, religion, self-improvement philosophies, or any manosphere pick-up artist promises of getting laid. He doesn't even want to belong to a community of like-minded peers, the last thing he wants is more people talking to him.

What the fuck could it offer as a lure to a man who wants nothing else but to fuck off into the woods, never to be seen again.

[olderthannetfic]

Ayyy, there seems to be a lot of older people among the regular commenters of this blog so I'm gonna shoot my shot and ask for advice.

Idk if it's just the clinical depression but I can't help but feel like I'm never gonna find love as a straight girl. I don't hate men at all -- I've been very lucky to be surrounded by decent dudes growing up but shit. Lookin at the state of the world rn... Gen Z dudes chugging misogynist bullshit at alarming rates, women like Gisele Pelicot going through unspeakable shit from their own husbands... it's hard not to feel cynical. On top of that the decent dudes I know irl are all taken, I don't wanna go on dating apps, and as much as I wanna fuck an older man no decent one is gonna settle for a depressed young woman who's a 4 at best...

It's not that i don't have fulfilling friendships or that I don't value them, I just want to love and care for (and get dicked down by) a decent guy who feels the same way. I've always wanted that and I don't think it's changing anytime soon. Feels impossible though. I'm not sure if I'm the problem (I'm plain faced at best, no fashion sense or charm to speak of, though I do my best to be polite and kind) or there's just shit going on I've no control over.

--

People will give you a lot of placating nonsense, but the reality is that the supply of reasonably okay straight women is much higher than the supply of reasonably okay straight men. Finding a fulfilling long-term relationship is always hard anyway, but man... straight guys really need to step it up.

That said, a lot of people in general and straight guys in particular learn a lot from the breakdown of their first marriage/long-term relationship. Just because a guy is listening to godawful manosphere podcasts today doesn't mean he's never going to be dateable later.

Research on dating apps suggests that your average guy responds to pics where women have a lot of makeup on by looking for a hookup, passes by the ones with no makeup, and finds the ones with a little lipstick or something but not heavy makeup the most dateable.

While it would be nice if appearance didn't matter, if you're really worried about this, there are some basic things you can do where you'll get a lot of bang for your buck: Find one lipstick you can stand and learn to apply it. I like Bésame Cosmetics because I am a nerd and they sponsored a local film noir festival. Peggy Carter's lipstick was from them. They have the advantage of being intensely pigmented, so a quick swipe gives full coverage. I hate having shit on my face in general, so that's helpful. If eye stuff is less bleurgghhhh than lip stuff, learn to apply eyeliner instead. There are some liquid ones I really like even if it takes some practice to get decent at painting them on. You don't need a full face of makeup or really much of anything to read as Hot Girl™ to people who don't know anything about makeup and aren't paying much attention. Yes, even if you're a 4 and it's not just the depression talking.

Charm is hard. Some things can be taught, but a lot of that's innate. Fashion, however, is not. You don't need to be a fashionista to look better than a lot of the people around you. Save your money for fewer, better outfits. Buy things that fit well and get things tailored. Don't settle for ill-fitting clothes that don't make you feel good. Look for natural fibers and clothing that will last a long time. (And if you think you have sensitive skin that cannot handle natural fibers, you need to go up several price points on your cotton. Just saying.)

You can also increase your chances by doing activities where you meet more people who might be a good match. This means finding hobbies that actually have straight guys in them and going to in-person things where you meet new people. (This sounds obvious and pedantic, but I cannot tell you how many women I know who want a boyfriend but only do social things that are 95% women and 5% gay men.)

But the biggest thing you can do to stand out is... well... work on that depression. Self confidence and obviously being in a good place in your life are very attractive. Also, the good catches who haven't been snapped up tend to be the quiet, shy people. If you have your own shit together enough to detect and pursue them, you have a better chance of finding someone great.

I get that ~fix your depression~ is not helpful advice, but working on yourself in both important and relatively superficial ways is something you can control. Meeting the right person is not.

It might help to look at this as a 5-10-year goal and/or a lifetime goal, not a "Oh my god, my life sucks this year" problem. Yes, there's shit going on that you have no control over, but if that's your career and mental health and so on, you can work on that and be in a different place in a few years.

Frankly, I think a certain amount of cynicism is warranted, but that doesn't mean there are no decent guys or that you'll never find one.

[some-pers0n]

My favourite thing ever about LITWTC is that it sounds completely and utterly bizarre to anyone who doesn't listen to it. What do you mean that music artist I heard on TikTok has a podcast where he and his friend talk about the apocalypse.

Anyways some of my favourite bits are

Tommy Lasagna, a fully Korean man with a thick Brooklyn accent, will own a fast food combination auto repair shop, wherein he'll mix up your order and put burgers on your tires and serve you a fistful of wires instead of fires

Will getting harassed by a ghost prostitute named Mama Doo-Wop for like seven minutes

Chris and Will stopping their car (they were driving around in this episode) and laughing at a decaying house for like five minutes

Will larping as Tom Waits for an entire episode

Leopard Planet is the only band still left in the apocalypse, wherein the lead singer and rhythm guitarist and Rock God, Zap Gorgeous, will have leopard print clothes as they play on top of a leopard pyramid

Will and Chris try getting their Wendy's order and it takes 20 minutes because the Doordash driver kept circling a graveyard

Will will save Jordan Peterson from the manosphere grease pit (where any manosphere person is greased up and tossed into a pit where they have to kill everyone else to survive) and turns him into a parrot-like pet that he listens to for hours on end

Chris Dunne Won't Go To Therapy I/II

ROLL!! THEM!! BONES!!

Bobby Sugarbones dying because the recording program closed and they didn't notice because the laptop had a picture of Chester Cheetah inflation art covering it (this was because Chris was trying to get Will into the kink so they could fuck the podcast, which is a gutter clown with that kink)

"Yes! And–"

Chris and Will spending an entire episode parked in front of a school because Will's car broke down and they were waiting for the repair guy (yes there are two episodes where they're in a car)

The Bug Woman

[mariacallous]

Georgians are in the streets fighting for their democracy. The Georgian Dream party, which is working to align Tbilisi with Moscow’s interests, declared victory in the country’s Oct. 26 election before the votes were even counted. Voters and election observers were harassed by Russian-funded gangs and mobsters; just after the election, protesters holding European Union flags were sprayed with water from high-powered hoses. And the person who has the iron will necessary to lead the charge against Russian-inspired authoritarianism in Georgia? A woman: President Salome Zourabichvili.

This is no accident. Across the world, women have, and are, playing incredible roles as bulwarks against the rise of authoritarianism. Moldovan President Maia Sandu is standing up to a tsunami of Russian disinformation. In Poland, women played a critical role in the effort to oust the right-wing populist Law and Justice (PiS) party. In Hong Kong, women continue to be the practical and normative face of resistance to Chinese authoritarian rule.

These are the freedom fighters of the 21st century. And yet, the U.S. national security community tends to view women’s issues as a domestic concern, frivolous, or irrelevant to “hard” security matters. For example, in 2003, discussions of securing Iraq excluded women, with a top U.S. general stating, “When we get the place secure, then we’ll be able to talk about women’s issues.” More recently, the role of women in the military has been reduced to discussions of diversity, equity, and inclusion, rather than a focus on how women have been vital to solving the United States’ most wicked national security problems—from serving on the front lines in combat to providing essential intelligence analysis. But if the overall aim of U.S. national strategy is to shore up democracy and democratic freedoms, the treatment of women and girls cannot be ignored.

Globally, women’s rights are often eroding in both policy and practice, from the struggles of the Iranian and Afghan women who exist under gender apartheid to the Kenyan women experiencing the harsh backlash of the rise of the manosphere. In tandem, there’s been a sharp rise in reports of online harassment and misogyny worldwide.

National security analysts explore issues and psychologies through any number of prisms, but Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) remains an underutilized one. One of the national security community’s core tasks is discerning signals from noise in the global strategic environment, and regressive ideas on gender and gender equality can be a useful proxy metric for democratic backsliding and authoritarian rise.

The United States’ 2023 Strategy and National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security provides the backbone for the United States to leverage WPS to counter authoritarianism. It highlights that displays of misogyny online are linked to violent action. The plan also points out that formally incorporating gendered perspectives is essential for maintaining democratic institutions at home and modeling them aboard. This includes recognizing misogyny—online or in policy—as an early indicator of authoritarian rise.

Unfortunately, WPS is often misread as simply including more women in the national security workforce. But it is more than that. It offers a framework for understanding why it is useful to take gendered perspectives into account when assessing how the actions of individuals or groups enhance national security, which is especially important at a time when authoritarian regimes are weaponizing gender in ways that strengthen their grip on power domestically and justify their aggression abroad.

In Russia, President Vladimir Putin has argued that he is the guardian of traditional Christian values, telling women that they should be back at home raising children, and has been rolling back domestic violence laws at the same time. Days before invading Ukraine in February 2022, Putin said, “Like it or don’t like it, it’s your duty, my beauty,” which was widely interpreted within Russia as a reference to martial rape. Russia’s own army is built on a foundation of hierarchical hazing in which “inferior” men are degraded by their comrades. With that kind of rhetoric from the top, is it any wonder that Russian soldiers’ war crimes have included the rapes of women and children?

But Putin isn’t alone. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban has consolidated media outlets to censor women’s voices, in the name of protecting traditional values. He has also used coercive financial practices to push women out of the workforce and positions of political power and into more traditional roles of wife and mother. In Belarus, President Alexander Lukashenko attempted to force the deportation of the most prominent woman opposition leader and imprisoned her after she tore up her passport to prevent it. In China, where women were once told they “hold up half the sky,” President Xi Jinping has worked to undo decades of Chinese Communist Party policy on gender equality. Chinese women are now being encouraged to return home and become mothers, while feminists have been targeted legally and socially.

The WPS agenda provides the U.S. national security community with three opportunities to recognize, understand, and counter early-stage authoritarianism.

First, the United States can do a much better job of supporting women’s groups around the world as a central aspect of its national security strategy. Women’s groups are often a bellwether for authoritarian rise and democratic backsliding—as currently on display in Russia, China, Hungary, Georgia, and Belarus, where women inside and outside their respective regimes have been specifically targeted or attacked.

Women have also found innovative ways to resist the rise of authoritarian norms. In places like Moldova, women have acted as bulwarks against authoritarianism despite vicious disinformation campaigns targeting women leaders. Yet when it comes to formulating and executing strategies on national security, women’s groups are often left in the margins and their concerns dismissed.

Second, gender perspectives are essential to more fulsome intelligence gathering and analysis. The U.S. intelligence community can do a much better job of integrating gender—particularly as it relates to the treatment of the most vulnerable—as an indicator of societal and democratic health. This includes understanding how both masculinities and femininities influence decision-making and how, in turn, lived experiences act as necessary analytical tools. Training collectors and analysts of intelligence to recognize gendered indicators will provide a more robust view of the geopolitical landscape and fill critical holes in national security decision-making.

Finally, the United States must improve the participation of its national security community in WPS and feminist foreign-policy discussions. For too long, the “hard” security sector has distanced itself from more “human” security-focused endeavors and treated women’s rights as something that’s just nice to have.

Yet national security is an essentially human endeavor, and gender is a central component of what it means to be human. This is something that needs to be appreciated to better understand the many dimensions of the conflict—disinformation, online influence campaigns, and lawfare—that authoritarian regimes are waging against the United States and its allies.

[pawberri]

I guess it’s like…not having a word isn’t bigotry, yes this is true I agree. But it seems like a lot of people take the stance that having a word IS bigotry. Why? (Idk what other anon’s beef is with cause their wording definitely make it sound like protecting trans women is a bad thing)

I think that theoretically just “having a word” is not bigotry, but there’s more to the impulse than just convenience. Defining transmisandry as a separate concept implies that trans men have oppression separate to the system all other trans people are subject to. While transmisogyny is a compound of two oppressions, transmisandry either must commit to the idea that cishet -white-privileged-in-every-other-way men are oppressed simply for being men, or that trans men are oppressed in an exclusive, unique way. It’s dismissing the existing concept of intersectionality as offensive and inadequate only by virtue of not centering trans men. If another trans guy started saying we needed to talk about “transheterophobia” I would roll my eyes because I, as a bi trans dude, have seen how heterosexual trans men still benefit from the privilege of heterosexuality while gay trans men deal with both homophobia and transphobia. The transhet dude is suffering expressly because he is trans, and pretending there is an intersection of “transphobia” and “heterophobia” is just an attempt to avoid accepting any amount of systemic privilege. I WANT to engage with that trans man about how much it sucks to be excluded as a trans man, but he’s choosing to distance himself from me and center his own experience.

This same thing happens in all minority groups. This is a classic pattern, not a new bit of linguistic inclusion. A follower of mine on twitter discussed, for example, how white natives often speak over their brown native siblings. White natives experience genuine erasure and racism and systemic oppression, but they can also weaponize those experiences against the more marginalized in their community. The manosphere on YouTube has plenty of men of color who discuss how they can’t possibly be privileged because they experience limited privilege, all while throwing women of color under the bus. Etc etc.

And there’s also this disconnect where people think “privilege” = happiness. Patriarchy, transphobia, capitalism, all these systems make us all suffer. Maintain privilege often even involves suffering. A closeted person might stay in the closet for fear of losing their privilege at the expense of their happiness. A person who is forced to face significant systemic oppression might be happier on an individual level because they have community and support etc.

I love trans masculinity. I love being a trans man. I suffered so much to accept this identity. I was told I was disgracing womanhood and being evil. Transphobia is a plague. No man with an oppressed identity has FULL access to male privilege, and full access to male privilege doesn't guarantee happiness. But it is a privilege. It exists. It's a concrete, quantifiable experience. It's a system. It doesn't mean you don't suffer, because you suffer a ton. It doesn't mean your voice doesn't matter, because it does. But that was all true without the word "transandrophobia." So I necessarily have to question the impulse to make up a word that denies that your experience is part of a continuum of experiences.

Tl;dr You think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of everything that came before y

[thorne1435]

I wish that the people men listen to when they're feeling desperate and unwanted actually thought that they were worth anything.

You hear manosphere types talk about how the value of women is inherent and the value of men is something that has to be earned, and...in a weird way, it breaks my heart. Because I know that somewhere in the world there is some lonely desperate man who really just needs someone to give a shit about him, and he's finding shit like Jordan Peterson clips and Andrew Tate misogynist 101 advice. And, like...they're desperate. So they believe them. And they're just going to make them more bitter and lonely and sad and it's not going to end in some "billionaire sigma male grindset" it's going to end in a false resolve to achieve it, and then an overwhelming rush of despair and depression that, in all likelihood, they'll drown out by playing some video games, masturbating, and going to bed.

They're not going to feel a sense of purpose, they're just going to feel justified about how isolated and depressed they feel, and that's simply because listening to some old man who doesn't like women that much tell you that women have it all and you have nothing and that you have to work for the right to be considered "valuable" is just not the solution to their problems. The solution is social integration, and that is hard to achieve in this shitty capitalist society where everyone is at each others' throats.

But that message doesn't get through to men. They never see it. They only see Jordan Peterson and Andrew Tate, telling them that they need to muster up some inherent urge to work and become valuable that these boys don't really feel so much as hope that they'll start feeling.

And y'know...I just wish someone could get to them before the manosphere did, and tell them that they are valuable inherently, and that they don't have to work or fuck or lead to contribute to society. That we as human beings contribute to our society by thinking, by talking, by doing things that humans do passively in their existence. That men and women alike contribute by being alive. And that you don't have to earn the right to do so.

[estavionpira]

The real reason all the heartbroken wanted to leave was because heartbreaker wouldnt stop talking about manosphere content. Cherie in the car staring deadeyed into her knees as he enters the third consecutive hour of talking about how feminism has ruined women

[grison-in-space]

Reading Men Who Hate Women (Laura Bates, 2020) at the moment. She's talking about the manosphere: the massive online communities of men who congregate to talk misogyny, ranging from PUAs to MRAs, incels and MGTOW. These aren't new topics to me—I've been following this off and on since watching Gamergate kick off—but Bates handles them well and I think this book could serve as an introduction if this is a movement with which you're not familar. By the way, it's been a decade since Gamergate this year. Isn't that a kicker?

(Incidentally, I first ran into the concept of incels way before I think many people did: when I was still on AVEN, c. 2006-2007ish, I remember a few occasions where users ran into incel communities and brought them to our forums to ask: is this like what we're doing? Is this like us? Consensus quickly solidified on the direction of "no," each time, not least because asexuality dialog at the time was extremely clear about divorcing desire from action, and it was very clear that the desires centered in that community were very different than the ones people in asexuality spaces were untangling.)

Bates handles the topic with grace, compassion, and a deep understanding that I really wish more writing on radicalization or terroristic networks used: people in real pain, who are struggling in pitiable circumstances to do their best and clearly need more support, can also in their pain be truly dangerous to others. Hurt people hurt people. Compassion for pain suffered is important—you can't understand recruitment without understanding that—but you also have to understand that pain, fermented in darkness, can create deadly poisons. Pain isn't essentially holy or cleansing or cauterizing. It doesn't accomplish anything good by existing. If we can relieve it, we should—but we should follow harm reduction principles as we do so, lest pain be allowed to multiply and fester.

What gets me is that in 2017, in the wake of the Google bro "manifesto," I spent a feverish week writing what wound up being a 20,000 word rebuttal studded with what eventually totaled 100+ peer reviewed citations. It got quite a bit of reach and covered ground ranging from effects of testosterone on behavior, the concept of effect size in sex differences, basic statistics, the ways that humans treat people differently based on their perception of gender, intersex trauma, and whether feminists care about men's problems (yeah, actually, and they should).

I released that piece, changed up my name and fannish presence—my long time pseud was tangled all over the piece's genesis—and hunkered down for the reprisals. I expected harassment and vitriol. It never really came: I ignored the comments on the post, after a bit, and I held boundaries on what I was willing to pay attention to. But by and large, I had no direct consequences from the Manosphere.

Perhaps the piece was too long (although I got many comments from people who read it and found it useful, and I included an index). Perhaps it was simply that I included a headshot of myself, with uncharacteristic red lipstick and characteristically buzzed hair, and cheerfully discussed throughout that I was butch and queer: sometimes I confuse people who are very focused on bioessentialist sex differences, because I don't fit their paradigms in the slightest.

About six months later, James Damore attempted to frame his incredibly poor decisions in light of his Asperger's, and I did get a couple dudes on social media presenting me with this information apparently in the hope that it would shock or embarrass me. I immediately pointed out, acerbically, that I'm equally autistic and that he was making us look bad, and they melted away again into the background. It wasn't really the well of terrifying anger and obliterative fury I was expecting.

I find myself reading these stories in Bates' book and thinking about the internet I grew up on: AVEN by 2005, WrongPlanet the same year, listening to people on the margins talk about their fears and hopes and dreams and theories about themselves. I find myself thinking about narratives and meaning, the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and why.

I'm certainly not the first person to worry about radicalization of young autistic people, especially autistic men. Not even close. Paradoxically, it's a group of people for whom an understanding of intersectionality is crucial: young disabled men often alienated deliberately from conceptualizing themselves as disabled, without the tools to understand why life is hard and painful and never seems to reflect their experiences, trying to construct understanding beyond one's singular, isolated defective wrongness—which is what's left, if you take community off the table.

(Have I mentioned how grateful I am that so many autistics are trans spectrum? Imagine if we weren't, and if I didn't have so many transfeminine sisters funneled along those same currents and drifting closely enough alongside to understand. My sisters, so many of whom are out there living and modeling better ways to understand and participate in gender as a social activity: by figuring out what is most comfortable for you, understanding that comfort for one might be agony for another, and taking steps to shape your own life into a fashion that wells forth the most peace and joy. It's a message we all need to hear, but that is a group of people I hear singing so loudly from my place in a different wing of the choir, and I love them for it.)

I don't have answers. As is, so often, the case these days, I have only grief and love, and the determination to build better structures where my own hands reach. I had intended to direct my career, once, to undermining the entire concept of "good genes" models of evolution and explaining how their convoluted connections to natural phenomena are better explained by other, more direct motives. Since 2020, I've been moving in a new direction—but what precisely it is, I'm not sure.

Sex differences is certainly a piece of it, though. Even if I find myself often enough writing that it's not enough to know a sex difference in one species to assume that another will reflect a similar relationship: we should study sex differences in animals, but we really shouldn't assume that humans will have the same ones or work the same way. I suspect this won't be the first time I tangle with that community. I suppose it depends how much authority I can accrue as protection first.

[murfpersonalblog]

My Coven Is Claudia 🥹🌹 | Interview With The Vampire 2x7 | Reaction & Commentary - FrankFreezy

FrankFreezy on Loustat, and Lestat’s Misogyny & Misogynoir 

(40:15 - 46:23)

I feel like for a lot of misogyny and misogynoir and such adjacent behaviors, some people--and I know they're a gay couple, but like--misogyny is a concept that is all around us! 

Some people, I feel, are just so deep in the sauce that their behaviors and things they do--thinking that's what they're supposed to do as a man, or what they're supposed to do as a Dom, or what they're supposed to do as someone with authority over their partner--they're so deep in the sauce that doing all those things, it just ends up like drilling you deeper into that hole. 

Because those behaviors never result in anything good or kind. Especially people who are oblivious to such behaviors; to the point where what goes around finally comes around, they're in deeper pain. Like, they're in such a worst place, you know what I'm saying? 

I just thought of that, because it's like Lestat is loving Louis the only way he knows how to love--or the only way he learns how to love. And I think I picked up this concept when I did some studying into misogynoir on that whole Manosphere gang.

And it's like, I think earlier in my life I was very dismissive of such behaviors--even to the point where I got family, I got homies that I don't talk to no more for years and stuff! Just cuz of some of the things they say and spew was just so much like Brain Rot! And I peeped this when I was looking into the Manosphere. Someone who I consider to be one of my inspirations, he brought up this whole conversation about how a lot of this--I'm using “men” cuz we're talking about the Manosphere, but it's like--sometimes, dawg, empathy is the way to get in there.

And I'm not saying [have empathy] for everybody! Cuz some people don't just have that bandwidth to empathize with a misogynist or something like that. Some people don't just have that bandwidth. And you’ll never catch me giving you flak for not trying to change the world or sh*t like that. 

But for those people who have the bandwidth to do it-- And the reason why I speak about empathy is like: someone like Lestat who was probably brought up--well, not “probably brought up in trauma”--trained in trauma! All the ways he knows how to love is coated in trauma or abuse or forcefulness or things adjacent to that. He's gonna to do those things to his partners! And obviously the repercussion has come and HE is gonna suffer more!

Obviously, centering the suffering of the people who he who he's inflicting it upon [is most important]; but like, HE’S going to suffer more; cuz it's like, that's all you have been taught to do: this thing. And when it goes around and comes around back to you, you're going to suffer more.

So I think of all this to say like in this scene where he's finally admitting what he did to Louis [in Ep5], this man is suffering! Because what he put into the world obviously is not all him--Louis had his part in it. But essentially, he was a catalyst for all of it. But what he put into the world came back and bit him in the a**. 

And that empathy point of view is not looking at him in this moment and me going: “HA! You got what you deserve!” But it's like realizing and analyzing why it even started in the first place.

Cuz actively, as we are watching this, there's so many people being filled--being fed--FILTH. Be it Andrew Tate, be it all these a**holes that young men aspired to be, you know?! Because of what society has shown a lot of young men what “manhood” is supposed to be; or what being a leader or the Alpha [is] -- God! If you're watching this and any man in your life you know calls themselves an “Alpha”!? Dawg!...

But it's like, it's coming back to hurt Lestat. And this does NOT mean centering Lestat over the victims! But like, from that point, the empathy angle that I was talking about--I feel like it's important to analyze why. Cuz, bro is always going to come back and hurt them: everything he was brought up in and learned, put out there the only way he knew how to love.

Cuz we often say he loves Louis in his own way. And I feel there's a deeper connection in that: “in his own way” [is] coated around trauma and so many things that--you inflicting this on others doesn't just hurt them; it comes back and hurts you with him--very literally. Like, they yanked that man's neck you know? 

The emotional...? Man! 

I just felt I needed to say that, cuz it would just be like crawling in my mind, watching him regret this suffering.

(47:52 - 49:15)

Even at this point when that empathy is being shown and given to Lestat, consequences doesn't justify what happened! Because that's the cycle! Cuz internally he’s going through it; the guilt, the accountability, the self-hate, the shame for what he did to someone who he claimed he loved more than anything in the world--I hope that wasn’t triggering someone. But at the same time that is going on in you, the things you did to other people are still going on in them, you know?

So empathize! Give this man [Lestat] his flowers for being accountable! And you can also still bash his a** for the sh*t he did!

[teacupballerina]

PPG headcanons/plotbunnies townie and villain edition (non-crossover)

Mr. Green and Ms. Keane live in the same apartment complex. They meet after Keane's breakup in "Keen on Keane" when Green notices that Keane seems upset at the mail center. They start talking and--what a coincidence they both love kids!! A few episodes later Ms. Keane catches a nasty illness from amoeba-tainted oranges after "Divide and Conquer" and the only person she trusts to watch over her beloved class in "Substitute Creature" is Mr. Green. A few years later they get married and have halflings who help the new generation in Townsville stomach monster integration.

Robin's parents divorce not long after Super Friends and she blames herself because they are verbally abusive. They have split custody so Robin is only the Utoniums' neighbor every other week. She has an emo phase in middle school and cuts her hair short. Inspiration: the couple her parents were based on divorced IRL and she knows she's "an accident".

Following from previous, in high school Bubbles and Robin become girlfriends, Bubbles is the one who confesses first.

Buttercup taught Ace how to play bass during some never-made episode where the girls teach them to play instruments as part of a rehabilitation effort after Aspirations. ("If you want to meet girls, why don't you guys start a band?") The gang goes on to form a ska band with Snake on guitar, Ace on bass, Billy on drums, Arturo on trumpet (which he already knew how to play somehow) and Grubber on mic. They eventually split when Ace gets the call from Gorillaz.

Sedusa is Ms. Keane's elder sister. This is the reason Ms. Keane is more sympathetic to monsters and mutants. She doesn't have a lot of time between grading homework to keep up with supervillain activity, so she doesn't know half of what Sedusa has done. At some point they meet again and catch up, Sedusa goes low profile after "Aspirations" and leans more into civilian life. The girls don't find out the relation until after leaving Pokey Oaks Kindergarten, at Ms. Keane's wedding to Mr. Green.

Bubbles stays in touch with Wuzzy after "Roughin' It Up" and learns more about the forest and the Lumpkins clan from him. She even dates Wuzzy for a while and has a farmgirl phase, buying vegan leather cowboy boots that she wears into adulthood. This all helps her connect with and befriend Fuzzy himself, who learns to be more accepting through her. LOOK HOW CUTE THO:

Mojo Jojo ages very slowly due to his Chemical X mutation. His specific fixation on Blossom culminates in his focus shifting to either converting or dating her rather than destroying her (something he comes to understand as impossible). Even he doesn't know what he wants and has a lot of anguish over how he feels about her. Blossom's willing to be friends if he stops busting the city up, but she's never telling him that.

The Rowdyruff boys grow into manchildren and start "The Ruffcast", a manosphere podcast/youtube where they do nothing but play videogames, pump iron and complain about the Powerpuff Girls being too smart, too fat, and not feminine enough. Mitch Mitchelson gets roped in as the camera guy and occasional participant, which makes Buttercup dump him.

Princess Morbucks goes from wanting to be a Powerpuff Girl to just wanting to be a team leader. She recruits/buys her own team of girls to suit up and boss around, and this becomes a high-turnover job position for desperate people. Every other time the girls meet Princess, her lackeys are different. Daddy eventually disowns her not for being a villain but for being a tabloid magnet in college, forcing her to start over with nothing. One last ditch effort leads her to public records, and searching for any extended family to appeal to, she discovers her birth mother is Sara Bellum [A lesbian who used to be Morbucks' secretary--she loves Mayor because he's a harmless decent man who helped her escape that situation by hiring her]. Bellum takes her in, reluctantly, but she is totally immune to manipulation and sets her straight.

Ms. Bellum eventually runs for Mayor of Townsville and wins. Mayor Mayor retires to Pokey Oaks senior center. The girls visit him often and occasionally consult him for info about Townsville's history if needed--it's much easier for him to remember things from a long time ago, he's not so good with the day-to-day stuff. Bubbles volunteers there with Bullet, who opens Mayor's pickle jars when the nurses can't.

Harry Pitt running gag: Getting referenced as being in juvie and then prison, but it's never stated what he did. We know what he's in for, but the other characters never say.

[frequentrandomboners]

Rant about Marilyn Manson and Evan Rachel Wood Situation

IDK if this is the right place for this but I don't have anyone to talk with about it, and no one understands. AND my regular communities are in denial, and very hostile towards anyone calling them out on their double standards or hypocrisy.

Marilyn Manson decided to drop his defamation law suit against Evan Rachel Wood. I was a big fan of MM when I was in my early teens. But then he put out the heart shaped glasses music video. That's when me and my teenage circle started to dig deeper. We talked with other fans. We did what research we could with what magazines and websites and news was available back then. It became very clear that WE ALL KNEW and most of us were just in denial about everything that was going on.

That's when I stopped being a fan. I couldn't relate to MM anymore. I couldn't relate to his fan base anymore.

And to this day, you can't speak up about it. Not without MM fans turning on you and trying to sabotage you if not, explicitly, threaten your well being.

The same is true for ICP communities. I remember having to deal with ICP kids at the skate park when I was a kid. I love ICP music. It's their fans I can't stand. Any time an abuser who was "cool" and popular abused someone, or cheated on his girl, he was seen as a hero and the victim was the villain. If someone spoke up, they got "taken down" in one form or another.

That was through out the 90s and 2000s when I was a kid. I'm sure it was even worse before my existence. I can't imagine things being much better today except now we all have smart phones.

MM dropped his defamation law suit and is required to pay ERW's attorney fees. That should be a win for ERW but the internet, especially music news forums, and MM forums, see this as a total win for MM and a perfect excuse to vilify and demonize ERW.

The older I get, the harder it becomes to appreciate my own community, the metal music community, while on one hand welcomes amazing female musicians/bands like Crypta, Nervosa, SpiritBox, Poppy, etc. WHILE ALSO supporting Tim Lambesis, Ronnie Radke, and Marilyn Manson.

What even is going on here?

It's like you cannot stand up for victims, cannot speak out against violence against women, or misogyny, without being relentlessly harassed by (predominantly male owned accounts).

The red pill, "manosphere", continues to get stronger and stronger. Misogynist comments are allowed because there's just so many of them online. While anyone trying to speak up against it gets taken down because they're a minority seemingly by default.

The world just feels completely backwards. Idk what to do. I feel so helpless. I'm going outside to touch grass