#how do you define evil person making the argument

[eff-plays]

"Astarion is more evil than Minthara but Astarion girlies aren't ready for that conversation 🙄"

Astarion girlies are rather confused and amused by the fact that you think evil lies on some kind measurable axis instead of both characters being the product of different writers writing different characters with different motivations and backgrounds, and the reason Astarion girlies are probably not willing to engage with this argument is because it requires one to legitimize it as a valid reading of the text in the first place, which is the biggest hurdle in this hypothetical debate and would put Astarion girlies on the same level as you, somebody who's not yet ready to understand the extremely rudimentary and hackneyed concept of the D&D alignment chart.

[txttletale]

Ok so, let's assume there are 2 steps on how to deal with AI, which are:

give up on luddite dead end pursuits of turning back the clock to more indivualized production

put energy into productive working class organizing

Could you please elaborate who is even trying to do that thing you mention in step 1? Those in denial? I have yet to see anyone, all I see is people being upset and thus hating it, which is a natural reaction to having your art be stolen. Give it time, people need time to process this change.

And regarding your step 2, that's gonna happen either way? I mean, what choice do artists have? Same as all tech that those in power want to push, ai is gonna persist, it's inevitable, as is artists trying to adapt.

I genuinely see no sense in posts advocating for ai, like, it doesn't need that, it's doing good without you guys, it has a pr team working tirelessly trying to integrate it daily. What are tumblr users who advocate for it trying to accomplish here? Make artists hate it less? As an artist whose art got stolen, even if I do manage to successfully adapt, I will not stop hating ai and those behind it? Like, what's the purpose here 😭 Sorry this got kind of long

i mean i don't consider myself an 'advocate' for 'ai art'. generative visual art is an artform i personally have little interest in making. i think if openai went bankrupt tomorrow it would be awesome and very funny. you are making a classic mistake, which is to assume that every issue is like a splatoon splatfest with two clearly defined teams. i point out that the things that people frothed up into anti-AI hysteria say are at best untrue and at worst deeply reactionary, pushing right-wing social views about art or right-wing economic views about copyright because i think those things are bad.

i don't bother making posts pointing out that, like, @ApeHODL69Doge on twitter who thinks every movie will be ai generated by 2026 is moron because, very simply, i don't exist in a social environment where i run into that kind of guy or anyone who doesn't think that kind of guy is a moron, and also because liberals can and have done a pretty great job comprehensively debunking that type of guy's nonsense arguments and empty tech hype.

this does not apply to me but many users on tumblr who "advocate for AI art" are literally just defending themselves against vicious ableist harassment mobs who think it's okay to tell a disabled person their disablity isn't real or they should draw with their mouth or they're just whiny because they used the funny picture machine, so i think what those people might be trying to accomplish is to stop getting harassed, and i think that's a pretty admirable goal

my personal goal is to encourage people to think more critically about new technologies and understand that where these new technologies immiserate them it is because of the social structures and economic system under which that technology is deployed, not because of an evil devil curse lurking in the technology itself. hopefully this answers some of your confusion.

[naamahdarling]

I'm probably going to piss some people off with this, but.

The use of AI and machine learning for harmful purposes is absolutely unacceptable.

But that isn't an innate part of what it does.

Apps or sites using AI to generate playlists or reading lists or a list of recipes based on a prompt you enter: absolutely fantastic, super helpful, so many new things to enjoy, takes jobs from no-one.

Apps or sites that use a biased algorithm (which is AI) which is not controllable by users or able to be turned off by them, to push some content and suppress others to maximize engagement and create compulsive behavior in users: unethical, bad, capitalism issue, human issue.

People employing genAI to create images for personal, non-profit use and amusement who would not have paid someone for the same service: neutral, (potential copyright and ethics issue if used for profit, which would be a human issue).

People incorporating genAI as part of their artistic process, where the medium of genAI is itself is a deliberate part of the artist's technique: valid, interesting.

Companies employing genAI to do the work of a graphic designer, and websites using genAI to replace the cost of stock photos: bad, shitty, no, capitalist and ethical human issue.

People attacking small artists who use it with death threats and unbelievable vitriol: bad, don't do that.

AI used for spell check and grammar assistance: really great.

AI employed by eBay sellers to cut down on the time it takes to make listings: good, very helpful, but might be a bad idea as it does make mistakes and that can cost them money, which would be a technical issue.

AI used to generate fake product photos: deceptive, lazy, bad, human ethical issue.

AI used to identify plagiarism: neutral; could be really helpful but the parameters are defined by unrealistic standards and not interrogated by those who employ it. Human ethical issue.

AI used to analyze data and draw up complex models allowing detection of things like cancer cells: good; humans doing this work take much longer, this gives results much faster and allows faster intervention, saving lives.

AI used to audit medical or criminal records and gatekeep coverage or profile people: straight-up evil. Societal issue, human ethical issue.

AI used to organize and classify your photos so you don't have to spend all that time doing it: helpful, good.

AI used to profile people or surveil people: bad and wrong. Societal issue, human issue, ethical issue.

I'm not going to cover the astonishingly bad misinformation that has been thrown out there about genAI, or break down thought distortions, or go into the dark side of copyright law, or dive into exactly how it uses the data it is fed to produce a result, or explain how it does have many valid uses in the arts if you have any imagination and curiosity, and I'm not holding anyone's hand and trying to walk them out of all the ableism and regurgitated capitalist arguments and the glorification of labor and suffering.

I just want to point out: you use machine learning (AI) all the time, you benefit from it all the time. You could probably identify many more examples that you use every day. Knee-jerk panicked hate reflects ignorance, not sound principles.

You don't have beef with AI, you have beef with human beings, how they train it, and how they use it. You have beef with capitalism and thoughtlessness. And so do I. I will ruthlessly mock or decry misuse or bad use of it. But there is literally nothing inherently bad in the technology.

I am aware of and hate its misuse just as much as you do. Possibly more, considering that I am aware of some pretty heinous ways it's being used that a lot of people are not. (APPRISS, which is with zero competition for the title the most evil use of machine learning I have ever seen, and which is probably being used on you right now.)

You need to stop and actually think about why people do bad things with it instead of falling for the red herring and going after the technology (as well as the weakest human target you can find) every time you see those two letters together.

You cannot protect yourself and other people against its misuse if you cannot separate that misuse against its neutral or helpful uses, or if you cannot even identify what AI and machine learning are.

[genderkoolaid]

Can you explain a sentence from your bio? "To create loving males, you must love males"? I don't understand that sentence, because like does that work for all oppressive groups? "To create loving white people, we must love white people" or "to create loving straight people, we must love straight people". That doesn't make much sense to me, especially since women do this all the time. Women always make excuses for men's behavior, give them the benefit of the doubt, are empathetic and sensitive to men and make tons of posts on the internet about male positivity and yet men still commit 80-90% of violent crimes (from what I remember). And I'm not trying to argue or anything, it's a genuine question. How is being kind to men going to bring about the collective liberation of women from the patriarchy?

So this quote needs to be understood in the context of both the book it comes from (The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love) and bell hooks' philosophy of love in general. Here's the full paragraph it comes from:

“Only a revolution of values in our nation will end male violence, and that revolution will necessarily be based on a love ethic. To create loving men, we must love males. Loving maleness is different from praising and rewarding males for living up to sexist-defined notions of male identity. Caring about men because of what they do for us is not the same as loving males for simply being. When we love maleness, we extend our love whether males are performing or not. Performance is different from simply being. In patriarchal culture males are not allowed simply to be who they are and to glory in their unique identity. Their value is always determined by what they do. In an antipatriarchal culture males do not have to prove their value and worth. They know from birth that simply being gives them value, the right to be cherished and loved.”

People often see this quote or another one and assume a lot about bell hooks' point here, but The Will to Change includes her own experiences of abuse by men and her experiences with misogyny, alongside her observations about how men in her life experienced patriarchal abuse. She is not ignorant of the harms done to women when she says this.

My personal interpretation of her words is this:

The patriarchal expectations relating to how women are expected to "love" men is very different than what bell hooks means to love. Her concept of love requires self-love and self-care, and not being a doormat or adopting a "I can singlehandedly fix that incel by being nice to him!" mindset.

And, equally, how we are taught to "love" men is not good for men either. The patriarchy promises love to men in exchange for appropriate performance of dominance. It says that there are "real men" and "fake men" and only real men are deserving of love. It says that men must be constantly fighting each other, women, and queers in order to be deserving of love and escape punishment. bell hooks' argument is that we as feminists need to see inherent worth in men as people, and reject those patriarchal notions of what makes men worthy as well as the doomerist radfem impulse to label all men as evil and sever all connection forever. Men are people, and women are people, and we are all people in society together, and we always will be, so we need to be able to work together to create loving communities. Whether men are your friends, lovers, relatives, neighbors, patients, students, etc. you do live in a society with them!!! And we (intersectional / revolutionary feminism) cannot win without them. Not just as quiet allies on the side but as meaningful co-conspirators, fellow feminists with just as much a stake in the fight as any woman.

You can read this short chapter of one of her books where she explores love ethic in politics specifically relating to race.

[saint-ambrosef]

I think the big problem with a lot of post-modern concepts of morality is that so much of it (e.g. gender theory) is ultimately based on the assumed premise that "not hurting others" is the end goal of all moral philosophy and social behavior.

Conflict with these theories and concepts primarily stems from a rejection of this fundamental premise. "Not hurting others" is a highly subjective goal that is difficult to define or qualify, since it requires an agreed understanding of everything that constitutes "hurt". But it's highly idiosyncratic by nature because it's such an individual response, so morality then becomes an incredibly difficult dance of knowing every individual person's tiniest preferences and sensitivities in order to be a good person. When hurt is held as the ultimate evil, there is never a reasonable justification for not validating sensitivities. If what you know that what you think, say, or do hurts people, you're a bad person - full stop. (Although it usually comes with the unspoken understanding that this only applies to certain groups of people you have arbitrarily determined are not problematic, i.e. it's okay if your beliefs hurt bigoted people).

And yet it also raises the major moral conundrum of self-inflicted pain; if you believe suicide to be "hurt" and therefore immoral, but the person in question does not see it as such, is it morally correct to let them commit suicide or to stop them? If we admit that not all perceptions of hurt are equally valid, then we must question how we distinguish the legitimate from the illegitimate. And if we consider that self-inflicted hurt is still bad even when consented, the oft-cited counter-argument, "Let people do what they want as long as it's not hurting others" falls hopelessly flat - because what if the 'other' they are hurting are themselves? Who gets to determine what constitutes self-harm? "Hurt" is such a highly subjective perception, and everyone will argue that their perception is the moral standard, while arguing that everyone else is unfairly projecting their own standards for "hurt" on others (thereby causing hurt in the process). It's chaos.

This is why basing an entire moral philosophy off "not hurting others" is bananas. It's one thing to hold that philosophy for yourself, to determine what you think is the true standard for "hurt" and avoid that as much as possible in your choices. It's another to assume that everyone agrees with your assumed premise that avoiding hurt is the basis for all moral decisions.

There have been multiple times I've been in an argument with someone over a perceived injustice, and it's fascinating how often their point ultimately boils down to "it's mean to make people feel bad". But that's not what I base my morality on. I base morality on what I perceive to be objectively true, and although I never wish to make others feel hurt, others' subjective emotional response to confrontations with moral truth is not my responsibility.

[cripplecharacters]

Sorry to bother you,

Your blog is wonderful! Since it's one of the most dialogue/explanation oriented, i wondered if i may please come to you with a more general doubt. i'm sincerely confused... Why is "curing" disability bad per se?

So far, the arguments (on Tumblr) seem to be,

i. Consent.

ii. Generalisation. ("Everyone will want this same thing".)

iii. The undercurrent ideology holding disability as a flaw to be "cured" (including the use of the term "cure").

On which we all agree, they're implicitly bad no matter if it's disability or a haircut. Very well.

But.

What of magical healing per se is inherently bad? Because being given a choice implies that for every given person agreeing, there are going to be others who won't. So we should still write our fantastical society around them, that's not in any way in question.

But these, the possibility of magical treatment and the non-necessity of the same, are not mutually exclusive. You don't have to "take one before the other", they can very well coexist.

Last question (i promise), is seeking treatment for oneself bad?

Like, if there came up a quest to get the glittering flower blooming once a millennia guarded by the Evil Dragon of Evil and capable of magically taking away OCD and PTSD, sign me up! Or if there's a spell to resuscitate my thyroid or an alchemical pill that solves ADHD's executive dysfunction. i mean, that's kind of what my medications should do if they weren't so costly and inaccessible, and that would be a one-time thing too.

Autism's doing alright, i'd keep everything, thanks.

Disclaimer, i'm obviously not advocating for eugenetics (as this term has been often used and misused in these discussions, better to precise).

All these conditions in one way or another define me and effect my life in a pervasive, quotidian way, or/and on a more existential scale. Not always in bad ways -my life is not a tragedy, and this i wish to make clear. i'm not saying that a "magic cure" should come before a change in society to accommodate disability. What i'm advocating for is their coexistence, as a choice -not evil per se, but nocive if inserted in a context of ableism, negation of individual consent, and, indeed, choice.

Or at least that was what i was arguing for until a few months ago. Now however, seeing as the collective opinion is one of strong rejection for these ideas, i believe there must be some important fallacies in my reasoning, and i wish, before everything else, to correct them. To understand.

Sorry for the monologue, but, may you help me?

Thank you for your time and for your kindness,

Anonymous Sloth.

Thank you for your ask! The reason curing disability is bad in media is because the disabilities cured often cannot be cured in real life. People with incurable disabilities already have so little representation, taking away the characters they see themselves in with an impossible cure is incredibly disheartening. I live with multiple incurable physical conditions, and I’ve accepted that I’ll live with them for the rest of my life. Day to day I already deal with people saying how much better my life would be if I didn’t have these conditions I had no choice in getting, I don’t want to see that in my stories! If someone has my conditions I don’t want the author to get rid of them with magic, I want to see that character going on cool adventures and being badass! Sure a magical cure might be nice, but that’s never going to happen. I’m going to be living in this body for the rest of my life, and I want to see stories where people like me get to live their lives with their conditions!

Disabled people should be allowed to see themselves in sci-fi and fantasy stories! People who can’t be cured, who can only have their symptoms managed, who have to be on medication/assistive devices the rest of their lives and who don’t want to be cured should be allowed to see themselves in media without the constant reminder that most able bodied people think their lives would be so much better is they would simply stop being disabled.

Additionally, even conditions that do have cures or ways to manage them aren’t realistically portrayed. There are never any symptoms, side effects or rehabilitation, it’s always portrayed as a magical cure that completely gets rid of the disability. This rarely happens in real life, and I don’t think it’s wrong for someone who shares a condition with a character to want to see that condition accurately portrayed.

It’s perfectly fine for a disabled person in media to want to seek treatment, plenty of disabled people in the real world also have to fight to get treatment (though the fighting is usually against insurance and doctors, not dragons and wizards). But like I said above, it should be at least somewhat realistic. The world is already over saturated with stories of people getting magical cures that make everything better forever, but what about cures with long lasting or permanent side effect? What about healing that requires extensive physical therapy? Or someone who needs to take potions for the rest of their lives to manage their condition? These realities should also be portrayed. Sure maybe some people want to see an escapist fantasy where their conditions could get cured, but not everyone wants that and it’s almost entirely done by abled authors who fathom why anyone would want to see a disabled person who isn’t trying to ‘overcome’ their disability.

We’ve also reblogged this post & answered this ask that deal with similar topics if you want to check them out.

I hope this helps! Have a nice day,

Mod Rot

-

Everything Mod Rot said.

Basically, it's like giving us representation and then taking it away. Readers with that disability are going to read that book and relate to that character. Having a character like you in a work can be so important. But then the character is magically cured of an incurable condition, and now they're completely abled. Good for them. But the reader is still disabled. The reader will still always be disabled.

Disabled representation is already so rare. It's not really nice to take away what little we have.

- Mod Aaron

Echoing what everyone else has said, I want to add an extra thing:

If there was a wealth of disabled characters in media, represented with respect and nuance and care and all that, some stories involving disability being cured wouldn’t feel out of place, because there would already be so much to see that it would be an interesting departure and not posed as the only option for a happy ending.

And if you’re writing something about curing a disability that you have because that’s your experience and it’s what you want, that would make sense as well.

But since so many representations of disability in media have the underlying message that the only way to truly be happy or worthy or whatever with a disability is to have it cured, to have the least amount of signs of disabilities ever, then adding more of the same to that can be not just frustrating but harmful.

An “overcoming” of disability, a “making invisible” of a visible disability, or a cure for a disability are not the only stories worth telling about disabled people—because they are also not the only lives worth living for disabled people.

— mod sparrow

[writingquestionsanswered]

I've perfectly understood protagonist and antagonist, but now I've lost understanding on heroes and villains. I used to think, unlike antagonists, villains are usually evil or have malevolent intent. But when I think about it, that's not what I see in most stories. When I plan out my own story, I always fail to make anybody evil - including the villain. I just don't think anyone is evil. I don't believe in it. So now my understanding of these archetypes are all messed up.

Heroes and Villains

Bear with me while I try to unpack this, because what you've stumbled into is a philosophical quagmire...

I think where you're getting hung up is the discordance between the definition of true evil, and the loose application of the word to anyone or anything that causes harm. Complicating matters is the popularity of morally gray villains, which is what I think you say you're seeing ina lot of stories.

The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy defines "evil" as "the most severe condemnation our moral vocabulary allows. Murder, torture, enslavement and prolonged humiliation are some examples of it." The definition goes on to explain that evil must involve serious, unjustifiable harm that causes suffering and damages the victims' capacity to function normally.

The keyword here is "unjustifiable," though, because... and here's where the philosophical ramifications come into play: what is and isn't justifiable can be up for debate, as is who gets to decide that.

I'm sure you've heard of the "trolley problem." If there's a runaway trolley heading toward five people stuck on the track, and you can pull a lever to divert the trolley onto another track to save them, of course you'd do it in a heartbeat. But what if there was one person stuck on the other track, so you'd be killing them to save the other five people. What do you do then? On one side, there are all sorts of arguments about the greater good, sacrificing the few to save the many, and the potential immorality of doing nothing. On the other side, you have arguments against "playing God," interfering with fate, and turning an accident into a deliberate decision to kill.

And then you get into the persnicketiness of justifiability, because killing the one to save the five is justifiable to the five people, their loved ones, and people arguing on the side of the greater good and the immorality of doing nothing. But, killing the one is not justifiable to the one who dies, their loved ones, and the people who argue against playing God, interfering with fate, and turning an accident into a deliberate decision to kill. So, no matter what you do, it's unjustifiable... but does that actually make you evil? Of course not.

And that's where things get complicated with villains in fiction and how we apply the definition of evil. One of my favorite villains ever is Niklaus Mikaelson in the Vampire Diaries universe. He's one of the original vampires... a young Viking man, abused by his father since childhood, cursed with immortality as a means of protection by his well-meaning witch mother. This leads to him and his siblings being chased by their father-turned-vampire-hunter through the centuries. Klaus's ultimate motivation is to protect his family, but as the lengths he goes to become increasingly more harmful, the justifiability of his actions becomes increasingly twisted. Klaus is certainly evil by definition of causing unjustifiable, serious harm. However, when we start to look at who he is, why he is the way he is/does what he does, and his overall motivation, we get into some gray areas.

Which is why morally gray villains are so popular in fiction, because if we can argue what is and isn't justifiable, and who does and doesn't get to determine that, things start to get really complicated, making fiction a fertile ground within which to explore the concept of evil, good vs evil, morality, etc.

So... having said that... I think you know what antagonists are, and I think you know what villains are. Don't get too caught up on the idea of pure evil. You can have a villain who causes harm for reasons that are justifiable to them or others, even if the majority of others would not see it as justifiable.

I hope that helps rather than muddying the waters!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

♦ Questions that violate my ask policies will be deleted! ♦ Please see my master list of top posts before asking ♦ Learn more about WQA here

[sevilynne]

Sorry in advance, I'm going to rant here a bit.

Why do 80% of Snaters have to bring his looks into the discussion? Like, the way he looks has nothing to do with his character! I just saw another post calling him a "disgusting, oily, ugly man" in their rant on how he is an evil person, like... I look, apart from being a woman, exactly like him. Like, I 100% match the book description. Crooked teeth, shoulder long hair that gets greasy way to quickly, big, hooked nose, dark eyes, too skinny, walks in a "gliding" way: that's me! Why do the marauders fans have to do this?! Don't they realize that there are people, who will look like the charakter they hate on? This fucking fandom made me so insecure about my nose, that I am considering an operation at 19 years old! I just cried for half an hour after seeing jet another post about how ugly Snape is and no wonder he never found love! It just causes so much pain. If they want to hate on Snape's character, fine by me! But why can't they leave the way he looks out of it? Why?

Sorry for freaking out here, but you are one of the few pro Snape accounts one can write to anonymously and I don't want them to be able to figure out who I am. Thank you for reading this messy thing i wrote, it just needed to be said.

I must offer my deepest, sincerest apologies for posts you’ve seen. Alas, Marauder Stans possess a troubling insensitivity and thoughtless disregard for the nuances of character and narrative. In Sev V. S Marauders arguments, when they find themselves cornered without a coherent defense for their beloved quartet, rather than talk about the substantive truths about Sev, they instead throw callous, almost vulgar fixations on his appearance.

Marauder Stans, as fervent as they may be, are often proved problematic. Their disdain for Sev runs so deep that they not only dismiss his importance and erase him from his own circle but also stoop so low to attacking his appearance and ridiculing his poverty.

Marauder Stans seem to revel in disparaging Sev, often going out of their way to strip him of any redeeming qualities. It's that they take pleasure in rewriting his narrative, erasing his virtues and amplifying his flaws, making a one-dimensional caricature that serves their biases. It's a weird thing, revealing more about their own prejudices than about Sev himself.

Your appearance is a distinctive and beautiful part of who you are, but it does not, in any way, define your value or your capacity to be loved and cherished. Those who resort to attacking someone’s looks often do so because it’s the quickest, most mindless way to inflict pain. It says more about their own insecurities than it does about you. You deserve to be appreciated for the incredible person you are, far beyond the surface.

Please remember that you are so much more than any fictional character, you have your own unique story, rich with experiences and emotions that are entirely your own. Here, you are loved and valued for who you are, regardless of how you look or the way you express your personality.

You can always try to block every Marauders Stan who spews negativity about Severus’s appearance. Hypocrisy is those are often the same people who accuse him of bullying, completely oblivious to the irony of their own actions. They fail to recognize that by mocking an 11-year-old who grew up in the grip of poverty and isolation, they are perpetuating the very behavior they 'condemn'.

Have a pleasant day! (Apologies, I'm bad at comfort. And in summary, they hate Severus's character by itself and it's appearance and NOT because he bullied kids, and people like spewing insults at Severus because he is conventionally unattractive, unlike Potter and Black.)

[butchsophiewalten]

I'm annoyed by some of Martin's hypocrisy regarding Felix Kranken. He claims that there're no clearly evil or clearly good characters in twf, the show has a gray morality, etc. But at the same time, he refutes the fact that Felix was abusive towards Linda and makes their conflict much less dramatic and far-fetched. Like, abandoning a sick person who needs you simply because he said a few harsh words to you while drunk? Sorry, but in this situation the last thing I want to do is empathize with Linda.

And I understand why Martin did it: Felix is obviously one of the main characters, if not the main one, and the audience should sympathize with him. Martin probably doesn't feel comfortable making the wife-beater likable to anyone in any way, it probably violates his moral principles. But then why does he write a story with a GRAY and AMBIGUOUS morality with a child murderer antagonist at the center of the plot, if he can’t stand the everyday dirt that exists in real life?

I answered this ask with a lot of text. I've put it all under a cut, because it's long.

I really want to seem levelheaded and thoughtful in my response to this, because I never want to assume more than is absolutely necessary from a careless message on the internet. Y'know, It's just nice to be thoughtful when talking to people. It's good manners. I don't want to say anything needlessly incendiary. But before I respond to any of this, I really can't ignore just the legitimately vile misogyny in this message.

You think Linda is in the wrong for "abandoning" her husband over "a few harsh words" after she tried for TEN YEARS to salvage their marriage? And she only left for her own sake after a relationship-defining argument that made her realize she couldn't emotionally contend with the way he was treating her anymore? I'll get this very clear right out of the way: activism for addicts is something that I take incredibly seriously. People who are suffering with life-ruining addiction absolutely deserve networks of support, and they deserve respect and kindness, and they deserve easy access to social programs that are equipped to provide those things. Even the worst addict in the world, who's done the most terrible shit a person could imagine, deserves such a level of care that should be afforded to any human being. What none of that means, is that you, as in individual, in an interpersonal relationship with a person suffering from addiction, need to submit yourself to a life of flagellation for the sake of that person. Because that person is sick, and you aren't. No man's downward spiral is the fault of the woman who left him because he took it out on her.

Okay. With that out of the way, I can respond to the walten files part of this ask now. I'm not sure if you read my recap for the twitter space where he talks about Felix and Linda's relationship, and I don't remember exactly how I did or didn't summarize what he said, but my opinion of what he talked about there was that he personally doesn't think of Felix and Linda's relationship being abusive, but that he doesn't think it would be necessarily incorrect to interpret Felix's behavior as emotionally abusive or neglectful, (he says this much almost verbatim,) which makes a lot of sense to me. To him, the problem with their relationship was that they were kind of fundamentally romantically incompatible beyond the point of reconciliation, but that they (primarily Felix,) weren't willing to recognize that and dial back their relationship to just being friends (because they are, he says, incredibly important to each other. It's not like their relationship was completely torrid and loveless. They loved each other.) He compares that to Charles' relationship with his (ex)wife, where they came to a mutual understanding that they weren't right for each other as husband and wife, but they stayed friends, because they cared about each other and otherwise their relationship was good.

I don't understand how that's less realistic or nuanced than. Felix beating his wife? So much of The Walten Files is about mourning things that could have been. It's about peering into times when things were good, and watching those gears turn and those mechanisms of tragedy fall into place, and seeing it come apart in a way that makes you ache. I think it's much more in-keeping with the narrative interests of The Walten Files that Felix's relationship with his wife wasn't some trite misogynist horror story, where he beat her and she left him and now he has Manpain about it, but as this much more human (as in, humanizing) sort of thing wherein there was such a clear path to improvement, but Felix sabotaged it in his lack of willingness to adopt agency within his own life. It rings alike to every other time he was has been and will be faced with the opportunity to do the right thing, and how he rejects it every single time, in his own unwillingness to help himself.

I don't know how any of that is in any way ignoring or sidestepping the consequences of real-world tragedy. Just because Felix isn't the terrible violent misogynist you seemingly want him to be, doesn't mean that he, as a character, doesn't reflect any aspects of reality. I think, in fact, Felix is meant to embody a lot of the worst tendencies you see in a lot of people, even you or I, who fail to help themselves out of situations they are objectively capable of improving. Out of a fear of action or consequence or upsetting the status quo. But in a way that is exaggerated and more suited to a narrative.

That, and I feel that Martin means more specifically that there are no "completely good" or "completely evil" characters in The Walten Files, which I feel is self-evidently true. Nobody is Evil Incarnate, and nobody is a messiah, or a perfect victim. Felix is terrible and his actions are condemnable, but you feel for him when you see his flaws as a human being, and there's meant to be a part of you that always hopes he'll eventually do the right thing. even if he doesn't and never will.

We're already seeing the reverse of that in characters like Charles and Susan, where they gossip amongst themselves about their friends' tragedies and thus far refuse to be proactive about Felix's shitty behavior, with Susan even saying outright that she wants nothing to do with it. It's really easy for me to imagine a version of these characters who see something like Felix trying to hide Rocket from Jack and Rose, and who immediately go "This is wrong! I'm going to tell them right away!" and I really do like that they don't do that. There's a degree of complicity. They're just done with getting wrapped up in Felix's shit, even if it means they end up a bystander to something really shady, and I like that it makes them more nuanced as people, instead of being so perfectly virtuous. There's a balance of this. The Walten Files' interest in the morally gray doesn't just mean that the villains get off easy, but rather that the people in it behave as people do, and are sometimes flawed or self-interested. And I think this sort of thinking is going to become a clearer pattern as the series goes on.

[cometblaster2070]

alright here we go, we're going to talk about raven for a bit, because there are some people saying strange, strange things about HER of all people.

(slight disclaimer: this is not an apple white hate post; she is also the loml and both her and raven are wonderful, nuanced characters)

i've seen a couple of people (before you ask, yes, it is those apple white defenders) talk about how utterly selfish raven was being. how she was completely uncooperative and unwilling towards apple, how rude she was, what a terrible friend and a terrible person she was in general she was to everyone (but especially apple gasp), and most of all, raven is completely and utterly selfish for refusing to see apple's viewpoint and for refusing to at least hear apple out.

LIKE IM SORRY?? DID WE WATCH THE SAME SHOW?? DID WE SEE THE SAME CHARACTERS??

AH YES, MY MISTAKE, RAVEN WAS COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY SELFISH FOR NOT WANTING TO FOLLOW IN HER VILLANOUS MOTHER'S FOOTSTEPS AND HARM THE PEOPLE SHE LOVES AND CARES ABOUT.

she's also definitely wrong and completely selfish to even consider wanting to have a happy, peaceful life for herself, instead of poisoning her best friend and ending up hated, alone and chained up like a monster.

my bad guys; i misunderstood the show, clearly it was raven who was the selfish one for not acquiescing to apple's request of poisoning her and ending up miserable for the rest of her life.

jokes aside, like, i don't even know how to explain how wrong this is. not only is it completely outlandish to make the argument that raven is wrong and selfish for wanting to NOT end up in magic jail, but it's so strange to demonize her in this particular way??

LIKE WOW WONDER WHY SHE WOULDN'T WANT THIS DESTINY.

raven's defining character trait throughout the show and the books and any other form of media she's associated with is her kindness, her gentleness, her willingness to do the right thing and how she sincerely just wants to help people, and completely loathes the fact that people see her as nothing more than evil and they see her as someone dangerous.

raven is shown to be someone who would literally rather die on the spot than hurt someone or willingly cause them pain, she has also continuously shown guilt over her mother's previous actions (particularly Wonderland); and another thing we're shown time and time again, is that although she disagrees with apple, she loves her so, so much and would do ANYTHING for her.

LET'S ALSO TALK ABOUT HOW RAVEN WAS CONSTANTLY EMOTIONALLY MANIPULATED THROUGH EAH BY LITERALLY EVERYONE??? LIKE THIS GIRL COULD NOT CATCH A BREAK, IF MADDIE WASN'T THERE SHE WOULD'VE SNAPPED SO FAST IM NOT EVEN KIDDING.

side tangent on this: woman spent her wishing well coin on asking if her friends would be fine if she didn't sign, PLEASE I LOVE HER.

like we had GRIMM of all people on her ass constantly threatening her with going 'poof' and ruining everyone's lives, and oh yes, he took the one thing she had from her mother and gave her that horrific wishing well vision, and then, she had ALLLL the royals telling her how horrible she was for not signing and dooming them all, and then we still have apple, who was constantly reminding her to sign and asking why she didn't and how she should've and whatever whatever; you get the point but STILL.

like i sincerely have trouble understanding why we're demonizing raven rn over wanting to choose her own happiness for once, over a lifetime of literal TORMENT AND SUFFERING.

and consistently throughout the show, we are also shown how apple is in the wrong; apple is a very nuanced character yes, and there's a lot of valid reasons that explain why she has the worldview that she does, and does the things that she does, but it doesn't take away the fact that apple is wrong, and throughout eah, we are shown apple realizing and then later accepting that she's wrong and raven's views and actions are valid and right.

i mean, we even get other characters who were diehard royals acknowledging raven's terrible situation and sympathizing with her; case in point, briar in thronecoming.

lastly, on the point of her not listening to apple or hearing her out, girl, like i love apple sm; but her entire point throughout the earlier seasons was 'oh raven why won't you poison me so you can go to prison and i can get my happily ever after like we're supposed to?'; like apple is also shown to be entirely unreasonable in the earlier seasons to raven being like 'haha hey, this is kind of fucked up, don't you think??' and again, apple has valid reasons for this, but it doesn't take away the fact that she was wrong and that there is really no reason for raven to be demonized over THIS of all things???

tl;dr: raven queen is a wonderful character; apple white would beat your ass if you're talking shit about her (like not in being like "oh i don't like this character" way, in this particular clown way), and demonizing raven for being 'selfish' is WILDDD.

[mdhwrites]

You said the arcs of certain characters in TOH have an 'Us vs. Them mentality.' I take it that's because, as you say, the narrative pins the bad qualities of certain characters on separate parties (e.g. "Amity's flaws are only because of her mom"), but would you care to elaborate further on said mentality and how it sticks out to you in TOH?

So shockingly, not really. It plays into it but I am actually inherently talking about the same sort of mentality that Belos perpetuates but back onto Luz. After all, if you look at the main cast by even mid season 2 we have a problem forming. Eda: Has lost her criminal edge, has no personal interests, is defined by being nice in a way befitting Luz's worldview. Momma Eda.

Amity: No longer is studious and hard working but instead focuses more on her girlfriend and her nerdy interests. Is also now just nice. Was only shown genuine care by Luz, instead of just trying to fulfill her nerdy desires, once she finds out Amity is into Azura.

Lilith: Has turned into a nerd and given up on any ambitions that had led to her previous actions, becoming a nice cool aunt. Only now has Luz tried to form any relationship with her (admittedly, she didn't get many chances before now).

Hunter: Has only been being given kindness because he has shown a capacity for kindness that Luz only really started showing him, beyond not wanting him to die, once he showed he had a nerdy interest in wild magic.

Gus: Was a nerd from go and always nice, even if he could be slightly selfish.

Willow: By mid S2, is essentially out of the show for the past half season, has never had a strong personality and is just nice. Yes, she'll start her jock stuff soon... And never have a real conversation with Luz again, at least not until S3 maybe? So a full season where Luz and Willow, after Willow might have stopped being nerdy/an outcast, where Luz doesn't have an interest in her anymore.

And uh, just as a reminder to S3, Hunter gains a scifi interest post redemption and Luz explicitly listens to NOTHING her mother says to her during her big speech in For the Future until she reveals herself to be a secret nerd. At that point, suddenly Luz dials in.

For TOH, a show supposedly about the individual and self expression, characters either lose their personality and/or gain the personality that matches LUZ. There is less character variety in interests and personalities than even 90s cartoons much of the time by the end of TOH because these characters all lose so much of themselves fitting in with the good guys, especially the redeemed ones.

This is where your argument for this does come into play. I'll frame it as the fandom likes to with Amity: "She didn't have Luz in her life yet."

Amity is only a bitch while she is hanging out with the wrong crowd. Socialites, those with ambition and jocks. The Luz enters her life and despite the fact that the ONE time Luz ever calls Amity out for being a bitch being when Amity is being a bully to King and clearly trying to get a rise out of Luz, making that moment meaningless, that simple fact starts warping Amity. Starts making her turn back to her good, nerdy side. And because this is such an inherently good thing, there is no difficulty in doing this. She needs no motivation, no calling out, nothing. She just needs to desire to be like Luz/liked by Luz. She can discard her entire friend group and do things that should get her disowned with how evil Odalia is and face zero consequences because... I guess that's the power of becoming a nerd.

You are beyond reproach. You can only do good. Same goes for Hunter. Despite YEARS of potential propaganda and the like, Luz just getting into his life and admittedly jabbing at Belos/him a little, is all it takes for him to embrace the inherent goodness, displayed by his nerdiness about wild magic, and start becoming a better person. For this, he loses his home but that is only seen as a positive because indeed, he got away from those hostile that made him a bad person. He could now be a good person because he no longer had those influences and could embrace Luz's way of life.

With the show's themes, why is this the case? Shouldn't their base personalities be allowed to exist? Shouldn't a wide range of ideologies and the like be allowed since that is a part of self expression? Instead, when people don't like Luz approves, they are disapproved by Luz and either need to get the fuck out or conform.

And this is all without getting into how she becomes Jesus in the last episode...

None of this is intentional but if someone told me that the show felt hostile to them because they didn't consider themselves a nerd or because they tried to get somewhere in life, I wouldn't blame them. The show has a weirdly narrow belief in who is a good person. Who is allowed to exist in the main cast, a problem that cascades issues into a lot of its themes. I mean, this is the first show I've ever had to ask if character arcs are actually hurt the themes of the show because of this, a blog I sadly couldn't refind.

There is admittedly an element of this where I might not have thought about it without the fandom. Most people I know who are multi-fandom still agree that TOH is aggressive against others, even for a fandom. That it lashes out and blames others for its problems. Almost like a *gestures at the thesis*

And that doesn't help make any of this be less uncomfortable unfortunately. See you next tale.

======+++++======

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

A Twitter you can follow too

And a Kofi if you like what I do and want to help out with the fact that disability doesn’t pay much.

[pain-indeed]

Let's talk about Mecha Knight

Well, well, well, would you look at the time. It's "me writing too much about Kirby" 'o clock ! And it seems like Mecha Knight will be the topic.

So, the reason I am writting this is that I see more and more people say that Mecha Knight is an overused subject and it doesn't deserve to have so much angsty fics, art, etc. I strongly disagree and I will explain why. I know people won't change their mind with a single, random rant, but I just want to share my opinion on the matter. With that in mind, here I go, describing how the whole Mecha Knight thing is indeed messed up.

First I want to objectively describe the situation. So the Haltman Company invades popstar, starts mechanising everything and everyone. Meta Knight has the Halberd blown up, and we don't hear about him untill world 4. We discover that he had tried to fight the corporation by himself, then failed and was captured. Then he was turned into a cyborg forced by mind control to work for the guys who are actively destroying what he was trying to save against his own will, and forced to try killing one of his friends/rival twice, before being freed and helping the heroes.

I think we can all agree that this a bad thing to happen to anyone. Kidnapping, enslaving and modifying someone without consent is pretty horrible, and there is no denying that. Everyone who has basic ethics and empathy would know that. So logically, people sympathise with Meta Knight, and they can show it by imagining what it must have felt like for him trough art.

So, why the heck would some people try arguing why it actually was'nt that bad and artists should stop "milking angst" out of this ?!

Here's their argument ; Some have said that Meta could'nt have been badly hurt, as he is seen seemingly fine after fighting Haltman. As if being fine physically means you are fine mentally. If you were mechanised, do you think you would'nt feel at least a little bad ? Is it wrong to think the victim of this situation may keep some scarring memories ? Or is it that you think Meta Knight having trauma is contradictory to his character and he should'nt be allowed to ?

Well, in fact, if you look back at his personality, having trauma out of being Mecha Knight make perfect sense as it goes against his most defining trait ; stenght.

Normally he is very powerfull, physically, mentally and politically. His character practically revolves around power ( he is often shown trying to be more powerfull ). So imagine what it must be like, having all that strenght completly taken away from you and used by his ennemies against his allies. How it must feel to go from leader to slave. Not being able to move an inch by yourself while your body moves on its own. And it's only made worse by how in every other instance of him being posessed, he was shown to have tryied resisting evil influence. Even in RoMK he was revolting against lazinness. Here, the only clue we have about him trying to resist was the title of his battle theme, commonly known as "inner struggle". But the fact you can't even see that in game prooves how powerless he was, how vain his resistance was.

Even if having been turned into a robot did'nt disturb him, not being able to do anything against it definitly could have made him question himself. It could have shattered his ego and confidance in his abilities. It make perfect sense.

And, well, being turned into a cyborg must have been terrifying anyways. We don't know how mechanisation actually worked, but according to the number of screws in the mechanised people's design, how we only see him after a while and Kumazaki's habit of impliying terrifying stuff going on behind the scenes, it's understandable to assume it was painfull. And it must also suck to be treated as an actual object.

So, yeah, the situation was indeed pretty fucking bad, and seeing people trying to say it’s not unnerves me. I think they either are Meta Knight fans who feel like him being allowed to feel the slightest of insecurities would make him weak, MetaSusie fans who are trying to defend her actions by minimilizing them or just fan that have enough to see it over so many other topics. Like, bro, feel free to make your own art instead of complaining. Or potentially write countless paragraphs to share your opinions like I do ( just kidding, it’s actually pretty anoying ).

Basically, it's normal to see angsty art and fics of an event that was objectively pretty horrible and complaining about it is weird.

Either way, if you’ve read trough all this, congratulation. Must have been long. Thank you for your time and patience, and I hope you have a wonderfull day.

[captainjonnitkessler]

Way to reblog that shit totally misrepresenting the “man vs bear” argument.

If you think I'm wrong and you want me to reconsider my stance, you need to present some sort of argument instead of being passive aggressive. Explain why you think it was misrepresented and offer an alternative viewpoint.

If you don't care if I change my mind and just want me to feel bad for having an opinion you don't like, that can't be accomplished by internet randos yelling at me. Look at my blog. You think this is the blog of a person who cares if they get yelled at by internet strangers? But you might want to reconsider how you spend your time if you think lashing out at strangers for fairly minor disagreements is a good use of it.

Anyway I do think I could do better at being more nuanced. Women obviously face harassment and assault from men, including in the woods. I meet men in the woods every time I go hiking and I'm not going to pretend I've never had the fleeting thought of what I'd do if one attacked me. But that's the thing - I meet men in the woods every time I go hiking. It's really weird to have it presented as some sort of hypothetical thought experiment instead of the mundane reality of a very popular hobby.

The biggest problem I'm having is the number of people using it as an excuse to play the "I am in perpetual danger from every man I meet and I have to perform a series of performative safety rituals to ward off serial killers and That's What Being A Woman Is About" game. I've had, over the past couple years, a few people tell me that if I'm not perpetually afraid of every man I see then I must not actually be a woman, or I must be lying, or I'm some naive young waif who doesn't understand the Evils Of The World yet. It's really fucking annoying! Womanhood is not defined by fear and paranoia!

The other problem that I can't believe I'm having is the number of people arguing that bears are basically just big cuddly uwu babies who are more scared of you than you are of them!!! and you just have to shoo them off the path like waving a bird away from a berry patch!!!

Bears are dangerous as hell - even black bears - and you should NEVER assume they're safe or friendly. And sure, maybe 99% of black bears are fairly non-confrontational and don't want to fight you - but the same is true of men! But unlike men you can't outrun, outfight, or outclimb a bear. You're pretty much just fucked if one does decide you look tasty. So again - it just feels very performative to me to make a big deal about how dangerous men are while downplaying the danger of a literal apex predator.

[tgammsideblog]

Darryl and neurodivergency

Darryl is the younger brother of Molly Mcgee, who is often characterized as mischievous and a troublemaker. Some episodes have subplots that involve him making deals with other people or getting into some shenanigans, like ¨A Period Piece¨ or ¨I Wanna Dance With Some-Ollie¨. However, it is clear that not all his behaviour is considered totally intentional, as he wants to be good but he struggles understanding how. This struggle with understanding social norms is heavily implied to come from his own neurodivergency

In this post i'm going to discuss how Darryl is written as a neurodivergent character mainly using the episode 2-B from Season 2 ¨Double, Double, Darryl & Trouble¨ and how it explores the relationship he has with his family and how he views himself.

First, what is neurodivergency?

From dictionary.cambridge.org defines neurodivergency as: ¨having or related to a type of brain that is often considered as different from what is usual¨.

So, from my perspective, this means people who have their brains wired in way that is considered ¨different¨ from the norm. This doesn't mean that there is something wrong with the person, it just means that they may operate or think in a unique way or they have a different way of learning new things. A person who is neurodivergent can carry out their daily lives just like a person who isn't neurodivergent does.

Now, why do i describe Darryl as neurodivergent?

Well, it has been mentioned by some people in the crew how Darryl's brain is wired in a different way from the rest of the Mcgee family. Bob Roth, one of the creators of the show, described Darryl on his twitter as ¨Darryl isn't evil or sadistic. He wants to do good. He thinks he's doing good. But his ways of getting their are really are just... off.¨

Sam King, the person who directed the episode ¨Double, Double, Darryl & Trouble¨ talked about how the plot of the episode is based on how she and her sister had neurodivergences that affected how both of them did at school. She talked about how Darryl struggles with what is expected of him or how he shouldn't change completely who he is to be ¨good¨.

Having this in mind, it is clear that Darryl written as a neurodivergent was intentional from the crew and the writers' part. This means that Darryl is intended to be read as this and it is an aspect that should be considered when it comes to analysing his character.

How does the episode ¨Double, Double, Darryl & Trouble¨ tackles this theme?

The episode starts with Darryl getting caught for making a giant graffiti mocking the school principal Connor. Connor talks to Sharon and Pete about this, both who are disappointed at Darryl's behaviour. As a punishment, Darryl has to clean up the wall and miss the recess.

However, once Pete and Sharon get on their car, they start laughing of their son's pranks. They praise his artist talent and believe that his humor is hilarious. This goes to show that while they both try to be firm with Darryl, they still like him for who he is and enjoy his pranks even though it puts him on trouble with school.

Back to Darryl, he gets the idea of becoming a wraith and letting his shell (body) to clean up the graffiti on the wall while he has fun flying around as a ghost. He later persuades Molly into letting him be a wraith for the rest of the day while his shell body goes to class, with the argument of how he (his shell) is behaving good like his family and the principal want him to be.

During these scenes you can see Darryl getting frustrated with the idea of how almost everyone around him wants him to be a well behaved and model student. He doesn't fully understand how to be that and why his behaviour is wrong because his own morality works differently from other kids. When he tries to be good he often can get things wrong and do things that weren't expected of him. Darryl has some struggle understanding social norms and being able to differentiate between what is good and bad.

I think this is a feeling plenty of neurodivergent people can relate to. The idea of not getting what things were wrong and how growing up adults around us wouldn't explain why those things wrong. Or saying things that were inappropriate without meaning to because we thought we were just being honest. And we could get angry with people around us for not explaining things well or us just not understading the situation. At least it is something i can personally relate in my experience as teenager.

Another thing that is worth of analyzing is the role the Scratch plays in this episode. Scratch always had this sort of uncle relationship with Darryl and you can see that they were already getting along in early episodes from Season 1 such as ¨Getting the (Band)Shell Back Together¨ and ¨No Good Deed¨. Both have similar personalities that involve getting in trouble and being mischevious. Because of this, Darryl feels like he can be more himself around Scratch than he is with the rest of the Mcgees. Scratch seems to accept him more for who he is or put less pressure in him to be ¨good¨. It's not surprising to see why they are usually seen hanging out together. However, Scratch can be a bad influence to Darryl and encourage bad behaviour and habits from him. So, this is the downside of them hanging out together since while Darryl feels like he can be himself around Scratch, the blue ghost isn't the best role model for him.

And in ¨Double, Double, Darryl & Trouble¨ Scratch is the one that encourages the most for Darryl to stay as a wraith. In the song sequence Darryl and Scratch play all kind of pranks to the teachers and students in school while Darryl's shell behaves like a model student, which becomes important for Darryl's conflict later in the episode.

When Molly, Scratch and Darryl go back home, Molly notices that Darryl is still a wraith and orders him to return to his human body. Darryl refuses to go back to normal since he says that ¨he feels more alive as a ghost¨. He doesn't have those social pressures he gets all the time and he is hanging out with someone who he feels like he can be himself freely.

In that moment Sharon and Pete call Darryl about how the school principal called them. Darryl's shell goes to Pete and Sharon while Darryl listens to the conversation. It turns out that the principal called because ¨Darryl¨ has been behaving well all day. Both Pete and Sharon tell ¨Darryl¨ how proud they are of him, making Darryl feel insecure about his relationship with his family.

He later talks to Scratch about he feels like his family likes more his shell than they like the real him. Scratch ties to convince Darryl that this isn't the case, only for them to hear Molly complementing the shell's behaviour. In response Darryl gets really angry and decides to stay ghost ¨foverer¨ if their family ¨loves the shell more than they love him¨.

Before Darryl decides to run away from home and stay as a ghost, he listens to Pete and Sharon being worried about him. They talk about how ¨Darryl lost his spark¨ and think they did something wrong as parents. Darryl then realizes that his parents like him for who he is and that he misunderstood the whole situation.

I think this conflict that Darryl has about feeling misunderstood and unwanted by his family it is something a lot of neurodivergent people experienced growing up. About not feeling good enough for your family and that you are letting them down. That there is something wrong with oneself and that your family secretly hates you for that. This is something that Darryl probably has felt multiple times before this episode. He feels different from the rest of his family. He believes that they don't accept him for who he is and mainly see him as a troublemaker. It isn't suprising to see why he lashed out when he saw his shell being praised by his parents and Molly, despite that wasn't the real him.

After some shenanigans involving Darryl rescuing his body from a garbage truck and almost falling into an incinerator, Darryl goes back to his human body and returns to his home. He has a conversation with Pete and Sharon about how he can't be this perfectly well behaved son, how sometimes he is going to get into trouble and they have to accept that. Both of them tell Darryl that they love him as he is, even with the problems he usually gets into.

In the end Darryl understands that his family accept him as who he is and they only want what the best for him. They want him to grow into a good person and not fall into the wrong path. Although he may struggle with understanding certain social norms, that doesn't mean that he should completely change who he is as a person.

In conclusion, the point of the episode is that if someone is neurodivergent or has way of behaving that is different from what it is expected, that person shouldn't have to become another person and leave behind who they are to be accepted. They can still be themselves while looking for a way to become better people. Because a person shouldn't have to completely change their personality to please others.

[sophieinwonderland]

Greetings Sophie!

Now, prefacing this: this is not to hate or whatever, just wanna have a true same level discussion for interest.

But I don't think tulpas and non-traumagenic systems are the same as traumagenic systems. What I mean by this is: When I did my research, DID and OSDD was described as when contant stress and trauma happens to young children and barriers in the midn are created, separating areas of the brain, wich individually develop into different personalities. So it's not something that you can do on will.

Now, it also says that for it to be the mental disorder it cannot have a religious or social context, it has to cause some distress to the people, and is not something counciouss.

So therefore Tulpamancy and non-traumagenic are not DID and OSDD. BUT, I do believe it may be something else, another sort of plurality that is not well researched maybe? Possiblly they are influenced by other things.

Tho, I admit, as far as I believe some tulpas and endos, I have a hard time believing all of them, this is more a personal bias.

Also, I think the DID OSDD comunity, and the tulpa endo comunity, should be separate, as one is a community for trauma survivors and such, and the other is a social/cultural/religious thing (as far as I understood).

Just wanted to share my ideias and opnions, and tought this may be a good place to havr someone to argument with me, the only eay to understand is to talk to someone from the other side, yeah?

^^

— love, ♤

I think you need to define what you mean when you say you think the communities need to be separate?

Do you mean that you want there to be subcommunities that are exclusively for CDD systems, and others that are exclusively for non-CDD systems. Because as that goes, so do I! And this already exists!

There are CDD spaces that are exclusive to CDD systems. And then there are tulpa spaces that are for tulpa systems. I believe there are also still Daemonism servers as well, though I'm not certain on that.

If that's all you mean, then congrats! This is already true, has been for a long time, and nobody wants to change it. I have no interest in going into CDD communities myself, and I don't think other non-CDD systems do either! This is a non-issue.

But if you mean that you want a complete separation, as in there should be no mixed/inclusive communities whatsoever, that's obviously not going to happen. It's not even a realistic goal you could ever make headway on. I mean, many of the largest names in the inclusive community are traumagenic DID systems. The coiners of the term endogenic are a diagnosed traumagenic DID system. The founders of The Plural Association are another traumagenic DID system.

The inclusive community is, regardless of origins, bound together by shared common interests and goals for plurals of all kinds.

An Issue of Mixed Origin Systems

Overall, while I don't think non-CDD systems should be in CDD-exclusive spaces, there is another wrinkle I need to talk about, which is how there are a number of mixed origin systems who fall between worlds, including many diagnosed with these disorders.

As it stands now, due to anti-endos in CDD spaces, mixed origin systems aren't welcome in spaces that should help people with their disorder.

This is a huge travesty, and I firmly believe that these spaces need to be restructured to support mixed origin CDD systems.

In my opinion, running a space for trauma survivors and people with mental disorders, but then denying access to those space to people with those disorders and trauma just because they might also have tulpas or spiritual headmates, or were plural before their trauma, is nothing short of pure evil.

And in the case of spiritual systems, is a clear example of religious discrimination.

Below the cut are corrections that are beside the point by still important.

Pedantry on diagnoses

Overall, you're right about the requirements for a disorder and this is irrelevant to the main point, but given how misinformation spreads, I wanted to add a couple corrections.

DID can involve spiritual/religious contexts: This is covered in the DSM-5, where it lays out situations where possession may be an example of DID. DID cannot be a NORMAL part of a cultural or religious practice. In other words, if it's normal to be possessed within specific rituals but not outside of them in a certain culture, and a spiritual medium suddenly starts finding themselves being possessed in ways that are outside of their control and distressing, then this can be diagnosed as a disorder.

DID requires distress OR impairment: In the DSM, the criteria requires distress or impairment in important areas of functioning, not just distress. Someone may not be distressed by their disorder, but can still be impaired by it. Someone can also be distressed by a disorder, but not impaired. While these will often happen together, either is cause for diagnosis. Additionally, in the ICD-11, only impairment is taken into account.

[egg-emperor]

Do you prefer the name Eggman or Robotnik? Personally, I don't understand why people in the fandom get so upset about him being called Eggman. I just accept the fact that a character has two names and it doesn't mean his real name is no longer Dr. Ivo Robotnik. Eggman is just a silly nickname that he adopted for himself. I call him Eggman since I grew up in an era where he called himself that. I also never got the argument that it's hard to take him seriously when he calls himself Eggman. Eggman being a silly name doesn't change the fact that he has committed terrorist attacks, conquered planets, blew up the moon as a warning (no fandub plz), and literally shattered the earth into pieces in Unleashed. If aliens visited a thousand years from now and found out that the world was conquered by someone named Eggman, I'd be embarrassed lmao. The beauty of Eggman is that he can be both silly and serious. I don't think Eggman being 100% serious is the way to go with his character. Eggman being silly makes his darker moments stick out more. That's why Eggman threatening the Zeti in Lost World is considered the standout cutscene to most people.

I don't really have "preference" per say in terms of liking them, I like both. They've established in canon that Robotnik is supposed to be his birth surname and of course I'm not gonna say that isn't good. I think it's cool. But I'm sure it's obvious what my preference is in like referring to him as I call him Eggman almost exclusively, unless I'm talking about his younger self pre Eggman name story wise, where I will just call him Ivo Robotnik for obvious reasons

I've never understood or felt strongly about the debate. I've been a fan since 2005 so he'd already been known as Eggman in western media for years by then. But what I do find most ridiculous is the truth is, he was always called Eggman in Japan and he's their character. Since his very creation he's been Eggman, it predates Robotnik factually. Then both names have been known to the world for as long as each other, just in different parts of it

Robotnik was literally initially just something the west decided to call him to make him sound cooler or more villainous seeming or something, just like any redesigns they attempted. But he didn't need those to be evil, it's his actions and personality that makes him evil, not his name and appearance, which is really cool and I love that. But it's actually the one thing the west did with him without SoJ/Sonic Team JP's involvement that I like

I like how it's the one thing SoJ/Sonic Team JP decided to roll with too. It was a great idea to make Robotnik the family name and Eggman his nickname. I like what it represents, he takes something used to poke fun at his weight and embraced it, took away the power of it being an insult and put a new power of his own to it. It says a lot about his self love and emphasizes his serious threat status, if one is to make the grave mistake of underestimating him due to his name just like his appearance

He was always called Eggman in Japan. If you really wanted to get technical, it's really his one true name. His creations always had Egg in the titles too, so it really all made a lot more sense in JP before English. Now even after they decided to adapt Robotnik into the canon in all languages, Eggman obviously remains his main defining name. The character himself calls himself Eggman exclusively now in English too and has for as long as I've been a fan so I do too

So yeah I'll use them interchangeably, Robotnik if talking about him before he took on the nickname but that's very rare so I near exclusively call him Eggman. I don't mind people calling him Robotnik if they just have a preference but it's bothersome if they act like Eggman is a terrible name and bad change when really it wasn't a change at all as he was always called that really. I lol when commenters get mad at my video titles of classic Eggman on YouTube

And yeah I'm a massive defender of both humorous and silly but also seriously evil threat Eggman. That's how he really is in game canon and I love every part of him. It's really awesome that he can be so serious, threatening, and badass but also have a very entertaining funny silly side, and how often the two can overlap in his crazy dramatic showmanship, presentation, and wacky interests with an evil streak. And such extreme devastating evil being committed by a funny egg shaped man named Eggman is epic XD

Him being a guy who looks super serious, acts super serious at all times, and only has one less unique and striking name (as cool as the name Robotnik is), would lack a lot of the charm and uniqueness he has as Eggman. It really does compliment and emphasize his evil very well when the same guy who can be goofy and silly is also the guy doing thrilling badass evil and causing great fear and devastation to the world. The contrast and suddenness of the switch at times can make some of his best moments, like Lost World

So I love him having a silly sounding name, appearance, and actions so much, they don't take away from his evil and seriousness and level of threat, unless one simply isn't paying attention. I'm the biggest defender of it and it's one of the reasons why I defend the name too. Besides it literally being his original name anyway, suiting his appearance very well, reflecting his self love and confidence, and just being very charming all around. Plus it can really just emphasize his if it makes someone underestimate him! 💜🥚