#it's quite clear on rereading that the way i phrased my reblog did make it sound like i thought ace hcs about Martin were wrong

[czolgosz]

"rpf ocs" is a fascinating phrase i would love to hear more abt that if you would like to share

ok there's really only one rpf oc (i just didn't want to make up a new original story tag format) and that is gwyneth (no last name) who you've probably seen me mention?. and she's just following the classic leon czolgosz rpf thing of having prominent fictional characters. but to recap: she parasocially falls in love with leon czolgosz and breaks him out of prison (through the power of surrealism not needing to make apparent sense), and well to be quite honest he doesn't like her or her dragging him around very much. <-explaining the relevance of the reblogged image i used #rpf ocs on. and again something important to note is that it's based on a dream i had which is why i'm always calling it "rpf from my subconscious"

umm just to pad out my response here's a description of her demeanor that i wrote for my associate SAM of mckinleygirl98 hello SAM. (btw i'll return to collaborative writing someday i promise 😭. i think of it often..) well hopefully this isn't missing any context that i otherwise told them (i'm not going to bother rereading):

gwyneth’s main thing is that she feels trapped by society, partially because she actually is due to being a woman and very clearly having some things going on psychologically, and partially in silly unsympathetic ways—she’s very “i wish I were poor so I didn’t have to act respectable 🥺!” with no thought of what being poor is actually like. at her core she’s remarkably self-centered and solipsistic and is decidedly unconcerned with politics despite being aware of how eg. feminism could help her because she just doesn’t feel like she can be bothered. she’s also obsessed with the concept of romance and specifically wants to have a “forbidden” romance to cut her off from higher society; this is related to her sort of fetishising style of classism as well as her immense loneliness and idea that a man can “rescue” her from her life, because again she has a sort of self-inflicted learned helplessness going on. <-hopefully this is all coherent.

and then mckinley gets shot. she sees his assassin in the newspaper. she finds him conceptually alluring; he’s really taken a shot at society! look at his initiative!! and she decides it’s time for her to break out of her metaphorical prison and take action as well by breaking this guy out of his literal prison. she plans. her weird, prying questions and suspicious reconnaissance all go smoothly because she’s white and has no foreign accent and dresses nicely. she succeeds at getting him out—despite the necessity of some murder, it goes oddly smoothly, the first indication that maybe this… isn’t actually happening. leon is rattled. gwyneth doesn’t care. she has some high expectations for him! and is very thrilled by this whole situation! but she hasn’t developed that much. she tries to defer to leon for decisions despite him being even more clueless than she is (did i make it clear before that gwyneth has some internalised misogyny problems?), but, importantly, she sees him as more of a concept than a person, as she does most everyone—she’s just decided that he’s an important concept, so in the narration he gets a name and something of a personality. and anyway as i’ve previously mentioned, gwyneth becomes more controlling and paranoid as the story progresses. and it all ends in ambiguity over whether her death was suicide or murder, whether leon died too, and where she even is at the time. <-hopefully this is all coherent too??

MAIN TAKEAWAY: gwyneth is ridiculously self-centered and doesn’t see anyone, including herself honestly, as a complex being with thoughts & feelings & goals, and this definitely comes across

[thedreadvampy]

As an ace arospec person, I don't think your first post about Martin was aphobic. But the way you just keep digging yourself into a hole is the real issue. When you first saw people had issues with your comments, you could have just made a post that said "I'm sorry that my wording implied that being aspec is infantilizing. It wasn't my intention, aspec people are valid" or something like that. But you just kept going and now you're speaking on things you have no real authority on (qprs etc.) 1/2

and you're constantly playing the victim card which is really infuriating when aspec people are just trying to educate you and figure out if you can be trusted. And maybe that comes off as rude but you don't know how many times I've looked up to someone or enjoyed their content and then found out they're aphobic. "I lost my dad i lost my snake i don't know where I'm at housing wise AND i somehow managed to start more fights while i wasn't looking." Just apologize and stop dragging this on. 2/2

---------------------------

Hm. No?

Every time something blows up, I get two rounds of people in my inbox, half of whom are angry that I'm not answering their questions and half of whom are angry that I am. I am not "playing the victim card," because I'm not having a bad time because people are criticising me and I wouldn't be having Not A Bad Time if they weren't, if you scroll back in my blog prior to the last week you may notice this is Not New. This is however my fucking blog, which I maintain specifically because I need somewhere to put things that are overwhelming me or sick in my head, so ex-fucking-scuse me if I say "haha I'm having a Bad Time" when haha I'm having a Bad Time. I haven't said and nor do I mean "I'm having a bad time so nobody's allowed to criticise me" or "I'm having a bad time And It's Your Fault," the only reason I have ever connected the two things is to say "I'm having a Bad Time which is why I'm being a bit slow off the mark answering messages about this, but I'm not ignoring them"

No, I'm not gonna fucking apologise for eventually caving and answering a question I have repeatedly said "no I don't think it's my place to speak on that so I'm not going to" after people have repeatedly demanded I Answer To The Anonymous Jury. Jesus fucking Christ like I'm not up here at my podium giving a speech on My Opinion On QPRs unasked I literally. have been repeatedly told I'm being shitty and evasive for days for Not Unequivocally Stating My Position On Ace Issues so nah son I'm not going to now feel like it's a great imposition by me to answer that question.

And no, I've said this before and I'll say it again, an apology is literally meaningful only as a commitment to action and I'm not comfortable or willing to make a show of apologetics in order to appease people or avoid criticism. I will not say "I'm sorry that my wording implied that being ace is infantilising" because, given that, once again, I at no point even mentioned infantilising and only mentioned aro/ace identity to say that it wasn't what I was talking about, I don't think my wording did imply that. I'm open to being proved wrong but literally so far nobody's even explained how they read it that way, so no, I'm not fucking sorry that I ~implied that being ace is infantilising~ because as far as I'm concerned I Did Not Do That. and I won't be sorry for it until someone can point me to where the fuck I did that and I can identify what I did wrong and what change is needed. Am I sorry that people have been hurt? Definitely. Am I sorry if people don't feel safe interacting with me? Very much so. But I'm not going to ~say sorry and move on~ because that would be hollow, performative and dishonest.

[magireco]

Would love to hear more thoughts on how these girls have understandable teenage motivations (A+ tag analysis by the way)

1. Thank you!!!!!!

2. ALRIGHT IVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS (shuffles my papers). i’ve gone off about homura’s motivations in depth before but i think it was only in dms/groupchats? anyways i’ll go in order with All the girls bc i think about this all the time as a teenager who grew up mentally ill and had their perceptions skewed because of it, and also i don’t think it’s talked about nearly enough for the others, at least on my blog... so, buckle up!!! this is REALLY LONG!!!! 

3. i tried writing like, an individual thing for every member of the quintet all together in this one ask, but i ended up talking a little too much about homura and now i’m going to split up all the different analysis stuff for each character into the reblogs and work on it every so often! you’re free to kinda skim of course because i really did write a whole novel but here we go!! read under the cut. :3 this is literally essay length btw. i did NOT expect it to get this long but if you want to read it all i’d recommend it but i don’t expect most people to

First: Homura Akemi

okay so i’m going to kind of summarize everything but from the perspective of empathizing with her so if you don’t want to reread a whole recap you can skip to the ending few paragraphs

Summary

first of all, in episode 10, homura’s past is explained for the viewer. she was a shy, unsure girl who had been bedridden for a long time. she was clearly unsocialized, not to mention she went to a catholic school and those can be brutal, esp in japan... that’s all we know about her in that episode, but it’s revealed in one of the drama cds that she was bullied as a child(& further at mitakihara middle), her parents never were mentioned ever (i assume them to either be dead or neglectful, considering she lives alone and unchecked), and in magia record, homura says to natsuki that she’s never had friends before, she hasn’t been on vacation before until the beachside bonds event, hasn’t ever celebrated valentine’s day, has never celebrated new years, etc... 

clearly, she’s missed out on a lot not only because of her sickness and hospitalization, but because of her isolation as a child at school. judging by her demeanor and the way she reacts when madoka comes up to her without being asked to, something like that had never happened to her before. it’s clear to me that madoka was many of homura’s “first’s”, her first friend, the first person who reached out to her, the first person to compliment her name honestly(validating her, disproving her dislike of her name), the first person to regard her so kindly rather than judging her based off of her appearance and demeanor (like other students had apparently done, this is also shown when the other students at mitakihara middle make fun of her for being tired after only being able to run one lap). AND, madoka (and mami, but homura knew madoka better at that time) saved her life, even though homura was so willing to die, just in that moment... i’d assume it made homura feel like someone believed in her even when she was at her worst. it’s really clear by the glimmer in her eyes that these are nice people that made her feel happy and welcome... and then walpurgisnacht came. she didn’t know much about magical girls and just believed in madoka and mami to be able to defeat the witch because she saw them as strong and saw the witch as defeatable, despite its size. and then mami died, right in front of her and madoka... 

this kinda seems headcanon-y when i phrase it this way but it’s practically proven in her actions but i really think homura is scared to be abandoned, especially by someone who was as overtly kind and nonjudgemental to her as madoka... it’s in the way she cries her name and says “don’t go” before madoka runs away to fight walpurgisnacht. OH ALSO, i need to address this one thing really quick because people like to assume that homura didn’t care about mami from the beginning and only liked madoka. it’s not that she wasn’t sad when mami died, she was clearly terrified and didn’t want the same to happen to madoka, also mami LITERALLY WASN’T IN HER CLASS OR HER GRADE so i assume she spent most of her time with madoka considering they were in the same grade and class and probably shared most of their periods with each other... but also, once again, mami is older than both of them and homura probably saw her as more of a mentor/teacher that she needed to impress rather than madoka who was more on her level, i guess?

anyways, moving on... homura had to see madoka die (& experience the crushing guilt she felt for “letting madoka go” even though there was nothing she could’ve done) and literally says “i’d rather you had lived than saved someone like me” ... her self worth is below zero. she makes her wish to be strong enough to protect madoka(because she sees madoka, her first friend, who saved her life which she felt had no worth, as so strong and noble) which causes her to go back in time, etc. etc., you know the deal. okay before i move on to talk a little more abt the timelines and the personality change i’m going to address why it’s reasonable that she’d be attached to madoka.

i mentioned before that homura said herself that she had never had a friend before. just like, put yourself into her shoes for a second. this girl has no idea how to make friends; it was never taught to her. it’s literally rational that she’d get attached to her first ever friendship. it’s not “normal” the way she views madoka, but how could it be? this is her first time having a friend, she’s afraid of being abandoned by her, but she’s had to see her die over and over again anyway. she doesn’t want to lose madoka. even if she doesn’t go about it in the right way, there’s no way she would’ve actually known how to Do relationships. no one taught her. i think that needs to be empathized with more...

i kinda feel like i need to summarize all this just bc if i word it right it kinda reminds you & puts into perspective just how terrible and scary all of this was.

anyway Again, i would skip straight to the end of timeline 3 (where a New Flavor of trauma is given to homura) but i need to first address timeline 2 for a second. it was homura’s first time repeating the timeline, she trained with madoka and mami again, she was still hopeful despite what happened, etc. kinda just bonding further with madoka Again... and then it’s at the end of this timeline that she watches madoka turn into a witch, just in front of her very eyes... and realizes the true fate of magical girls. when she resets the timeline again, it’s up to her to start anew and break the truth to the group when she sees them again. when she tries telling the truth, sayaka immediately shoves this aside, claiming homura was just trying to split everyone up. it’s clear that that hurts homura. (also the little shinies in her eyes were wavering which is anime-code for sad) her feelings were immediately disregarded by sayaka and she couldn’t defend herself, but madoka did for her, and mami tried to diffuse the situation. 

after they all find out homura was right when sayaka turns into a witch, mami kills kyoko and ties up homura in her ribbons and aims a gun at her, and this, rightfully, ignited a fear within homura... madoka is forced to kill mami in order to save homura, leaving only the two of them to fight together. then, when walpurgisnacht comes that time, The Promise is made... madoka tells homura to go back in time and save her from becoming a witch (because she doesn’t want to curse the world that way, she still sees beauty in it) and homura agrees, saying she’ll never stop until she saves madoka, and then... homura has to mercy kill madoka before she becomes a witch. she cries loudly and shoots madoka’s soul gem... it’s literally so heartwrenching and (usually) brings the viewer to tears, or puts something into perspective for them...

then we assume the personality change happens in the timeline right after. this personality change causes a lot of discourse because sometimes it’s seen as kind of irrational, but personally, i think even moemura had at least SOME resent for the world around her considering what she’d been through. it’s madoka’s repeated deaths that finally push her over that edge. i could get further into the coolmura arc but that’d take a WHILE, so i’ll just kind of explain something briefly though -- why homura ended up becoming even MORE focused on madoka. and i’m also going to debunk the claim that homura doesn’t care about her other friends as fast as i can before moving on.

also, ONE LAST side tangent, for those that think homura really did do a 360 degree personality turn are wrong. it’s shown explicitly in homulilly’s labyrinth that there’s this... “core” homura, a shadowy purple silhouette with braids. every time the series depicts homura’s internal self, it’s always glasses+braids, symbolizing her “child” self, who she truly is. she never stopped being that person. she doesn’t want to kill. ...but i can get into that in a rebellion analysis later! this is also shown in wraith arc bc the person inside her soul gem has glasses+braids. anyway let’s get to the next part i’m going to rant about

Homura’s Love for Madoka, but Otherwise Apathy

homura has seen many different, yet all similar, versions of her friends. the first claim i’m going to talk about which i saw brought up quite a few times before is in regards to homura and mami. first of all, homura absolutely still cares for mami, and not just in the “i only care about your life if it affects madoka’s” way. one part that always gets me is when mami ties her up in the series timeline after homura frantically warns her that this witch isn’t normal, to which mami IMMEDIATELY brushes this off, without even giving homura a chance. then, when mami’s ribbons fade away, homura looks horrified and just goes “oh no...” and it’s kind of obvious to me that it was in response to mami’s death rather than madoka’s reaction. this is arguably up for debate i guess because i’ve seen different takes on that reaction and it’s ambiguous, i guess? but i’m about to get into something extremely similar and that’s the sayaka situation, where madoka throws sayaka’s soul gem onto a moving car. homura gasps and immediately pauses time and disappears, running in literal open traffic and climbing on top of a moving car to retrieve sayaka’s soul gem. one could argue that this is ALSO only just because homura wants to save madoka (and kyoko) the fear, but don’t you think her expression would be different? if homura truly didn’t care for sayaka’s wellbeing, wouldn’t she be making an expression more similar to like, “oh, this shit again...” instead of the frantic one she was making in the scene? this kind of thing Also happens when kyoko asks homura to leave while kyoko’s about to sacrifice herself in oktavia’s labyrinth, and homura looks up sadly at kyoko and then back down at madoka, and once she knew kyoko was dead, she just quietly said “kyoko...” to herself. she usually refers to them as [last name, first name], but she dropped that during that moment... it otherwise sounds like a bare minimum thing to do, but keep in mind the timeline we’re shown in the series is implied to be like, the 110th timeline, i think? like, this is the last timeline, she’s worn down, but she still does have empathy -- or at least sympathy -- for the others. she still loves them. 

homura promised to be madoka’s protector, she dedicated her life to her, and also she doesn’t have a choice not to dedicate her life to her anymore, even though that’s not fair to her... homura is in a really hopeless situation and madoka is her hope, and madoka is the one that judges her the least out of the quintet (like saying “i’m sure homura is good” to herself) upon first impression. also okay i mentioned this already in my last post (which you saw) but i’m going to bring it up one more time, homura is not mentally 26!!!!!! she is still 14 mentally!! in order to be 26, you have to have experienced 26 years of new life experience. maybe you acquire that through school, maybe you aquire that through friends, whatever it takes. but homura just repeated the same month over and over, and it’s not like her body (canonically) ages ever. she just kind of gets transported back into her body in the hospital again considering she’s back wearing her braids and pajamas... so, yeah. no mental development there. i also mentioned this here but i’m gonna say it again, that just makes it even harder for her to actually age correctly... it stunts her to 14. imagine being 14 for 10-11 years...

In Defense Of My Own Claims

btw before you think i’m just going full-on radical homura apologist, i’m not explaining all of this to be like “homura made ALL THE RIGHT DECISIONS because her trauma gave her an excuse!!” because like, Obviously, she did a lot of bad things, she killed people, did a lot of callous things, a lot of thoughtless things, a lot of things that make her seem emotionless, etc. but i just have trouble blaming her considering how things ended up, and it’s not like she enjoys killing people. she’s not sadistic... she ends up becoming short with all the others not only because of her (extremely) weakened trust in them, but also because the amount of times she repeated the timeline. i’d imagine it makes her feel like the others can’t truly die because she can just go back and see them again. (this is also why wraith arc/post-tv series must’ve been hard for her because she can no longer turn back time, things are permanent now, deaths are forever) she’s become so worn down that she’ll do anything to escape the loops... also considering she has no choice but to continue? although it shouldn’t be, it’s technically her job as a magical girl to defeat all witches and walpurgisnacht counts. it kills magical girls and tears up the whole city and she’s usually the only magical girl left... her choices, when defeated, are either to give up and die or to go back and try again, and she made a promise to her first ever friend to do just the latter... i just don’t understand how this isn’t easier for people to comprehend, that all of this trauma and stress and responsibility on top of an already traumatized 14 year old does not mix well. ever. she had to figure out all of this by herself.

TL;DR:

homura was a previously traumatized, unsocialized 14 year old with (very)low self esteem & self worth whose first friend (and first love, really, let’s be honest) died in front of her in horrific ways and she watched as she (and the other friends she came to make) drifted slowly apart from her in her endless and futile attempt in saving her from what proved to be an inescapable fate. also she’s 14 and also she’s (canonically) mentally ill and a lesbian. not a monster, not evil, not “psycho”. and that’s that!