#i have a corporeal form and i exist i exist i exist

[literallys-illiteracy]

Trans Allegories in Lobotomy Corporation

Part 0.5 in a series that i'm making going over the archetypes, themes, and interpretable meanings of all the abnormalities in this game, before the next, and then finally in Limbus.

Cut is for further explainations

First Tier: Trans Allegory 100%

It is important to note that there is no strict defining line on what a trans allegory is, which I also have a project working on to describe my theory, but in the Scaffold one could theoretically understand the structure that I have.

Snow Queen:

The power of love overcoming that of cold, stagnating, uncaring evil in order to help one re-find themselves. The snow queen herself does not represent that of the allegory, it is rather Kai (Kay) and Gerda's story from the original tale that can represent this, however interlinked all the same to the queen.

King Of Greed:

Part 1, the work line:

"When The King of Greed assumes the form of an egg, you can faintly see a smiling girl inside it."

alongside the fact that her title is "king", a traditionally masculine rank.

Part 2, the actual thematic:

The concept of "greed" in this abnormality is not truly one that is borne of what one would traditionally think, rather than the desire to take for the sake of taking, it is the concept that the root of happiness is desire, and at the root of all desires is an insatiable greed within.

While desires many will go unfulfilled, they will always be the root of ones happiness, and will always remain in ones subconscious.

Snow Whites Apple:

Snow whites apple is one of being discarded and abandoned, hoping to rot (similar to another teleporting, hallway damaging, plant based Waw in this same tier), who, after time passed, realised that the life she had seen come to fruition for Snow White was not the life that would come forth for her, so she leaves to go on her own journey, to find herself.

The apple, realising that the life they had once thought was not for them, sprouted forth, grew, and became a princess in search of a story.

Nothing There:

Egg.

Beauty and the Beast:

Change, death, a life trapped in a body that is not *you*, an endless cycle that all parties wish to part from.

Today's Shy Look:

someone in a discord server noted that this abnormality is a parallel to neurodivergence, especially ASD. Unfortunately i beat them to that analysis a few months ago.

The themes of identity, denial, and divergence all carry over to themes of trans nature, however that is not to say that Shy Look is intended to be one, it is almost certainly intended to be that of ASD.

That being said, kill the author with your own bare hands, the autonomous psyche that exists in humanities collective contains these archetypes of identity and denial, and integrally they are linked to these conscious perceptions we have of them — Inseparably these ideals are linked to conscious perceptions, though borne from the unconscious mind, and forth from this there is no way to remove change from identity, to remove denial from the 'self', to differentiate one's societal differences and strife to that of another. We are all human, we all share in this human collective, these unconscious symbols are not defined by a singular perspective, interpret things as you wish. If you disagree with my analyses, by all means, slay me by your own hands; forthcoming the 'Death of the Author' is the 'Birth of the Reader'.

Alriune:

Doll wished to be human, abandoned to the wayside, finding their own goals shattered.

Though Alriune may be interpereted very strongly as a trans allegory, which i also have a different (netzach) project related to, that is once again to the visceral humanity of these abnormalities, which i plan to touch on at a later date if a certain mutual doesn't beat me to it.

Funeral of Dead Butterflies:

Whom also has their own post on this topic. which is another 'death of the author' tangent for you to read on i guess.

The Funeral of Dead Butterflies' thematic is that of death, and hence that of rebirth, of life.

This concept is best demonstrated through a quote from Demian:

“The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Who would be born must first destroy a world. The bird flies to God. That God's name is Abraxas.”

Herman Hesse, Demain

However, i also have a topic essay separated from PM somewhat regarding the nature of death as an allegory, alongside an additional essay named "Transing Death".

Notes of a Crazed Researcher:

"The final chapter ends with the phrase: “Born again.” "

Notes of a Crazed Researcher, observation level 4.

We Can Change Anything:

Don’t like how you look? Are you too fat? Too skinny? We can change that!

We Can Change Anything, Observation level 3.

Being somewhat more serious, with both the notes and this tool, though not integrally linked to that of these allegories, they are both understandably interpretable as this with reasonable argument to support them.

Tier 2: Plausible to Write as a Trans Allegory:

Burrowing Heaven:

This abnormality will come back later. Keep an eye on this one for a moment until then, hold on.

So Burrowing Heaven's gimmick is that of attention, wings, and eyesight.

It's descendant from the trope of 'gazing upon a god' often present in fictional or extant religions such as in the Lovecraft mythos (which is noted in particular due to the abnormality being described i later depictions as "wings of an elder god").

That being said, this abnormality's concept of "existing within ones perception" is interpretable as that of identity, alongside the line of "I could only bear fruit in your sight", akin to the concept of only flourishing when viewed as what or who you are.

Scorched Girl:

Abandonment, sights of a better future, disregard by society.

This abnormality only gets this lower tier due to its source material's differentiation, rather than seeking a better life for strictly herself, she sees in the fires a world of warmth, of joy. Though hope is a powerful emotion, and one that is linked to desires at a primal root neighbouring the king of greed, it is wrote here in a way that is less linked to that integral theme of identity I seek.

The following three exist in the same vein:

Queen of Hatred, Little Red Riding Hooded Mercenary, and Big and Might be Bad Wolf:

All three of these abnormalities share the same virtual story framework, one of managing your identity within a predestined story.

Queen of Hatred defines her existence upon the extant force of evil, though in opposition to it, hence her dual thematic of both love for good, and hatred for evil. Little Red, similarly, is not a being without her antithesis, without the wolf she cannot exist as an individual, without her hatred for the one which haunted her for so long.

The Might be Bad Wolf exists in a barely different stream, though still that of a predestined story, it is rather that of societal fatalism, wherein its nature as a wolf determined its future, the wolf is always the villain of the story, the wolf is meant to hunt.

The wolf is also the most trans-coded out of any of these abnormalities, its nature of being hated due to its nature alone, its lack of decision in the matter, its fate, it "will be" the Big and Bad Wolf.

The former two however share this in many ways, due to the aforementioned predetermined nature of their tale, however in both a meta, and mirrored parallel.

The Hood and Queen both define themselves on another's basis, being unable to exist without the other, leaving themselves as incomplete — In queen's hysteria we can see the repercussions of this unfold, her strands of being still loose she unweaves into a beast, into a creature that she does not *want* to be.

The Hood exists in a slightly different manner once again, as she has found herself in the wolf's hunt, though less so in this unweaved state that the Queen has.

Warm hearted Woodsman:

Desires and is denied a heart due to its nature from birth, from its creation.

Do you know what letters heart has? thats right. HRT. I rest my case.

Der Freischutz:

Loss and searching for identity, sacrifice of ones old life in order to create a new one on their own accords.

Red Shoes:

This abnormality is the literal incarnation of desire, so much so that it's EGO is the only one to actually include the word "desire".

The Firebird:

The Russian avian version of Moby Dick essentially, a bird which wishes to be perceived, wishes to be hunted like it once was, in order to regain its glowing feathers.

This bird exists in the same concept of Burrowing Heaven (you can stop keeping an eye on it now), wanted to exist in ones perception, as beautiful as it truly can be.

Plague Doctor/Whitenight:

Both Plague Doctor and Whitenight share both of their placements due to its fucktonne of different plausible interpretations, this one was extant on its own, but furthered by someone named "chaos" in a twitch chat when i first made this list.

This concept is mostly that of change, of becoming your true self, and finding those that know about and accept this self before the advent comes.

This transformation is integrally linked to Whitenight, alongside Plague Doctor, however they will get their time in the spotlight soon enough.

Mirror of Adjustment:

Changing one's self though appearing the same in the mirror, see Limbus Company canto 4 for more details.

Meat Lantern:

Appearance verses reality.

Knight of Despair:

Yet another struggle to find one's identity in a cruel world, a tale as old as time, where the knight's experiences, her cycles of despair, lead to her view of herself, her sough purpose in life, to be naught.

This purpose is then renewed through the protection and guidance of others, similar to mine, like how i attempt to guide others (in both understanding themselves, alongside subconscious themes, and media literacy), the knight attempts to guide others, and protect them from the harm that she could not protect others.

Yin/Yang:

The innate feminine and masculine traits that each holds, alongside their obvious dichotomy and wholeness in unity can be understood as one coming to understand or accept their true identity.

The reason that this is not in a higher tier is because of some psyche stuff that i don't want to get into here but i think i may have wrote about in the past.

[Censored]:

This abnormality is by design an enigma, which is its entire purpose, the concept of a hidden form, of redacted information, of a 'true form'.

Now as the river of humanity I may be a bit biased but i think that this abnormality is the peak form that one could take in a transition i think.

Tier 3: Transphobic:

Forsaken Murderer:

Medical experiments forced upon someone in order to cure an unseen disease of the mind, which removes ones identity and personhood in the process.

The above paragraph is describing what is known as "conversion therapy" which is a fucking horrendous concept that draws parallels to the forsaken murderer's story involving medical experiments forced upon someone in order to cure an unseen disease of the mind, which removes ones identity and personhood in the process.

Whitenight:

This is about people who use religion to justify their hatred of others, about people who make their anger justified through their posited god, who make their disdain, their xenophobia, into a so called 'Divine' wrath.

Plague Doctor:

[...] cure an unseen disease of the mind, which removes ones identity and personhood in the process.

(me, 3 paragraphs ago).

The plague doctor, sharing the concept of Forsaken Murderer, seeks a so called 'Disease of the mind', which culminates in the deaths of many once its mission is seemingly complete.

Bald:

[...] forced upon someone in order to remove [...] which removes ones [Hair] and [Hair] in the process.

[knifebucket]

there's something about going through mild pain to make your body look the way you want it to that feels so fucking good. every time I stretch my ears or get a wax or sit through a tattoo or hiss through a piercing I feel so rawly close to myself. catharsis within the knowledge that I'm building a temple I guess

[ongreenergrasses]

tagged by @my-gaydar-is-on-point forever and a day ago to do this picrew, thank you for the tag 💜💙💜

feat. the wings i definitely have

tagging @paris-roubaix @spacegirlsgang @spacewitchqueen @ykaaaras @lasciatemi-stare @constantlyfalling and anyone else who would like to!

[demon-girl-izalith]

I do agree with the majority of what you say, but I think I disagree with the characterization of art as a transcendental beauty that exists fully independently of "political reasonance", of people and their interaction with the piece. The art doesn't exist in a vacuum, part of what makes it living is it's context and the communicative element it has with people. I think this interpretation here takes a fully subjective perspective on the art that I don't think quite captures the communicative, give-and-take aspect that I think we use to define art itself.

For example, when I engage with a piece of media I enjoy like the movie Office Space, a piece that has both pro-capitalist but anti-corporation elements, for example, I WILL be critical of some of these elements as the art does not exist in a vacuum, but I will also bring to the table a recognition of the qualities in the piece that met my axioms or expectations. And I think if I'm using my expectations, axioms, etc as a metric then the piece is going to be not fully subjective.

I do think there WILL be a layer of objectivity to that and I think the art itself should be looked at critically, we should ask what it's trying to say and what its appealing to, it SHOULD be the art's problem. We should ask if the piece is really tapping into an "aesthetic" very well, or, for example, if by appealing to the pro-capitalist aspects, if office space is not committed enough to doing so. Perhaps the piece was meant to interact with one aesthetic principle one form, and instead could be argued to be more strongly tied to another. That's where discussion about what a piece is saying becomes important.

By interacting with the art I'm bringing to the table my identity, my expectations and axioms and forms that I'm feeling pull on me, so I'm looking for these in a piece, and so it is entirely fair to criticize the piece for not meeting that expectation, especially if it demonstrates elements that otherwise engage with these themes that may have caught my attention to begin with. It leads to feeling misled by the piece, feeling like an aspect of the art isn't there that should be, as if the art is tied into larger aesthetic realities and they aren't being manifested by the instance of the work in engaging with. Of course, with a different perspective, a different set of axioms, I may indeed find that the piece IS meeting the standards of some other infinite form or transcendental aesthetic, but perhaps not the ones I'm looking for.

Ultimately I think you've made the art too transcendental here, removed too much of its humanity, defining art as a spectacle and nothing else rather than a communicative process that exists connected to ourselves as agents viewing it. Art can be a spectacle, but especially with art made for consumption, I think it is also made in a political context for real human minds, it is still communicative and it is not merely a spectacle. Claiming it is this and only this feels reductionist to me.

i dont think fight club was co-opted by the right because they didnt get the satire, it was co-opted because it fuckign kicks ass. they would have co-opted any movie that is that good and has hot sweaty men in it. right wingers aren't aliens, they know a good movie when they see it, the lesson isn't "don't make satire because the wrong people might think its for them" the lesson would be "don't make art that kicks ass" and i'd rather there be art that kicks ass

[featureenvyproductions]

Going to forever keep advertising my shit with tropes because do I have to? No. Am I too "stupid" to do it another way? No, not really. And as you've all seen, I also am perfectly capable of writing real blurbs and do write real blurbs. But I think it's fun to make the pic with the tropes anyway and have that around too. And also it keeps the pretentious people away. The sort who don't understand reading is not always for taking a "discomfort" vitamin because they A) are privileged enough to not have discomfort every day of their life to need to escape from or B) are fresh out of college and haven't discovered the joys of/have been shamed OUT of reading as a fun low pressure thing they can do to escape when they're fucking tired (and they think this sort of thing is new with fanfic and not more or less how "trash" lit like romance novels are marketed), as opposed to reading as some sort of Moral Duty To Be Deep that was instilled in them by a middle aged straight white English professor who thinks one can fulfill this by writing 10 pages about books where people scream at each other, have affairs with young women, or Make Up A Guy to warn people about things that Could Happen (that *cough* already happen to marginalized people *cough*) Anyway it's my version of a scarecrow. Firing shots to keep the rent low. Come take a seat next to me in the dumpster my fellow raccoons.

[realitys-ex]

One kinda fun/odd bit about Discworld is the place of Jews/Judaism in it (no, this probably won't go where you expect).

So there are the 2 obvious places and one arguably subtle/debatable place:

Feet of Clay/Golems very clearly drawing from Judaism (though in subsequent books that was toned *way* down)

Omnianism is a very clear stand in for/amalgamation of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism (the amount of each is left as an exercise to the reader).

and Lastly / debatably many people find a similarity between the description of the Dwarf religion and Judaism (I am not stating I agree, just I would have been remiss if I didn't bring it up)

Now the one thing that kinda gets forgotten is that: Judaism as a whole independent religion is somewhat confirmed in Discworld leaving arguments about the above somewhat moot! (you can't have a stand in for a religion if you already have the religion itself).

In both Feet of Clay and Fifth Elephant it mentions Vampires working at Kosher Butchers (for those unaware blood is not kosher so it needs to be drained extra well from meat, a perfect job for a vampire).

Now what does that actually imply? Absolutely nothing.

PTerry often had off the cuff jokes, as well as mucked about with continuity (remember how Trolls originally would continue to grow until they died, and could get up to the size of a small mountain, which only came up in one of the early books and was ignored in the rest?) and (I am sure) just liked that joke and did not intend to imply any theological ramifications or serious world building from it.

But dammit, it is (to me) incredibly funny to step into a (semi) serious discussion about Judaism in Discworld and completely derail it with a throw away line.

[memser]

sometimes (a lot recently) i get so looped into being online i want to buy a blackberry and an old computer and never visit current sites again. no more twitter no more tiktok no counting views/likes/shares/followers/growth. just posting my brain spew onto a blog and being where my friends are. ideal

[isfjmel-phleg]

😶

[valiantsilver]

what if the five sacrifices but they’re song lyrics

witch image - ghost // rachael - she wants revenge // nobody’s hero - black veil brides // body - mother mother // the foundations of decay - my chemical romance

[wheucto]

actually about the Revelation + how it affects worldbuilding. a way better example would be the afterlife (rather than countries)

[1zashreena1]

some days you're just not fit for human consumption

[jennytwosheds]

I'm so tired. Not like physically (I mean yes physically but that's not the point), but like. Cosmically. Cellularly? Metaphysically. Anyway for my next incarnation can I be like. One of those fish on the ocean floor who hasn't moved a muscle in like 100 years. For my next incarnation can I be excused? I'm tired of.... well. Just tired.

[prokopetz]

A lot of folks are responding to the whole Reddit situation by calling for the return of decentralised forums, and I think it's important to remember that, contrary to certain popular narratives, the reason early 2000s forum culture has fallen by the wayside is not because people are Just Lazy. Certainly, ease of use is part of it, but a much larger part of it is how vulnerable self-hosted forums are.

Basically, the problem is that even the largest and most carefully managed self-hosted forums can be rendered unusable more or less indefinitely by a single sufficiently determined hostile actor. This can take the form of both attacks on the forum's social infrastructure (i.e., via sock-puppet accounts, botting, organised "raids", etc.) and attacks on its technical infrastructure (i.e., via hacking, DDoS, etc.). In either case, a self-hosted forum has no real defence, and the majority of decentralised forum communities survive only by virtue of their relative obscurity; once a self-hosted forum manages to attract the attention of That One Guy who's willing to devote his life to shitting the place up over some microscopic slight, it's effectively game over.

Right now, there are essentially only two mitigation strategies:

Gathering huge numbers of communities under a single, massively centralised technical infrastructure that's simply too large and robust for any one hostile actor to bring down; and

Hardening the community's social infrastructure either by going private and invite only (i.e., the Discord approach), or by making use of a vast centralised pool of volunteer labour to aggressively enforce community standards (i.e., the Reddit approach).

To be clear, these are not intractable problems; other solutions may well exist. However, any proposed plan for bringing decentralised public forums back needs to address them. If you're going in operating under the assumption that forums have become marginalised simply because corporations are evil and people are lazy, you're setting yourself up to learn the hard way why self-hosted forums no longer seem to be capable of growing beyond a certain point.

[sakuravalelp]

A dream land - DP X DC Prompt

Okay, so I was thinking about that episode "Perchance to dream" where Bruce is trapped in a dream world and this, even thought really different, came to my mind.

Danny is king or prince of the infinite realms. He's been working on personalizing/decorating his castle in the infinite realms. When he feels someone walking just outside the castles walls. The thing is, that someone isn't a denizen, they aren't in a corporeal body, but he can feel that they are very much alive and feel distinctly human. He approaches the person to ask why and how they are in the infinite realms, but they fade away before he gets the opportunity.

Clockwork, who was with him at the moment, tells him that the visitor from the living, was just the soul projection of someone that was sleeping, and then refuses to elaborate further. Since it's something that was to do with sleeping, Danny decides to go and ask Nocturn, it seemed like a reasonable assumption that he was the one at fault for the soul projection.

Contrary to what he thought, Nocturn informed Danny that Sleeping soul projection was a natural phenomenon that he didn't control. The land of dreams, ("My domain" - Nocturn reminds him), was in the infinite realm after all, and those who have been close to death sometimes slipped they're whole soul instead of just their mind, and ended up all over the infinite realms.

It isn't too different from a lucid dream for them, the body gets all the benefit of the sleep, the mind feels rested if they had a good time in the realms. Except, if they hurt their soul too bad during their little trip, it would have real consequences. Loosing memories, abilities regression, migraine, pain that reflects the soul damage, all either temporary until the soul healed, or permanent and deteriorating, and in some occasions finishing in the persons death. In the latter, the soul is usually too damaged and cease it's existence, or have enough ectoplasm and emotion to form into ghosts with crack cores whose existence is instantly in danger.

Danny clearly didn't like the image that was painted to him, so he asked Nocturn if there was really nothing that he could do. It took a lot of talking and convincing, but eventually Nocturn admitted he could be able to direct the soul projecting to appear on a certain place, but he refused to babysit anyone. Which was enough for Danny, all he needed to do was make another expansion in his castle.

He decided to make a garden to receive their soul projecting guests. The garden was enormous, with all kinds of spaced within it. Playgrounds, picnic spaces, soft benches, tables with ghost and space teamed board games, fountains, and of course, the beautiful flowers that surrounded and decorated the place. Once he got ghosts with gardening, protection and caring obsessions on the place to look out for the souls, he was ready to receive them. It took him by surprise the amount of people that came, the garden was never crowded, but was never empty either, and souls of all ages and places were visiting at all times.

He kept expanding the garden as he heard of new things their guests wished for. He enjoyed spending time in the middle of the garden where souls passed by but rarely appeared, it was calm, but not completly quite with the background noice of the soul enjoying their dreams, and he could do the more mundane king/prince work. Until, he starts getting a regular visitor on his little space of the garden.

Choose the DC character you prefer, my idea is for people who hasn't died in the past but has been in the doors of death (so died and came back would be disqualified but you do as you prefer), but I'm going with Tim.

The soul of a boy around his age appears just in front of him, as usual when he greets new arriving soul, he welcomes him with a gentle smile and tells him he is free to explore the garden. A ghost taker is assign to him. The soul, as usual, seems confused and like he wished to asks questions, but seems content to ask them to his tour guide, and Danny continues with his own duties.

But then, the same soul continues to appear in the same place every two or three days, they exchange greetings and every time talk for a bit longer before the boy leaves to explore once more. It's rear to have multiple visits from one soul, even more so for said soul to appear in the same place every time. By the four time, Danny decides to take a break on his royal duties and accompany his new friend.

~ They get close, and have cute scenes, Tim asks a lot of questions and Danny answers and not-answers a lot of questions ~

One day, Tim shows up as usual, but he is in full Red Robin costume, and well, Danny wasn't expecting an identity reveal.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

On the Bats side:

There's an attack of some villain that's able to put Red Robin (or character of your choice) on a sleeping beauty type of sleep while carrying a serious injury, were he stays sleep until teammates or backup gets him out of it. The event affects his soul, making him disconnect partially from the land of dreams and making his soul sleep project almost every time he sleeps.

Tim starts sleeping more often. It's worrying at first, Bruce being paranoid does every test in the book, despite Tim saying he's just finding sleep easier now. But, he was just affected by sleeping magic and suddenly his sleeping easier? Seems like a side effect, and that makes it worrying.

Tim's health in general improve, just like he's concentration and productivity. Who would have thought that working rested actually was more productive than working on less than three hours of sleep and missing obvious details and clues due to how tired you are.

With everything not only being okay, but better than before, paranoia about Tim's new sleeping schedule soon dies, and instead is replaced with teasing about how he used to refuse to rest kicking and screaming, and now he may sleep more than any of them.

On Tim's side, he's loving being able to soul project so often. He knew from the start he was in a different dimension, and he just wanted to know the hows, whys, and everything else. So far, he seems to do it at least once every three days, and he's even gone two times in a row a couple of times.

The garden had a lot of things to do, but Tim doesn't care about that, he's more interested in all the information he's getting. The first 3 times he was given different ghost nanny's, who were more focus on entertaining him and didn't really answer direct question. But then king/prince Phantom decided to accompany him personally, and everything went smoother. He was going back to get to know more about this new world, and maybe to know more about the cute prince/king too. He might also have gotten some better looking pajamas.

Now, he has a mission that takes more than a couple days with some people in his team that hasn't yet sen his face. He didn't realize how difficult it would be to do all nighters after getting used to a sleep schedule. He would usually try to go as long as possible without sleeping, but he decides that he should take advantage of the safety of where they're staying and sleep a bit too. He ended up soul projecting in full Red Robin costume. He tried to play it cool, maybe Phantom wouldn't know it was him.

"Red Robin, even if you didn't appear on the same spot as always, I can feel your soul. I know who you are."

[deathlonging]

x

[qqueenofhades]

i registered to vote for the first time ( i feel old) now that im an adult but my state has closed primary elections which i was wondering if you have an opinion about. my initial thought was that its bad because i had to register democrat (rather than my states green party which represents my beliefs more) just so i could vote between democrat candidates, which feels like being pressured into supporting the weird pseudo two party system we have. but then i looked it up and apparently a reason for this is so that people from opposing parties wont purposefully mess up the votes just so that their preferred candidates have an easier time winning, and i think that makes sense too. but is that actually the reason theyve closed it or is it just to force us dem/republican?? cause it feels strange

Okay, look. I respect the fact that you're a young person, and I appreciate that you have not only registered to vote, but plan to vote in the primaries, so I don't want to lecture you too much. That said: I am taking you out for coffee, I am sitting you down, I am looking into your eyes, and I am urgently telling you the following:

The Green Party is a scam. It is a scam. It has existed for decades in American politics as an empty shell corporation weaponizing the good intentions of young people like yourself, because all it theoretically stands for "it's good to save the planet maybe." Which is not something that any non-insane person seriously disagrees with, but there is no world in which that cause is actually furthered by registering/voting Green (you mentioned that you did vote for Democrats, which -- good, but listen to me here, youngun, okay?) It ran Jill Stein in 2016 to siphon more votes from HRC, and this election it plans to run Cornel West, a pro-Russian tankie who positively equated Bernie and Trump, as another spoiler candidate. It does not stand for "protecting the planet" or America in any real way. It has never elected a single senator or congressman, let alone a president. It stands for empty performance/grievance political theater by those people who feel too morally superior to vote for/affiliate with Democrats, often because the internet has told them that it's not Cool or Hip or Progressive enough.

If your main priority is climate/the environment, you're doing the right thing by registering as a Democrat and voting for Democrats. (Also: the adjectival form is Democratic. It is the Democratic party and Democratic candidates, otherwise you sound like the Fox News host who wrote a book literally entitled "The Democrat Party Hates America.") They are the only major party who has in fact passed major climate legislation and have made environmental justice a central tenet of their platform. As opposed to the Republicans, whose Project 2025, along with the rest of its nightmare fascist prescriptions, openly pledges to completely wreck existing climate protections and forbid any new ones, just because we weren't all dying fast enough under their death-cult rule already. That's the main logical fallacy I don't get among both the Online Leftists and the American electorate in general: "the Democrats aren't doing quite enough as I'd like, so I'll enable the active wrecking ball insane lunatics to get in power and ruin even the progress we HAVE managed to make!" Like. How does that even make sense?

On a federal level, the Greens have contributed nothing whatsoever of tangible value to American or international climate policy/legislation, environmental justice, or anything else, because as noted, they don't have any elected candidates and mostly focus on drawing voters away from Democrats. There might be plenty of good candidates on the local or city level, which -- great! Vote away for Greens if they're available, or the only other option is a Republican! But on the federal/primary level, please understand: once again, they are a scam. There is no point in affiliating yourself with them. You're welcome to register Green and vote Democratic, if that makes you feel better or if you prefer having another label next to your name, but once again, I'm telling you in my position as a salty Tumblr elder that they have done nothing but harm to the causes they claim to care about, because "environment" is such a nebulous priority and has demonstrably been hijacked to stop the American government entity, i.e. the Democrats, that is actually working to improve on it.

As for your question: nobody is "forcing" or "pressuring" you to vote in primaries. By your own admission, you made a conscious choice to register as a Democrat in order to vote for Democratic candidates. If you were just a regular registered voter of whatever party affiliation, you would vote in the general election for whatever candidate the primary process produced. But if you are sufficiently vested and committed to that process that you would like to have a say in who is running under that party label, it is not unreasonable that you would register as a member of that party. Nobody has twisted your arm behind your back and made you do so; you are taking a considerable level of initiative on your own. Likewise, open primaries can be both a good and bad thing. This falls under the "the political system we have is flawed, but we can't magically pretend it doesn't exist and act according to our own fantasyland versions of reality" thing that I keep saying over and over. So yes, if you want a role in shaping the Democratic candidates who emerge from a Democratic primary process, you will usually register as a Democrat, and nobody has forced you to do that. It's that simple.

Likewise as a general programming note: I'm trying to cut back on politics a bit right now, because I don't have the spoons/bandwidth/mental health to deal with it. I apologize. So if you've sent me a politics-related ask recently and haven't received a response, I'm not deliberately or maliciously ignoring you; I just am not able to handle it as much as usual and will have to put it on pause. However, I feel as if this is important enough to be worth saying, so, yeah.