#however like i said i really don't know how qualified i am to analyze it

[evilkitten3]

ok so i'm going to preface this by reminding everyone that i'm white and therefore can only come at this from a white person's perspective; on top of that i am in no way qualified to talk about race, racial prejudices, or colorism as it affects any country, least of all a country i have never been to on a continent that i have also never been to. anything i have to say on the subject should be treated exclusively as my best guesses unless i'm including a link to something by someone who knows more than me. ok? ok.

so i'll start with this:

hashirama's skin tone in the anime is somewhat different from his skin tone in the manga (rather, his skin tone on the cover of volume 64, which is the one that i own and am the most familiar with). there are, as far as i am aware, not really any signs i'm aware of in the manga that hashirama is intended to be darker than madara, but since most of his appearances there aren't in color, it likely wouldn't show up much.

if i had to guess why he's noticeably darker in the anime, my first guess would probably be to contrast with tobirama's color scheme (dark hair vs light hair, red clothes vs blue clothes, dark skin vs light skin), as both of them showed up way back when orochimaru first invaded during the chuunin exams which i think was before madara was a properly thought of character, and which i'm fairly certain was before he'd been mentioned at all.

interestingly, this isn't hashirama's only color change - in the manga, his sage mode markings are red, while the anime has them as green.

now typically i'd say something like "well perhaps people are just going with the source material rather than the adaptation" bc i tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. but most fanart of kidoumaru from the sound four/five/six/five-and-a-head seems to lean pretty strongly towards the anime's version

here's kidoumaru and sakon/ukon in the anime:

and here they are on the cover of volume 24 of the manga:

on the other other hand, iruka is in the same boat as hashirama (lighter in the manga, darker in the anime), and yet fanart pretty much only contains the anime's version

so as much as i'd love to come up with an answer for you, all i can really do here is give you a very bewildered shrug

something I notice when seeing Hashirama's fanarts are how they whitewash him, like it's so strange and weird why can't ppl just draw him dark skinned like in canon?

@narutobrainrotstuff @evilkitten3 @anubisthe1

[gattmammon]

Ancient Gods of Rome, explained by an idiot

When people (on this hellsite and in general) said that the Romans "stole" from the Hellenic religion, they're referring to Interpretatio romana, a complex process of synchretization that would require a Classics degree and a dedicated series of sourced quasi-academic articles to unpack.

I don't have a Classics degree and I am also a completely irresponsible dumbass so I will not talk about that. Instead, in this series of posts I will try to talk about how the Roman religion looked like before that. Which is also a very delicate subject that I am absolutely not qualified to explain but again, irresponsible dumbass. (However if you have corrections or sources spit them at me I'm listening).

This post lays the grounds for what will be hopefully a mini series. That "hopefully" is necessary because, again, irresponsible. These are all boring dates and scientific info necessary before we delve into the really cool stuff such as spirits of the dead, pseudo house elves and beans.

Ok, first thing first: timeline.

Ancient Roman history can be divided into three phases, more or less:

- the Roman Kingdom, from foundation (traditionally 753 BC, thought, contrary to popular belief (im gonna be saying this a lot) the Romans themselves weren't sure and preferred to count years by consuls rather than from the year of the city's foundation) to the overthrowing of Tarquinius Superbus (Tarquin the Proud) and the establishment of the Roman Republic in 509 BC. This phase of Roman history is drenched in legend, to the point that the Romans themselves had trouble telling truth from fiction.

- the Roman Republic, from 509 BC to 27 BC. This is an exciting and complex time of political upheval, almost impossible to describe synthetically. It's also a time of great cultural fervor, during which many rituals are re-established but also analyzed with critical eyes.

- the Roman Empire, form 27 BC to... 419 AD??? whatever date they have decided I am not like super interested in this phase of history and I am bad at dates.

The first two phases of Roman history are what we will be mostly looking at. As you can see it's the span of several centuries during which Roman culture goes through massive change - the language itself goes from Old/Archaic Latin to Classical Latin in the latest phases of the Republic, which is the language you were probably taught in schools if at all (thought there are important Archaic authors).

As for the origins of Rome, we know for a fact that from the very first phases of its history, Rome was under Greek cultural influence (yes - contrary to popular belief, in this first phase, Greece is the political and cultural superpower and Rome is just like... a village, so it's most likely it was this way around). The Greeks owned big chunks of the Italian peninsula, and had well-established and ancient colonies.

There's also heavy influence and close exchanges with the other populations of Central Italy, of which however very little is known. Many of those civilization have left very little writing, and some have languages that are to this day not entirely comprehensible.

The most famous of those civilizations, one that was in a complex love-hate relationship with Rome, was the Etruscans, on which I will make a specific post. The Etruscan spoke a poorly attested language that contains a bit of a mystery.

Latin and most other Central Italian languages of the time, as well as Greek and the Germanic languages that were spoken in Southern and Northern Italy, are all different branches of the same family of languages, the Indo-European family. Etruscan isn't. This would mean that the Etruscan language, and probably the settlement of Etruscans in Central Italy, predates the arrival of the Indo-European tribes in the 3rd millennium BC, but historical linguistics is a fickle lover and I am in no mood to put up with it rn. For now just know that the Etruscan influenced Roman language and culture a lot.

...that's it for tonight.

[fangirlinginleatherboots]

I'm not sure if you're awake right now but I wanna ask, can you describe some things your ocd causes(I don't know if that's a good word to use but it's all I can think of) you to do? I'm wanting to write a story involving a character with ocd, while I'm doing research I remembered (I might be wrong though so feel free to correct me) that I think you said somewhere before you had it and since you kind of inspire me to go after things I thought I ask. If it's too personal feel free to delete!

Also, ocd story anon, I read that trauma can be a cause of ocd, do you believe that your ocd could've come from your trauma?

This is a very very long response going into a few of my (and some alters) OCD traits and some reasoning behind them and the range of responses I have to various triggers. It actually helps me analyze my traits better when ppl ask stuff like this so I may have gone overboard as stuff kinda clicked in my brain but hopefully somewhere in here you will get your answer.

So, I’m going to start with the last question first. MY OCD was not caused by my trauma, however my traumas have completely shaped my compulsions and obsessions to a point where my OCD traits are almost inseparable from my PTSD. See, I’m autistic, and OCD is part of this co-morbidity package a lot of autistic people end up with, to a point where the co-morbid disorders are often not even diagnosed after the autism is because its that common. (They’ll diagnose separately if you need treatment for one of them. like the reason i have ADHD and OCD listed as dx’s is because the doctors count them separately on me bc i need medication for them, but they’re extremely common to the point of being expected with most ASD dxs)

Yes, I have OCD and have always had, but my trauma caused so much anxiety that the disorder reshaped itself around specific triggers. There are many layers to my OCD, it’s actually a strange sort of nonspecific looking presentation because of how many alters also have OCD, so it becomes difficult to tell who has which O and C thus there being a lot of inconsistency in whether or not a trigger affects me.

It’s also worth nothing that some doctor’s feel that I fit under the specific label of “scrupulosity” or rOCD (Religious OCD) because of how much of my stuff revolves around religion. I don’t always agree that it’s this because while my O and C are based on religious themes, I don’t believe in the concepts behind the things. I believe most of the religious stuff is just from religious trauma.

On one layer, I have a number obsession. There are certain numbers that are tolerable, a few that are “cursed,” and one that is “blessed” and one that is “perfect.” I will do anything to change things to match my blessed and perfect numbers. I will even fudge the truth a little (not a lie, often an exaggeration, by about one or two digits) to make something fit those numbers. To randomly come across a cursed number or even just a slightly intolerable one, makes me very anxious and can shape how i spend my day and how much time i spend with my better numbers. The way my trauma shaped this compulsion was that my numbers tie to religious stuff, since my traumatic environment was often religious, or trauma would be inflicted with religious reasons.

There is an alter that has a compulsion to say a prayer. When we have intrusive thoughts (which you super need to research if you’re writing OCD bc it is a KEY PART of the disorder but ill go into it later here), someone starts reciting the prayer. Sometimes I will as well just because it’s easier to go along with it. Not completing the prayer is not an option. I mean that with absolutely every intent. Not completing the prayer is NOT AN OPTION. It does elieviate some background anxiety, so whoever is dealing with that is being helped by the compulsion, but it is extremely frustrating and upsetting, especially since i am as non-religious as i can possibly manage to be. The prayer is also said whenever something is uneasy or something triggers specific flashbacks.

One of the most obviously noticeable and upsetting for all involved O and C is being “dirty.” There’s a VERY wide range of triggers here, from actually dirty/germy/unclean things, to unpleasant/intolerable sensory triggers, all the way to conceptual dirtiness like sin, virginity, and lying. This can affect me subtly sometimes, like how i compulsively tell the truth and over share so that i feel clean or how i cannot go to sleep after a fight if it has not been resolved. (”never go to bed angry” they said, well shit now i literally cant cool.) This can also hit me violently and to a point where I am a danger to myself. I worked at a movie theater for a summer some time ago and touched something that was a bad sensory feeling while cleaning a dirty theater. I then proceeded to scrub my hands in near-boiling water for almost fifteen minutes in the break room, broke down sobbing, and when I got home i sat under very very hot water in the shower until my skin was raw and red for days. It doesn’t often get to that point, but when it does, I’ve been held down for my own safety since I’ll literally rip my skin and bite myself to punish myself for being dirty. It is frequently bad enough that I will let myself do something “dirty” as a form of self harm since it seriously makes me miserable and sick. This stuff comes both from religious trauma and from just....crappy normal autism feelings and manifests as my most disabling OCD trait.

There are other things like closing drawers and straightening and arranging things that are done to feel that I am being “good” because of reprimands I received in the past that made me feel like I am “bad.” I am sometimes able to not act on these compulsions, though it takes conscious effort to choose not to. Whether or not this stems from trauma doesn’t really matter to me. I know that most of the fronting alters have these “little OCDs” be it through me or for their own reasons. Tia for instance has to keep things in the kitchen a certain way and Phoebe has to complete certain physical activities a certain way or else she gets upset or feels she did a very bad job/failed.Since I’m really just. going at this question lmao lets talk a little about intrusive thoughts. Intrusive thoughts are upsetting/disturbing/unacceptable thoughts you do not take pleasure in. For me, a few of them make me feel dirty, which triggers my compulsions very badly. Some relate to trauma, others don’t make sense. There are very common ones such as urges to kill or mutilate self or others, urges to do disastrous things (like causing a huge car accident), urges to do disgusting sexual acts (to self or others, often to unacceptable people like children, elders, and the undesired sex), urges to become a serial killer/rapist/shooter/etc, and other such painfully upsetting things such as those. These are often what fuel the obsessions in OCD and the compulsions are to make these thoughts stop or hurt less. Personally, I get a lot of sexual ones because of how poorly the topic was handled in my childhood. I get ones about elaborately slaughtering a specific abuser, about doing things that will kill me, about mutilating myself and mutilating pets (those are the ones that fuck me up the most i think), and about doing very destructive things that would harm a lot of people. I also get some about terrorism happening where I am, but that one is FOR SURE a trauma thing so maybe it could just be my PTSD. 

Intrusive thoughts occur with a LOT of different disorders!!!!! It’s just OCD when you have compulsions to cope with them. Even then, it has to be a certain way for it to qualify.

I hope I was able to give you somewhere to start in terms of information. OCD is a very big disorder and is a major reason why I’m unable to function in a workplace environment. I didn’t go into the specifics of every compulsion, but if you have questions, I don’t mind talking about this stuff. It helps me process it to explain it to others and I end up healing a little through oversharing I think.