#i just like the idea of parting myself from the “people” group and being labelled a “thing”

[r0tting-rat]

People have often used both she/her and he/him for me, sometimes even they/them when they feel a bit in da mood, but recently I started considering it/its and? I actually love them? I mean, I still use all pronouns and I've been using it/its for quite some time so it's nothing new, but no one has ever used them before, yk?

Idkkk yesterday I was thinking about it and ngl being called "it" gives me a kind of feeling that is pretty new without being uncomfortable. It's nice.

[glowettee]

✧ if i’m so dramatic, why am i always right? ✧

✦ intuition vs gaslighting ✦

hi lovelies, it’s mindy 🌷🕯 i’ve been off tumblr for a few days, things have just been really overwhelming lately, and i needed a little breather. but writing always brings me back to myself. it’s my favorite kind of comfort. the glowettee x pll series has seriously been such a joy to create… every post, every idea, every digital piece for my gumroad has been healing in its own way. this next post is something close to my heart. it’s about gaslighting... something i’ve experienced a lot, especially from people i thought i could trust. it’s such a common thing, but so many of us don’t realize it’s happening until way later. i used to second-guess my intuition constantly because people convinced me i was being “too much.” but every time… my gut was right. so i wanted to write this to help you tell the difference between real intuition and someone twisting it. if you’ve ever felt that quiet confusion or started to doubt yourself after talking to someone, this post is for you. i hope it brings clarity. and softness. and maybe even a little validation if you’ve been there too. - mindy 🤍🩰

sometimes i wonder if girls like us were born with a sixth sense or if we just got so used to being hurt that our bodies evolved. hyper-awareness as a survival trait. intuition as our most sharpened weapon. people love to call it being “dramatic,” but let’s be honest... i was right every time.

𓆩♡𓆪

❝ if you’re so emotional, how come your instincts always come true? ❞ they never have an answer to that, do they?

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ the 'dramatic' girl dilemma

there’s a reason why every group chat has a girl they secretly call “too much.” the one who always has a weird feeling. the one who picks up on tone shifts and changes in energy and tiny inconsistencies like it’s her full-time job. she’s the one who says, “this doesn’t feel right,” and gets labeled a buzzkill. the killjoy. the overthinker.

but i’ll let you in on something i had to learn the hard way: they only call you dramatic when they don’t want you to notice what’s really happening.

girls like us don’t get the luxury of being chill. we’re watching. always. we had to learn to be. we’re the first ones to feel the shift in a friend group dynamic. we clock the fake laugh. the silence in the hallway. the DM left on read. and when we bring it up? “you’re imagining things.”

they say "you're too sensitive" like it's a flaw. like feeling deeply makes you unreliable. but being sensitive never meant being wrong. it just meant you felt the betrayal before it became undeniable.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ trauma turned my gut into a siren

there’s something about growing up being ignored, bullied, overlooked, or manipulated that turns your whole nervous system into a radar. suddenly, you’re the girl who notices everything.

like, i still remember being 14 and realizing that one of my friends always laughed at my jokes in front of boys, but never when it was just us. or how she'd call me pretty but then immediately ask if i was wearing makeup. subtle stuff. stuff that sounds dumb when you say it out loud. stuff that makes people go, “you’re reading too much into it.”

but i wasn’t. i never was. that’s the exhausting part.

emotional intelligence feels like a superpower until it starts to drain you. like being psychic, but without the option to turn it off. you don’t just read the room, you analyze it, archive it, cross-reference it with past data.

i used to hate this part of myself. now i know it kept me alive.

you’re not paranoid. you’re perceptive. there’s a difference.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ you knew, even when it didn’t make sense

sometimes your body knows things before your brain catches up. your heart races before he lies. your stomach drops before the betrayal hits. you get that pit-in-your-stomach feeling and then brush it off, until the truth slaps you a week later.

trust me, i’ve been there. i once had a gut feeling that a friend was turning people against me... but there was no proof. just a weird energy. until one day, someone accidentally sent me a screenshot that wasn’t meant for me. and suddenly the feeling made sense.

they call it “bad vibes.” i call it early intel.

start decoding the patterns:

the too-long pause before answering your question

the “i didn’t mean it like that” when you call it out

the subtle digs framed as compliments

the way people say your name when they think you’re not listening

you noticed for a reason. trust the noticing.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ what gaslighting actually feels like

gaslighting doesn’t always sound like “you’re crazy.” sometimes it sounds like “you’re overreacting,” or “you always assume the worst,” or “why do you make everything a problem?”

but the worst kind of gaslighting is the kind you do to yourself. when you feel the red flags and immediately shut yourself down. when your first instinct is right, but your second thought is “i’m just being dramatic.” that’s emotional self-betrayal. it hurts. a lot.

i once told a guy that something felt off, he’d been cold, weird, distant. he said i was insecure. i said sorry. two weeks later, i found out he’d been seeing someone else the whole time. lesson learned: don’t apologize for what your body already knows.

you can’t logic your way out of a feeling that was never lying to you in the first place.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ intuitive doesn’t mean irrational

“dramatic” is just a word they use to discredit girls who are too emotionally accurate to manipulate.

your feelings are data. emotions are not the opposite of intelligence, they’re the early warning system. they tell you what’s not being said. they tell you what the energy in the room is doing. they tell you the truth before the truth shows its face.

what if you’re not “too much,” what if you’re just always one step ahead?

what if the real problem isn’t that you feel too deeply, but that you feel accurately, and that makes people uncomfortable?

i’m reclaiming the word dramatic. to be dramatic is to see danger before it arrives. to feel something shift before it collapses. to be emotionally clairvoyant. and i think that’s beautiful.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ how to protect your knowing

your intuition deserves protection. here’s how i keep mine sacred:

✧ journal your gut feelings ~ even if they don��t make sense yet. time-stamp them. track patterns. ✧ make a screenshots folder ~ for receipts, subtle shifts, digital clues. memory gaslights too. ✧ create a ‘weird vibes’ note in your phone ~ no explanation needed. if something feels off, log it. ✧ meditate or walk after intense conversations ~ let your body process what your mind can’t yet. ✧ check in with your inner child ~ would 13-year-old you trust this person? she knows. always.

𓆩 ritual for the emotionally haunted 𓆪 › write down a time you were right, but told you were wrong › throw it away, or rip it up › whisper “i trust myself now.” › repeat every time the world tries to confuse you.

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

✧ you weren’t crazy, you were correct, and ahead

they’ll tell you you’re crazy until the moment you’re proven right. they’ll call you dramatic until the danger becomes undeniable. they’ll gaslight you until the truth surfaces, and then pretend they never doubted you at all.

the girls who trust themselves become the women no one can lie to. so feel everything. sense everything. believe yourself.

being dramatic is how you survived the world they tried to confuse you in.

and if you’re always the first to notice the danger, maybe it’s not a flaw. maybe it’s your gift. maybe it’s what will save you.

✧ love always, mindy

[atlas-of-the-sea]

It's -45 days 'til Jimin is back and I have something to express 'cause I am MAD as F*!

First I'll share my -45 days favorite Jimin and proceed with the rant.

I wish for all this negative energy towards you, to transform into the power that will push you to be as successful as this universe (God) wants you to be Jiminah 💛

Look at those mochi cheeks 😍

Now my rant...

Since BTS solo careers started officially in 2022 with the hiatus to focus on their personal careers. I've seen A LOT!!! And everyday I think I can't get more disappointed with "Army" but I am proved wrong every damn time!

How I ended up here, my personal story with Jimin (feel free to skip this green color)

I am more of a observer than an active follower.

I know BTS because of Jimin. So I learned to like BTS songs because of Jimin.

With that being said, I am not ARMY, I am not PJM either. I have problems with labeling myself. I don't like labels.

I'm simply a Jimin fan that likes BTS as well. I respect the guys and I have many songs from BTS as a group and the members as solists that I like, I am surprised that I do have songs from each member that I listen to now since I don't really vibe with most of their solo songs for the most part. HOWEVER!!!! I can't come here and say I am ARMY when I know very well, that I do not support the others as deep as I do with Jimin, I have a clear biased support for Jimin that can not be compared to the others at all, neither by streaming or by investment in their work. Nonetheless, I am not gonna be attacking another member just because Jimin is the one I like. I have my opinions of BTS as a group, and about each of the members as individuals, and I may not like some things, and I am ALLOWED that because I am my own human, with my own brain and thoughts, so as long as I do it in a respectful manner that's all that matters to me. I could care less what an "ARMY" "OT7" thinks of me in that regards and what they want to label me as.

With that being said...

Before I start I will make a clear distinction

(which is my personal opinion)

Army for me are those that love, respect and support all members. It doesn't have to be on an equal level. But Army is not disrespectful and hurtful towards any remember. (Anyone that thinks real Army are those that support all members on an equal level is DELUSIONAL! PERIOD! That's why people have biases because there's always one that you deep down do more for or pay more attention to, it doesn't matter how much you OT7fy this, even if you think you don't have one member singled out, you do 😉)

"Army" when you see this in quotations here. Know that I am talking about those that call themselves Army, but are clearly shady towards other members, and have a superiority complex because they have been in the famdom since the big bang theory happened.

Now that I cleared what Army vs "Army" means to me, I shall proceed.

In my opinion, the online Army space, meaning every social media presense of OT7, even YouTube and Reddit, it's 85% "Army" and the other 15% are the real Army. Now those that are not actively engaging online with the fandom, that only care about the members and their music. That's a different story, but from those people, you really don't see things about since those are just normal people living their lives and minding their business. I am like that with all the other things I am interested in for example Beyoncé, I have no idea what's going on with her, unless it's about music and concerts. And I should go and do the same with Jimin because these spaces are too toxic for my limited patience.

The online Army space whether Twitter (I refused to call that X), Instagram, Tiktok or Tumblr, is full of solos that reunite as "Army" when BTS as a whole is being attacked, (Look at them now, uniting against Jimin) but even if they have an OT7 account you can see their clear biased opinions and shady behavior towards other members. Majority always let their real sentiment leak into a post or a comment somewhere, no matter how hard they try to be "OT7 for ever and ever" and "Army for life 💜" in their bio quotes.

And I finally concluded that this week with all the AMA drama going on!

( I will note here that I don't think anyone but Rosé is going to win that AMA. Just by logic of the song with Bruno, and the fact that she will be there present and probably perform that song. It's clear. But I will still vote for Jimin just in case I am wrong.)

Carry on...

How SAD it is to know that this is how most of this fandom moves!!

I feel so bad for the members that are aware of how toxic most of their online fans are. How sad it is to know that they want to feel proud, but is an online fandom that is rotting each day, more and more. And I hope one day, them as a group address their fandom, even if their words do nothing in the end. All these toxic people need some reality check. And only BTS can maybe make them touch some grass. Seeing the comments on their lives is so disappointing that even them have said something about it at one point.

I see some OT7 here and there saying that the real Army are those you see at the concerts, not the ones in the online spaces making fools of themselves. And to that I say, my brothers/sisters/non-binary siblings in Christ! You are just part of the online 15%, don't be delusional! (Honestly, 15% might still be a lot as of right now from where things stand) Even solos go to BTS concerts. A lot of solos were once Army, and they are going to go see their bias whether it's a BTS concert or not. Even PJMs, JJKs and KTHs solos watched Jikook's show, to talk sh*t but nonetheless, they still watched and generated views. So 😬

"Oh! but, you see, those online that defend BTS against the ones that want to destroy them, those are the real Armys, we gather up! We protect our boys" LOL, don't make me laugh!

My brothers/sisters/non-binary siblings in Christ! That's 85% solos, united for the same goal, to defend BTS because their bias is within that group as well. No more, no less. There is only that 15% that is truly Army online. You can even see it now. Solos uniting against Jimin to only vote for RM. It's a fact!

And I am clearly giving 15% because I have no way of actually measuring this, I am going off from the years of online reading posts of different people within this fandom I have determined my numbers that way. Nonetheless, the case here is, majority are not real OT7 as they paint themselves to be, the purple 💜 won't make them real.

(It's a good time to mention that these are the names I go by, and I could care less of any opinions of my names choices, RM, Jin, Suga, Jhope, V (TH), Jimin (JM very rarely) and JK. And I say this because I've seen "Army" talking sh*t at what names should or shouldn't be used. If I want to call Namjoon, Rap Monster, let me be, unless you are Namjoon, I don't care about what you think)

The things I have seen the past days, but that have been happening more evidently since the guys started their solo journey:

1. OT7 accounts partnering with solos to vote for RM because and I quote:

"RM deserves an award"

"Jimin would be happy to see RM win"

"Army gave Jimin a Daesang and now it's RM's turn"

[So much more that I don't have the patience to write here.]

Yes, RM deserves this award, but so does Jimin. Let fans vote for who they prefer for this award. Period!

2. Every time Jimin has a upcoming milestone there is always something else that "Army" wants to say all Army need to focus on.

Let that be:

Jimin breaking Billboard or Spotify records, or even voting for any award he is nominated for, this is not the first time that this has happened with a member, back when Jimin and JK were nominated separately it was another disaster, anything that involves Jimin succeeding, especially if there is no other member that has ever done said thing, there is always an imposition to not make that happen.

And every time I see some "Army" pulling through at the last minute, it's because another Kpop group fandom got involved and started attacking BTS as a whole through Jimin and they want to prove those people wrong. But at the end, it's never for Jimin, it's for their "Army is the best and biggest fandom" ego.

That's tragic! To say the least.

3. Jimin biased Army saying that they will be voting for RM because, and I quote an actual posts I saw, "that's what Jimin would like us to do."

Are you mental????!!!!!!!!

Weeeeehhh??? *Korean tone*

When did Jimin say that???!!!

Because the Jimin I know from the very little I can know of him as an outsider that doesn't know him personally, it's a Jimin that is ambitious, goal oriented, a man that since his debut said that he wanted to succeed and be that one idol everyone talks about, that even if he didn't make it in the BTS group he was going to find a way of making it somehow, a man that is always saying to his fans that he will do his best, and that he will be better.

(and I don't even know how, because he couldn't be more perfect already)

Is that the Jimin they are talking about?

I don't think that they, as Jimin bias OT7 are really talking about that Park Jimin, they might be confused. I hate how they are only doing this because they are scared of going against their "OT7 for life" moots so they don't get blocked by them and kicked out of the chats and asigned as a solo for life!

You coward!

Don't be taking Jimin as your pathetic excuse. I've seen enough of you the past 3 years. You all make me sick!

I even saw a few people that dared to say that they were going to vote for Jimin, and they legit got blocked and called a solo. This is not just an example. I really saw it happen in real time in Twitter and Instagram.

Jimin wouldn't want for any of his members to get achievements based on pitiful behavior. No person feels okay of getting something because someone else feels bad for them, especially someone like RM. When you know you got something because people feel bad for you, it never feels good at the end, that only increases impostor syndrome on that person.

And Jimin loves his members, which is why he has not left the toxic environment that that company is for him. But he also loves his career. Don't use his emotional qualities and character to make such an ignorant statement! I wish I could Will Smith you all in the face.

[ Did you get the Will Smith reference? No? Ok, moving on ]

4. Jimin biased Army being called solos because they want to vote for Jimin.

I legit saw more than 5 comments of "Army" accounts, commenting on other people's OT7 accounts on Instagram that were voting for Jimin with the # vote. Like they legit were writing to them, that they should vote for RM not Jimin because that's what Army is doing, and that RM deserves this award.

Oh! So Jimin doesn't????!!!!!

So you're telling me that you with an OT7 account. You forgot that Jimin is also nominated and part of your OT7 for life SH*T, so you can't let another OT7 Jimin bias make their own decision?

Like??? Are they for real??!!

LET PEOPLE VOTE FOR WHO THEY WANT!! Especially if Jimin is their bias, that's their bias!!! What the F*!!!!

[Forgot to mention and had to edit this in:

This is a US chart award. And Jimin was the one between the two of them that dominated the charts in the US, by that logic, Jimin should be the choice, but you see, I don't care, if I wanted to vote for RM, I would, regardless of logic. That's just how it should be!]

5. You see solos complaining about what they think their bias has not been given and so on. On a regular basis, but this is more evident, when there is an award nomination, new music releases, new content out or new records achievements made by another member.

And I speak about all solos, PJMs included. They all complain and complain. I see some arguments as valid, the execution in which they bring these arguments and the way they act about it is what I don't agree on.

But one thing I have to admit, and I don't care if this will classify me as solo by whoever read this.

PJMs do the damn work!

(Yes, I intentionally made that purple!)

Like I've seen a lot, and I have to give it to them.

FACE and MUSE had the success they had because of PJMs, "Like Crazy" went number one because of PJMs, "Who" spent 33weeks in the Hot100s because of PJMs.

No matter how much Army, OT7 or whoever wants to call it. Jimin is doing numbers because of PJMs.

Yes, he has the general public and Army, but by definition PJMs are Jimin's solo fanbase, and there is a lot of those people out there making things happen. Getting him on playlists, working on radio, buying albums, streaming songs, voting!!

I've seen other solo member fandoms and their complaints are more effort than what they actually do for the members they stan. PJM are annoying in many ways, but these people are working hard to give Jimin what they think he deserves. And I recognize that. I hate to break it to "Army", the more they go against Jimin the more OT7 who bias Jimin are going to become solos. I've seen it a lot the past 3 years. And this week has made that worse.

And yes, going solo shouldn't depend on what online "Army" says to another Jimin bias, but it's very hard to be in the online spaces and see the injustice and aggression against Jimin (or any other member for that matter) and keep calling yourself OT7, many of these people (PJMs) don't stop caring for the members, but they do start investing and streaming harder for Jimin due to the circumstances which at the end of the day makes then a solo under everyone elses definition. And God forbid you support Jimin publicly as a Jimin biased OT7 and you show how proud of his achievements you are without mentioning another member in the same sentence, you are called out for it and asigned as a hater by default.

"Army" is dividing the fandom into solos themselves. Because unfortunately it doesn't matter if the real Armys are not like this, the online presence of the toxic ones is so big, that it overshadows the real Armys and push them to the back into a place where the general public can only see the toxic ones, and by that mix, you all end up in the same pot in the eyes of those that don't follow BTS. I was one of those that before I knew about BTS as individuals, I knew about Army, and nothing I knew about the fandom was positive. My first encounter with "Army" was very negative due to a misunderstanding, at the time, they started attacking and after realizing they made a mistake, the damage was already done. All these "Armys" move like sheep and don't think for themselves or do their own research before trying to cancel people.

It's unfortunate, but that is the reality of their social media presence.

I believe BTS almost disbanded in 2018 because of the outside negative pressure they were facing with so many people in the industry and Kpop community against them. And they survived together because they did the psychological work it took them to understand that they were stronger than that and that they would not allow the outside forces to dictate their future. Plus the support of their fans meant a lot to them.

And it's sad to see that they are coming back to a fandom that has become so devided, and that now there are more Ex-Army who have become solos attacking other members many times unintentionally just to defend their bias, because a backhanded comment is still a micro-aggressive comment anyways. There is more of those people than possibly other Kpop fans from other groups out there that attack BTS. Now the hate is coming from within!

How sad! I'm glad that Jimin has cut his social media engagement, because I am sure it was the toxicity of "Army" that drove him away. It killed him to see that the ones he thought wouldn't hurt him have turned the ones that wanted to disappear his soul to defend another member's honor.

Some of you may say that Jimin doesn't acknowledge PJMs. And that they don't exist to him, because for him his fans are Army, and to that I say, do you really think that any BTS member will full on acknowledge their solos by their name? LOL be for real! They know they have solos, they are fully aware, if you heard Jimin, RM and Jhope's comments lately on their solos project, you'll know that they are very much aware and that they don't address it because they have a rule within the group. For them you all will always be Army, solos or not, you'll be Army. The most you'll get out of them is "My fans".

The day one of them addresses their solos in a positive manner, that's the date you can say, BTS as a group is in danger. Especially if that comes from Jimin.

Some of you really need to sit and watch your bias in original content and learn what he is truly like.

How disappointing!

P.S. I might be reaching here, but every time a member during their solo activities promotions mentioned the word "fans" or "my fans" instead of Army when it had to do with their personal work projects, that to me was some acknowledgement to include their solos that they know are out there.

And also, let me clarify this danm thing!!!

NOT ALL SOLOS STARTED AS ARMY! SOME HAVE JUST BEEN SOLOS SINCE DAY ONE.

The members are not a set on a box, they all have their own individual careers and personalities that attracts the general public to them individually, and for some, eventually to BTS, like in my case, although as I mentioned I am not labeling myself as a PJM. I'm just a Jimin's fan. Same as I am just a Beyoncé's fan and not Beyhive. Or insert the name of any other artist I like.

She is from Destiny's child. I like some Destiny's Child songs, I like the other 2 women. But at the end of the day, I have supported Beyoncé more.

You get my point? 😌

I can't wait for Jimin and JK to do their live (I hope they do) and see Jimin's cheeks 🥰 that's going to be another sh*tshow in which many of their solos will combust!

And I have been having this feeling that those two are going to do some big project together or have an official subunit. If that happens, find me in a dark corner losing my breath as I laugh my life away LOL ���

P.S. I am not reading all this. Whatever mistakes I made either by grammar or spelling will be forgiven under the sun. Amen!

-Atlas ❤️

[schizoid-hikikomori]

Something I don't see people talking about often when it comes to schizoid pd is that idea of relatability.

I don't think I've been able to truly relate to anyone in my life. I believe part of that may come from my observations of behavior from my older sisters and older cousins and being able to learn what not to do or how not to behave.

Many people form bonds over being upset with their parents, as a very early example. Because I didn't have violent emotional outbursts like I would observe my sister to have, I wasn't punished in the same way, I didn't harbor the same frustration that other people might experience with their parents, and again, I never got to experience those dramatic emotions.

So when you start off early in life diverging from expected behavior, it doesn't set you up well. Not to mention the fact I went to a school of mostly white students as a nonwhite and multiracial/multiethnic student. White kids in this small school had established social groups they wouldn't diverge from, they looked at me differently and talked to me differently than they would their friends, and had a very distinct non-interest in interacting with me. (And the typical tropes of white girls being jealous of my hair).

Of course I had friends, but consistently it was only one or two I would be seeing outside of school, while my sisters and cousins had larger friend groups with more things going on.

I developed depression in middle school and at this point I think my more identifiable schizoid traits became more pronounced here. I was never all that happy as a child, but this is where it became very clear to outsiders that I wasn't doing well if they were paying attention.

At this time the rift between myself and others grew even larger. Kids would be hormonal, getting into relationships, smoking cigarettes and weed, drinking alcohol, and starting drama just for the hell of it. Those things people described as high school activities started in middle school.

In high school I got this feeling I was falling behind. I never experienced things other people experienced by the time they were in high school. I just wanted to drop out completely and move on. (I didn't, of course. My mother would never have allowed it.)

It became a phenomenon where when I was talking to someone new that I would get annoyed or frustrated when they tried to relate to me. I would tell them something that seems simple about me, and they would make an attempt to relate.

The issue is, they experience that specific thing for a different reason than I do. You think you get it but you really don't.

As an obvious example, people group withdrawn and solitary individuals into groups and labels but fail to recognize the reason someone might be withdrawn.

Similarly, someone might claim to despise people as I do, but still make an effort to seek out new friends and attend social events, which tells me no, you're not anything like me. Stop pretending to be.

This same phenomenon of people trying to seek relatability wherever they might find it also leads to the impulsive self diagnosis thing. People see a basic list of DSM symptoms (which are very surface level) and start imagining they have a disorder, ignoring the reasons behind those symptoms.

It's to the point where they even have to advise psychology students studying abnormal psychology to be aware of this and to avoid it.

I've seen people with other disorders able to bond over their shared experiences and provide one another with support, creating a sense of community, but there's something about schizoid pd that completely prevents me from being able to do that.

Early on, there were so many factors that prevented me from being able to properly connect with people in my family, and furthermore with classmates, which evolved into this full barrier between myself and everyone else.

I don't try to relate to anyone anymore, and it's irritating when people try to relate to me when I know they won't ever be able to fully understand.

Photo from a few weeks ago.

[only-the-shippers-can-bully-nrmt]

(Original Japanese on the left with translations under the break, Fan Translation in the middle, and Official Translation on the right.)

Saw some things flying around that have (unintentionally or otherwise) been giving people the wrong idea, so here are the comparisons to show that, yes, Miles was referring to Phoenix near the end of the second Miles Edgeworth Investigations game. Miles does bring up Gregory too, but Gregory being "that man" during the famous "shines brilliantly" scene was actually a change in the official English release that does not line up with the original Japanese version (even MTLs will get across the Wright meaning).

Also, "shining brilliantly in one's eyes" can be both how a son might look up to his father but also how a ruffly prosecutor might strongly/romantically see his courtroom partner; the line is simply intense enough to not easily carry the label of an "average" relationship. We don't need to elaborate when we tell family members/friends/significant others "I love you" (even if it's at the same time) for similar reasons, and I don't see anyone arguing that this means that Miles must see Phoenix like a father because he grouped them together in some form.

TL;DR: The official translation mucked up some context and stuff happened because of it. Keep shipping and feel free to use this as a reference post because the shippers did not misinterpret anything. We can have a conversation about how the change affected the moment, but the original context is still important and Phoenix was part of it.

Besides the translations, there are other points under the break as well, including a bonus of one of the nice and harmless additions the official translation changed/added with the "saved me from myself" line:

Translations (provided by a friend of mine who knows Japanese; edited at times to sound more natural in English or help get across the intended meaning)

........以前、 ある男が言っていました。

……..In the past, a certain man once said:

被告人の唯一の味方になって あげられるのが弁護士だと。

the only one willing to be the defendant's ally is their lawyer.

依頼人を信じることで、《真実》に近づいていく････

By believing in the defendant, the truth draws closer....

その男の姿は、私の目にも まぶしく映りました。

The image of that man was so bright in my eyes, it was engraved into my mind.

There's a bit more added here for clarification's sake and people like me who have a habit of taking metaphors too literally; essentially, the first part that's in the game is saying that the sight of "that man" was so blinding that it stuck in Miles's mind/memory eternally, so the translation in the fan version is correct in a direct translation and what it means is closer to the official.

(fun fact that if you go for an MTL, a translator may translate what in English was "image"/"sight" as "appearance" or "figure" which is technically accurate but obviously not the intent when translated, just as "so bright"/"shining brilliantly" may become "dazzling"; doesn't mean I won't mention it for people to imagine/have fun with though :3c "That man's figure was so dazzling in my eyes." my god)

法廷で戦う父と、同じように････

In the same way my father fighting in court does….

(without the clarification it's more like "In the same way my father fought in court...." but as above, message is clearer this way)

しかし、それはあくまで その男や父の生き方です。

However, that's just the way that man and my father lived their lives.

This is the big one since it makes a clear and blatantly obvious separation between "that man" and Gregory himself.

Here's another translation in a reblog of the post I linked, which follows even closer to the fan translation and is more straightforward.

My asks are open for any further translation clarifications people may want to make (don't want to bog down reblogs when edits can simply be made) but this was a long-winded way of saying that the fan translation was super on point with accuracy and the only thing of note is the "burning into memory" that the official one has to help get the point across (though I think more was definitely lost the way it was done).

Other Points

1 - Staying on the official translation, its use of "that man" is rather... bizarre, even if one hasn't seen the original. Such a use is typically for:

someone the game wants the audience for figure out on their own (so the character knows it but the player needs to go talk to the person themself once they figure it out)

someone who the character speaking isn't really familiar with (like, "oh yeah, that guy, I kind of remember now")

someone the game tries to keep secret a little longer for the sake of mystery (example being the fan translation where Ray refers to Gregory without a name drop for the build up that Ray worked for him)

Miles using the phrase and then saying "my father" in the very next sentence made me do a double take because I was totally caught off guard by how it was done.

The shot of Miles sepia toned in the courtroom (the fourth shot) doesn't even make sense anymore if he's only talking about Gregory since obviously he's never seen Gregory from across the courtroom while Miles has been behind the prosecutor's bench (nor do they do a camera slide as if Miles is only imagining himself across the courtroom from him; it flashes to white instead). It only makes sense if he's taking about Phoenix.

2 - Looking at it from a fan's perspective, it makes 150% sense why "that man" would immediately be associated with Phoenix in the context of the moment. Not only did the last case of the first game have that exact thing too ("In a situation like this… what would that man do…? What would he who can turn any desperate situation around do…?"), thus making it a near-perfect continuation of that, but "a defendant's only ally being their attorney" was a huge part of the original trilogy.

In fact, the official translation actually actively makes it weirder to leave Phoenix out of that bit because of the change "a friend to the friendless" it did, which catapulted me back so violently to Turnabout Sisters - the first serious case in the entire series - that it could've put me in a coma.

This is even disregarding how important the whole "trusting clients" and "finding the truth" stuff was in cases, especially 2-4.

It's like, "ah yes, Mr. Fender, that was yours and my father's life, not mine and also no one else's; honestly, not a single other important person in my life who I could have mentioned comes to mind" lol)

3 - From my own personal perspective, I'm not stirring up a fuss over shipping, it's not about that (though shippers getting thrown under the bus absolutely sucks). I'm far more baffled that it takes the already-not-around Phoenix and chucks his mention away for later.

4 - Anyone lamenting the loss of "shining brilliantly" for something else without the context has every right to be confused and should not be criticized for it. Shipper or otherwise, most wouldn't imagine for a second that the end of Miles's arc/self-reflection would have a significant change that takes 50% of the original meaning out.

This taken into account with my comment about the visual aid of Miles behind the prosecutor's bench in sepia during that very line furthers this. Obviously people will (still) think it's about Phoenix.

5 - I only linked to one of the comments/posts I saw in case I was accused of making things up. I don't actually recommend approaching/confronting anyone because I don't think it's worth the time/effort, so this is more for anyone who felt gaslit/like they'd gotten it wrong or wanted the actual evidence. I did check the blog of the person who I linked and they made a long answer to a person who was complaining about the people complaining about said post, but hadn't made an edit to their original post telling people that there were misinterpretations being made.

That's not actually me being aggressive in any way (it's their business and their blog), but pointing out that it's not something important to people like that. I'll also grant that some might simply not know enough about the fan translation/original meaning to get it, so don't stress about it is all I'll say. :)

6 - Here's the "saved me from myself" line as promised, congrats on listening to me babble and making it all the way down here~

[fuck-you-showerthoughts]

hello, I apologize on the behalf of my fellow angry people in your inbox.

I'm also a little angry but I'm doing my best to put that aside because I'm trying to understand you. Please understand that I'm not trying to hurt you with this or anything. This comes from a place of genuine intrigue (while also kind of mad).

Why do you feel the need to define yourself using the transfem label? I get that you think of yourself as approaching femininity from a masculine start point. You said earlier that it's a different, new kind of femininity, like two different sodas. How? Why? From what I understand being a woman is not choosing a monolith out of a henge but instead just identifying with a group. Why are you getting out of the group only to return to a different part of the same group?

I know men and other bigender/multigender/etc people who started as men, fucked around with being a woman or nonbinary for a while and then either returned to masculinity or kept it as part of them. None that I know of insist of saying they're transmasc the way you do. [I have also seen afab people do the same thing, I'm not making this a birthgender thing, I just used this example somewhere else] I myself, during a period of my life "detransitioned" from transwoman to nonbinary and I did not consider myself transmasc for that.

My kneejerk reaction is of course "fuck you, get your effeminate hands off my special little word" [I'm making fun of myself] but after reading through everything you posted recently and thinking about shit I'm asking myself why. Why do they want the word?

possible answers include:

they just want it

internalized misogyny causing them to grow disillusioned with their previous identity as a woman but they still feel like one and wish to return to it under a new pretext

genuinely feels like they have disconnected entirely with womanhood while transistioning and wants to reconnect

I'm doing a shit job of summarizing my feelings on this, I apologize.

Also, why do you refer to yourself as a trans^4 multigenderqueer (hyperbole) but still have your pronouns listed as they/them.

off anon because I think people who hide behind it are cringe.

hello! thank you for such an excellent breakdown of your feelings, and for taking the time to think about your own emotions (completely sincerely, I had a similar journey like this a while ago and getting rid of first impressions is HARD). I think the main disconnect here is the idea of masculinity and femininity being separate (inherently and for me specifically) -- like i said in the answered ask before this, I'm already both a man and a woman, together, at the same time. This, for me, means that both of those aspects of me are trans simultaneously -- I use transfem while being afab because my femininity is trans. (The same would be true of my masculinity had I been amab)

I can't leave cisfemininity because I never belonged there in the first place, and I would never abandon being a girl altogether, so to me the obvious (and quite honestly only) conclusion is queer femininity (which naturally mtf trans women are an immediate part of). The bullet point explanation you've missed here is that I use transfem because it's simply the most accurate word I've found to describe my identity, and gender limiting things in 2024 of all times just doesn't make sense to me :]

(Also I have they/them because that's what I'm most comfortable being addressed as by *checks follower count* almost 20k people. I use different sets with different people -- but also sometimes expression is a lot simpler than identity haha)

[wanderingcritter]

Hello! I have some questions for you, if you don't mind.

What does transspecies mean to you?

How did you discover you were transspecies?

How do you feel about the myth that transspecies makes fun of transgender people?

How do you feel about the idea that transspecies should not be used or people who are transspecies should stay hidden because it can be used against the transgender community

(A controversial one) Why did rad-q takeover the transspecies term, how does that effect the alterhuman community, and how do you feel about it?

Hi thank you sm for asking hehe :3 I love getting to talk about this stuff (and knowing that others are interested in hearing about it lol)

Long ass post below the cut

1. To me, transspecies is the rawest, most direct way for me to express my nonhumanity. It cuts through a lot of the vagueness and nuance of some other nonhuman labels (not that there's anything wrong with that ofc) and gets straight to the point: Im not entirely human and want to be acknowledged as such by my peers and society at large. It emphasizes my desire to move through life as nonhuman, and that there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I also like that it challenges the narrative of human superiority and the idea that species identity is purely biology based. For me personally, it also ties into my experience with being transgender, as I often see my gender as being partially nonhuman. Many things that are gender affirming are also species affirming and vice versa. But obviously you don't have to be transgender to be transspecies, one of my irl packmates and close friend is cisgender transspecies and she's awesome <3

2. It wasn't so much a "discovery" for me. My transspecies identity is very closely tied to my therianthropy, the species I identify as and see myself transitioning into are also all kintypes. So after I realized I was a therianthrope, it was kind of just a slow realization that it was also a label that fit my experiences well. Like most alterhumans I had heard the word used as a weapon against transgender people and alterhumans, so I had a very negative perception of it for a long time. I think the first time I ever heard it referred to in a not-outright-negative sense was in PDTherians "Trans-species?!" youtube video (which I do not recommend as a source of education at all it's a very flawed video that's riddled with misinformation) a few years back, and from there I slowly started to open up to the idea and yeah. The rest is history pretty much lol

3. To some degree I actually can empathize with the stance because I used to be in the same camp, and I know from experience that for a lot of folks it's just well intentioned but misplaced passion of trans liberation. But at the same time it's still a harmful belief and one I grew out of because I matured and learned more about the communities I was part of. Anytime you cast judgement onto a group of people with a harmless identity/belief/interest for the sole purpose of "they're too weird", that harms everyone, not just that group. In this case, hatred against transspecies folks implies that there is a right and a wrong way to be queer/trans, which is harmful not only to nonhumans but to all queer individuals.

4. I think it's bullshit lmao. Shying away from it and outcasting the people who use it does absolutely nothing but divide us further and make us an easier target for discrimination. Categorizing it as a community taboo just turns it into ammunition for transphobes and anti-alterhumans alike. Turning against each other and fighting over stupid shit like labels is exactly what oppressors want, a house divided against itself cannot stand. It also just doesn't make sense, species identity is socially constructed, similar to gender, so why should people be forbidden from using a word to describe that experience just because it's misunderstood?

5. I honestly have no idea why radqueers do anything at all lmaoooo. But if I had to guess, I think it's because on some level, they know that nobody with any semblance of social education or moral compass is ever going to be on board with their beliefs, so instead of trying to fight a losing battle they just barge their way into other small, marginalized, and outcasted groups (alterhuman, altage, paraphiles, etc.) and try to claim them as "part of them". It's a lot easier to tell a group of people "Hey you guys are actually just like us so you need to support our ideology because otherwise you're just fighting against yourself" than it is to try to convince them from scratch that you're not a horrible person.

As for how it's impacted the alterhuman community, Im not entirely sure but luckily I think its effects have been fairly minimal thus far. The alterhuman community is significantly bigger and older than the rq community, I've only ever run into rqs on Tumblr and even here Ive met transspecies folks who had never heard of radqueers before. I think its biggest impacts have been on the transspecies niche specifically, since they often try to lump it in with transid's like "transrace" and "transharmful", which leads to the assumption from outsiders that they're inherently connected and that all transspecies folks agree with those stances as well. But I think as transspecies and alterhumanity as a whole slowly becomes less stigmatized and more widely understood over time, that belief will also fade and die off.

Sorry for the massive text wall lmao, I hope that wasn't too much info. But again thank you sm for asking ^^ I think it's super important that folks out there are interested in learning more about this stuff and that alterhumans are able to communicate their experiences to one another <3

[gynandromorph]

It's okay not to answer, I know it's broad territory, but I really respect you as an artist and writer. How do you handle people misinterpreting or missing elements of your work, especially when they may still enjoy it and get something out of it? As an artist I'm struggling lately with knowing my work will always inherently be read differently from what I intended as a matter of the human experience, as well as me being autistic complicating my ability to communicate.

An addition to that last ask. I don't know if it's clear what I'm asking so I'll give some examples. A 50 year old man and a 21 year old woman will get different things from a movie due to their lived experiences. As a gentile reader I might miss jewish narrative themes in a piece of work. That doesn't mean it's bad for us to have experienced it, but as an author I find it frustrating when something is missed or misinterpreted, and I don't know how not to be a control freak about it.

i feel you, i have ocpd and being misinterpreted when i agonized and stressed about how to present my wording makes me want to light myself on fire and it's something i'm working on. writers are supposed to expect and account for different perspectives ahead of time, so it always sort of shocks me when i hear interpretations i wouldn't have thought about at all. i know logically i can't predict all outcomes, but it's still surprising anyway!!! but i generally feel a lot of distress about being misinterpreted because i'm afraid it'll label me as A Bad Person, so i think that's where the experience diverges. maybe investigating why you need to or want to control the way your work is interpreted would help as a starting point? i think having a larger audience helps, too... it means more people will misinterpret your work, but it also means you're more likely to have at least One Guy who interprets it just right and makes fireworks go off in your brain, but there's no way to control how big your audience is!

anyway, the ways to control how your work is interpreted, to the degree that you can:

you can make it simpler. the more parts a story has added to its complexity, the more it's going to be misinterpreted.

you can make the intended message more blatant. you can have a character say exactly what you want the audience to think or hear, or something very close to it. don't want a detail missed? make it bigger.

you can reprioritize parts of the story. basically think of a group of interpretations you want the audience to have if you can, and then put them in order of importance. then the story has a hierarchy to lean on wrt artistic decisions.

you can give the story multiple meanings. more targets to hit. if they're mutually exclusive, i find this works better... i like making my stories ambiguous with conflicting interpretations a lot. yeah, people are going to interpret the story wrong, because it was made in a way that will guarantee it is interpreted wrong in some way.

you can layer the meaning so that less literate audience members will at least get SOME of what you intended. basically, close to the previous strategy, but like a hybrid of that and "make it simpler" imo because you're constructing multiple interpretations that are all supposed to lead to one conclusion (like a persuasive essay or something), but can act as an adequate conclusion on their own.

all of these options have obvious qualitative losses. if you have anything in particular that is repeatedly misinterpreted or missed, it's a good idea to think about Why you're making those choices. consciously committing to a higher-risk artistic choice will help you feel more in control of what happens to it once it's done. the way your art is interpreted isn't totally out of your control, you are making decisions that add to or mitigate the risk of misinterpretations, and you can bring those choices to a more conscious awareness to see them and appreciate them. sometimes it'll feel like a begrudging compromise, but it'll still be Your choice ultimately.

on an emotional level... hopefully this makes sense. there's always going to be the piss-on-the-poor scenario and sometimes i just remind myself that some people are not as literate as me, but it's great we were still able to connect through a work that was probably difficult for them!!! it was a privilege to get to grow up with a good education, access to art and technology, strangers who want to look at what i made, and there are times where i take this for granted, and my expectations of readers are actually kind of unreasonable!!! some people are younger than me and say stupid things like i did, but they aren't able to understand things like me yet, and it's important for them to learn by figuring it out on their own!!! i was and will always be That Guy to other artists and other writers, and i want to give other people the same grace as i get. some people have wildly different life experiences compared to mine, and these experiences can be much more nuanced than i could ever imagine, but it's a little gift that they made my world larger by sharing theirs through my art!!! it's terrifying and embarrassing knowing that i don't know much of anything, even about something i have total control over, but the consequences of that aren't always negative. and possibly the saddest but most common way i deal with this is nothing more than accepting that no one is ever going to understand me on the level that i want to be understood. sometimes my frustration has come from a place of miserable alienation, where the need to feel Seen can be quite desperate. i've made art explicitly about Me, and i've made art deliberately hostile towards its audience, art that's said they don't get it and they never will, but they still bothered to try. i made a game that said no one will win here and they still played it with me, and i can appreciate that. in many cases, they actually know more about me than i know about them. but more importantly, it isn't my audience's job to take care of that emotional need -- in fact, as much as art is made out to be a mode of pure self-expression, i don't think they can. it's a reality that i don't like, but i accept it. art made to benefit others is a one-way mirror: you make them feel seen, but they should never see you, because if they see you, the mirror isn't working.

[burinazar]

absolutely unhinged rant about…i don’t even know, alienation from gender roles? lack of a sense of community for Strange And Grotesque Bisexual Woman? idk it’s 2am let me rant on my tumblr i think this kind of shit is what tumblr is for

I am very jealous of people for whom queer self discovery has led to a sense of community and acceptance. The more in touch I get with my sense of gender and sexuality the more alone and excluded and unfit for the world I feel. What I want and the way I am seem to be are. , in the context of how other people seem to label and process queerness, at best highly unusual and at worst simply unacceptable. I feel far more at odds with (and far more interested in expanding) expectations of womenhood than anyone I meet who still seems to identify as a woman, except for lesbians and certain trans women (though i may just be saying that because the only other human who seems to have worded certain skepticism on m/f dynamics the way i tend to is a transfem author), and neither of these labels apply to me; I can’t find precedence or community for anyone who is like me, all we have are silly posts and memes. I like silly posts and memes but they can’t really help me stop feeling like there is nothing for me and maybe there are no people like me and the ones who come closest are the most painful to realize I am not the same as because if I were just a bit different I’d be like them but I’m not.

Truly does no one feel the way I do about widening the definition of womanhood and the agency of and roles for women? Why is everyone apparently so happy with what’s been given to us? Do you really ACTUALLY LIKE like being expected to do makeup and hair and jewelry and being the party expected to receive attraction rather than enact it? And do you find what you’re supposed to like in men and in relationships with men appealing rather than essentially feeing like it’s all backwards and should be the other way around, like we should be the pursuers, like men should be small and cute and inaggressive rather than muscular and “alpha”” being the cultural idea? I can’t relate to this shit at all and I can’t wrap my head around most women liking the things that I hate and relating to things I can never relate to, but I refuse to accept that the answer is something like “stop trying to call yourself a woman” instead of “we need to make the definition of woman wider and wider and less and less restricted and more ugly and weird and delightfully fucked up.” But the only ppl who I see feel this way are in groups I’m not part of, and the ppl who are in the groups I’m part of seem to be much much happier about the current definition of womanhood (and the proscribed dynamics of how men and women interact) than I ever will be. I wish I were a type of person that there was a community for. It’s too hard to be like this by myself.

[kiragecko]

what do you think about batcest?

Okay, I believe in Ship and Let Ship, and that fiction can be about whatever it wants to be about. So I'm not getting into a purity culture discussion here. Instead, I'll talk about my actual opinions, rather than a moral stance.

Mostly, I think that it is an uninterestingly large category, grouped together mostly for logistics reasons.

-

First, there's incest-kink. Which comes in two main flavours that I've seen: restitution, and violation.

Restitution incest-kink is when a person either didn't get strong family relational attachments growing up, or idolizes those types of attachments, and finds a way to create them with other loved ones later on, through either sex or roleplay.

Since familial connections were my ONLY stable relationships as a kid, this just ... feels weird to me. Why get that from people who, in my experience, are WORSE at it? I find it mildly off-putting in fic.

Violation incest-kink is when someone is attracted to the broken trust, vulnerability, and shame attached to being harmed by someone supposed to protect you.

I like dark fic, and benefit from reliving helplessness in a safe environment (like fic). I will read a fic like this, but usually for unrelated reasons. Incest isn't the draw, it just often shows up in the same stories as tropes that work better for me.

-

Then, there's the Batcest which isn't interested in incest at all. It's just labeled that way to warn people that characters, which the audience might consider family, are dating/having sex.

I think it's a good idea to label that! Some people might want to avoid it!

(I don't personally think that this counts as writing incest. This type of fic is usually impossible to differentiate from fic about characters who are unrelated. The previous type of fic that I described IS distinct. If something has no effect on the story, I don't think it's an important variable.)

I think people write Technical Batcest for multiple reasons. Some that I've seen are:

They're the characters the authour has seen interact. Which makes them the only available options to ship. I can enjoy this type of fic, though I REALLY like supporting characters, and comics minutiae, so I often find it a bit limiting.

The authour only knows how to interpret canon closeness through sex/romance. Similar to the first type of incest-kink, but without the awareness. I'm way too aroace for this boringness.

The authour has a specific dynamic or theme to explore, and it can most easily be explored through sex/romance. This ... is often extremely compelling. Fiction has tools that really life doesn't. Metaphors, symbols, and mirrored experiences can be amazing ways to explore complex topics. I APPROVE of shipping Bats together if it gets me some deep insights into them, myself, or the world!

-

For me, whether something is Batcest or not isn't really a helpful factor. I'm looking at other tags, the summary, and maybe the first few paragraphs, instead.

The only things I actively search out are a few JayTim tropes that I feel are most successfully explored through their particular history and context, and also work best with sex as ... almost a distancing effect? Like, the thing they're resonating with in me has NOTHING to do with sex, but is far too vulnerable to be addressed directly. Pretend sex happening to other people is enough distance that I can actually look into that part of myself.

(I would like if enough people knew about the 'Incest Kink' tag that I could assume that 'Pseudo-Incest' by itself probably WASN'T the first category. It would make both tags more useful. But I still think it's valuable to tag things even if they don't help me!)

-

Finally, here are my opinions about the actual ship dynamics.

I am not interested in Damian being shipped with anyone, related or not. Find it a turn off. He's little, I don't HAVE to tolerate ships yet!

There is a certain kind of romantic exploration I find compelling in rare Cass fics, but I have no interest in reading about her having sex, ever. (The only other Wayne I've seen this dynamic with is Tim, and those were written before the adoption.)

Tim is shut down enough that sex becomes a valid way to get into his head. Really uninterested in anything but his platonic sibling relationship with Dick. Dark fic with him and Bruce is possible, but can go wrong in a lot of ways. I like him and Jason with a variety of dynamics and interpretations - both canon compliant and completely fanon.

Dick and anyone other than Jason usually bothers me, and I avoid it. I relate to Dick as co-eldest-siblings. That is not what I am interested in with siblings. Even Dark fic with him and Bruce isn't fun. Prefer Dick & Jason over JayDick, but the ship can occasionally work.

I'm more interested in the family dynamics with ALL the characters. That's true with Jason, as well. But with him I have the least strongly-negative reactions to ships. The only Wayne ship I get a lot out of is JayTim, but I'd be willing to read most of them, if the story seemed interesting.

Bruce and his children is ... I'm not a FAN. But, again, when I want things dark, that tends to be one of the places writers gravitate to, so I'll follow them.

Alfred. I do NOT want Alfred/Bruce. No. Not for me. Theoretically, Alfred would be even more affective than Bruce for dark ships with the kids, but I haven't actually found anything that worked for me.

And I haven't seen enough fic with any other relationships that would fit this label to have opinions.

[yoongleboonglepie]

is the main character written as bipolar? confused bc it’s never explicitly clarified - unless i’ve missed something - but you describe some of the shifts in her mood/actions as depressive and manic episodes which are mainly a bipolar thing

Okay so yes!

Reader is technically written with bipolar type 2 characteristics because parts of myself really seep into her character (hi, I'm bipolar type 2 haha).

I also figured it'd play well into how her mother uses her emotional range against her and speaks of it negatively, because often times people look at being bipolar as something that immediately negates anything "good" you're capable of, or to dismiss their feelings/actions as ungrounded (and I've definitely experienced this in my personal life ooff).

Okay, very long personal author ramble beneath the cut (sorry y'all, my own real life Mariah pissed me off real bad today and I'm at the ready to drone on and on about this story and the characters):

It was a deliberate choice I made because personally I feel like a LOT of reader inserts make the reader very demure, very timid/calm, non confrontational etc. Whereas I never really fit into those archetypes? And I'm not hating those stories-those are also valid ways to be! I just really wanted to push against some of the unspoken boxes that are placed around fanfiction spaces, and if that means I get less attention, then so be it! I'm glad with the small group I have 🥰It all comes down to writing what I wanted to read and couldn't really find all that often, and I hope I can help even just a few other readers find that too.

And I don't claim to do this perfectly myself - really, I can only write what I know and have experienced best, just like other authors will. I do however, try really hard to avoid at the bare minimum to keep major physical barriers to stories out: like skin tone, I avoid talking about touching or messing with hair, I avoid super specific body size relations, etc. I occasionally make some physical notes, but I try to keep them pretty broad and open to the interpretation of the reader.

Now I'm just rambling here lol (dw I'm not mad at this question at ALL-quite the opposite- I love it, I'm just very passionate about this and you caught me on a day that I need a good rant to the void).

I like to explore diverse character types (like for example, Jungkook is actually written as autistic/neurodivergent, and there are other disabled characters in the story that haven't gotten their chance to shine yet). I like to base a lot of them on people in my own life and not just ideas! Like A LOT of the family and side characters are based on people I've met or had come in and out of my life, or issues that are near and dear to my heart and my own found family.

I've never really felt the need to specifically state or label these things, because I feel like it might make it feel too barred off to others. But if asked, I'm not afraid to say "Pechsträhne Jungkook is Autistic!" Or "Reader is bipolar 2/ neurodivergent in other ways, and queer!" (and this could lead me into a whole other rant about how all OT7 x R stories are inherently queer and no one wants to say it because of the fear of what accepting that might mean, but I will spare you all that one).

With this and my other fanfictions, I wanted to challenge myself to write things that scared me to post; mostly in the sense of kind of polarizing for people who are comfortable, and making space for stories that show parts of myself or others that mayhaps haven't always been depicted in fanfiction. And while I know that brings its own conundrums of here will be others that don't fit perfectly into this story, but I think the conversation needs to be less about "fitting" and more about being able to relate to and find oneself in characters that aren't just like them- specifically if they've had the privilege of always being seen or written about. Thus, it needs to be more about telling more stories from more perspectives because there is space for everyone!

To cut myself off before I write a novel, I will finish here with a quote from Virginia Woolf that keeps me inspired when writing Pechsträhne:

"So as long as you write what you wish to write, that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only hours, nobody can say." - A Room of One's Own, An essay On Women and Fiction.

Okay, so much love to you and thank you for letting me info dump ~Delyn <3

[system-of-a-feather]

Honestly, a thing I've kind of started to realize within both our proper involvement within trauma / mental health care spaces and within our own healing, a large issue (not bad or derogatory, but rather a "flaw" and an obstacle that gets in the way from the most effective condition) is that a lot of DID / OSDD / CDD spaces are heavily built with a large atmosphere and focus on trauma, trauma labels, terms, the nuances of what is and isn't possible, and just largely a lot of the talk and engagement is about sharing one another's trauma stories and explaining How The Trauma Happens and the details of how Trauma Has Affected / Impact / Forever Changed You and that is COMPLETELY expected and understandable

Trauma is an incredibly harmful, incredibly hurtful, incredibly impactful thing to go through and it can very very easily make you feel EXTREMELY stuck in the place you are. It's not something that can easily swallow your existence - especially if you have DID and even more so if you are specifically a part that got the misfortune of having the role of holding trauma or being explicitly stuck in flashbacks. There is nothing *wrong* with the community being like that, it's completely expected and there is nothing *bad* about it. I think it is incredibly more helpful and better than everyone being isolated, uninformed, unsupported, and having *nothing* to help them through what is often an unsafe environment or the challenges of early recovery.

That said, both of those values / beliefs / mindsets are incredibly trauma-driven focuses that - in the process of helping meet needs, a sense of community, and safety (things individuals with a trauma history have a lot of a need for), reinforce the building of one's sense of self and identity AROUND and on top of the trauma and thus also kind of reinforces the idea that someone is defined, forever stuck, and distanced from other people based on their trauma.

And I think that is a key thing thats a difference between peer survivor groups processing things together and proper professionally guided group therapy of survivors. I'm not saying that professionals and group therapy is "good", because I have had a number of really negative experiences with it myself and as a person with a trauma background myself (even if I talk like this, I'm not immune) I both distrust "officials" and instictually would very much prefer if people who have not experienced extensive trauma stayed out of my trauma spaces.

What I am kind of trying to say is that in the former, there is an issue of the blind leading the blind as everyone involved is more or less stuck in that trauma space / mindplace that makes it hard to see the avenues of healing that go BEYOND trauma and are not something that individuals who are still deep in the trauma sauce are not going to really be the most open to. In the latter, in theory, there is a heavy trauma-responsive and trauma-informed professional who is both able to understand, empathize, be attuned to, and respond positively to traumatized individuals and the frequent challenges; and that not "In the Trauma" view provides a lot of essential and helpful opportunities to challenge (positively) some of the largest generalized trauma views / values and help in developing and builiding a sense of self and a life that is not as heavily built upon the basis of "Trauma being Defining" to who you are.

And as someone who was there before, its totally fine if you have a problem with me saying that "Trauma does not have to define your entire existence and doesn't make up everything of who you are" because 1) I don't know your story and 2) You don't have to trust me, you have no reason to trust me on that; but as someone who went through a shit ton of trauma and recovery myself, I hope that its something you would at least humor that I strongly believe that and have seen it multiple times - both in human and nonhuman experiences.

I just really say that because in my experience, the most important belief and self concept to challenge that REALLY changed how I felt about myself, my disorder, and my symptoms was the development of the belief that "I went through a lot of trauma and it greatly impacted me, but trauma isn't all of who I am and with every day I live outside of it, trauma becomes a smaller and smaller portion of who I am"

I think its important to hold discussions on how healing doing things and engaging in conversation AWAY from trauma can actually greatly help develop a sense of self apart from trauma and paradoxically greatly help in recovering from it. It sounds very anti-intuitive and against what might feel right / productive in the moment, but it's honestly really just such a powerful thing in my experience.

[retrowaving1]

I noticed people creating such descriptions on Tumblr, I assumed that I could do the same so that the people who visit my blog would be less confused about what they're seeing here. After all, I'm really open to communication, but it's probably better if you know what to expect from me:)

So, who the h am I?

> Obviously, Ohiko Amok is not my real name. I don't want to go by my real name on the internet unless it comes up in conversation with my mutuals.

> I'm a person of many professions: (1) personal tutor teaching adults with dyslexia, adhd, Asperger's etc.; to speak English (2) Marketing professional; (3) Graphic designer;

> I have lots of hobbies; I like cooking (I'll gladly exchange recipes with anyone interested in mine), I like painting and drawing (both digitally and traditionally), I do yoga, I like reading (and sometimes even writing) and I like learning about skin issues (lol, I even have a certificate that I finished a course teaching about acne and how to properly deal with it xd). I also play a number of very simple computer games and enjoy board games, but I wouldn't call myself an enthusiast of neither. What I do adore is music - I'm the only person in my family who haven't had any musical trainings in the past, but I do have a strong appreciation for music.

My taste in music is very vast and it'll be difficult to limit it to one genre or a group of artists, but I can easily name some of the most influential performers for me: Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Leonard Cohen, Dusty Springfield, Judy Garland, Fleetwood Mac, Czesław Niemen, Marek Grechuta, Magda Umer, Tori Amos, Volodymyr Ivasyuk, Okean Elzy, Skryabin, Shocking Blue..

I would love to bond over music with anyone with similar tastes <3

> I do not identify myself through pronouns, sexuality, belonging to a certain movement. I think all of those labels are secondary and often limit person to a certain degree. Biologically, I'm a woman. I'm bisexual, but I do not consider myself to be a part of LGBTQ community. I'm not religious. I'm not a feminist of any kind. I have my own strong ideas developed through the years living in a certain context, my own preferences and worldview, but I don't want to label them in any way, as it seems redundant.

> I come from Poland<3 Currently, I live in the Eastern Part of the country.

If at some point you might get confused by my posts' being inspired by both Polish and Ukrainian popular culture and historical background, it's because I was born in Ukraine (albeit in a Polish family) and feel a strong connection and love to both countries.

> Since I've started to post on Tumblr regularly, I very often get some horny messages (i'm talking about real people, not porn bots), so here's one bit of information which I feel obliged to add to my account description: I'm currently engaged and I'm not looking for any relationships aside from friendly ones!

> I don't reply to messages in russian

> I've recently created another blog called @retrowaving-vents to just write random stuff and repost meme I find funny. Welcome, if you are interested in some random stream of consciousness.

Cheers, if you've managed to read this whole post, I hope you'll enjoy the content I post on this account<3 Feel free to ask any questions that might come to your mind, I really like talking xd

[nerves-nebula]

hi there, i want to ask about your usage of it/its pronouns, sorry if this might make you uncomfortable or if its weird or confusing

are your it/its pronouns any different from it/its pronouns for an object? I don't know how to word it sorry, I'm just trying to understand more about other types of pronouns

It’s fine. They aren’t different from an objects it/its to me, because objects & animals & concepts aren’t inherently inferior to humans, so I wouldn’t really mind being in the same group as them conceptually.

It’s a mindset I haven’t fully gotten into but I’m trying to rework the way I see the world, inspired partially by the things I’ve heard native Americans say. Like, I am not better than the food I eat because I’m human. A bear isn’t better than me because they can eat me & kill me. Humans are a part of the earth and would do best to work inside of it and with it than to try to control it or put ourselves on a higher level than it’s other creatures.

I mean clearly we can’t be all that much smarter & more important, what with what we’ve got going on.

But anyway, my pronoun change was at first honestly just the most logical conclusion.

Here’s my train of thought: I didn’t like he or she, Im not a man or a woman. and they/them don’t tell you anything about my gender. If you hear someone call me they/them you aren’t even gonna know I have a weird gender!

Similar to how man and woman are genders, but Non-binary isn’t. Non-binary just describes what you aren’t, its an umbrella term not (inherently) a specific gender. it’s very broad and most nonbinary people I’ve seen & met still identify in parts with man and woman. They/them is so vague that no one would bat an eye if you slipped in a they while describing a cis person who clearly reads as their assigned gender.

And I’m too forgetful & lazy to use neopronouns so, it/it’s was the natural choice. It’s easier to integrate because people already use it/it’s for stuff all the time.

And see, here’s the thing: I have a gender, I’m not vague or in between or a mix. And it’s much closer to like, the idea of a Third Gender. This was something that frustrated me a lot in high school because I would go looking for labels and most of them were about proximity to manhood & womanhood. Or about being agender or neutral. Or about concepts I fully did not relate to. I am not one of those things.

Another issue I had was that a lot of these gender labels had “-gender” at the end which doesn’t make sense to me at all. It’s not mangender and womangender so I didn’t vibe with this naming scheme.

I was also hesitant to use a label a white person made because I’d noticed that white people kind of have a different experience with nonbinary gender than people like me.

Luckily I found the perfect label! Maverique! It had no weird -gender suffix and it was made by a black person who created it online after realizing neutral/agender didn’t fit right.

And yea so it/its is a signifier of me as a third thing. not male, not female, not neutral or in between or lacking gender- just a different kind of person.

And this isn’t even getting into all the ways that I related to monsters in media, which were frequently called by it/it’s pronouns. Or how being abused factors into seeing myself as a non human THING and how embracing that makes me feel much more alive & like a person.

So yea, that’s the run down :)

[cowboymantis]

Y'know what since it's pride month, I'll do a little random rambling about my identity, bc hell I am 22 whole years old and I am still struggling with my gender lmaoo 😭😭

But also, nowadays I think it's really funny that I took so long to properly realize I was trans and aroace

There were. So many signs. 💀

I almost dreaded to come out as trans to one of my old online friend groups, not bc I thought they were transphobic (bc we were always a heavily lgbtq group), but because I thought I took so long and now I'd have to explain myself. (Stupid I know, but my family is very transphobic, so I never got to be my true self irl, and idk if I ever will as long as my family lives, but maybe I'll be brave enough one day)

But one of the first reactions I got was just yeah I always thought you were gonna say that 😭 And us all talking AND OTHERS COMING OUT TOO it was just such a weight lifted from my shoulders, it was so great.

Because of my family, I'm not 100% sure how I feel about my gender, if I feel more nonbinary or male, it's more something in-between, but more towards male,, but that's why I just feel most comfortable without a label, I'm just me and I'm here 🛌

When it comes to figuring out I'm aroace, the thing is, I kinda thought about it before, but I wasn't sure. Even then, it wasn't too long before I realized.

I always hated romance and cheesy scenes, kissing and especially sex scenes in anything I watch make me super uncomfortable, I'd sometimes think about, if I'm grown up and in a relationship, I have to do all of that... And I was actually scared of needing to get in a relationship, or something like that. Part of it was pressure from my parents to tell me I need to find a partner, to, I guess properly live my life or something. And this is essentially what a lot of people think, that you NEED to have a partner to be complete, and I always found it so weird. I don't want a partner I just wanna sit in my room and play videogames all day :'D

Oddly enough, No Straight Roads, one of my favourite games ever, has indirectly helped me- NOW HEAR ME OUT. One name: Eve.

Omg I love Eve so so much, and her whole arc just made me slowly go ... I feel that omg

I was in one relationship in my life, I'm actually still friends with that person, they also came out as trans, but are in a poly relationship now, which is kind of funny to me because we went pretty much the exact opposite route, I love it 😭

Anyway, I never had any feelings of love how people describe it, I never had any attraction to people. But I was so desperate when we broke up, like I lost my one opportunity in life to be in a relationship, like I needed to have someone else no matter how uncomfortable I felt being in one.

And I just saw my younger teenage self in Eve and I think this is one of the reasons I am so attached to this character, gahhHH I love No Straight Roads so much. It has helped me in a time I was feeling down, it indirectly got me into kpop (😭😭yeah), which then also came at the right time when I had a downer phase, and the community of the game on release was just so sweet.

But yeah, to come back to it, throughout my life, I basically went from "I guess I'm pan or something, because I don't have a preference"

To "Okay the thought of being with a man disgusts me, so I have to be a lesbian"

To "Okay, but I just like looking at people in an aesthetical way, I simp for characters or actors as a joke, I just like looking at them or think they're cute, but that's about it"

And then I was just like oh. Oh wait. it's all coming together.

Realizing you're aromantic and/or asexual can be really hard, and I've seen others' experiences be similar to mine. I think, in a way, it's so hard bc pursuing relationships is the norm for most of the world.

Thinking back to that one lesson we had in ethics class I'll never forget, we had to write down something about the meaning of life. And then everyone should say what they have written down and what their idea was. Most people wrote down having a family. I don't even know what I wrote down (probably something like a happy life or something basic), but I talked about how meaning of life doesn't have to be having a family. And the teacher basically laughed at me for saying that bc that's the whole point of being a human!!!

And I guess from that day I had this one sided beef / grudge against this teacher bc how the hell are you an ethics teacher and think so one-sided 😭 Sure, humans start families so they don't die out, but not EVERY human needs to start a family to have a purpose in life?

So yeah, anyway. Aspecs are very nuanced, there are those who have platonic relationships, people who enjoy sex although they are not attracted to someone, I myself am absolutely repulsed by anything sexual and I don't ever want any type of relationship, I don't like being lovey dovey, and I hate being too close to someone, like hugging, etc. On the outside I've always been very distant, but on the inside I have all the love I don't have for romance, for my friends and for this world instead 😌🙏

I guess I can really seem too cold or maybe even angry, bc it's hard for me to properly show my emotions, and that's why I prefer text over word, I can express myself so freely and can add all the silly little emotes I want :3

Also, I always loved the I do not perceive and do not wish to be perceived bc yeah . Me fr jfhdjdhr

Also, I'm not too fond of sexualities and genders all having weird stereotypes, but god damit I love robots/androids etc sm I always would love to be one fr ‼️‼️ I guess that's one of the reasons I was immediately hooked on Tokusatsu- NO THIS IS NOT GONNA BE A TOKU POST THIS HAS DERAILED WAY TOO FAR

But speaking of-- Naki me belobed and ofc their actor, I love Nakayama sm man and recently read an a bit older interview of him and he's so real 😭😭 I've never literally me-d for an actor so much 🥲

[brothermoth]

I get that language is very important but some of y'all need to reassess your priorities. If I, a queer historian, refer to my studies as "queer history", that is not in any way a problem. Yeah the word has been used derogatorily and I acknowledge that. If you're more hung up about someone using a word you don't like than the fact that people's experiences are being recognized and acknowledged by historians, I think you should maybe take a step back.

If I personally call you queer after you've said you don't personally want to be called that, then I would be in the wrong. Queer history is dead people. They're dead. It's the best word to categorize their experiences without explicitly ascribing them a label, which I personally find disrespectful and choose not to do. Me (a queer person) using the term to point out that someone was different from what was socially normal at the time and has experiences similar to those of LGBT+ people in modern times. This is not an issue, nor should it be made into one. I use it as a catch all term because it's just easier, and it feels fair to me, and its a better word for people who wouldn't have used our modern labels or who had flexible relationships with gender and sexuality (like myself ). If you don't like the word you do not have to use it, that's fine. But you can only make that choice for yourself. Me calling it 'the queer community ' isn't going to hurt you. I wouldn't call you that personally, nor would I use it to describe you as an individual. If you joined a group called "queer studies" or something but said 'hey I'm not really comfortable personally being called that' I guarantee nobody will have an issue. It just doesn't apply to you, you're still part of the group because those people have similar experiences to you.

Also what other people call themselves isn't your business. It's not my problem, it's not your problem. I don't care. I just want people to have human rights. The idea of sexuality as an identifier or something to label is almost entirely a 20th century concept. It's nice to help find people with similar experiences and a sense of community, but it's a personal thing. You don't have the right to tell someone they aren't bisexual, or a lesbian, or trans (nor do you have the right to ascribe a label to someone). Their identity should not affect your own. It's all made up. We're just meat with opinions.