#it's the stupid subreddits I miss the most

[citytrialost]

Mastodonsaurus giganteus. Animal Ghosts. Edited by Claudia Clow. Illustrated by Walt Disney Productions. 1971.

Internet Archive

[kr-cube]

but were you alive to witness your favourite band become a fixation for the weirdest and most off putting people online?

[angelyuji]

yandere superman headcanons

tw kidnapping, "nice" guys/incel behavior (kinda), isolation as punishment, manipulation, yandere stuff... the usual

yandere clark kent x gn!reader

diana prince is next guys I LOVE WOMEN!!! lemme know abt any tags i miss or just any other superman thoughts (yandere or not) cuz i love superman a lot

hes so big and buff and strong

hhnhsdngnnhnhnngnfhgnnngngn

sorry

ive been obsessed with superman and lois recently and i thought to myself “i need him so bad id do unspeakable things”

ALSOOOOOO have u guys seen the new superman??? ohmygodddd HELLOOO SAILOR

anyway here we go :)

sweetest kindest angel alive… at first glance

actual clark is genuinely the best sweetest guy in the world and i don’t think that would technically change but if anything he’d start buying into the incel/nice guy pills and that’s what would warp him

he’s literally sooo sweet to you (i cant get over how much a of cutie pie clark kent is)

ok pause lemme start from the beginning

when he first met you, he was e n a m o u r e d like he thinks youre the most beautiful person in the world type stuff

at first, the relationship is normal, you guys are friends, study buddies, coworkers, yk normal shit

he’s still super in love but hes kinda aware that its one-sided and he can’t make you like him

you guys are super close friends tho

but as his crush progresses, he starts to consult more than his friends and normal relationship advice, he starts to consult incel chatrooms and subreddits

he wants to go further than friendship with you, but all the guys in these chatrooms are telling him awful things abt u. for example:

‘hi! requesting help for getting out of the friendzone with my friend’ i’ve been friends with them for a long time, but i see them as more than a friend. ive had to watch as they date all these awful people and i just want them to see me more than a friend. any advice is appreciated!

– dude these ungrateful bitches are never gonna see u

– people like them never see the good guy until its too late

– u just gotta make them like u, nobody understands the nice guy until u make them

– all of these responses are so weird, just be normal and flirt a little!

ur stupid fuckign idiot nice guys don’t get a chance till u make them give u chance

women are so fucking stupid

reading all these “helpful” comments really warped his mindset

he went from innocent farm boy to incel misogynist becuz

they have to be right! like why else have u not given him the time of day as more than a friend

so soon, ur gonna notice these changes

he went from being supportive bestie to making snide comments, putting you down, making moves on you that you clearly don’t want

ur hurt, heartbroken, your friend became something unrecognizable

u’ll ask for some distance, just to think abt if u want to continue the friendship and clark will realize that he can’t make you like him from just this

so you’re gonna go home, take a nap, and next thing you know you’re getting snatched from bed by freaking superman

he genuinely believes he’s done the right thing

he’ll bring u to the fortress first. he has everything set up already, so u wont freeze or starve to death

i wont bore with the details but he would NEVER lay a hand on u

that’s NOT my superman

its more like

“i need you to eat something.” clark begs you, his eyes filled with worry. he had crouched down next to where you sat. clark had given you free-reign around his fortress, but you chose to sit in the corner near the entrance.

“fuck you.” you turn away from him, anger dripping from your voice. you haven’t eaten since he brought you to his ice castle, but you can’t remember how long ago that was. you missed home, your friends, your family. you missed freedom. you hear clark sigh.

“you’re gonna get sick if you keep going like this, (y/n).” his hand touches your face and you slap his hand away. you know there was no way you could hurt superman, but he holds his hand looking hurt, and you feel a twinge of guilt. he holds out a bag from Big Belly Burgers and places it next to you.

you scooch back, your back hitting the wall, not willing to back down. “i’ll eat if you let me go.” you feel like a child throwing a tantrum, but you would do anything to go home.

you see him rub his forehead in frustration, “this isn’t working.” he mutters to himself. you don’t say anything, wanting to see what he would do. instead of trying to fight you again, clark picks up the bag. “i’ll come back when you’re ready.” he says.

“come back? what are you talking ab-” in one blast of air, clark was gone and you were alone.

days had gone by, you felt like you were going crazy from the solitude and the hunger. thankfully, clark had left mountains of water bottles for you, so you tried to fill up with those. it wasn’t enough, you had started to miss your kidnapper’s company after many conversations with yourself. all you could do was sleep or stare at the wall, blankly. after a week, you couldn’t take the isolation. “clark?” you call out, weakly. not a moment passes before he appeared before you.

his eyes were filled with pity and worry, “are you ready, sweetheart?” his hands cup your face and you lean into the warmth, nodding.

he could never hurt you. that entire week away was killing him, but the commenters were right. you just needed to know that he was all you needed.

[lenixsocial]

Watcher (and why nothing matters anymore):

So, in case you've been locked away under a proverbial bridge for a few days, Internet personalities Steven Lim, Ryan Bergara, and Shane Madej (known as Watcher) have elected to begin their own streaming service and ditch YouTube.

On the surface, that mightn't even seem like news at all.

After all, this sort of thing seems to happen all the time: The Try Guys left Buzzfeed to create their own company, Rhett and Link took the dive and diversified into paywalled entertainment a few years back with Mythical Society. Both of which however still rely on YouTube itself to generate views on the main channels, which funnel viewers into a FOMO type situation where "you can't miss" a special airing on the app (Mythical Society) or Patreon (Try Guys).

Watcher, in its infinite wisdom (stupidity, carelessness, unparalleled greed - take your pick) has decided that YouTube is pointless, and has moved ALL their content behind a paywall, claiming that the service was amping up to provide "TV quality programming", leaving only old content and the first episodes of the new shows up on their YouTube page as a subtle tease as to what you could get for $6/month.

It's now quite apparent from reading the comments section of their (now infamous) YouTube video, their official subreddit, and the tag on X that the fans were...not thrilled. The fingers began to be pointed within minutes. Name calling soon after. Then this blossomed into dissertations on why this was a horrible idea.

Then we found out that there was no app. Just a website. So you're paying for website access. Not a full blown streaming service to rival Netflix. Oh, and they don't even have their own servers, the videos are hosted by Vimeo. The deeper the comments section dug, the nastier the attacks got. Steven soon became the whipping boy. His past, his interviews, scanned and mercurially dug up for juicy tidbits (although all anyone gleaned from these was he's rich, was born rich, drives a Tesla in LA, likes fancy food, and has friends whom he values who are racist and possibly sexist and will not sever ties with them).

Then came the cries of incongruity. Shane Madej repeatedly said to "Eat the Rich", and here he was schilling for a platform that cost $6 a month. The cries began to pirate all of the new Watcher content because maybe he was under duress and was secretly telling them to do so. Fact is, I don't know if he was or what, but I'm certain he's under contract and wants his job.

Then came the videos from other internet users analyzing the video, and comparing this to the Try Guys situation with Ned a few months back. Both are disasters, each in unique ways with different players, and such like but here's the vast difference: none of this will even matter in a month.

Let me explain: We are in the total free fall stage of Watcher's Internet Streamer Service. What they do in the next 24-48 hours is crucial. If they revert back to their YouTube channel and apologize, they'll be fine. People will probably poke fun at them, but they'll be forgiven, eventually. But if they don't and they keep on, ignoring the fans, dousing the haters, and make it a month, I doubt we will see any resistance outside of a terse article or two.

Why? The collective memory span in this day and age is extremely short, many have likely already made judgment in their head and have passed said judgment. Therefore, they'll avoid the channel, and the streamer and will be blissfully unaware of any changes. Those who have joined up and paid will remain members, and those who have elected to remain subscribed will likely remain so and will watch the free content until they can afford the $6/month.

The thing is like it or hate it, if they decide to do nothing and ignore the public at large, they most likely will be fine. Maybe they will not have the hugest subscriber base, but people will forget about this. Something else major that is more salacious will spring up in the months ahead. Will there be lingering anger? Sure, but like I said before, these people have already passed judgment so they're already gone.

In an era of "nothing fucking matters" when your choices are sometimes entirely out of your direct control and are (at best) two sides of the same coin, it should be of absolutely no surprise to anyone that there is a fairly good possibility even after all that has transpired that nothing bad will happen. Lest we forget that old adage: "there is no such thing as bad PR".

Personally, I feel $6 is a tad much for a non-app based web streamer with little to no content. It was disingenuous to announce its launch internationally where even more people can't afford it, and some can't even view it. Steven wasn't upfront with who was in charge and now it really does seem like he's using the subscriptions to fund his international gallivanting. It's clear nobody wanted TV-show quality Ghost Files to take place in another country, nor did they want an old show revived with votes when you pay the first month's dues. They say it's a case of Watcher "not reading the room".

[velvetvexations]

I feel like the "trans men are privileged over trans women" discourse is such a Tumblr-specific phenomenon (and I guess Twitter and TikTok but I don't use them lol). I used to be a moderator of a very large trans subreddit (RIP 3rd party apps) and, if you've used Reddit, you probably know the Reddit trans community skews really heavily transfem.

And the Reddit discourse used to be, for the most part, "stop speaking over trans men/mascs, please make room for trans men/mascs in the community, please remember that trans men/mascs are underrepresented and deserve love too" etc. None of this shit about calling trans men MRAs for talking about issues that affected them! Like people who would say shit like that were mostly downvoted into oblivion and the mod team (not just me but the transfem mods too) would actively remove comments to that effect. It was great!

Most transfem users didn't have this weird persecution complex where they believed they were the most oppressed queer identity of all time either, not a lot of people were really seriously claiming that trans men had any kind of meaningful institutional power over trans women except maybe your occasional stale-ass passing privilege thread (which plenty of transfems in the comments usually shot down because passing discourse is mostly very stupid and people knew it).

It's so obvious Tumblr is so shitty about this because of the deeply entrenched radfem culture on this site tbh. I hate it here. Trans Reddit used to do mass-report campaigns against r/GenderCritical and their ilk and it fucking worked! They got site admins to fucking ban TERF subreddits!! For all its copious flaws, I really miss how the Reddit trans community knew exactly who the enemy was and that it wasn't each other.

Yeah, Tumblr has always skewed towards the most overly dramatic expressions of praxis, as shown by the hysteria equating a few brigading-induced bans to Tumblr staff perpetuating a genocide. Reddit was much more a space for adults to have adult conversations and not just descend into constant finger-pointing.

[mathlann]

9 People You Want to Know Better

Tagged by @undyingembers and @arendaes, thank you!

Three ships:

Casimira x Marazhai. My brain is so souped about them I started writing fanfic again after a 12 year hiatus. My drafts have a file/tag system now for subject of whatever 10pm shower thought I get about them. It's just over for me, I may never get better.

@poetikat's Tree Baby and Animal Man /Silfrun x Ulbrig. I'm so invested in their divorce drama like you wouldn't believe. Even in my own game, he's Silfrun's Problematic Ex-Husband first, man second.

Matilda/Rosario x Ambrosio, The Monk. Two horrible people who deserve each other. I don't know what to say except this book still has my head turned 'round backwards a year later and the scenes of Matilda seducing Ambrosio are 90% of the reason.

Last Song:

Miss Murder-AFI. Free nostalgia from the song guessing poll that was.

Last Movie:

Bad Boys: Ride or Die, for Father's Day. It was like, okay. A Dad Movie™.

Currently Reading:

Nothing. Currently on book burnout.

Currently Watching:

The Double, on Netflix! I love family revenge and court intrigue C-Dramas so it's right up my alley.

Currently Eating:

Pizza. Skipped on tennis tonight and its just me and my dad for the evening, which means tradition dictates we order trash pizza.

Currently Craving:

My brain juice coming back. In a write/stupid flow as is customary, so the start of my week was nothing but the former and now I must suffer a few days of the latter until my brain stops making static noises.

Favourite colour:

Blue, especially deep jewel toned blues.

Current obsession:

Rogue Trader. But also Pathfinder 2e. I have a love-hate relationship with Paizo because I dont find their game design in either edition to be very fun (for me personally) and I spend enough time on the subreddit reading design discourse to have parasocial enemies there, but at the same time it's also where I learned the art of the Character Build and Paizo's flavor/concepts are top notch even if the concept doesn't always get expressed as well in the actual mechanics. So with another Remaster book coming up I am once again drawn to Pathbuilder+Archives of Nethys to make little guys.

Last thing I googled:

Pathfinder 2e subreddit. See above.

Favourite season:

Fall! Birthday season, cooler weather, and most importantly its the end of the cicadas' tyranny over the outdoors.

Skill I’d like to learn:

Oil Pastels. I foolishly bought some for my birthday while entirely forgetting i hate oil based art products and don't have the temperament for them. But they're so pretty! I wish I did.

Best Advice:

Writing specific, but having a talk buddy works! I get really stuck in my head about a lot of things because of perfectionism/anxiety means I never really know if I'm making sense but genuinely one of my de-stress rules I adopted in college is just talk it out, and for voice conversations keep the pepe silvia sticky note board updated while I do it. Works for my academic shit and my fandom writing stuff, because if nothing else, the time it takes for me to explain whatever im thinking to someone not-me helps cross the first anxiety hurdle of "this is dumb and incoherent."

No pressure tagging:

@poetikat, @bladesmitten, @molochka-koshka, @moosifers, @hellishhurricane, @spidercatenthusiast and whoever else wants to do it!

[unitedstates0fdakota]

I deleted Reddit a while ago cuz it stopped being cool after i developed some brain cells but the one subreddit I kinda miss is gamingcirclejerk. Like the whole schtick was that everyone on there would pretend to be a capital G Gamer (aka an idiot) and post screenshots of actual capital G Gamers saying stupid shit like “fallout isn’t a political game” or “there are too many women in this game and it’s unrealistic” or even “politics aren’t important in media” and everyone would pretend to agree with them like “yeah man fallout is the most apolitical game I’ve ever played in my life” but sometimes someone would post a screenshot of a take that was so fucking insane that everyone would be like “hey uh breaking the gimmick for a sec, what the fuck is this guy talking about” and it was great. I hate Reddit but I miss you GCJ 💜

[episodicnostalgia]

Reading Break: “Retiring” from comic book collecting

The Reading Break continues, mainly because work is still hindering my ability to write structured reviews with any regularity.  It’s a bit of a bummer, because I genuinely enjoy writing them, and it’s made blogging fun for me, but doing so requires more mental energy than I can currently afford to spend.  Sometimes you just gotta prioritize payin’ them bills, and staying alive. In the meantime, I don’t want to sacrifice writing altogether, because I value this platform as an outlet, and since it is MY flippin’ blog, I figure I’ll just relax the structure a bit and write about other shit; less episodic, and more nostalgic, I suppose.

So anyways.  Comic Books.

More of my leisure time has been spent reading comics these days, and if you’ve been tuning into any of my most recent posts, then you already know that I’ve been on something of a Spider-man kick for a while, and that’s unlikely to change in the immediate future.  Obviously, the fact that I’ve been reviewing the 90’s cartoon has fanned the flames of my current fixation, but it’s been a long time coming.  Over the past few years I’ve been casually focused on completing my ideal Spidey-Comics-collection, and I’m very nearly finished.

Incidentally, that also means that I will also be, by-and-large, finished actively collecting comic books altogether.

Technically I kind of “stopped collecting” (heavy on the quotations there) shortly after DC’s ‘New 52’ reboot kicked off.  It wasn’t that I particularly disliked the changes, but I found myself lacking the energy to maintain my interest.  Since Marvel wasn't exactly doing anything more appealing (and the MCU was still scratching that itch), I just stopped altogether. To this day, I haven’t really felt that I’ve been missing out. 

I’m still prone to casually glancing at subreddits, Wikipedia blogs, and the occasional review/pop-culture think piece, just to check in on all my old fictional friends, and see how they’re doing.  Superman and Lois have a kid who grew up, and also became another Superman. Batman and Catwoman got married, and then unmarried, I think?  I know it resulted a in a bunch of fans getting angry. I understand Miles Morales has been transported to the 616 universe (after his was destroyed), and I seem to recall that Wolverine was dead for a while. Maybe he still is?

I admittedly I did start reading the new Ultimate Spider-man, and intend to continue doing so, but I’ll drop it in a heartbeat if I get bored, meanwhile the other books in the new ‘Ultimate’ line don’t really appeal at all. I’m not trying be pretentious either; All the new stuff being published today looks like it’s probably reasonably entertaining, and there are some fantastic new artists working in the industry, but I’ve just mostly had my fill.

That said, there were a decent number of older issues that I’d always wanted to read when I was a kid, but never got to.  So, shortly after I stopped buying any of the new books coming out (a little over a decade ago), I began removing the issues that I had no intention of re-reading, to make room for the various ‘missing’ issues I needed to complete my "essential" collection once and for all.

After all, is any reading list complete without Super-merman?

During my comic-hunt, there are two characters who I predominantly focused on: Superman (Merman or otherwise) & Spider-man (there are no Spider-mermen. Because that would be stupid.)

Two-or-three years ago, I successfully completed my collection of Superman comics ranging between late 1986 to early 1995.  That’s the era that includes, among other things:

Lex faking his death, swapping his brain into an enhanced clone body, and returning with a full head of hair as his own super hot, Secret, Australian-raised son, aka Lex Luthor II.  I’m not making any of that up, but it’s actually a great Lex Luthor arc, and I mean that unapologetically.

Lois getting engaged to Clark, and being trusted with his super-secret. (And also, hilariously, in that order.)

The artificial protoplasmic lifeform aka ‘Matrix-Supergirl’ from “the pocket dimension,” who easily ranks as my favourite iteration of the Supergirl property.

The evil Kryptonian AI aka “The Eradicator,” and of course…

The world-famous ‘Death of Superman’

As ridiculously 90’s as that all sounds (and was), it was a truly solid 8-year run that has (in my millennial opinion) never been matched for its combined quality, diverse-and-dynamic supporting cast (which no other set of writers have ever come close to utilizing as effectively), and tight continuity. Most importantly, by the beginning of ‘95, the story sort-of comes to a natural close that leaves our characters happy, with most of the major arcs and plotlines resolved. 

That itself is nothing short of a small miracle for an ongoing comic book series to achieve, and so I’ve always privately considered that to be "the end" of MY definitive Superman story. That respective collection begins with ‘Man of Steel’ #1, spans across the four Superman books of-the-time (plus select mini-series, annuals, and crossovers), and ends with ‘Action Comics’ #706, some 350-odd issues later. 

It's an impressive achievement in storytelling that seems to finally be getting more recognition (from what I’ve seen on various forums and subreddits), but I still don’t think it gets enough credit for allowing our beloved Kryptonian’s story to move forward for (arguably) the first time in the character’s then-50+ years of existence. Suffice to say, while it was no small feat tracking down each of the necessary back-issues, it was relatively simple process to figure out WHICH issues I needed to buy, since it was all part of one consecutive run.

Finishing my Spider-man Collection was a little trickier.

Technically, the Spider-man books have never broken their continuity (with some room for debate, but I don’t feel like getting into that), and as such, any truly complete collection of the 616* Spider-man would span several thousand issues, many of which I don't consider essential reading.  So it’s been a longer, more meticulous process of figuring out which artists, writers, and story arcs I actually want to sink money into. 

[*616 = The OG Marvel universe from the comics]

With a few exceptions (and where I’ve had to accept trade paperback collections as a vital alternative to spending at LEAST several tens-of-thousands of dollars), I’ve now collected nearly all of the main eras throughout Spidey’s career that interest me.  I’ve very nearly completed the Roger Stern run,  along with a healthy sampling of Tom Defalco’s work, leaving me roughly 10 issues away from my goal.

If you care to know, it comes to the equivalent of some 420+ issues from the various 616 Spidey books, between Amazing Fantasy #15, to The Amazing Spider-man #508. 

Why stop there? Because much of what has come out beyond that point feels either like a departure from, or a retread of, the character I grew up with. I don’t begrudge anyone who enjoys the current Spidey books, but he seems to have been stuck in a holding pattern that TPTB have decided the writers aren't permitted to move beyond. I imagine that’s also why the new ‘Ultimate Spider-man’ has captured my interest, at least for the time being, by letting him grow up and raise a family. Still, I won’t be surprised if/when even that version of the character ends up getting caught in his own version of an editorially-mandated limbo.

In the end, that’s what it really boils down to, the lack of endings.  I won’t pretend I’m making a new observation in this regard, since most ongoing series are tailor made to reset every few years, and that’s unlikely to change any time soon.  Even so, knowing when to end a story is as important to me as the plot itself, and since the writers aren’t ever granted the power to offer definitive endings to major proprietary characters, I decided to pick one that I can be content with.  I find doing so makes going back and re-reading these stories from the beginning more enjoyable, since I know it will eventually end on my terms.

Speaking of ending things, It’s probably time I wrapped up this post.  It’s possible I might come back with more specific observations about the Spidey books, depending on how long my “reading break" continues.  Or maybe by the time I’m back, I’ll be able to focus on the reviews again.

Guess we'll see.

Thanks for Reading.

[i-am-totally-not-a-lizard]

Do you think Reddit is ever going to come back? I don’t particularly miss it, but there are some parts that are missed, and I mean tumblr is so much nicer, and I don’t wanna offend any of the wonderful tumblr users, I think I’m just more used to Reddit. (Yes, I am overthinking an anonymous ask)

Reddit is absolutely coming back. It's mostly, from a user perspective, the same as it was before already. Most subreddits only participated in a 2 day blackout, which had basically no effect besides demonstrating how widely disliked the API changes were by the user base. Even the ongoing gimmick protests on subs like r/pics, r/interestingasfuck, etc still bring traffic to the site. They still drive user interaction with the site and still bring money to Reddit. The only way to effectively protest these changes is to stop using Reddit, or make others stop using it by privating subs and drawing the bases to other websites (aka what 196 did, and thus why many of us are here). This is why the 2 day blackout was a stupid idea to begin with, it was big for publicity, but had little meaningful effect. After those 2 days, it's the same as if it never happened, but now with worse API restrictions.

So yes, Reddit is basically back to normal. You can still participate in all the communities you were part of before, but they'll probably have less and worse moderation, meaning probably more bots, reposts, bigotry, etc.

Personally I still use Reddit, just not nearly as much as I did before. Now I use it for the communities which I can't find parallels to on Tumblr. It's a unique platform which I already know the reins to, and I'd love for it to go back to normal, but it's not likely because of the profit there is to be gained by the company with the new changes. Ultimately, it's your choice if you want to go back there or not.

[ladyof1000masks]

Sorry I've been gone. As if anyone noticed. Honestly, my absence is because I had a depressive episode because my body stopped absorbing my meds due to a critical vitamin deficiency. Oh and people still suck.

Last night was a good example. I was replying to a serious Suicide Squad game post on Reddit titled "Will the insanity end when the new game is released?" There was a slightly off-topic, but still relevant conversation going on.

I got into how odd it is that Waller didn't take any interest in Scarecrow as he was the only rogue in the Arkhamverse to unmask Batman and brought him the closest to defeat/breaking any of them ever had. Fuck, he even out planned Bats on a couple occasions.

I don't know if anyone here realizes just how amazingly OP Arkhamverse Batman in almost every discipline, but for a rogue to get a couple steps ahead of him is a feat unheard of. Scarecrow devised a Thanatos Gambit on the master of the technique. He technically won.

Sure Scarecrow didn't make Batman cross the line he most feared but he gave him a good shove toward that precipice. Using fear toxin, a substance very well known for breaking people permanently even in it's weaker variant, on criminals is extremely morally dubious.

The strongest indicator of the damage done, is that he injected Scarecrow with the almost always lethal version with the intent of destroying his mind. I expect cruelty like that from Scarecrow or Riddler, they're the "bad guys" not our dark brooding hero.

But I digress. I didn't go into it as much as I have here because doing so guarantees no one will read my post.

The OP came back with "Not sure what fear toxin would do against robots." No shit! I'm so fucking stupid I wouldn't know something so obvious. I never implied that fear toxin would affect robots. Completely missed my point. I was talking about his chemical genius, brilliant mind, and ability to out gambit Batman.

Never once did I say he'd be one of the ground forces in Taskforce X. Any fan knows Scarecrow isn't a fighter, that he specializes in psychology and excels in unraveling sanity as opposed to a physical threat.

You'd think Waller would have at least "recruited" Crane to be on the support staff and put his genius to good use. That's all I was saying.

People seem to hate all the Rogues I like in the Arkham subreddit. Riddler and Scarecrow are especially unpopular. Honestly, the more assy they get about me talking about Scarecrow, the more I'm going to mention him.

It's okay for others to make multiple posts describing the explicit things they want to do with Bane, the Joker and Batman but I get shit for just talking about Scarecrow?

Not even in a sexual way, either. I may exaggerate my obsession with Scarecrow in an attempt to be funny but everyone on that sub exaggerates in some way.

Fuck your double standards. Also fuck feline respiratory infection and double fuck the blizzard ruining my cat's vet appointment.

[goose-onthe-loose]

i understand and relate to your ex religious posts so much it feels like you're in my head, even though i'm exmuslim instead. i'm also 19, i'm kind of jealous that your parents took it okay. i know it won't be safe for me to mention my atheism to mine until i'm moved out and independent (which is pretty far away atm). i'm glad for you that you got away from that and found your own beliefs. do you also feel like you're stunted from your upbringing? if so, do you have any advice on learning how to be a normal person lol

Hey! First of all thank you for your ask, and I'm sorry for the late reply. I've been in the shadow realm for a couple days but I ate a bagel so I think I'm good /hj

Ok! Before the advice, a couple disclaimers. First of all, I recognize that my relationship with my parents is pretty unusual, meaning there are certain aspects of what you might call "the standard deconversion experience" that I can't advise on.

I wish I could reveal the secret formula for supportive parents, but honestly I just got stupid lucky.

And second, obvs we are from different backgrounds so like. Take this with a massive grain of salt. Perhaps even an entire teaspoon.

Now to answer your questions.

Yes, I definitely feel stunted in a few ways... like, I missed out on plenty of general teen things, like parties, dating, and extracurriculars. Because of this I'm a little scared for college, mingling with people I feel I don't have much common ground with.

And then there are the years I spent in emotional turmoil, trying to figure out if I wanted to leave, how to do it, if I was making the right decision, etc etc etc.

I also regret the hundreds, if not thousands of hours I wasted studying obscure Jewish laws, time which could have been spent on... literally anything else.

But at this point, I can't change any of that. So I'm trying to focus on what I can do; here are a few things that have really helped me.

Research! Google is your friend, and you can use it to learn about everything from secular social norms to basic life skills. I literally got all of my sex ed online, lol.

Which brings me to my next piece of advice: build community. This one was especially helpful to me. In fact, I think of my discovery of the subreddit r/ExJew as a turning point in my deconversion journey. Like I know the site in general has a bad reputation, but stumbling across that page genuinely changed my life. It provided me with something I sorely needed: a place full of people like me. Somewhere where I could vent, ask questions, get advice, and even joke around. Idk about the culture on the exmuslim sub, but I'd say it's worth checking out.

This was also a good place to find anti-apologetic blogs and books, which went a long way towards undoing the bullshit religious pseudologic I'd been inundated with.

And lastly, "coming out". This one is iffy, and you should only do it if safe. But I still recommend it, because honestly. After I had decided to leave, one of the hardest parts was pretending to be something I wasn't.

So... after a while, I stopped. Wrote a letter to my parents, sent a mass email to the teachers in my religious school. I chose not to tell most of my classmates, but I did find another closet atheist in my school, and she honestly made the rest of my senior year a lot easier. Just having one other person to look over at and silently agree, "yeah, this is bullshit," can help with morale.

And even if you don't find anyone like that, there's a lot of peace, I think, in speaking your mind.

I hope this helped, and I hope good things come to you soon.

Lmk if this was helpful, or if you ever wanna chat :)

[adverbian]

Too bad Reddit is about to drive off the same cliff as Twitter :(

TL;DR Like Twitter, Reddit has decided to make it prohibitively expensive for third-party apps to operate starting July 2023. They want to push everybody to their official app.

But the official app is so terrible that it’s nigh-unusable. It pushes a bunch of algorithmically-recommended posts and videos into your feed. But the algorithm is terrible and stupid, so it’s all crap you actively don’t want to see.

I personally expect it to become like YouTube — algorithmically pushing people towards radical right-wing content, because the algorithm sees “high engagement” with that content.

Even more: A lot of the moderators of those niche, friendly subreddits? They rely on third-party apps to moderate effectively. /r/maplesyrup — and many like it — might have to shut down if the mods can no longer keep up. Either that, or they’ll just become full of spam like the rest of the internet.

It’s a real shame. Short-term greed kills a place that was really good because of the small, human communities.

I’m on Reddit (under a totally different handle) but I’m most likely going to peace out of Reddit at the end of this month (June 2023). Just like I peaced out of Twitter, and for the same reasons.

I don’t miss Twitter at all. But I’m really going to miss some of the subreddits.

One of my favorites is /r/ABraThatFits. They’ve got a bra-sizing calculator that’ll change your life. They’ve got friendly, ultra-helpful mods and commenters. They are welcoming to anyone who wants a bra that fits. That explicitly includes trans people, non-binary people, cross-dressers, and other gender non-conforming people. Their mods swiftly get rid of sex pests, TERFS, and other troublemakers.

But unfortunately, we might be about to lose all that.

A lot of subreddits are going dark next week in protest (the week of June 13, 2023). I wish I could say I thought it would change the Reddit CEO’s mind. I think it’s just a lost cause at this point.

It’s really a shame.

[anauwhere]

I was thinking that good, interesting and layered male characters are as rare as female characters in media even if there are more male characters in percentage. Stupid me i looked up on reddit to see if people agreed lol. I stumbled into the ask men subreddit and my God they sure hate women writers and female characters who are not perfect while lamenting the same for male characters. Women write men who are too good, too perfect and irl they never look twice at Bella Swan or Rory Gilmore, they will walk past ur 50 you milf, they would pity ur depressed fucked up loser female character. Maybe that's why fanfic usually elevates male characters, maybe that's why silly ya movies and books exist. Bc the perfect(albeit not often 2d, I admit it)man can thrive in there. Because most women are "in the same league" of ur Mrs perfect or desire to be. Because not all women are the embodiment of a golden prize themselves. Oh em gee these men written by women are not completely dumb and terrible and they make them feel safe? Rubbish!!! Well fantasies are just fantasies but sometimes they are the signal that there's something missing irl and you can make it up in fiction and play with it by your rules. Instead of crying I'd look at the mirror.

[sophieinwonderland]

I see you have been very active on r/SystemsCringe lately. Have you lost your faith in humanity yet?

It's definitely been an... interesting experience...

On the one hand, it's a subreddit dedicated to mocking people on the internet, where posts asking people to not bully minors get responses like this one:

BUT the next comment in the chain was this:

This is a very important and solid take to see. Even if opposing the bullying of children is perhaps the lowest of bars.

But we can't ignore that this same user has also claimed the endogenic community started with a group identifying as "sane plurals."

Which isn't a thing. I mean, maybe I missed that part of the Plural Deep Dive, and @subsystems can help me out, but the only source I can find from Google is this random tweet from last year:

Misinformation on this subreddit runs rampant. As does hate. But there are some takes that are at least more reasonable than those from some anti-endos from other sites. At least common sense things like the fact that "an endophobic Pride Flag is stupid." And also that using an app for a purpose it wasn't intended for isn't taking that app away from others.

Because though /r/systemscringe is horrible and the people there are more malicious, by far the most mind-bogglingly dumb take I've seen over the past few days wasn’t from there. It was a comment on TikTok that claimed singlets using Simply Plural was literally the equivalent of an able-bodied person stealing a wheelchair. I... need a whole separate post detailing all the reasons this is stupid.

Of course, amidst the common sense takes on the matter, you also have tons of fakeclaiming... and then the transmed showed up...

Just... ugh... look, I'm not going to bother responding to this. I'm just going to take another comment from the same post out of context to do it for me.

Thank you, /u/ghostcorpse, for destroying both the systems gatekeeping Simply Plural AND the transmeds!

Also, on the subject of posts I need to make, I also have an ask in my inbox from /u/FakerBaiter asking for links to research on endogenic systems, and I'd like to take my time with the response and make it as thorough as possible.

So, faith in humanity? I don’t know.

Many of the systems there are hurting, lashing out to give themselves some semblance of control over their lives. Many of the singlets have been raised in a society where people with the mental illness or the appearance of mental illness have been othered by society, and belittled for being different, and are just continuing the same ableist and sanist rhetoric they've been taught.

Of all the hate and misinformation I've seen there, very little of it was actually unexpected. It's terrible, but predictably so. So, I guess I don’t think my faith in humanity was affected because I already knew exactly what the people there were like. It's terrible, but I already knew that going in. 🤷‍♀️

[siryouarebeingmocked]

Ah, yes, a few dozen people on Twitter represent millions of men, and victimhood is totally zero sum.

I also like how Radfemmay thinks "we should give male victims decent treatment" is the same as treating men "like kings". Just outright hallucinating, as usual.

>>“More women hearing other women complaining about a man not associating with them in work, she defends him saying he literally did nothing & calling those other women spoiled & attention seekers & sexually deviant.”

>Calling women spoiled and attention seeking bc men are treating a job like playground and using their personal feelings of misogyny to not interact with women ?

I saw a Reddit post where a guy was just not very social in general, to men or women, but some women took it personally, thought he was "creepy", assumed sexism, and spent a month successfully trying to get him fired.

And a feminist subreddit highly upvoted the post.

That's what OP may be referring to. As people on Reddit (and on my post on the matter) said, the guy might've just been autistic, or had social anxiety, assuming it wasn't a troll.

Also, the type of person who runs to HR with a vendetta because they got criticized is precisely the stereotype of a Diversity thing.

And as for the professional development thing, there were a bunch of articles in the wake of #MeToo. Feminists wanted men to be more aware of women's potential feelings, and how men might look to women.

Loads of men, according to several articles, decided it was best not to spend any time alone with non-relative women, in order to prevent any misunderstandings.

And loads of feminists said "well, if you can't be trusted alone with women, that's a you problem!" Completely missing the actual point about the he said/she said nature of many sexual misconduct accusations.

And the possibility that a woman could honestly misunderstand a man.

And the fact that the "Mike Pence" rule objectively reduced the risk of any form of sexual misconduct, which is what feminists supposedly wanted.

Because it would complicate the Narrative.

I also like the completely unfounded assumption of misogyny. Weird how someone complaining about men wanting to be treated decently is also saying women deserve men's time and attention.

Also, it's kind of astounding how RFM literally posted evidence of thousands of people supporting and condoning female on male child rape…as "evidence" that society should NOT devote more attention to addressing female on male rape (and f-on-m wrongdoing in general).

I know radfems are so low on self-awareness it loops back into projection, but that's crazy stupid even by RFM's low standards.

>#LMAO???????#someone call the circus and tell them one of their clowns escaped

I love how you people push this completely made up myth that MRAs support adult women who rape boys.

When in reality, that's literally one of MRAs' most common complaints.

Unless you were claiming OP is something only an MRA would say, which is still wrong. There's lots of non-MRA people, including (rare) feminists, who care about men's issues like this.

And I notice you don't have any actual criticism. Just a label, and (mostly) mockery.

I wanna see more stories of women defending men from false allegations.

More women hearing other women complaining about a man not associating with them in work, she defends him saying he literally did nothing & calling those other women spoiled & attention seekers & sexually deviant.

I wanna see more women being good & decent with good morals, standing up for the men around them even if they get nothing out of it because it's the right thing to do.

Because for years, women have been telling men, "don't flirt with me," "don't talk to me," "don't look at me." Then, when men totally cut them off, these same women whine & complain that men don't associate with them beyond professionally, saying it creates a "hostile work environment?"

Like, he literally did nothing!! How is that hostile in any form or fashion!?

We need more good, upright, sensible women with good ethics out there defending innocent men who just wanna go about their lives.

Rad Feminism has utterly destroyed dating & that's making the lives of women who actually want to be wives & mothers, in particular, much much more difficult because men just don't want to take the risk of finding the right girl anymore!

Let's be realistic ladies! We need men & they need us! So, get back to treating the good men like the fucking kings that they are!

Did you know that it's actually a felony if a man doesn't register for the selective service? For them to have the right to vote, they have to be subject to the draft.

We get to enjoy the right to vote just for being here, but men don't! How is that fair!?

Why don't rad feminists clamour for that??

If you really wanted equality, demand that we too should be required to register for selective service!

As for male rapists not being jailed for long enough, you are absolutely right!

They should suffer longer jail time.

And so should female rapists!

At least male rapists actually get jail time. A girl recently raped a 13 year old boy & is now having his baby, but she gets to walk free, no jail time at all! Not only that, but she gets to keep the baby!

And, guess what? It's looking like the kid might end up having to pay child support anyway despite being a boy & a victim of rape.

Yes, we are absolutely the oppressed party here!

[urupotter]

So while I've said before that I don't like the HP subreddit, I still frequent it because occasionally I read something insightful. This is one such case, where I read a reading of Lupin that I'd never seen before in response to a comment of mine analyzing the shrieking shack confrontation between Snape, Remus, Sirius and the golden trio, where I mentioned that Lupin was a gaslighter so I wanted to share. It was created by reddit user u/UsuallySiSometimesNo and is posted here with his permission. We had a little conversation in the comments. Read it under the cut

UsuallySiSometimesNo: That struck a cord with me, too. I didn't think about that on a conscious level before, but when I read it, it felt instantly true.

Honestly, I think the strongest examples of Lupin gaslighting are actually done to himself. The biggest, character-defining example, I think, is that after finding friendship with James, Sirius, and Peter, he becomes so desperate not to be ostracized from them (due to his issues of self-worth and his personal brand of impostor syndrome) that he deliberately and routinely feeds himself false narratives about their behavior until he can no longer tell fact from fiction, even as he's experiencing it.

Their relentless bullying of Snape? A childhood rivalry.

Their casual bullying of other students? Kids being young and stupid.

Their clear disinterest verging on contempt for Peter, someone less fortunate and vulnerable with whom they're supposed to be good friends? Just mates being mates.

Even actions taken against Lupin, himself, are revised in his memory to be 'no big deal', because he desperately needs that to be true. Let's pretend for a moment that Snape indisputably deserved to be slaughtered by a werewolf the night Sirius told him how to get past the Whomping Willow. Sirius did not send Snape to be killed by any old werewolf. What happened that night was that Sirius - one of Remus' best friends, if not his actual best friend - attempted to use Remus' curse/illness against someone (which is a big enough betrayal on it's own) without ever telling Remus that when he woke up in the morning (covered in blood and in the presence of a shredded corpse) it would be to find that he had committed the act he was most petrified he might one day commit. In setting Snape up to be killed by Lupin, Sirius, at the very least, risked Lupin's sanity, and, at the very most, risked Lupin being sentenced to death.

Now, I understand that Sirius wasn't thinking about all of that when he did what he did, and I, as a someone removed from the situation (and armed with the additional character/situational knowledge granted to a reader) can even understand why Sirius' own trauma led him to grant such a blind death sentence to Snape (which I think is related to a point you made elsewhere, u/Adventure_Time_Snail, about Sirius' "violence towards those who trigger his fundamental fear of wizard fascists" because of his abusive upbringing). But Lupin's perspective is not one of an unbiased observer. And once James found out what was happening and pulled Snape back before it was too late (which, I would think, was more to save Lupin than to save Snape) and once Remus awoke the next to day to discover everything that transpired the night before, I find it hard to believe there wasn't at least some conversation about the true gravity of the situation. And yet, even all these years later, Lupin doesn't bat an eye when Sirius not only doesn't display shame when the event is mentioned in POA, but offers something akin to regret, NOT at the fact that his actions could have gotten Lupin killed, but that that they DIDN'T get Snape killed: "It served him right...", he sneered. etc. etc.

I think the obvious question here, is 'Even disregarding what Sirius did to Snape - how can Lupin be okay with the knowledge that Sirius has no regret, at all, for what he did to him, even now that they're adults?' Well, we're not in Lupin's point of view in the books, which means we can't hear his internal monologue, but I think a satisfactory answer to the question is that he's done a substantial amount of internal gymnastics in order to get to a point where he doesn't see this as a big deal, or even as something that he has a right to be upset about.... just like a gaslighter does to their victim.

Again, because we're not in Lupin's POV, we can't point to the exact instances that such internal gaslighting took place, but, based on what we do observe from Harry's POV (and based on external knowledge of gaslighting as a true-to-life concept) I wouldn't be surprised if Lupin so desperately needs everything to be okay that he derides himself for feeling bad or betrayed, that he calls himself stupid for thinking terrible things that have happened to him are a big deal, that he wars with himself about how people who are his friends and who are so good to him and who are better friends than he thinks he deserves could possibly do something to harm him/others, and that he beats down whatever emotions and senses and gut feelings he has that tells him something his friends have done might be very wrong. What we see in the books is a man who makes excuses for his friends and harbors a warped perception of reality in much the same way victims of gaslighting do, and he seems to exploit his own insecurities in order to instill doubt in his own experiences in much the same way perpetrators of gaslighting do.

I can't help but think that, by the time Lupin tells Harry that Snape harbors a particularly strong hatred for James because James was a better Quidditch player, Lupin has become so adept at gaslighting himself that he actually believes it.

tl;dr: One of Lupin's defining characteristics is that he gaslights himself out of a desperate need to be liked by others, since he has a difficult time liking himself and seems to believe all of his relationships are incredibly fragile.

Urupotter:

This is a fascinating reading on Lupin that I've never seen. I don't read him the same way, in that I think Lupin actually does know that what he's doing is wrong, he just doesn't have the moral courage to act on his conscience. (I view him as the anti Snape, great conscience, but abysmal moral courage, while Snape had unbelievable moral courage but a shitty conscience. Their arcs are about growing their moral courage and their conscience respectively) Realizing that his negligence almost got Harry killed is what triggers his arc, concluding when he goes back to Tonks and Teddy after running away, taking responsibility for his actions for the first time.

But this reading is so interesting that I'll have to reflect on it. Do you mind if I post it on my Harry Potter tumblr blog? I'll credit you of course, I would just like to discuss it with my followers. Of course if you don't want to I won't.

UsuallySiSometimesNo:

Honestly, I think the lack of in-depth conversation about Remus Lupin (at least compared to fan favorites Sirius Black and Severus Snape) is a missed opportunity and a shame. Don't get me wrong, I can discuss Sirius and Snape until blue in the face, but Lupin's arc is just as powerful in an understated (and often underestimated) way. The muddy, oversimplified truth is, without the fatal-flaw decision making of all four Marauders throughout their lives, the series of events proceeding the first chapter of the first book don't happen, and the story we all know and love never comes to be.

And speaking of sparking a discussion about Lupin...

I think Lupin actually does know that what he's doing is wrong, he just doesn't have the moral courage to act on his conscience.

You know what? I agree. And that's what makes him so interesting, I think. He is constantly and dependably full to bursting with internal conflict. When his friends are wrong/do something wrong/say something wrong, he can and does immediately identify the situation as wrong. When he does something wrong, or when he does nothing in the face of something wrong, in that moment I believe he knows the full weight of the situation. Like you said, he has a strong conscience, as well as a deeper, perhaps more nuanced understanding of right and wrong than do, for example, James and Sirius. Now, Lupin needs his friends. They're not just people to hang out with, they're a lifeline for him. He's not going to engage in conflict with them if there is even the slightest chance that he might lose them (for a variety of reasons, he lacks, as you said, the moral courage to do so). But he's also a generally decent human being, and with a strong conscience comes the capacity for sincere guilt and remorse. So, not only will he not confront his friends, he needs it to be okay that he doesn't confront them. And it's at that point that I think the self gaslighting is triggered.

But Lupin is intelligent and nobody's fool, so the gaslighting creates only a thin layer of ice over the problem. Just enough of a cover that he can live with the things he would otherwise deeply regret. I do think he believes the alternative reality he makes for himself to be accurate as long as it isn't really challenged. Crack the ice, though, and we see him express remorse and reveal an underlying awareness of past and present truths. But then the moment is over, and the war between the uncomfortably and full weight of the truth and his need for the companionship of his friends returns, and then the gaslighting begins again, allowing him an easier return to his closest friends (and eventually his closest friend, singular, after the others have been taken from him as was his fear all along) without conflict and with minimal strain on his conscience.

Once Sirius, the last of his original chosen family is gone - truly gone, as opposed to 'located elsewhere' as he was when in prison - following OOtP, suddenly Lupin's arc takes off at a greater speed than at any point prior. He's now literally lost all of the people he'd been terrified of figuratively losing. Although there are still people and things he cares about, he isn't as dependent on any of them as he was on those foundational friendships, and the finality of their absence allows him to finally grow beyond his stifling cycle of reality shifting, confront the truths of his reality and his circumstances, and, as you said, finally take responsibility by returning to Tonks and Teddy - a decision that, ultimately, triggers his death (I don't mean to imply that it was a bad decision or that it's the sole cause of his death, but Rowling has said that being 'out of practice' contributed to his loss at the Battle of Hogwarts, which makes for a fantastic tragedy).

I don't mean to overstate the importance of this theory or imply that it's always present when he's on-stage, and, as with anyone, many other elements, of course, factor into his actions/words/motives. But I think it's a fascinating potential component of his character all the same. If you have more thoughts on this, I love to hear them - and I look forward to reading the discussion on your blog!

So what do you think? Is this a valid reading of Lupin? I'd say it is, but I'm interested in reading my followers thoughts!