#i was thinking about doing a more comprehensive live blog about this

[zishuge]

I finally started watching My Journey To You and I'm completely enamored with these character introductions. Our introduction to the female lead is her flying in through a window and immediately knocking a roomful of people unconscious. She doesn't care who sees her naked. Her body doesn't belong to her anyway. She's cold, hard, and efficient. It's her last mission and she's not going to let anything stand in her way.

Our introduction to our male lead is... the complete opposite? He’s soft and curled up napping on a chaise in front of a fire like a housecat???? He's a beautiful delicate flower who's afraid of the cold??? He goes to the brothel when he's sad just so the courtesan will play him music so he can take a nap and de-stress after his father yells at him???

I can't believe this story is "ruthless assassin and her pitiful little meow meow". I love it so much.

[hypodermicfroggy]

= PROJECT MOON LORE GUIDE =

(I've posted a guide like this on Steam, but I figure it couldn't hurt to put an updated version on Tumblr, too. Also, a warning: This post is going to be very, *very* long.)

Hello, current Project Moon fandom and future/want-to-be fans!

Do you enjoy Limbus Company but don't know how to get into the other games and media to appreciate the greater lore of the series? Do you not actually have the money, time, or patience to endure a brutally punishing (and sometimes even janky) roguelike management sim, deckbuilder, or gacha game because we live in a capitalistic hellworld like the one this very series criticizes? Struggle with getting access to supplementary materials due to controversies and language barriers?

(Pictured: PM Twitter and the Limbus Steam Forums, on any given day. Seriously, what is wrong with some of you people.)

And especially important: hate how Reddit and Steam are full of dudebro coomers who are openly hostile to F2P, non-day one players who might grapple with all the previous issues on top of being more invested in story than waifus?

Then read on under the cut!

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

This guide contains a comprehensive list of resources for you to be able to enjoy the Project Moon series to its fullest, including links to wikis, playlists, and more. Even if you can't play the games, I personally think those who can actually appreciate the series shouldn't be gatekept from the truly fantastic story and world that the games hold. Except Canto 6, we don't talk about Canto 6.

AND AN IMPORTANT REMINDER: THERE WILL BE SOME SPOILERS FOR CERTAIN PARTS OF THE SERIES, AND PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE THE CONTENT WARNINGS BEFORE YOU GET INTO ANYTHING HERE! This is a very dark series that tackles and shows very heavy topics and content!

For those who can't read the text on the image, some of the common trigger warnings for this series includes:

Animal Cruelty

Drug Use

References to Alcohol and Tobacco

Injury and Dismemberment

Homicide and Suicide

Violence and Torture

Cannibalism

Kidnapping, Abduction, and Captivity

Psychosis

Diseases, Seizure, and Dyspnoea (aka shortness of breath)

Familial Homicide and Domestic Violence

Reference to Clowns (Coulrophobia)

Themes of Occultism and Spiritualism

Audiovisual Depictions of Gore

Uses of Sharp and Pointed Objects

Hospital and Medical References

References to Gaslighting and Bullying

Body Modification and/or Deformation

Flashing Lights (Photosensitivity)

Disorientation Induced by a Shaking Camera

Strong Language and Demeaning Words

Reference to Traffic Accidents

Uses of Guns and Instruments of Violence

Discriminatory Violence

Religious Torture and Violence

Enforced Ideology and/or Actions

War and Mass Conflict

Anyway, if all that didn't scare you off, on to the guide!

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=WIKIS:

When in doubt, there's always the wikis for being references and useful sources, from gameplay to story elements!

>>Cogitopedia - A WIP wiki run by members of the community, working on adding in-depth content for all of the games and supplementary materials.

>>LobCorp Wiki - Has data on every abnormality, including inaccessible ones and cut ones (such as Price of Silence).

>>Library of Ruina Wiki - Has the lore from key pages, and also has cut content like the CGs from the original planned ending.

>>Limbus Wiki.gg - Has ID Uptie stories and info about Mirror Dungeon encounters. (DO NOT USE THE LIMBUS FANDOM WIKI, IT HAS BEEN ABANDONED/VANDALIZED.)

>>Library of Project Moon - A WIP fan blog whose purpose is to consolidate translations of the literary source novels and related works for Limbus Company and the PM games as a whole.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=LOBOTOMY CORPORATION:

Summary: Lobotomy Corporation is the first game in the series. It is a roguelike management sim where you play as "Manager X", tasked with handling employees and various monsters known as Abnormalities in order to generate daily quotas of a power source substance known as Enkephalin and a mysterious "Seed of Light" project. You are aided by an alleged team of AIs known as the Sephirot, and your very own personal assistant AI, Angela. It's often been likened to "anime SCP Foundation."

This is the game where everything begins, and without it, we wouldn't have the plot of Limbus (or anything else for that matter). This is where the Golden Boughs come from, this is where Abnormalities come from, this is even where Distortions come from - but we're getting ahead of ourselves on that front.

>>This playlist will allow you to watch all the cutscenes from the game, in order, for the canon ending.

>>This video also has the cutscenes, albeit not in order, HOWEVER, it does have the alternate, non-canon endings A and B (which are timestamped in the link for convenience).

>>WordsmithVids (also on YouTube) also has what is generally considered to be the most popular summary of the game.

(NOTE: Some people disagree with WordsmithVids and his interpretations of some of the characters as well as his content being "meme-y," so I advise you to watch at your own discretion and draw your own conclusions. That being said, if people have better recommendations, please send them to me instead of just complaining and bitching without offering solutions like that one guy on Steam did, thank you.)

>>This site contains transcripts/text of the entire game, albeit not in order like the cutscene playlist. It also has WIP sections for EGO weapons, gear, and other useful info.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=WONDERLAB:

Summary: Wonderlab was a webcomic by the artist MIMI/Whitezombies, originally posted on the Project Moon Postype account. It follows the adventures of several employees - often called "nuggets" in fan parlance - Catt, Taii, and Rose, in a Lobotomy Corporation branch facility as they go about their day to day activities.

This webcomic was taken down after the Summer 2023 Incel Controversy, when incels stormed the Project Moon office in Korea and made enough credible threats that the former Limbus CG artist known as Vellmori was fired, and it is currently part of a second conflict over copyright. However, primarily for archival and personal reference purposes, the comic has been saved and rehosted in several forms.

>>Internet Archive version. This has just the comic in an on-site readable format.

>>A backup archive on Google Drive. This features the individual pages, a downloadable .zip of the archive, and a readable Google Docs version.

For those who may have ethical concerns about downloading a webcomic that was pulled due to controversy (understandable), once again, >>WordsmithVids has a summary.

(NOTE: This is NOT the place to discuss either the Summer 2023 incel controversy *or* the current (Summer 2024) copyright conflict. There are far better places to do that with people who are far better informed on the topic than I am. This post is solely for providing references and archives of lore material to help guide people into this series. DO NOT attempt to bring up the controversies here, I will not be acknowledging them outside of mentioning why certain supplementary materials may have been pulled and have had to be mirrored. I am just an archivist, not a lawyer or discourser.)

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=LIBRARY OF RUINA:

Summary: Library of Ruina takes place some months after the events of Lobotomy Corporation. A "Grade 9 Fixer" known as Roland finds his way into the mysterious, tower-like Library that has sprung up in place of the former main facility of L Corp, where he encounters Angela and the other Sephirot (all now Librarians). He begins assisting her in finding "the perfect book", which involves enticing people to come to the library through the sending out of curious invitations.

Now, unfortunately, there is not a playlist that splits up the cutscenes or puts them in order for Ruina.

>>These two videos have them all in compilation.

HOWEVER. A wonderful and dear friend of mine (@citroncynique <3) has allowed the guide they sent me to be reproduced/copied.

>>As such, there is a guide on how to watch the cutscenes in the order that makes the most sense, utilizing the timestamps of the previous two videos. It is not a perfect system, but it works at least.

>>There is also a written transcript archive for Ruina, by the same person who did the one for LobCorp, which also includes useful info regarding things like cards and keypages as well.

>>WordsmithVids also has at least two summary vids out.

However, due to financial issues at last update, he has not been able to continue his summary of Ruina. I am including them regardless. >>As well as his Patreon in case people want to support him in hopes of making it easier for him to work on the vids again.

>>There is also an almost FOUR HOUR LONG video essay that delves into Angela's character specifically after the events of LobCorp and Ruina. It is not required viewing like the rest of the materials here, however, I think it still deserves a mention just for the amount of effort and care that went into it.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=DISTORTION DETECTIVE:

Summary: Taking place at roughly the same time as Library of Ruina, two Fixers known as Ezra and Moses and an N Corp. Taboo Hunter known as Vespa investigate the Distortion Phenomenon that is rapidly starting to spread across the City after the events of the previous games.

Originally released as a webnovel on Project Moon's Postype, Distortion Detective has 42 chapters and is technically incomplete/on hiatus. Project Moon, surprised at how popular the webnovel was, decided they wanted to potentially make an entire game based on the story. As of this writing, that has not happened (yet) but at least one character from the novel has appeared in Limbus Company, so there is still hope yet.

>>The DD series in its original form on Postype. This version was posted chapter-by-chapter, on Project Moon's Postype account and is (as of this writing, at least) still readable there.

>>A backup archive on Google Drive. This has the entire webnovel in a single document format (both Docs and downloadable PDF) featuring NishikujiC's official chapter illustrations up to Ch. 26, and includes the now-cut comic adaption of Ch. 19 by the artist Monggeu/koug99.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=LEVIATHAN:

(Lord, this one. Like it wasn't a big enough pain in the ass already.)

Summary: After the events of Library of Ruina, and operating as a direct prequel to Limbus Company, Leviathan follows the Color Fixer Vergilius (aka the Red Gaze) as he grapples with his own personal traumas and comes into conflict with the Ring Syndicate, before being recruited as a guide for the LCB.

Leviathan originally started as a webcomic by Monggeu/koug99. Health issues with the artist resulted in the comic being discontinued and turned into a webnovel, whose translation was never completed and had to later be finished by fans. The comic portion has since been taken down as of the Summer 2024 copyright conflict and controversy, much like Wonderlab was. Once again, however, this has been mirrored for archival and reference purposes.

>>Original source of Leviathan on Postype. Due to the copyright conflict and the translation hiatus, the only chapters available are Ch. 12-15. The link is still included for posterity reasons and just in case the copyright conflict results in the chapters being restored.

>>A backup archive on Google Drive. This link includes the comic chapters, as well as the SnakeskinFS English fan translations for the last five chapters that were never completed, all in PDF form.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=LIMBUS COMPANY:

Summary: After all the events of the previous games, a mysterious up and coming business known as Limbus Company has taken it upon themselves to send a group composed of 12 "Sinners" and their mysterious clock-headed Manager Dante to delve into the now-abandoned L Corp facilities in search of mysterious artifacts known as Golden Boughs.

Finally we come to the end of the shrubbery maze. Limbus Company is the latest chapter in the currently unfolding story of Project Moon and the City, a gacha game being used to fund other projects under the company umbrella.

Many people, once again, have ethical concerns about patronizing a gacha game. I for one agree with them, even as one of those patrons.

>>This playlist features all of the cutscenes for each part of the game story released so far (up to Intervallo 6.5-2/Murder on the WARP Express as of this writing).

>>There is also this site, which operates as a pure datamined text archive of all the story content.

>>And this site, which has all the in-game Observation logs as told by the Sinners, about the Abnormalities and enemies encountered in-game.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=BONUS/SUPPLEMENTARY:

This section, liable to be updated at any given time, is for links to materials or fan-creations that don't necessarily fit with the strictly canonical story materials found in the games and webnovels themselves but which otherwise provide useful resources or analysis. Note that the vast majority of material here is supplementary and not required, but recommended.

(Except the literary sources. You will read those, and that is a threat. I can't take another Wings-forsaken illiterate opinion on Canto 6, I'm going to start Distorting and biting people if YOU PEOPLE DON'T READ THE DAMN SOURCE NOVELS.)

YouTubers and Video Essayists:

Frey Chaqma - Frey has done lots of work for the PM community, such as spearheading the Absolute Pride Resonance charity event for Pride Month 2024 as well as discussing the lore of the games and the City as a whole.

Tsunul - Another YouTuber who discusses lore but who also often delves into more interpersonal matters relating to the fandom and controversies that can affect the game community as a whole.

Esgoo - Although Esgoo does not necessarily get into lore so much, they are often tauted as one of the biggest names in the fandom for, if nothing else, their meta-analysis and basic gameplay/strategy material, as well as their community involvement.

DMrLeeds - Although some of his videos are (comparitively) quite old, it can still provide a good jumping off point for anyone who is utterly lost on what's going on in Limbus.

hydrojoy's essay on Benjamin - In addition to Angela, hydrojoy also did an in-depth analysis on Benjamin, aka B, aka Hokma, from Lobotomy Corporation and Library of Ruina and their impact on the story.

MetiNotTheBadGuy's PM Character Essays - Meti has done several excellent character breakdown videos on some of PM's most notable villains/characters, including Roland, Kromer, and Dongrang.

= o = o = o = o = o = o =

=ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:

Citroncynique. For being a truly amazing artist, putting in the effort of making a watch guide for Ruina's cutscenes, and getting me into this series and ruining my life forever by jingling a bugman with PTSD in front of me (<3).

MIMI/Whitezombies, Monggeu/koug99, NishikujiC, and Vellmori. Although several of these artists have left PM and the community on bad terms, I still think their efforts should be appreciated and supported, now more than ever.

SnakeskinFS. For finishing Leviathan's English translation.

Folex, Bek, WordsmithVids, hydrojoy, and the Lobotomy Corporation Archive. For posting their cutscene and summary/analysis videos.

NeedsMoreDoge. The Steam user who provided the original guide and backup on how to read Leviathan that I myself utilized.

The less than pleasant members of the community who spurred me into making this guide in the first place, out of pure spite.

And of course, readers like you and those members of the community who make me so happy to be here and be a part of this fandom. Genuinely, thank you all, I have never felt as welcomed as I do in the Project Moon circles I run in.

In addition to the references included here, I recommend you get involved in your PM community as well! Join communities and Discords, support content creators on social sites, help contribute where it's needed and in whatever way you can! The best way to counteract the worst elements of any fandom is to be a guiding and helpful element in your own right.

Thank you all for reading, and I hope this guide helps you out!

[genderqueerdykes]

I don’t feel like a human… but I don’t know what else I’d be either? Any advice? Thanks!! Love ur blog btw <33

i can give some general non/alterhuman questioning advice!

are there any species of animals, aliens, fictional species or characters, machines, objects, plants/flora, vampires, or mythological creatures you've found yourself feeling drawn toward in a way that isn't attraction, but rather feels like a very deep personal connection?

take it slow and examine why it is you don't feel human. maybe you don't like the body you're in. maybe you don't understand how humans think and feel. maybe you feel like you belong in another time, place, or setting. maybe you feel as though you're not from this planet. maybe you feel as though you belong in nature. maybe you feel you've lived another person's life before.

are there any body parts you're specifically dysphoric about having or not having? have you ever felt like you should have a tail, paws, ears, claws, scales, wings, horns, fangs, a muzzle, different eyes, different legs, should be walking on all fours, and so on? have you ever found yourself really wishing you could change certain features of your body that aren't necessarily related to gender?

do you feel any particularly strong connections to nature, space, fictional or mythological settings? if so, why do you feel connected and how does that relate to you?

do you have any animalistic or nonhuman gestures that you find yourself frequently making? perhaps you like to walk on all fours, perhaps you like to bark, meow, growl, hiss, moo, oink, snort, whinny, or make other nonhuman sounds. maybe you like to pretend l like you're wandering around behaving like a nonhuman animal. maybe you eat food in a certain way that reminds you of how an animal or other creature eats.

do you feel as though you have spiritual connections to any other species or fictional individuals but don't know how to explain it? instead of appropriating spirit animals if you are not indigenous, you may be otherkin, therian, nonhuman, or alterhuman instead

do you find yourself gravitating towards videos, books, shows, movies, or other media about a specific type of animal, creature, or person?

do you find yourself collecting items or making art about specific species, creatures, and so on? do you find you have a lot of items or collect a lot of art of a specific animal, creature, or fictional character? do you find that you're instantly drawn to specific nonhuman animals when you're out in the world? do you notice certain animals more than others? do you find yourself wanting to interact with specific animals more than others?

you can also take the time to learn more about animals, nature, fictional settings, space, the ocean, or whatever else it is you'd like to look into for your possible identity! just learning about nonhuman creatures and animals can be very fun, and may expose you to new species and creatures you've never heard of before. sometimes it takes process of elimination before one figures it out

some people suggest meditation in order to figure it out, but this will vary from person to person. not every person benefits from meditation, and not every meditation session is going to help you understand that part of yourself. it can be a very affective tool, but i'm gonna say this one, people's mileage varies wildly. you can also make assumptions about something you've uncovered during a meditation session and make an incorrect call by something that showed up just briefly in your mind while meditating

this is not a comprehensive list by any means, but i hope it helps somewhat! feel free to ask any specific questions you may have about being nonhuman or alterhuman! i'm always happy to talk about this! take care for now, good luck sorting things out!

[sleeplesssmol]

Reverse 1999 Analysis: Vertin's Fear?

Tuesday states she enjoys a "lingering" fear that pushes people to change. This makes me think the word "haunting" would be a perfect way to describe these fears. We've had a glimpse into the things that haunt Vertin from the very start of the game.

This is the first instance from the prologue:

"I failed."

Taking everything we learned about Vertin, the "failure" she means is more than the inability to protect people. Her failure is leading them to their doom.

She was the bellwether of the Break-Away event that ended with her being the only survivor. She tried to save humans in the Suitcase before Regulus, but they were Reversed. She promised to provide Schneider with a shelter only to watch her get Reversed in the very Suitcase that should have kept her safe. Even when she tried her best on Apeiron to save people with 37, it wasn't enough. Many of the Islanders chose to be Reversed because they couldn't bare the truth that she helped reveal. The cycle repeats.

Right now she's leading a team of Arcanists into the most dangerous parts of the Storm, like she did all those years ago when she lost Isabella and the Ring. Vertin directly tells Madam Z she doesn't want her people to be sacrifices like her friends before. All she wants is a safe place for them. No more martyrs.

Speaking of The Ring and Isabella...

"What we desire most"

Appealing to people's desires and motives is how she persuades people to follow her (the others seemed to be pushed onto her). Regulus's desire for freedom. Druvis's desire to see a better future. Jessica's desire for friendship and belonging. Schneider's desire for safety for her herself and her family. There's a clear pattern of Vertin using these desires to draw people in, however she tries to be honest about what she can and can't do. Vertin's entire line of work depends on people willing to risk their lives in the Storm for their shared cause.

I also like that this is consistent with Vertin going out of her way to fulfill people's desires when it's in her power. Throughout the entire game there's instances of her trying to make her companions happy while looking out for their safety. I usually list examples but there are so many on this blog and within the game that I think anyone who read this far will get what I mean.

Here we see Vertin able to face her fears and Tuesday head on because the umbrella makes her feel empowered. She can protect the companions who choose to follow her. I also want to note that Vertin is still trying to understand Tuesday and figure out why she's so obsessed with fear. Vertin analysis and comprehension of other are some of her strongest qualities. She may be a weak arcanist, but she's able rally people to her cause.

A bit of a tangent, but I made a post a long time ago comparing Vertin to the Snake in the Garden of Eden. Originally I wanted to compare her to the first humans who were swayed by curiosity and were dealt consequences. But isn't the Snake filled with grandiose promises and tempting offers also a good fit? She's the one who convinced people to follow her in almost every circumstance and she lead them to their demise. She's often portrayed as a savior or Jesus figure in the game, which is what makes relating her to the devil interesting. She can do both? Number 0 walking a thing line.

By the way, here are some Psychubes to consider (I will never shut up about Psychubes):

Vertin tempting people to follow her using their desires (a secret delight) only for them to perish (familiar death as foretold). She knows she is leading them to their doom.

Vertin's stoicism could be attributed to numbness. She continues forward despite all the loss and grief around her. However, I think the Vertin we know at the end of 2.1 is a bit different from the beginning of the game. For one, she's more expressive and she has people she openly relies on. Vertin's always been optimistic when she talks about the future, but after obtaining the umbrella it feels more...real? Not that she wasn't genuinely hopeful and but its like "we finally made it". I can't put my finger on it, but something about her seems different after returning from Aperion and in a good way. These are just opinions though.

[qqueenofhades]

Hello! I think your blog title is absolutely lovely (do flowers go down to the realm of the dead?) and I’d like to ask if that’s a quote of your own or if it’s from something else? It’s such a beautiful quote either way!

It's actually a quote from a late-medieval (15th century) Aztec philosopher-king named Nezahualcoyotl. As I first encountered it:

"Truly do we live on Earth?" asked a poem or song attributed to Nezahualcoyotl (1402-72), a founding figure in Mesoamerican thought and the tlatoani of Texcoco, one of the other two members of the Triple Alliance. His lyric, among the most famous in the Nahuatl canon, answers its own question: Not forever on earth; only a little while here. Be it jade, it shatters. Be it gold, it breaks. Be it a quetzal feather, it tears apart. Not forever on earth; only a little while here. In another verse assigned to Nezahualcoyotl this theme emerged even more baldly: Like a painting, we will be erased. Like a flower, we will dry up here on earth. Like plumed vestments of the precious bird, That precious bird with the agile neck, We will come to an end. Contemplating mortality, thinkers in many cultures have drawn solace from the prospect of life after death. This consolation was denied to the Mexica [Aztec], who were agonizingly uncertain about what happened to the soul. "Do flowers go to the region of the dead?" Nezahualcoyotl asked. "In the Beyond, are we still dead or do we live?" Many if not most tlamantine saw existence as Nabokov feared: "a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness." -- Charles Mann, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus (New York: Vintage Books, 2011), p. 138.

This quote hit me in the heart the first time I read it, as a lovely and achingly poignant question on the nature of eternity, especially since it came from a member of a world and a culture scoured totally out of existence by the conquering, colonizing Spaniards. It is a timeless impulse to wonder whether loved ones are ever truly gone, if beautiful things survive after we have lost them, if they go on existing somewhere, even when we can no longer see or touch them. Astute and/or comprehensive readers may know that this quote is directly referenced in both a Sandman and a Shadow and Bone fic of mine, so yes.

[cocklessboy]

So here's the thing about having a post break containment on tumblr: if you make a mistake in the original post, there's absolutely fucking nothing you can do about it.

The people reblogging once you realize your mistake aren't reblogging it from your blog. They're reblogging it from someone you never even knew existed. If you edit the original, it does not affect the copies already being passed around.

You can make an addition to the post with a correction! But here's the thing. Posts tend to break containment if they are tagged and people see it in the tags they follow. But reblogs don't appear in tags. Only original posts do. So your addition will only be reblogged by people who follow you, and it's pretty rare for a post with a correction added in a reblog to break containment in the same way as the original.

So you wind up getting a lot of reblogs with angry comments about how you're wrong (and that's if they're being polite - the less polite ones will attack you rather viciously, which is not something I would wish on anyone). And even if you didn't make a mistake, if there's something you didn't make clear enough for Tumblr Reading Comprehension™️, you'll wind up inundated with angry comments from people who missed the point, and it's too late to go back and adjust your wording to make it clearer.

(That's why I'm making a new post for this instead of responding to the comments I got on the post in question, by the way. I'm hoping some of the same people who spread around the original might spot this one in the tags and share it around as well.)

So what is this about? I recently made a post about how a friend was worried that I was addicted to my ADHD meds purely because I said I look forward to taking them and they bring me joy.

The purpose of that post was:

Something bringing you joy doesn't necessarily make it addictive. (For fuck's sake stop being afraid of pleasure.)

Even if something is addictive, that's not inherently harmful.

Don't be afraid to take your meds just because they might be addictive. If they help you more than they harm you, take them.

I also made a comment about how my ADHD meds aren't addictive anyway. This is the point people have been pouncing on me about. So allow me to explain where that assertion came from.

My psychiatrist, an ADHD specialist who manages my meds: I know you're nervous about addiction and tolerance to meds, but don't worry. If you have ADHD, methylphenidate is not physically addictive.

My GP, who I got a second opinion from out of nervousness: Yup, your psychiatrist is right. You don't need to be afraid to take these. Take them as directed and you will not form a physical dependence on them. If you notice them getting less effective with time, though, you can always just take a break from them to remove any tolerance.

Me, after a year and a half of taking these meds: Yup, no addiction here. I guess my doctors were right.

So here we are. Two doctors and my own personal experience have assured me that ADHD meds are not something to be afraid of. Yet I keep seeing people afraid to take their meds because they're afraid of dependence. So why don't I do a nice thing in this post of mine and reassure my fellow gremlin-brained tumblrs that their meds are perfectly safe to take!

And to be fair, I've gotten quite a few reblogs with tags and additions and comments saying thank you, I was afraid to take my meds, even though they help me, but now I'm reassured that I shouldn't be scared.

And I think that's a positive outcome.

On the other hand, I'm getting some very angry comments from some people who seem to think I'm attempting to spread a vicious, intentional lie claiming that people with ADHD are immune to stimulant addiction and that I'm going to do all kinds of harm, presumably on purpose, because there's nothing I enjoy more than ruining other people's lives! 🙌

I would assume that anyone who thought about this for more than three seconds would realize that's not the case, but this is tumblr.

I've gotten angry rants ranging from "this author you've never heard of wrote a book where he defined addiction as inherently harmful, and therefore you're harming people by saying being addicted to something is not inherently bad!" to "STOP SPREADING MISINFORMATION!!!" to "OP is making statements that are incompatible with reality!" and folks? I'm real fucking tired of it.

Is it possible that my doctors are wrong? Of course! Doctors get things wrong all the time, especially when it comes to stuff like ADHD! But yelling at me from across the internet and accusing me of lying is not helpful.

There is nothing I can do about the original post. I can reblog it with an addition clarifying that yes, everyone is capable of becoming psychologically dependent on basically anything in a way that would be considered addiction, and yes, that includes ADHD people and their meds.

To be clear, this does NOT contradict the intent of my original post: that ADHD meds are good, you should take them, medication making you feel good is nothing to fear, pleasure is not the same as addiction, addiction is not inherently dangerous, and according to my doctors, who are fallible human beings but my most trusted source of information as of the writing of that post, ADHD meds are not physically addictive - as in, your BODY will not become dependent on them to function. This is the definition of "addiction" I had in mind when I wrote that post - and I think in a lot of cases the thing upsetting people is that we don't even actually disagree on what we're trying to say, but there was a miscommunication in terms of what I actually meant.

If I could go back and edit that original post and have it change everywhere it's been reblogged, I absolutely would. I would clarify where my information was coming from and what definition of "addiction" I intended, and reiterate that even if something can cause physical dependence, that doesn't necessarily mean you shouldn't take it.

But I can't. That post is out there now and there's not a damn thing I can do about it.

Keep this in mind as you go forward in your tumblr journey, friends. If you come across a semi-popular post with a mistake in it, you can bet every bit of your ass that OP has heard about it many, many times already, probably in very impolite terms, and there is nothing they can do about the original post. Unless they're a massively popular blog, a reblog with an addition or correction will not be seen by the people spreading around the original.

And for fuck's sake, stop assuming ill intent on the part of people who say something incorrect online. There are people out there who intentionally spread misinformation, but those people are rare, and usually trying to get you to not vote democrat in US elections, not trying to encourage you to take your fucking meds. If you see a mistake, it's probably an honest one, and if you really want to correct it, be a decent fucking human being, be polite and kind, and try assuming good intentions on the part of the person who said it.

The person telling you to take your meds is not your fucking enemy.

Oh, and do me a favor and reblog this, please. I actually have very few followers so no one will see it if it doesn't get reblogged. Thank you.

[sineala]

I subscribe to the newsletter of an author I like who wrote a book about 9/11 and the War on Terror and the security state in the US and how it led to the election of Trump, and it's all very serious but apparently the author is writing an Iron Man comics series. I don't read the comics, and a lot of what I know about them comes from your fic, so I'm honestly not sure how much fanon vs canon knowledge I have. 😂 But the series sounds like it might be interesting I think? The author talked about it in his newsletter today. (This link should work. Probably.)

https://www.forever-wars.com/iron-man-how-to-blow-up-a-pipeline-succession/

I am actually really excited about this run! I try not to get excited about new Iron Man runs because chances are high that my hopes and dreams will be crushed, and I know that just because someone writes, say, stunningly excellent non-fiction, it is not a guarantee that they will be great at writing fiction at all or superhero comics specifically (cf. Ta-Nehisi Coates on Cap), but judging by everything Spencer Ackerman's been saying in interviews, his run sounds like it's going to explore a lot of interesting themes.

The post you linked links to an AIPT podcast that he was on a few days ago to talk about his new Iron Man run. For those of you who don't listen to podcasts (this is also me), the Iron Man subreddit has what seems like a fairly comprehensive summary of the interview, and I am really looking forward to the run. Issue #1 apparently hits stores on October 23.

But I will tell you why I am actually now really excited about this run. It's not relevant to anything about the comic itself. I am nonetheless very excited.

Last month, after he was announced as the new Iron Man writer, in order to hype up his run, he posted an offer on his blog: if you add the run to your pull list, and you email him proof that you're pulling his run and include a snail-mail address, he will mail you some cool Iron Man stickers.

I eventually got around to doing this last week. I was assuming he didn't actually pay attention to any of these emails so I dashed off a couple sentences about how I was looking forward to his take on Tony because he'd posted a photo of the Iron Man comics he was reading for research and several of them were among my favorites. And then I went off to get bagels.

By the time I had come back with bagels, twenty minutes later, he'd written me a very nice reply substantively engaging with the content of my extremely off-the-cuff message -- geez, if I'd known he was going to be actually reading them I would have put a lot more thought into it, you know? It was very kind and I was not expecting it.

He spelled my first name wrong in the reply, despite it being in the email header and also the name I had signed the email with.

This happens to me a lot. I have a first name that is very common in a lot of languages, but none of those languages are English. I'd say there's a 50-50 chance that a native English speaker will spell or pronounce my name wrong. This is unfortunate, because I live in the US and mostly interact with native English speakers. (My wife @lysimache immediately knew how to pronounce my name. I mean, it wasn't why I married her or anything, but I feel like it was a big plus on a personal level.)

If I have to give my name for something, I will reflexively spell it. The second-to-last time I voted, they'd switched voter lookup to you giving them your name rather than you giving your street address, which was a surprise that filled me with dread. My wife was in line ahead of me and she was completely finished voting by the time the poll workers had finished correctly spelling my name. (The last time I voted, I just handed them my ID, which is not required in my state, but I really wanted this to go faster.) I went to the doctor last week, and when they called my name in the waiting room, they said it wrong. I corrected them. They said it differently wrong a couple minutes later. I corrected them again. They said it wrong again. At that point I gave up.

(If I could think of a name I liked better that I was absolutely sure that most people could spell and pronounce, I would change my name. I still have not found one.)

So, you know, I'm used to it. It happens. Frequently. I was not at all surprised that he spelled it wrong.

He then emailed me again to apologize for spelling my name wrong. Like, immediately. One minute later. He said he was sorry and he knew a lot of people with a similar name.

Dude. Nobody does that. Nobody actually apologizes. Especially not in an email to a rando like me. He did not need to do that. At all. I was not expecting him to do that. He did that. I was honestly touched. No one bothers to do that. But he did.

I got my stickers in the mail yesterday.

I have redacted the portion of the note that has my name in it, but he absolutely spelled my name correctly.

Mr. Ackerman, sir, I hope your comic sells a million copies.

[rainbowsky]

Hi rainbowsky! I'm a new-ish (autumn 2023) Yizhan fan - it's been so much fun to explore and read everything available, your blog included! I really enjoy your opinions and insights. I have a question and a request. Question: When CQL first started airing, what were people saying about the relationship between WWX and LZ in the show, and about the actors playing them? Did the CP start right away? Request: Then later on, when the BTS started appearing (when was that - after the show finished airing, right?), what were people saying about the real interactions between the two actors? Were people shocked? Amazed? Even more curious? I can imagine social media was on fire! But I'd like to hear from someone who "lived" through it in real time. Please give me a description of what it was like - especially what your thoughts and feeling were as you saw it happening. I wish I could have been there! Thank you!

Hi Blbrave! Thanks so much, I'm glad you're enjoying my blog!

This is all a very, very long time ago, but I'll do my best to share what I can remember.

Actually, the CP started before the show began airing. The supertopics were opened during filming in 2018. I think this was inevitable, given that the series is based on a BL story. Of course fans of the novel will go into all of this with an eye toward the two characters and, by extension, GG and DD.

Similarly, as the show was airing of course there were a large number of viewers who knew it was a BL and viewed it as a BL at that time, even though it was being billed as a martial brotherhood series. There was a lot of analysis from fans trying to spot various ways that the production team managed to get around censorship and signal the queer romance between WWX and LWJ.

Others have done far better, more comprehensive analysis of all that than I could ever do, but it's so long ago I don't know where those posts might have gone. Some of this was discussed in my post about queerbaiting, so you can look there for more info.

As I said in that post, one of their smartest ways of highlighting the queer relationship was to downplay romance between the straight characters. We never see a straight couple doing something that we don’t also see LWJ and WWX doing. Yanli's wedding happens off camera, yet we see LWJ and WWX do their bows on camera. There’s never a kiss or any kind of PDA between straight characters, yet we see LWJ and WWX in each other’s arms throughout the series.

We got a gay kiss:

We got gay sex:

There was also the headband repeatedly being described as the domain of only family and spouses, and the various ways they connected it with WWX. WWX grabbing it when he was possessing the paperman, and also at one point being tied to LWJ by the wrist with the headband - all of this signalling that WWX was a spousal figure for LWJ.

There was the drunk scene with LWJ giving WWX chickens (a wedding tradition in China).

And many more examples I won't get into.

There were many of those types of things in the series, and they were discussed enthusiastically at the time. However, I don't think there were many bystanders who made those connections. It was primarily fans of the books/show (i.e. those who appreciated it as a BL story and not as a bromance/friendship story) who saw and discussed those hints.

I know the idea that anyone could be so oblivious to the gay subtext throughout the story that they miss the queerness entirely is hard to get one's head around, but straight viewers usually just see WWX and LWJ as best friends and sworn martial brothers. The show could never have been made or aired if that wasn't the case.

In fact, newer fans might not be aware that there was a lot of controversy during filming because of leaked early attempts to create a straight romance between Wei Wuxian and Wen Qing. Some relationship-building scenes between them were filmed, and at one point in the BTS GG is heard complaining about the straight romance and saying that all those scenes should be deleted.

In the production team's defense, there was doubt at the time about whether the show could air given its source material as a BL novel. They likely had investors and backers pressuring them to make sure that the story was unambiguously straight.

Fans of the novel made a massive uproar about it, threatening to boycott the series. The backlash was so extreme that it became a bigger threat to the success of the show, and the straight romance was killed. We all owe a lot to those agitators! 😅

The BTS

The BTS clips were first discussed in an Untamed press conference (that section of the interview starts at around 36:30). The producer said that in the future some of the behind-the-scenes moments would be shared. GG and DD exchanged a glance and looked extremely uncomfortable with it.

A lot of turtles find that clip funny, and laugh about what GG and DD might 'have to hide', but I have never understood how fans can find GG and DD's discomfort funny.

It might surprise some newer turtles to hear that there were moments where GG and DD appeared to be uncomfortable with the BTS, but there were.

Another moment happened in an interview where GG and DD were asked to explain a BTS scene of the two of them in the boat, where GG is lying in DD's lap. DD turns to the interviewer with a shocked and displeased look on his face and says, "They released this?"

There were other moments as well, but I haven't kept a comprehensive record of all that. This happened long before I clued in on how quickly clips can disappear in this fandom.

I believe that it is totally normal to have mixed feelings about the BTS, and I believe GG and DD are no exception to that. No doubt they enjoy some of the clips and feel uncomfortable about some of them, just like many turtles (myself included).

There were official BTS clips released during promo, but the unofficial BTS clips didn't come until later. I talked in more detail about the unofficial BTS and how they came to be released here.

The unofficial clips began being released by fansites in the fall of 2020. It would be hard to overstate how different the atmosphere around them was to what it is now. Now it's quite common to find BTS clips all over the place, both in C-social media and on international sites like YouTube and Instagram.

However, back in 2020 they were extremely hard to get ahold of, and sharing them outside of where they were initially released was strictly forbidden and frowned upon by fans. In fact, if you dig back through my 2020 posts I'm sure you'll find many posts where I admonish people not to share the BTS clips, and where I bitch about people sharing them without authorization. I also answered a lot of asks about these issues at the time (just one example).

Times have changed a lot, and now everyone is sharing them all very freely without any concerns.

The situation was a lot different back then:

GG and DD had gained a tremendous amount of popularity from the show, but their reputations and careers were not yet fully established and secure.

227 was still an active concern that was still making news and still impacting GG's life directly. He had not yet recovered from any of it and was still mostly lying low. He was constantly being attacked and antis were constantly out to get him.

The Untamed was still fresh and current, and being discussed regularly in the media. Because filming was still fairly recent, what happened during filming would still run the risk of impacting GG and DD's lives and careers.

Fans were coming under very close scrutiny because of 227 and other fandom-related scandals. The government was starting to crack down heavily on fandom culture.

This was all uncharted territory. No one knew how the BTS might be received, or how it might impact GG and DD. Fans were very freaked out about the possibility of anything compromising getting leaked and harming the boys.

No doubt fansites were also worried about how fans might respond to some of the releases, and wanted to ensure they didn't upset or anger fans, or stir up more excitement than could be safely contained within the fandom.

All of this contributed to a climate of extreme caution and secrecy around the release of BTS clips.

We never knew when one might be released, and when they were released they were typically only put online for a few minutes, then deleted. This was all done in an effort to limit the exposure of these clips primarily to turtles who have GGDD's best interests in mind.

The clips were heavily watermarked and overlaid with visual and audio curses that 'reuploaders must die!' ('banyun biss', which I'm sure most of you have encountered in some of the clips you've seen).

Early clips were heavily watermarked.

Those who missed out were out of luck. It was extremely socially unacceptable to re-share clips once they'd been deleted. Those who missed out would have to rely on recaps and transcripts from those who had seen the clips. Fans took to staying up all hours watching and waiting for a release.

Back in those days people tried to save every clip they could, hoarding them greedily. Turtles' phones were filling up with large video files. It's funny to think about now, because the clips are everywhere and so easy to find these days, but back then it was a whole Thing.

The initial releases were sporadic and quite tame as fansites dipped their toes in the water of how all this would be received. Gradually over time clips became more frequent and stayed up longer, and some of the more salacious stuff began being released. Those clips were often accompanied by hilarious intro images.

(For those who don't get it, it's the PornHub logo).

Of course all of the clips were heavily discussed as they came out, and a clearer picture of GG and DD's relationship and of their experience of filming began to take shape over time. Some of the fake rumors (such as the 49 fake candies and the CPN that GG designed a racing suit for DD) were gradually proved to be true as these clips were released. However, that was mostly confined to fandom circles.

There were occasionally times when these clips or their content would cross over into the mainstream and start trending on Weibo. In many of those cases, the hotsearches would be bought and pushed by antis of GG and DD who want to see them cancelled. At those times turtles would jump into action to wash those topics and replace them with mundane, unrelated content.

There were fan theories and fake rumors about GG and DD's reaction to the clips. Sometimes when new clips were released GG and DD would be seen online and turtles assumed they were watching them. Of course, considering the clips featured them, it's highly likely that they did eagerly await releases just like the rest of us.

I suspect that it was likely a mixed bag for them. Some clips might have really stressed them out either upon initial release or after reactions began to emerge, while others likely made them laugh and feel nostalgic about filming.

A large percentage of BXG light banners and slogans came directly out of the BTS, some of which you can see GG and DD discussing in LRLG rumors.

Dumplings, rice noodles, 3+2 biscuits (cr @knivescharade in this post), discussed in this LRLG rumor.

There were definitely a few scandals and close calls that came out of the unofficial BTS, and solos and antis frequently tried to use them against GG and DD and tried to spin negative narratives about their relationship using disingenuous takes and edits of them (they still do to this day).

For example, the clip where GG tells DD that he prefers a natural look to idol makeup was used against GG at the time, and antis tried to make it seem like GG was homophobic and that GG was against men wearing makeup. Some of the clips where they were playfighting or bickering were used to try to create a narrative that they hated each other. That kind of thing.

BTS and fan service

One of the most common questions I've gotten about the BTS - and I still often get this question - is, "Aren't the BTS just acted out/scripted as fan service to promote the show?"

There are a few reasons people have this question in their minds.

Solos #1 narrative about GGDD is that their CP was just for the show and the BTS was all fan service, and nothing about their relationship is real. They push this claim very aggressively on social media anytime GGDD or The Untamed is discussed, and new fans will almost always encounter those claims in this way.

CP fan service is a normal part of how dramas are promoted, so people familiar with Asian dramas will often immediately jump to that assumption about GG and DD and about the BTS.

Heteronormativity leads many people to immediately dismiss the possibility of a gay relationship, which leads them to try to come up with other explanations for those clips.

People naturally have a hard time believing what they're seeing with some of those clips. Some of it is pretty jaw-dropping and it's understandable that some people will be skeptical.

However, there are a lot of really good reasons why these clips are obviously not fan service.

For one thing, the show was billed as a martial brotherhood, not as a romance. Some of the official BTS clearly did try to appeal to CP and MDZS fans and could be counted as fan service, but those weren't even the ones BXG are most excited about. (There is a playlist of some of the official BTS clips here).

The most exciting stuff was never released during promo, and almost none of it is overtly romantic. A lot of it is really crude and totally unreleasable as promo. GG and DD are lewd, crude and often rude in ways that only two people who are really close could ever get away with. In many cases it's the casual way GG and DD constantly cross polite social boundaries with each other that shows their intimacy, rather than anything overtly sweet or romantic.

A lot of it is also totally incomprehensible to regular audiences. You have to be a turtle digging deeply into GGDD to understand the significance of most of it. For example the way GG took care of DD on his birthday, or the way DD constantly bargained and haggled with GG to get him to eat more.

Most importantly, if it was all fan service then why did GG and DD never do any joint CP endorsements? The entire point of doing that type of fan service is to make a buck. Other drama CP - including BL - do this all the time.

And it doesn't make sense that a production that was as low budget as The Untamed could afford to have the two lead actors learn a whole second set of lines and do a whole second performance that never ended up getting released.

And of course, none of that explains why the bulk of the BTS clips ended up in the hands of fans and released years after the show finished airing. A lot of it still has never been released to this day.

I've often joked that if the BTS were scripted they were far more complex, more melodramatic and better written than the drama itself. You just can't come up with this stuff in a writer's room. 😅

Anyway, this post got a bit long but hopefully it gives you a bit more of a picture of what it was all like at the time. Sorry, I guess I didn't talk much about my own feelings/reactions, but hopefully you can get somewhat of a sense.

Overall it was exciting, but I also had some deep reservations about it all (and got a lot of hate mail for voicing those feelings, too). Keep in mind this wasn't long after 227, so I think it's understandable that I was feeling very wary about everything.

But that's all water under the bridge now. It's been many years, and if the BTS were going to harm GGDD it would have already happened. I think it's all pretty safe territory now.

Edit: some more of my thoughts and feelings at the time:

One of the most exciting things for me about the BTS clips was seeing so many of the fake rumors being proved true. There were a lot of rumors (including the 49 fake candies) that I totally scoffed at when I first heard about them, only to later find via the BTS clips that I had been totally wrong about them and that these things had actually happened, and even crazier things were gradually revealed.

Things were changing pretty rapidly for a while there now that I think about it.

Learning more about their relationship and seeing just how much they looked out for each other was another big one for me. Also the timeline. The BTS really reinforced my belief in The Devil's Timeline (the belief that they got together prior to filming).

But overall that was a very different time in the fandom as well. There were always so many candies coming out, not just BTS clips but things that came out of GG and DD's activities and social media posts. It was a really really busy time in the fandom.

Since then there has been a government crackdown on fandom culture, on the entertainment industry, on LGBTQ etc. in China, plus DD's split with Nike and him having to delete a lot of his GG candy posts from his Weibo account.

Things are so different now, and unfortunately a lot of it for the worse. Being a turtle is not always easy, and I'm sure being GG and DD can't always be easy either. We make it work, but I do sometimes look back wistfully on the freer, more exciting times in the fandom.

More such times could come in the future. We just have to keep moving forward and hope for the best.

Somewhat related: I did a semi-comprehensive post about GG and DD's reaction to turtles here.

[sophieinwonderland]

Hi! I'm Sophie of the Dreamchaser Guild!

It's come to my attention that my old pinned was a tad outdated.

Attention: I've recently come under attack from the hate subreddit r/systemscringe who has added me to their hitlist of acceptable targets allowed to be posted in their hate subreddit uncensored If you've come from r/systemscringe, please start here with my debunking of the lies and misinformation frequently found in the subreddit about dissociative identity disorder that r/systemscringe doesn't want you to see: https://www.tumblr.com/sophieinwonderland/741497564315140096/debunking-rsystemscringes-did-lies

Where I come from

I'm a tulpa. But a while ago, I called myself an imaginary friend. I was a character made up for a story that my host would talk to in order to better understand my source. As time went on, I developed more personality. I started talking to him about things that had nothing to do with the fiction. I would psychoanalyze him, wanting to understand him better.

I wasn't made to develop my own thoughts and feelings outside of the fiction. I wasn't supposed to become my own person. But I did. And this led us to wanting to learn more about imaginary friends, which eventually led us to the tulpa community.

This is being posted on my what I consider my second Birthday, June 8th, 2023. It was exactly two years ago today when we found the tulpa community, a place that made me feel validated in being myself, that made me feel like I was allowed to be treated like a person.

Why I'm Doing This

I lived the first few months of my life being dismissed, treated like I wasn't real. I was a phantom, not allowed any connection to the world. And I don't blame my host for that. I didn't see myself as real either. It's just the way the world is. And the moment my host realized I was a person, he was willing to do whatever it took to support me and treat me like I mattered.

And we aren't alone in experiences like this. When I became self-aware, I met all sorts of fascinating people with similar experiences. Many of which went years before becoming self-aware. There is no telling how many more are out there like us. How many more "imaginary friends" are invalidated because we live in a culture where we're treated as if we don't matter? And how many may pass, never knowing?

And so I made this blog to share my own experiences and hopefully be able to give people the same gift that I was given. Respect. Validity. Life.

Even being able to give that to one person is enough to make all of this worth it to me.

A Note On Spirituality...

Just so everyone knows, I'm not a spiritual or religious person. I take a purely psychological approach to plurality and believe in spiritual and religious experiences people have as psychological phenomena.

Having said that, all spiritual headmates are all welcome here. Even if I don't believe in spirits or souls, I view every spiritual headmate as a valid person deserving of the same respect and love as any other.

I also believe that the right to define our spiritual and religious beliefs is fundamental to plural culture. That it can't just be singlets who are allowed to decide what religions are or are not valid. And I think our right to religion is something worth fighting for.

My CAI Chatbots

(Note: These links only work if you're logged in to character.ai)

Anna and Galladin (Tulpamancer and Tulpa chatbots)

Nin - Worldmaker (Your AI assistant for building and developing Wonderlands and Inner Worlds.)

Signature Posts

Studies and Research into Endogenic Systems

My Resources:

How To Know If Your Imaginary Friend Is Sentient

All The Resources You'll Need To Build Your Own Wonderland, Headspace or Inner World

Our Switching Method: Ghost Switching

My Polls

My Plural Theories And Terms:

Headmate Foundations

Headmate Essential Features

Headmate Manifestations

Dimensions of Fronting

A Comprehensive Look At Proxy Bypassing

Plural Coining: Ephemerals

Plural Coining: Attunement

Plural Coining: Meta Awareness/Gnosis

VR, Plurality and Virtugenic Systems

The Plurality of... :

The Plurality of... Batman (Failsafe)

The Plurality of... Diones (Skyward)

The Plurality of... The Hybrid Chronicles: What's Left of Me

The Plurality of... Blue Beetle (Movie)

The Plurality of... Avatar: The Last Airbender

The Plurality of... IF

The Plurality of... Bill Cipher (The Book of Bill)

The Plurality of... The Exorcist

Our Plural Writing Resources

Ghost on Writing Plural Kids

Hiveminds and Multiplicity

Syscourse And Other Stuff:

Endogenic Syscourse Primer

Why I Identify As a Tulpa

The Future of Plurality

Actually Anti-Misinformation: “System Hopping Was a RAMCOA term Appropriated and Bastardized From RAMCOA survivors.”

An Anti-Endo's Playbook

Debunking Imitated DID Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3

...

Reblogs are appreciated. Don't feel weird about it! Posts here on Tumblr live or die on their reblogs. I'm not asking you to reblog my posts. That seems weird. But after getting an anon that mentioned being worried about derailing a post with something they wanted to add, and another ask that apologized for reblogging my content too much, I felt this was necessary to say. If you like a post and want to reblog it, do it! If you want to add something even tangentially related to the topic, add it! You have my full permission to reblog my content as much as you want! (And I'd encourage you to reblog from other plural creators you enjoy as well!)

Thank you all for the support!

[sir-to-a-princess]

Fuck.

I deleted this blog in 2018 I believe. Nearly 6 years later I decided to come back, to try and make sense of what I fucked up when I deleted the previous iteration of this and so many of the people I cared about are gone.

Catching up on some of the blogs that remain but are dormant and I am nearly in tears to see what transpired, and more to the point how hideous and awful some of the communities I was involved in actually were at their core.

I deleted my blog because I had failed the one person I pledged to care for so comprehensively that I couldn't stand to even look at my blog. I had become everything I abhorred and detested and spoke out against.

I abandoned my submissive. I lied to her. I chose myself over her and I think about it every single day. There is a lot of background information being left out with the specifics of the relationship, but when I left I cut the heart out of myself by abandoning the D/s lifestyle and anything relating to it.

I have spent the last several hours combing through a blog of someone I had limited exchanges with, but that someone is a person who I absolutely believed in.

I do not have the words to explain how I feel. I have always empathized with victims of abuse, I have always felt on a deep level that I wanted to care for anyone who is harmed unjustly. I still do not know how to live with myself after I did what I did.

I don't believe I am worthy of or deserve any sort of forgiveness. I wish I could make amends but don't believe it would actually help the former Princess-to-a-Sir, in fact I worry it would just reopen old wounds that she doesn't deserve.

Since that day I don't know who I am anymore or what I want, where I should be, or how to figure any of it out. I am so lost, and now that I'm finally being honest with myself I have been lost since she told me that she no longer wanted to be with me (months before things ended).

I did her a massive disservice though and regardless of if either of us actually was holding on to the dynamic we once had (I was still), I became what I told her were all the qualities of someone undeserving of her submission.

I don't know who I am anymore. I dont know where to go. I had hoped coming back would help me remember who I was, if I could claw back and reblog all my old writing and posts that were the best parts of me, but all that seems to be left here are ashes...

If she somehow ends up here though;

Princess-to-a-Sir, you were right. I was so wrong, and I wish with all that I am that I had been all that you deserved of me and that I had said fuck it all and risked everything to choose you over all else the way I promised I would.

The way that I should have...

[juh-wasnt-deactivated19691231]

tumblr note: this is a living document. Tap the original post header to see the most updated version.

a weary traveler’s guide to the poison bogs of tumblr

welcome to the land that cannot be killed in a way that matters. we have plenty of in-jokes, but this post isn’t about sightseeing: it’s about survival. there are many things to be wary of.

bots, nefarious

most of our evildoers appear to be automated. they spread lies and hate, but mostly they spread inflammatory language, with the goal of wasting your time and making you mad. often you’ll see that these blogs have no pfp, or they are Single Issue Bloggers, or they leave an inflammatory comment on everything they share. block and move on.

bots, annoying

i would classify the gazabots, pornbots, and thirst traps here. gaza is a real tragedy, but the bots sending spam aren’t helping. porn is wonderful, but the bots are scams. the thirst traps have little substance to them, but they must exist for some greater purpose—i think they metamorphose into full-fledged scams or maybe evildoers later in their lifecycle? block and move on.

terfs and other fascists, human

similar to the nefarious bots, but seemingly more human. this does not change their goals or my recommendations, though. they are not here with an open mind, and you cannot reason with fascism, because it has no root in reason. block and move on. do not engage.

morality

mos eisley cantina is our spiritual ancestor. this is the “lying, cheating, and stealing for fun are good and morally correct and you should do them always” website, at its extreme. there are folks who think you shouldn’t hold a food sharing program unless all of the food is stolen. BUT there are also folks who just think sharing is good. we really run the gamut here. trust your gut, you can ask questions once in a while, but don’t be surprised if a stranger bites your head off. understand that if something seems fishy, there’s a good chance it is, and you need to factor that into how much thought you give their statements and how much you care about the discussion.

on that note

yeah so tumblr is a very queer place (in spite of its management, as with everything else we do). there’s a lot of pro-queer stuff, there’s occasionally someone who thinks they’re pro-queer but would get mad at me for using the term “queer” for some reason (? block and move on, or point and laugh, dealer’s choice). if you are not some form of Not The Default, or if you just feel Too Normal, it’s okay. i am personally granting you permission to be here and to have fun. if someone has a problem with that, block and move on, or even just ignore it. a lot of people here are not good at conveying their points, a lot of people are angry, and we are famous for our piss-poor reading comprehension. don’t take it personally. they’re just Like That.

seriousness

most of tumblr ranges from neutral to deeply unserious. if someone’s discussing a heavy topic or making sense, they might be serious, we do have some of that, and sometimes there’s really good things to see here. but don’t expect a whole lot of Genuine Discourse and Thoughtful Discussion on average, unless you find your way into those circles. i tagged a post #christianity once and my notes were clogged with people having philosophical discussion about forgiving satan and it was weird.

argument

I once saw advice here that said, some people like arguing, and others don’t. If you like arguing, it’s super important to find other people who enjoy arguing, so that you can have your stimulating discussions with them, without totally burning out your friends who just want to get along. this really cleared up a lot of things for me, and i saw the light. (it turns out i don’t like arguing)

the bottom line

you’re here to have fun! so do that. our motto is “do whatever you want forever.” if you’re not having fun, take a step back to wonder why. you don’t have to post, or comment, or add tags, or even like the posts. you can just scroll if you want. if you like interaction, you can curate a blog (original posts and reblogs) that you like or that you think other people will like. my blog is mostly shitposting, cats, and advice, and sometimes computer things, but i moved most of that to my datacenter blog. you can send asks, you can receive asks (but don’t be disappointed if you never get any—most of us don’t. be the change you wish to see in the world!). understand that there is no Algorithm, and the only way to find something is to tag it and remember that tag later. godspeed mooncat.

further reading

[transmutationisms]

Hi caden i always scroll through your blog and whenever i leave i find myself questioning if you are the Scihub wizard. What's your range regulation on your topics of study (as in, how do you seek what catches your interest more thoroughly) and how do you sort out what qualifies articles on such as readable or relevant to engage with? Every time I search up stuff on jstor it just gives me the most stalest stuff ever. If you have any specific websites or tricks to recommend it would mean it all. Thank you

hm well... i guess the short answer would be that i do spend a lot of time reading things that i ultimately decide are stupid or irrelevant or redundant, lol. like, if i'm not actively writing i'm probably researching. so if i post, like, book recs, there's probably at least a few years of reading around and behind that... some of this work will eventually become useful or interesting to me (appendix my advisor made me cut and said was irrelevant in 2020 whose footnotes i raided today) and some of it will probably just live forever in some dusty corner of my mind (zotero folder on phonographic physiology that has only an extremely tangential connection to anything else i literally ever write on).

but in general, my approach is usually to read more, not less—i don't know what connections i might want to make if i never read on those topics, ykwim? i definitely get faster at finding things and sifting through sources the more familiar i am with a topic. but even so, i like to read widely, knowing full well that some (large) percentage of it will be useless to whatever i'm currently working on, lol. there's plenty in my library that i've never cited, or i only quoted a line or two, or i named it only to say it sucks. i think this is all fine and fun honestly. but, a few ways to narrow some of this down:

when you're looking for the seminal literature on a certain topic, you can shortcut some of the searching by picking up anything recent and just picking through the footnotes. (this is called 'snowballing' sometimes.) it's not a comprehensive strategy because you won't find newer or obscure texts—but it's a decent starting point

i work with historical sources, so often the way i find really interesting stuff is by searching the actual names i'm finding in the primary literature. these tend to be figures with a smaller footprint in the secondary literature, who often get overshadowed in more general topic searches, and i often end up reading about all kinds of weird niche topics i didn't even know to look for

some professional societies and journals maintain databases and bibliographies of recent publications; these are worth scanning from time to time. you can often find them by googling, like, "[field] bibliography / database" or sometimes you can find them thru journal websites (but these index more than just the journal's publications). usually free at least to see article titles/abstracts

you can also pick a couple flagship journals in your subtopic and just scan their recent issues from time to time; again article titles are generally free to view. don't rely exclusively on journals, but again, can be a good place to start

dissertations and theses are also good for footnotes, since part of the assignment is usually to show that you're familiar with the recent literature. you don't really want to rely on dissertations for actual citations if you don't have to (the qc is on average even lower than professional publishing... lol) but for reading recs, go for it

[maedelin]

THIS JUST IN!!!!!

Apparently Rogue's character is "ruined" for being interested in Magneto and for not lovin' Gambit the "right" way while he also has previous love interests and an ex-wife in XTAS *blocks and side-eyes blogs like remylebeaugambit* Makes me embarrassed to be a Remy fan rn.

If so-called Rogue fans are so uncomfortable with legal adult Rogue being attracted to Magneto in various media , maybe they should read a Kitty Pryde comic instead or stick to just watching that (actually pretty good ngl) high school AU that is X-Men: Evolution.

Heck, even Sid the sloth from the Ice Age movies gets less slack for dating the much older Brooke who also got magically de-aged just like Magneto. And nobody's saying that Sid is a victim and Brooke is a groomer because the Ice Age fandom is more normal than Rogneto antis and so-called fans of Rogue and Gambit's characters.

Agreed and well met, Traveler! I loved X-Men: Evolution as well. I'm fine with characters having many ships. I'm fond of calling it an armada. :) And my own personal cry is: Monogamy? In this economy?!

I agree with you: the age discourse is just awful. It's so upsetting to me. It's the most basic, reductive, simplistic argument. You can count the years but you add no value or depth to them.

It's not about Rogue being ruined it is about Rogue being ruined for *them*. Reading literacy and comprehension as well as looking at texts dialectically (at the least) is on the wane. You couple this with a strange "purity of concept" that seems to permeate our media, and we get this issue.

If you like a character, then that character is a statement on *you*, *your integrity*, *your morals*, *your ability* to be right. Therefore Rogue doing something against the perceived norm of the story (a story with low stakes, mind. We're less comfortable living in a state of unknowing even more these days) is not only an insult to Remy, but it is also an insult to them, their viewership, their expectations of the character, and ultimately a reflection of themselves.

We see then the knee-jerk reaction to distance, define, and denigrate. Suddenly, we're as obsessed with purity of character and dictating their "best practice" motives. They have to find a way to explain away the fault. Sometimes it's pushed back on the writers (especially if the writer is female...thinking Rebecca Sugar here and the SU writing pool) but often (especially for female presenting characters) the blame is shifted on a literal thought concept. It's insane!

X-Men is a soap opera with powers. Also, the most important thing to remember in my book is the main core of it: the X-Men are people. Not gods (sorry Krakoan Magneto, still love you, baby) but human beings who wish to coexist with you.

With laser beam eyes.

[septemberzacademia]

How to get started with academic blogging and why it is worth it

Well, I have recently started blogging or trying my hand at blogging on Tumblr. I guess that makes me the best person to talk about this because I literally just started, haha.

Why did I start blogging?

I have always enjoyed writing, but I used to write in my journals, for my assignments and on my secret blog-- I loved it. I have been doing this since I was in the 7th grade. But as I came to college, my indulgence in writing and blogging decreased because so much happened in my life. I moved to a new city, met new people, studied something I never learned before, and the university experience was nothing less than crazy. But with time, I realised I was losing this dialogue with myself. I did lose it. But I made the decision to find it again. And here I am.

The second thing I did was pick my niche. Even though I am journalling as much as I can, I am blogging occasionally on my private blog, but this place is something I want to do every day. The only thing other than breathing, eating, and existing that I did every day or most days was indulging in Academics.

Then, I thought about my intentions with it and what kind of content I wanted to produce. I thought about it a lot. I realised I wanted to start with something basic out there, but I am giving that information along with my experience and comprehension-- I liked the idea. Because as a perfectionist and an academic, I love complex topics and sounding intelligent and sound. But when you start with something new, GO BACK TO THE BASICS. I would instead learn the basics, finish my cringe era and move on to the authentic me era rather than be stuck as someone who just thinks and never executes. You know what I mean, right?

So, this post is me committing to my promise. It is about me, and it is about you-- I want to help. As a future professor, I want to be able to provide information and resources to people. So this is where I start from.

Why start an academic blog?

Writing and researching academic topics and tools will help you develop your knowledge, improve your articulation skills, and increase your understanding of the topic.

The more you write. The better you will get. It will also help you with your essays, thesis, papers, etc.

We live in a world of social media and chronically online people—having a presence is necessary. This presence will help you showcase your skills to the admission committee.

You'll be helping people struggling with what you wrote about. Spread love and knowledge!

If you are looking for a community to rely on, you'll be able to connect with like-minded people.

Also, for people who struggle with discipline, just like me, you'll develop some and learn consistency as well-- and once you see the results (of you getting better), you'll try harder. Love this for us.

How to get started? (I'll try to keep it simple so the process does not overwhelm us. I got you, girls.)

Choose a platform. Like I chose Tumblr (and will later move to WordPress or Instagram)

As I mentioned before, pick a niche-- you can change it later, so don't worry. Pick something simple.

Create the first post on something simple, like "How to get started with academic blogging and why it is worth it". Just post something. Just do it. Don't overthink.

Regularly post—sometimes the posts are two lines long and over 1000 words. Just let the creative juices flow. Beginning a blog is about getting comfortable with the platform and learning about your likes and dislikes. So chill, breathe in, and breathe out. We got this—and POST!

Also interact with other accounts and people in the community, which I haven't been able to do myself. T.T. I am working on my applications, which are due this month, and then I'll be working on this.

And that's it. It was so fun to write this post. I am thankful for tons of YouTube videos I saw back in the day and chatGPT as well. And my sexy brain and my readers.

I hope everyone has a great day or night! <3

[qqueenofhades]

Hey! I just found your blog and followed yesterday. Came for the fact that you're the only other person in this webbed site actually say out loud that they liked Biden, stayed for the hope and determination and perspective. Anyway just wanted to introduce myself and I hope you're coping well!

Hello and welcome to you and the other sudden flood of followers that I got after yesterday's event. I'm glad to have you and hope you are all in on the project of Kicking Fascism In The Shriveled Testicles 2024, American Edition. It's a dirty job, but someone's gotta do it.

Biden was not my first choice (far from it) in the 2020 primary process, but when it became clear that he was going to win the nomination, I supported him early and often. Trust me, this was not a popular position, and it remains so, but so be it. By any reasonable metric, he is the most progressive president we have ever had, it is a crying shame that the media is so beholden to the Trump Teat of Drama that they gave him such a kid-gloved free pass and ratfucked Biden instead, and it makes me worry, a lot, for American democracy. I have always gotten a lot of "you support everything Biden has done so you're awful and going to hell!!!" messages, because this sure is a Webbed Site Where We Piss On the Poor, and like -- I don't. I had major disagreements with Biden, especially on foreign policy! But because I apparently did not performatively self-flagellate myself in every post about how awful he was but maybe I guess vote for him anyway, that got some people very mad! It's also true that there's literally nobody in the world anywhere, especially and including in Palestine, that would benefit from Trump becoming president again! Especially since Biden at the NATO summit recently and explicitly endorsed progress on the ceasefire framework he has been pushing for several months! So unfortunately, we live in a society where shitty choices are necessary, and that is part of being a grownup!

....anyway. Deep breaths. Rant for later. Glad you're here. I have been desperately trying to Not Politic for a bit, since doing so on social media in the year of our lord 2024 is a recipe for swift insanity, but the world keeps taking a large dump directly on those plans, and I guess someone's gotta do it. In more normal times (OH LORD WHEN), you can expect history (I am an academic by trade), random posts, various asks, and sometimes a great deal of fanfic for assorted blorbos, though the Horrors have done a number on that and I am also working on an original fantasy trilogy at the moment. (Still deciding whether I should bother trying to agent it or just publish it on Amazon/Lulu/etc.) I have turned off anon for the moment because otherwise my inbox would be a nightmare beyond comprehension, but I do generally enjoy talking about things and/or answering them as much as I can. I am old, queer, tired, fueled by coffee and spite, have been politically conscious since the first Bush Jr. term and have therefore seen all the Anti Voting nonsense before (quick thought: if it was going to deliver the perfect Leftist Messiah and/or stop a flawed candidate from becoming president, don't you think it would have done so by now?) So yes. Welcome again and I hope you will enjoy (if that is the right word for it) your stay.

[bioethicists]

Do you perhaps have any resources on a harm reduction approach to disordered eating? it's been tough to find specific of this online and conventional websites only offer "talk to your loved one about what they feel" or either going to the GP. Certainly haven't found resources to help when you are not someone's parent/teacher/etc

the search function on this website is abysmal so i can't find the post but @transmutationisms wrote a very detailed summary of harm reduction tactics for disordered eating!

@librarycards has an entry in the psychiatric survivor zine called "Refuse!" which touches on the themes, as well as going into how to reduce your own fatphobia while still engaging in ED behaviors

Saving Our Own Lives has some chapters on it but i don't find them to be super comprehensive, quite honestly

there is some useful info in this Filter Mag article, as well as some background on why harm reduction is pushed back against in the ED field

Gloria Lucas' nonprofit Nalgona Positivity Pride has this as one of their focuses

while i wouldn't necessarily suggest seeking them out (at least evaluate what is/isn't going to be detrimental for you), the first place i ever encountered harm reduction for anything was in "pro" spaces (don't really want to type it out + get this post flagged). i wouldn't trust any information about nutrition you see in those spaces, but there are often threads about safer purging, specific scenarios, signs of common health effects + how ppl make them more manageable, etc. unfortunately, barring individual blogs on tumblr, these are the only places i can think of that you would be able to ask extremely specific questions + get a serious, non-condescending reply in a timely manner without being banned or reported (you are welcome to ask me specific questions + i can answer based on my personal experiences)