#it actually makes it more tragic and upsetting if you view his parents with empathy and try to imagine what they were going through too

[ssruis]

U know I dislike angstkasa and in general have a distaste of angst for the sake of angst but there’s a certain genre of “examining tsukasa as a kid under a microscope to explore why he has the insane neuroses he has today” that makes me fall to the floor in anguish (complimentary). & it depends on how his relationship with his parents is written. Nothing makes me sadder than the tragedy of his parents realizing that he’s so abnormally unselfish wrt their attention (due to him turning being a big brother into a mental illness) that they’re more upset/concerned about missing big events for him or leaving him home alone or not spending enough time with him than he is -> he sees them upset about this & internalizes it as “I made them sad it’s my fault and I need to be even more independent so they don’t worry.”

I think when he was younger he didn’t really have any “they’re always focused on saki” moments (or if he did it was rare & followed by immense guilt) because he was also focused on and worried about saki, and wanted to spend as much time with her as he could. He’d rather be with his parents and saki than be with his parents while saki was alone. & I think this genre only works if current tsk is like “this had zero lasting effects on my psyche the sad times are over and I don’t need to worry about it anymore.”

Idk I just think that a shoehorned ooc angst situation that casts his parents in a very unfavorable light for no reason < the very realistic depiction of parents who are constantly stressed and worried over their daughter and trying to balance getting her the care she needs with taking care of their son and working and not showing this stress to their kids. and they’re trying so hard to do their best by both of them and tsukasa’s shift from baby who clings to them -> “I need to be responsible and mature and independent to ease my family’s worries/burden (he is like. 5)” is slow and unnoticeable and maybe a little taken for granted (unintentionally) while they have so much on their plate. & then one day kid tsukasa does or says something that makes his abnormally unselfish attitude glaringly obvious and it’s too much so they break down and cry and apologize because even if they’re doing their best they still feel like they should’ve done more for him & kid tsukasa is so confused and doesn’t get it but all he knows is that he made his parents sad. so he further internalizes the “I need to do whatever I can to not upset my parents I want to make them happy” thing.

[roxannepolice]

I have a hot thoschei take: I don’t think most of doctor who tumblr is ready to confront the idea that Missy allowing the Doctor to “fix” her was almost more a form of self-harm for her than anything else. Which makes the confrontation between her and the Master even more upsetting to me than if it was a simple ‘Missy good, old Master bad and sabotages her goodness.’

It’s more like looking on your future self and seeing her restrain herself further and further in ways you’d rather die than do, in ways that are slowly erasing what makes you/her yourself/herself. and when you realize that she will happily push you into this fate, too, (and has the audacity to preach about it), how else can you react but cut her loose.

And it also makes Missy and Twelve more interesting to me, because you can’t really argue the Doctor doesn’t know that he’s contributing to this. He locked her in a box. He knows her far too well to really believe she’d want to live so long in confinement, but he does it anyway. I don’t even think it’s that divorced from love or a need for them to come to an understanding; the Doctor just wants it to be completely on his terms and for the first time ever, that control is entirely possible and he doesn’t even have to feel guilty about it because she’s letting him.

Anon, I'm kissing your brain. And wish I could transplant it into Moffat's head.

I suppose my own brain is a bit too of a "they are characters in a text, serving a purpose to the point made by the author, not self-aware people making choices" bitch to really view it this way. But I absolutely agree this whole situation was much more effed up than fandom gives it credit for. I mean, the basic message of the vault arc is "here's the fool-proof way to develop empathy: a human lifetime of solitary confinment! Let's just ditch all those resocialisation programs in prisons and put all violent criminals in solitary boxes with only psychologists visting them! :DDDD".

Yeah, ok, that last point was a bit over the top in social engineering area even as far as fan bashing is concerned. And, tbh, I think a positive side of the vault arc is the not-sure-if-intended idea that it in fact wasn't decades of solitary confinment with Twelve coming to banter through a locked door only actual interaction with Bill that had Missy introspect, but wtv, it all just needed to go tragic in the end. I think the really unawarely messed up part here is this underlying insistence on. well, basically writing the Master as Darth Vader. There's still good in you, I can feel it!, as in just go back to being a child that I will be idealising in the penultimate episode, which frankly sounds to me the extact same as GO2 Aziraphale asking Crowley to just go back to being angels only even nicer :) (sth sth angelhood as a metaphor of pre-selfaware childhood when you can't even tell yourself apart from other people and especially God-the-Parent). Basically, the big idea being the Master's villainy isn't a result of conscious choices of a hundreds year old eldritch horror only not hearing the music whatever that means.

Of course, it was backwards engineered, in a "ah, but what if there really, really, reeeaaaallly wasn't any other way for the Master to survive than as the Doctor's prisoner?" way, which could work considering how survival focussed the character is (like, surely that wouldn't be worse than becoming a cat? or a 90s effects goo snake? or a man eating emo electroskeleton? or a tooth?)... but then we have a "yeah, but there's like an evil past that does value their independence (and evilhood) over survival, ain't that tragic?" ending.

Basically, I think the problem is not so much Missy accepting being the Doctor's prisoner, as not trying to escape even freaking once? Like, if we started off with her being dishonest about the whole teach me to be good :((( and then easing into living like this, this might have been an interesting idea? But yeah, as we are, you're right, it just. Comes off as trying to amputate a limb that got caught in a mousetrap rather than snares...

[twen-nee7]

How Trump Changed My Dad

tw: racism & all the prejudices

Last weekend, I saw my father, and, for the first time in my life, I heard him say racist things about Chinese people. In fact, this was the first time I heard him say anything this openly racist at all, except against “reptilians who call themselves Jewish.”

This isn’t some story about us uniting after a long period of time and him being a racist. My dad has always been in my life, and I love him very much. This is a story about how he has changed since Trump became president.

This is pretty long, so get the rest under the cut!

TL;DR: My dad has had his worldview skewed so radically due to conspiracy theories that he thinks that everything Trump says is true, and that has become a seed for racist remarks and ideas that are in direct opposition to viewpoints he had even last year.

It is interesting, and tragic, to reflect upon what Trump’s presidency has done to my family-- or, well, I suppose, my father. Before I really begin to get into this story, I am in no way condoning is point of view in any sort of way or trying to make excuses for him, because he is a grown adult who can make his own decisions. That said, he is also incredibly gullible under the correct circumstances. Unfortunately, Trump has kind of become those “correct circumstances.”

Before I get completely into this, I’d like to give some backstory on who my father is, because I think that’s important to realizing how absolutely floored my sister and I were to hear him say racist shit about Chinese people.

My dad grew up in a Jehovah's Witness family. If you’re unfamiliar with that sect of Christianity, they are a cult. My grandfather was excommunicated from the church when my father was young, and my dad (and all his siblings and my grandmother and my grandfather’s parents and brothers-- you get it: the whole family) was forbidden with interacting with him. To interact with my grandfather-- my dad’s dad --was to meet the same fate. No Jehovah's Witness is allowed to talk to someone who was excommunicated.

Despite this absolutely bizarre-ass rule, children are allowed to communicate with these people, so long as they’re not a full part of the church. My dad and his siblings were just not able to speak with my grandfather because my grandmother (and the rest of the family) were not allowed to interact, not because they were fully a part of the church. Thankfully, my father avoided the ceremony that would make him a true Jehovah's Witness throughout his life, so I have been able to correspond with my family who are still a part of the cult due to this loophole. 

This loophole also made it possible for him to escape from an abusive situation with his step-father, and he moved in with my grandfather when he was thirteen.

I know this is exposition-heavy, but bear with me here. I want you guys to see the person I grew up with, not the guy that he is now, so you can understand why I am so confused and upset.

My dad is a fucking fantastic musician. He has so many good stories, but here are some highlights from his life:

* A close family friend who is a Native American taught him a lot about his culture. My dad likes to talk about how sacred nature is, and he also loves to talk about the very odd experience he had following the man’s meditation instructions. According to my father, he was teleported (in his mind) to a library where every book is the book of someone’s life. When the Librarian asked him if he wanted to read his book, he said no. This experience rattled him.

* He moved to the South Side of Chicago in the early 90s to chase his dream of music. He worked in a diner that was at an intersection where gang violence was common, and he lived even deeper south in the city than the diner. He recalls with horror what he saw, but he is quick to explain that there is a duality to people: people in gangs, he always likes to say, are just as human as the rest of us, and he always tells us he met “a kindness I never saw in anyone else,” in the people who came into his diner (especially the gang members).

* He also lived in Austin, Texas in the 90s, and played music with a band with an incredibly diverse background. He was on TV a few times (I imagine it was local, lol), and he loves to tell the story about the time that he ended up playing guitar at a Latinx club because he did a good job putting electricity into some guy’s house. He uses his story there to explain how to be humble-- he always tells us that everyone in the club was dancing to the salsa tune, then his dumbass had a guitar solo and he played the blues, which killed the vibe. “Always take in your surroundings.”

* When getting a tattoo, the tattoo artist mentioned in passing that a biker had paid her with his soul for a tattoo. My dad and his friend were drunk, and they bough the guy’s soul for $20 and planned to use it “to get big.” The next day, they were sitting at the table with this guy’s soul contract, and my dad said that something came over him-- “I knew that if I did what I wanted to do, I would get famous, but I also knew it wasn’t worth it.” He burned the contract. The karmatic repercussions of using some poor guy’s soul to become famous just isn’t worth it.

My father also taught me how to respect life. I lack empathy. I feel like I would have a much harder time with my life without my father’s patience in my earlier years. He taught me how to be socially appropriate in a way that wasn’t demeaning, unlike the rest of my family who berated me (and continue to do so) when I did something they viewed as wrong. One particular story sticks out:

When I was about nine or ten, we were camping with his side of the family. I caught a crawdad (crayfish for you non-Appalachian folk) out of the creek, and I was very curious what color it would turn if I boiled it. So, I did just that. 

I’m definitely not proud of that. 

My dad had always tried to explain to me the sanctity of life and how we shouldn’t just kill things prior to this, but that time he really seemed upset. He told me how disrespectful it was to the animal, and then told me to think about what it would be like to be boiled alive. He then told me I should at the very least eat the thing, which... I told my cousin to do because I am a picky eater.

That lesson definitely stuck with me more than, “Don’t kill spiders.” or, “Hunting for sport is wrong.”

Throughout my life, my father has been the level-headed one. He has been the one with useful life advice who actually knows how to have friends and talk to people. He has been the man I looked to to be socially appropriate and a “good person” because my mother has been chronically unable to keep any sort of friendly relationship for anyone longer than a year or two. She isn’t a very good social role model.

So, imagine my surprise last weekend hearing my dad talk about how much he hates the Chinese.

His basis? The time we went to California, and “they were way worse than the other drivers.”

I looked him dead in the eye and said, “Dad, everyone sucks at driving in California. It isn’t just Chinese people. White people can’t drive either.”

Now, I know he doesn’t hate Chinese people because of their driving. We went to California in 2004. He has never once mentioned a goddamn thing about Chinese people not being able to drive (or Chinese people in general regarding that trip), so it’s pretty fishy he would suddenly bring it up sixteen years later. 

This is especially odd since I’ve only ever heard him sing words of praise for Chinese immigrants, or, honestly, immigrants in general-- up until about a year ago, but we’ll get to that in a minute.

When my parents split-- and I know this may seem like another unnecessary deviation, but hold with me here --my dad’s obsession began. He moved in with his father, my grandfather, the man who hadn’t seen any of his family aside from my father and me for thirty years. My grandfather was a doomsday prepper. He owned something like 300 acres of land in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains down in what is known as a “Holler” here-- a small community of people who are very close to each other, live on the same road and are usually pretty friendly toward each other.

My grandfather also deeply believed in the corruption of the government, and how that would inevitably be the downfall of everything. While he wasn’t spouting anything about Hollow Earth or the sky actually being a projection, the man was distrustful of all things establishment. This kind of thought process definitely didn’t help my dad when he was going through a divorce, and I remember he really got into learning more about the 2012 Doomsday at the time.

To back up a bit, my parents have always been conspiracy theorists. My mom claims to have prophetic visions and that she is in contact with a Gray alien, which, yes, is probably just the schizophrenia, but my dad never questioned her and honestly, believed her. He was all about aliens and Area 51 and “Bush did 9/11″ when my parents were still together. He only got worse when he moved away, taking up the Doomsday stuff and digging deeper into 9/11, and then kept falling down this fucking abyss of a rabbit hole when he moved from my grandfather’s place into an apartment in the suburbs.

There, he didn’t have things to do after work. He didn’t need to attend to the horses. He didn’t have the hills to walk through. He had himself and oh dear god, man

The release of the first Assassin’s Creed was where the decline became noticeable. We bought the game, and the next time I saw him, he was telling me about the Knight’s Templar. As the years wore on, he only got worse. 

If you guys have seen the “Q Map,” that shit is all shit I can explain to you. Yes, I can tell you about the Draco-Reptilian Nazi Fleet, the Space War, and how Draco-Reptilian Nazis live in Hollow Earth. I can tell you how the Vatican relates back to the Knight’s Templar back to Moloch back to Egyptian Pharaohs back to Ishtar up to modern-day banks.

Look, I myself am gullible. I have the same kind of trait that makes me very paranoid and distrustful of people, especially authority.

My dad was spouting shit about “Kh****ian Jews” and how they were actually reptilian people (not real Jews!) who owned all the world’s banks and were trying to manipulate the populous into a One World Government, and, I’m sad to say, I believed it. Then, thank god I met my partner who shut down my bullshit really fast and has been a wonderful person to ground myself with.

(For those curious, my dad has asked for my partner’s bloodtype because they’re Jewish, and was visibly relieved when I told him it was B- instead of “an RH bloodtype” because that means that my partner is human... yeah.)

All that to say that I have an open mind. I’m willing to at least humor the idea of Nazis in Antarctica based on Admiral Byrd’s papers. Hell, I even humored my dad’s Flat Earth bullshit for a little bit, until I watched that Netflix documentary of Flat Earthers trying to prove the planet is flat, but only further proving it is round.  I’m totally willing to listen to alternate ideas, and I definitely find a lot of merit in many conspiracies.

This isn’t about aliens visiting Egypt or civilizations predating Sumeria, though, this is about my dad tripping on conservative conspiracy theorists and falling into a tailspin down the wrong fork in the trail.

This started with him listening to what he describes as “an underground conservative news channel.” He originally began being wary of the Democrats because he believed Hillary Clinton was a reptilian, but he originally was like, “Yeah, all politicians are these reptilians.” I honestly have no idea when that changed. The man didn’t even care all that much about politics until around the time of the 2016 election.

I’m assuming this is because Clinton was running, and he felt invested in not letting a reptilian become president? I swear, this man has a whole section of his brain dedicated to “Why The Cintons Are Bad,” and that only got worse as the 2016 stuff ramped up.

He started watching Alex Jones. I lived with him during this time, but I was going to college so I wasn’t home with him very often. I’d come home to the TV on Alex Jones practically foaming at the mouth every night and my dad asleep on the couch. Around this time, he started talking down to Democrats, which, hey, that’s fine, both parties in this country suck, and he honestly was interested in Bernie as a candidate.

He does still like Bernie, for the record. He even said this year that he wouldn’t mind Bernie as president.

The election rolled around; Trump got elected. Then, a lot of stuff happened.

* My dad was working for my uncle (his brother-in-law) and also renting from him. My uncle was barely paying him enough to live, so he decided to take his old job back.

* Shortly thereafter, my uncle sold the house my dad was living in. He didn’t even offer it to my dad. He fucking sold it under his nose. Not to mention, my dad was the one who put in all the flooring, bathrooms, wallpaper, etc into the house.

* My dad moved into a small farmhouse in the middle of a corn field. His old house was in a town, so he at least had interaction with other humans outside work. There are so few houses on the road he lives on that it doesn’t even have the ability to buy internet if he wanted to.

Living very much alone in the middle of a goddamn field has really impacted him.

My dad surrounds himself with what he believes to be unbiased news, but outright says are “underground conservative news outlets.” I mean, the majority of his time is spent listening to this fucking bullshit, playing old video games and jamming on the guitar.

Since the election, my dad has come to view Trump as an absolute force of good. He does admit that he does not like Trump as a person, and that he thinks that he’s honestly pretty gross, but he has been more-or-less brainwashed to believe that Trump is going to “save this country.”

Why?

* Trump is weeding out “the people the Clintons put in.”

* Trump is “going to make sure people who committed treason get what they deserve.” He points to John McCain and how Trump evidently tweeted something nine months before McCain died that eluded to the date?

* Those people who are committing treason are also part of a child trafficking ring and drink the blood of terrified children. I mean... maybe minus the blood drinking, but at least this one makes some sense, I guess.

* Trump is disbanding the Federal Reserve, which means that he is “taking the reptilians out of this country!” as well as putting the US dollar back onto the gold standard-- as if we have that much gold.

These were the original reasons why he liked Trump. He really thought, and continues to think, that the fucking orange in office has the best interest of America at heart just because he isn’t a politician. Anybody who ran for office who wasn’t a politician and got elected would have my dad’s praise, but it just happened to be Trump.

And what does that mean? It means my dad began by not agreeing with all Trump’s policies. It means my dad had a fucking brain, that he drew those conclusions himself with some aid of “”news”” (conspiracy) outlets.

But, because of the trust that he has put into this man, and the trust he has put into his “underground conservative news,” my father has allowed his perception of reality to become so incredibly skewed. For example:

* “Trump’s tweets are encoded by a quantum supercomputer to give news to the masses! Every misspelled word, random number and incorrectly capitalized letter means something, and it changes every time!”

* Dad says he doesn’t mind immigrants, but he constantly talks about how the people who want to get into America “aren’t actually struggling.” He pointed to something that happened in Mexico a little while ago and said that the people trying to get in weren’t starving, and he said that was all because they were a distraction hired by the Democrats to pull news from the trafficking of children over the border to contribute to the “adrenochrome market.” This is where some of his racist shit started.

* He believes all earthquakes in America in the last four years have been due to the Democrats “blowing up underground bunkers” to hide the fact that they are “conducing illegal human research.” He believes there is a whole world underground full of clones, and claims that ships docked on the West Coast exist there to help people that they take out of these underground cities. He also, of course, believes Trumpy-poo is the whole reason why “those poor people” are being liberated.

* According to him, there are Chinese tanks in the Amazon, and China is mounting an invasion on America. Believe it or not, this isn’t where he started talking shit about Chinese people.

* Trans* people do not exist. He also has become worryingly fixated on who he thinks is trans*? Literally any concert he sees on TV with a female lead singer becomes him pointing out “why that is actually a dude.” He’s also very fixated on “Michelle Obama is actually a man.” When we ask him why the hell that matters, he says it’s dishonest because “no man wants to be a woman.” Christ.

* On that note, he told me point-blank that women have more rights than men. I am AFAB. I fucking bluescreened.

* The BLM movement is just a way to deter from the election. The Democrats are busing in people to start riots and make cities shut down. “It isn’t a natural escalation of things to destroy your own neighborhood.” He also thinks the whole movement is shit beyond that because, “Everyone gets treated like shit by the police. I’ve been held down and beaten by a cop-- it’s just part of living in a city.” I... moving on

* “COVID-19 was created by the Chinese for the Democrats to skew the election.” He then points out all the sicknesses that broke out around other elections, like SARS and H1N1. This is where the sudden hatred of China comes from.

There is also just... so much more, but it is so incredibly tiring to try to think of all the things he tells me. Every time I look away to edit this anecdote, I remember more bullshit, so this is going to be the finalized list.

So, all-in-all, my dad went from being a very empathetic, compassionate man to having those traits used against him to believe that being racist is okay. My dad got sucked into politics because he was worried about the country being ran by reptilians, and now he believes that wearing a mask during a global pandemic is “unpatriotic” despite spending the majority of his life complaining about patriotism.

My sister and I try to set our dad straight. Any time he says something racist, we counter it the best we can, and it usually comes down to, “I’m not talking about all of them. I’m talking about the ones the Democrats paid off to do this stuff.” Unfortunately, there is no convincing him otherwise on that part, because if we try to show him anything regarding it, he deflects by saying that we got it from “a mainstream news source.”

I feel powerless as all hell because my dad has become something very distressing, and Trump / conspiracies are all he ever talks about.  I can only hope that his absolute bullshit “underground conservative news outlets” either get shut down so he has to look elsewhere or that he somehow finds some news source that he trusts that isn’t sucking Trump’s dick. I don’t know.

[larksinging]

okay I'm gonna submit a few ideas of christmas stuff and you can pick whichever works best for you I guess! some art of ivypool and hollyleaf hanging out, a long post about my writing or my roster maybe? or idk maybe some hollyleaf meta in general bc Fave Cat

alright here’s a second gift before i need to leave

alright storm! i’ve only known you for a few months but those months have been super rewarding. building up rp dynamics and talking about fight cats is always a joy with you, and i always appreciate little moments when you reach out when im upset. thank you for everything! 

i wanted to add a little something to the meta post gifts i did, so here’s a quick storyboard thing, i call “as thornclaw says, still gotta patrol even in the snow”

alright so let’s do the ultimate warriors thing: talk about how hollyleaf deserved better

i think i’ve said before that one of the erins’ actual strengths is in writing sibling relationships. considering how “the three” colloquially in the fandom still means “lionblaze, jayfeather, and hollyleaf” i think that says a lot about how good that sibling dynamic is. the setup of those three is so good and you can really see how deeply they care about each other and how strong their bond is from even the very beginning of the sight. plus the original setup creates this really interesting dynamic with jayfeather and the op but bitter and rebellious one involved in spiritual stuff, lionblaze as… strong maybe a touch densebut well-liked, and then hollyleaf as clever and super lawful. also in typing this i realized how they all have some potential to go a little dark, esp with how the prophecy treated them. anyway this is hollyleaf meta not three meta. that dynamic is so good and something that i think dovewing never really fills, because the erins don’t know what to do with dovewing.

though in some ways i’ve always found hollyleaf not having powers as something interesting? theres something really compelling in someone being surrounded by all this special stuff and being denied it. it would have been even better if her lack of starclan specialness was actually key to her doing something important, but… trust the erins.

actually now that i think about it, hollyleaf as a character is really unique? she is defined by her strict adherence to the code, which is something we… really don’t see any other time. sure, plenty of characters are strict, but nobody is quite as focused on upholding the code to the letter of the law in the same way hollyleaf is. warriors is full of a lot of rulebreakers, honestly. even outside of her role in the three, that makes her one of the most unique wc characters? i’d put her up there with mothflight, fireheart, and needletail as “having extremely interesting views and relationships to the warrior code”.

as much as POT’s ending is kind of a trash fire, i always thought hollyleaf’s breakdown at the end of that was pretty well-done and compelling. nothing is gonna break someone like hollyleaf more than knowing she is the product of such a huge infraction of the code and the way of life she holds so dear. her spiral into darker and darker actions makes sense but is also heartbreaking. it’s a shame ashfur wasn’t developed more as a villain, because i think there’s a lot of potential for him to be a foil to hollyleaf. he is obsessed with romance and revenge, whereas hollyleaf is too preoccupied with her ambition. but moreso, ashfur shows that he actively doesn’t care for the code or the good of the clanwhen he’s preparing to reveal the leafpool thing. ashfur choses his personal biases and emotions over the clan and the code to a point where it’s destructive, but i’d argue… hollyleaf does too. hers is more self-destructive, and she isn’t as willing to admit it, but the end of POT is hollyleaf spiraling as she can’t let go of how her family situation torments her, to the point where she begins to disregard the very thing she held dear. that’s really tragic

i’m glad they did bring her back for oots, because her return sets up a lot of themes that become important towards the end. OOTS has this sense of finality and old conflicts finally ending, so hollyleaf returning and being welcomed back into the clan (and the subsequent, though i think poorly handled, forgiveness about the leafpool thing among everyone involved) really is a first step in the reconciliation theme. then that sense of desperation, and everyone coming out of the woodworks and banding together to face the dark forest. buut one of her most compelling themes in OOTS is her natural parallels to ivypool. they could have had a lot more interesting development together than they got, which is a shame. they are both excluded from the prophecy and that drives them down a dark path (for hollyleaf it was more complicated, but). and while they’re different they both have a sense of determination and willingness to do anything - even self sacrifice - for the good of the clans. honestly while i think her disappearing isn’t bad for her arc, hollyleaf still being in thunderclan and having been ivypool’s mentor would have been interesting

alright to keep this from getting too long ill make this “au i want” part short, but. where is hollystar and ivypool deputy au. hollyleaf becoming leader was kind of foreshadowed in her desires early on, and the idea of hollyleaf getting redemption to the point of becoming deputy and leader afterwards would have been so satisfying. plus you get her getting to be special despite not being in the three, or because of not being in the three? it would also fit thunderclan’s whole “we don’t care where you came from or who your parents were, if you’re a loyal warrior then that’s all that matters” for someone from such a complicated situation to become leader. also though, hollyleaf should have had powers. what the fuck. give her jayfeather’s empathy power, or give her some kind of minor future-sight, or maybe she can view time more slowly to plan better, or something. jayfeather’s power is spiritual/emotional, lionblaze’s power is physical, so giving hollyleaf a power that’s mental would be a perfect way to complete the trio.

tl;dr hollyleaf is one of the best and most interesting characters in warriors and she got robbed so hard and it’s a fucking shame

[toralyzer]

apparently there was this series of personal writing prompts for autism acceptance month that i missed, but i decided to do them all now cause i like talking about myself. http://doingcollegedisabled.tumblr.com/post/159842938764/30-days-of-autism-acceptance

Day 1.     Make yourself known.

I’m Amanda I’m 19! I was professionally diagnosed at a young age but by the time they told me I already long since knew I was weird.

Day 2.     Talk about passing and/or being out.

I’d be open about it I think but it hasn’t come up many times. I guess I did work really hard growing up to be able to pass as allistic though. Oh... I’m not sure if that’s ever caused burnout!

Day 3.     Talk about relationships, both platonic and romantic. 

Yeah as a kid I had a hard time making friends but now I’m a lot better at being sociable - in the allistic way I guess. But now lots of my friends are proudly autistic anyway!

Day 4.     Talk about your family and support. 

I think my family was fine about it. Unless in fact my trauma comes from them dealing with my autism badly. It’s unknown.

Day 5.     Talk about employment and your career. 

Yeah I gotta get one of those...

Day 6.     Talk about music, art, writing, and other forms of creativity. 

Yeah I do that stuff! I’m really creative. Sometimes I think about autistic themes but I don’t think I know what they would be, I think I have too many bad depictions internalized. Sometime I wanna do something with the changeling comparison though...

Day 7.     Talk about community. 

I guess I’m really not out as autistic anywhere ‘cause I pass well. So idk. And I’m not in any communities of autistic people.

Day 8.     Talk about traditional media. 

I think as a kid, media depictions gave me this horrible sense of condescending superiority toward myself and added to my complexes of not listening to my feelings. It’s like, you get these books that put you outside the autistic kid to laugh at his misunderstanding things, and I think then I felt like any sincere expression of my own feelings and thoughts was an immature misunderstanding and worthy of shame.

Day 9.     Talk about Autism Speaks.

Ya, fuck them.

And/or  Talk about special interests.

Damn I’m not sure if I’ve had a special interest lately? I guess some things I’ve been constantly thinking about lately are, um, Sports Anime RPG and my Zimmy fanfic. Okay so Sports Anime RPG is a roleplaying game I’m making based on sports animes even though I haven’t actually seen many but I thought it was a cool idea. It’s split into two sections, one is for the sports games and you can swap out different rulesets for different sports, and in general it’s focused on strategy and mechanics, similar to traditional RPG battles. The other is more freeform roleplay for the story outside sports matches, with light skill checks that are mostly social-based. And there are friendship mechanics where you can build friendships with other characters and get friendship abilities that you can use in either mode! And then the Zimmy story is this fanfiction idea that I always come back to when I feel really fucked up in my head - the premise is basically to throw together all the most viscerally upsetting surreal gore and horror set pieces I can think of, in the context of Zimmy from Gunnerkrigg Court’s reality warping getting set off bad. I’m a little frustrated because I can’t figure out how to express how much I love Zimmy and want to save her but also address how abusive she is.

Day 10. Talk about a cure. 

It’s a divergence not an illness so it wouldn’t be a cure so much as just mental modification. And no that would be really evil for other people to be able to make us allistic

And/Or  Talk about stimming. 

Yeah I like stim toys sometimes. I have a bracelet of rainbow stars and a thing of rainbow blocks you can put in different shapes and a fidget cube. I think a bigger thing for me though is that if I’m listening to a podcast or so I need to play a video game that uses my hands but not my listening brain. When I do that it can be the most fulfilling and engaging activity ever. Watching video fills my attention too much to do a simultaneous activity but not enough to keep me from being distracted so it’s not as easy for me.

Day 11. Talk about sensory issues. 

When I was a kid I only wore shorts all the time. Now I’m hugely self-conscious about it and I’ll never wear male shorts again. Yeah, I guess there are various sensory things I have a problem with... It’s not too intrusive to my life though.

Day 12. Talk about ableism. 

I don’t think I’ve got any stories here. I’ve never been targeted directly.

Day 13. Talk about something funny. 

“Has anything humorous or ironic ever happened to you because you were autistic?“ Haha probably not anything I’d want to joke about!

Day 14. Talk about role models. 

Uhhhh I’m not sure I know any autistic role models. Sometimes there are tumblr users who are vocally autistic who seem cool. Role models in general? I was saying the other day, I used to have a list of people I wanted to be like, but several of them have since become my enemies, so. Yeah, I think every celebrity disappoints you eventually. The last person about whom I thought “well, at least so far, this person seems really good and kind and a cool artistic inspiration” was... Rebecca Sugar.

Day 15. Talk about identity. 

I was diagnosed with aspergers but later I learned that’s just a subset of autism now. I like autistic better.

Day 16. Talk about treatment. 

I haven’t done any that I can really remember. I should go to therapy though. Like in general.

Day 17. Talk about empathy. 

I guess usually I have more sympathy than empathy for people? But sometimes when my girlfriend does a kind of cutesy sad voice as a joke I get some kind of weird hyper empathy and get really sad.

Day 18. Talk about functioning labels. 

I hear those are bad. I would probably be on the higher functioning side but yeah, those seem like a bad idea because they describe how well society is ready to engage with us as if it was our own success or failure.

Day 19. Talk about your struggles and strengths. 

I don’t really know which of those are because of autism or not and I’m self-conscious about finding out because I spent so long trying to learn to be “normal”. On the other hand sometimes it feels like it’ll turn out that autistic traits just account for my whole personality.

Day 20. Talk about communication. 

I’m verbal, sometimes I like when I can communicate in other ways though, like when I can get something across with quick hand signs.

Day 21. Talk about comorbid conditions.

Well I’m not sure about any of those and I don’t think I’ll speculate here to make sure I don’t appropriate anything.

Day 22. Talk about autism parents. 

Wow fuck them! Yeah I was just reading about #BoycottToSiri. People who abuse their kids because they can’t fathom trying to interact and listen to them to understand what they really need and instead go to great lengths to train them like animals into simulating “normality” should die.

Day 23. Talk about your living situation. 

I have a roommate who I know enjoys being able to stay in their room without ever encountering a single allistic or cis person. ^u^

Day 24. Talk about the stereotypes and misconceptions that neurotypicals and allistics have. 

Luckily I haven’t encountered it much in person but I know people see us as a young boy with a slightly distant expression with a single savant skill but also enough tragic disconnection from the rest of humanity that they can safely feel intellectually superior. Wow now that I think about this it’s actually this really unique way of viewing a person where they feel that the stereotypical expression shows that this child doesn’t really exist outside of his mysterious, unknowable brain and therefore all of his personal space and bodily autonomy is up for grabs. It’s really unsettling how autistic bodies in media are dehumanized into dolls because the portrayer is so obsessed with emphasizing this perceived unbreachable distance between the subject and the human observers.

Day 25. Talk about meltdowns/shutdowns. 

Kinda had one earlier because academic research is so frustrating. I think work pressure like that is the usual cause, other than social overload.

Day 26. Talk about echolalia and scripting. 

Yeah I don’t use really specific scripts for most things now, but when it comes to formal things like phone calls I do really need to work out my full sentence before I start.

Day 27. Talk about eye-contact. 

I think I’m pretty okay with eye contact? I don’t think I give people the wrong signals? This always makes me self-conscious X(

Day 28. Talk about autism as a disability.

It’s not a disability ‘cause it’s just different, right? Or are there aspects that strictly make things harder? I don’t really know...

Day 29. Talk about executive functioning.

IT’S DEFINITELY AN ISSUE.

Day 30. Talk with pride. 

“Are you proud to be autistic?” Yeah definitely!!! “How do you show the world your pride?” Oh. Hm...

[servingkarmalikecake]

Maybe the Silence is Dangerous

As a child, Louis Weasley was happy and carefree – at least he thinks he was. He can still clearly remember the endless summer afternoons spent in his families cottage playing hide and find with his mother, or running barefoot across sandy beaches with the sun on his shoulders. He remembers the way the sky looked just before sunset as he stood on the front porch with his sister, who had held his tiny hand in her own and whispered a quiet story to him about the tragic love affair of the sun and the moon. Victoire had always been so dramatic. At the time, Louis had believed her; with all the wide-eyed wonder that only a still innocent child can possess. She had been his hero back then, Victoire. She was the statuesque goddess that snuck him extra cookies when their mother wasn’t looking and who threw the very best imaginary tea parties – of which Louis was always officially invited to attend. For years he basked in his sister’s light, blissfully unaware that one day soon he would have to give her up. He still remembers standing on a platform in a busy muggle train station, watching her leave for the very first time. He still remembers, peeking out from behind his mother’s cloak, eyes wide and red from too many tears, watching her rush up to meet her friends and shrieking excitedly – hoping she would turn back, just once, so he would know she wouldn’t forget him.  He still remembers.

As a child, Louis Weasley was loved and loved in return – at least he thinks he was. But Louis Weasley isn’t a child anymore, and just as the sun in the sky, the innocence of youth had been chased away by the darkness.  

There was a clinical explanation for the way that Louis was now. He had researched the subject himself, exhausting all resources available to him, - both wizarding and muggle alike – until he’d satisfied his need to know. In the end, it hadn’t really mattered…he wasn’t looking for salvation or absolution; he just needed to know. It didn’t change anything, didn’t stop him from slowly shutting down those tiny parts of himself. Emotions were messy and complicated; but as Louis got older he began to realize that they were so much more than that. Emotions were weakness and made you vulnerable and were just…pointless. Over the years it had become increasingly easy to disassociate. Cognitive disturbance a healer had suggested once, after his mother had dragged him to countless ‘specialists in an effort to fix him. Depression a muggle psychologist had said, after his father had taken him to muggle London at the urging of his grandfather.  The final straw had come at the hands of another healer – one who wanted to study Louis. His blood made him extremely rare and of great interest, considering. But Fleur, having been the subject of envy and interest her entire life, would hear nothing of it. Parents always want what is best for their children. To give them better than what they themselves had been given but in the end isn’t that just a lie that your mind tells you so that you feel better about yourself? Louis was special. But not in any ways that could be properly explained – not even the science.

In the end, his parents had given up and simply let him be. This didn’t upset Louis, it didn’t seem to bother him at all – but then, few things rarely did. Oh, there were occasional outbursts – those fleeting, elusive moments when he simply lost control, but even those lessened with age. Most of his extended family didn’t quite know what to make of him, and that was fine. They couldn’t help but be what they were –fallible; human. Often he was mistaken as being a bit soft in the head – as he’d overheard his idiotic Uncle Ron say once, but that couldn’t have been farther from the truth. Louis was smart and sharp, to the point of compulsion. He spent his time absorbing knowledge from everything around him because it was far easier to view the world from a clinical standpoint. When you stripped away all of the cumbersome qualities of empathy and emotion you were left with, as muggles say, the science.

Louis Weasley was the science.

He didn’t quite know why he had agreed to come. Family gatherings had long since been lost on him. Maybe it was his mother’s insistence that he postpone his departure from Cornwall for just one more week. Maybe it was the owl he’d gotten from Victoire, which had been lovingly written in her elegant, looping script demanding his presence at her tea party – just as she had when they were children. Maybe it was his father’s quiet acceptance of his son for whatever he was or Dominique’s indifference. But it wasn’t any of those things, not really.

The first time Victoire had brought Teddy home was hardly the first time Louis had ever met him. He was after all, an honorary member of the legion he was forced to call family. But it was the first time that Louis actually had an opportunity to sit down and talk to Teddy – for more than fake pleasantries. Like Louis, Teddy was different and special and the more that Louis talked to him, the more interesting he became. Unlike the rest of his family he felt connected to Teddy somehow; on a level that other people would not relate to, and he spent countless hours over the span of his adolescent life, learning Teddy.

Currently, Louis was standing on the front porch of his families home, eyes fixed on the fading sun as it slowly disappeared beyond the horizon. The sounds of laughter and happy shrieking filtered softly out through the screened door and Louis smiled – Victoire had arrived, which meant Teddy had arrived.

Louis shoved his hands into his trouser pockets and inhaled deeply through his nose, a salty ocean breeze ruffling his hair and carrying away with it, a slowly exhaled breath. He didn’t move to return to the house, he didn’t need to see what was happening inside to know. His parents were always so happy when their first-born returned to the nest. Their eyes would light up with pride and love and it was all a very boring affair that he’d seen countless times before. It was better this way, leaving them to their reunion; they all knew it, none more than Louis.

His mind wandered back to Victoire’s tale about the torrid love affair of the sun and the moon as he stood there, facing the sea, and for just a moment, he envied the stars.