#just absolutely incompatible with social settings

[citrine-elephant]

leon doing an undercover mission where he has to pretend to be a normal fast food worker, but he starts having a breakdown. and then gets a promotion at his real job for playing his role perfectly.

[trappedinafantasy37]

Since Minthara presents an exterior shell made of steel, and she's sometimes mean, and is an absolute badass in battle, she is often treated and perceived as someone who feels no emotions. And this often occurs to individuals who do put on such a tough exterior. It also does not help that many people perceive evil characters as incapable of doing or feeling anything other than evil. That love and evil are innately incompatible.

But Minthara is not emotionless, she does feel things. Sadness, grief, fear, loneliness, anger, anxiety, paranoia, vengeance, love. She can laugh, she can tell jokes, she can cry, she can smile, and she does get upset at things. If anything, she is emotionally repressed and emotionally guarded and the times where she does really express her more negative and vulnerable emotions is when it becomes too much to hold back and it comes out a little over the top. We have to remember she comes from a society in which such outward emotional expression would be rewarded with social punishment, religious scorn, or even death. So she really doesn't have the healthiest mechanisms to express her emotions.

She hides what she feels all the time as a means of keeping herself safe from punishment. She keeps it to herself cause she does not want you to see her as weak, as she would have been in the past. And she certainly does not want you or anyone else to punish her for it either. She hides behind little pet names and even using words from languages she knows you don't understand as that is the only way she feels safe being vulnerable with you. In her past, her love was rewarded with new wounds and new scars. She is terrified to open up to you, fearing that you will hurt her because she loves you. That her love for you won't actually be enough to stop you from hurting her. And she will only ever admit she loves you in contexts that have a high risk of death because there's really not much for her to lose at that point so she may as well tell you.

She also has a habit of intellectualizing what she feels and experiences so that they appear as "rational" and "logical" rather than emotional and to distance herself from her emotions. She says it takes a sharp mind to have sympathy for someone who suffers unnecessarily. She is trying to make it appear that emotions like sympathy is a matter of the mind, not the heart. That it is a mark of intelligence, because otherwise it would be the mark of weakness.

She blames herself for her own torments, like she deserved the awful things that happened to her. She frames the situation like she is more at fault and more deserving of blame, than the people who hurt her. It is the only way she can find any reason in what happened to her and any reason in her tormentors actions. That she did something wrong and induced someone's wrath upon her, rather than acknowledging that the person who hurt her is just a bad person.

She deserved what Ketheric and Orin did to her because she was "weak, passive, proud". That her emotional state had blinded her from the trap that was set, giving Ketheric and Orin ample opportunity to attack her. That if she hadn't felt those exact emotions, then it wouldn't have happened. She could have seen the trap coming, or she could have fought back.

Or if you attempt to tell her that her childhood was rough and her mother abused her, she immediately deflects by saying, "it could have been worse" and therefore, what she did actually experience wasn't really that bad. And yeah, sure, maybe she needed certain lessons given that she lived in a cruel and dangerous society like Menzoberranzan where she had to be prepared for violence at all times. But trauma is not born of love, it is born of fear, of pain, of agony, and her mother still tried to kill her. Regardless of her mother's intent, it was the first broken bond of trust and it left a mark on Minthara. Where she began to believe that her mother would torment her for torments sake, and she had doubts on whether or not her mother actually loved her.

When you encounter the first Orin imposter, it's pretty damn obvious she is terrified. And you kinda gotta squeeze it out of her to admit that she's afraid. Where it's "I'm afraid of Orin because she is capable of this, this, and this, and you should be too" rather than "I am afraid of Orin because she hurt me." And she begs you, BEGS, to keep her safe because she knows her fear makes her vulnerable to Orin.

She doesn't even truly acknowledge that she wasn't at fault for what Orin did to her until Orin is dead. She doesn't start putting the blame on Orin until Orin is dead. She doesn't go through the emotional process of sympathizing with herself until Orin is dead. And she doesn't admit that she undoubtedly has trauma, until Orin is dead. She gets so wrapped up, and so lost in her own fear and paranoia that she never has the room to properly process the things that happen to her. That her primary concern right now is keeping you, the others, and herself safe and her emotions can wait because wallowing in them will only make her weak. Only does the distance of death give her the room to start healing. Only problem is that there have always been threats and they never end, they never stop. So it is rare for Minthara to ever have a moment of peace and safety to work through what she feels and they just get backed up. Ignoring your problems does not make them go away.

So you wanna know what will happen when an embrace Durge betrays her? She will fall to her death, a knife in her belly, blaming herself for your betrayal. All her worst fears have come to pass and you were indeed a lover who hurt her because she loved you, and that she was a fool to ever trust you at all. That if she didn't love you, maybe you wouldn't have hurt her. She doesn't understand your reasoning, she can't make sense of it, she doesn't know why you'd betray her, so it must have been her fault for thinking you'd be different. That if she hadn't been so loyal, so devoted, that she could have been spared. That her belief that you would rule together is what damned her. She will die blaming herself for her own murder before she ever gets a chance to start blaming you.

[discourse-by-candlelight]

Astra: Some more random syscourse ramblings to put my thoughts to paper:

In my response to anti-endos and other confused systems I often point out that tulpamancy isn't a spiritual practice but a specific type of endogenic plurality. This is actually kind of misleading, however. It's not misleading in that tulpas aren't a form of endogenic plurality. They absolutely fit by definition (although this is also a draining of nuance which deserves a post on our main blog @thecandlelightsociety ), but the majority of tulpamancers don't so easily fit by community and culture.

To put it simply, the tulpamancy community and the endogenic and plural community have very different cultures from eachother. These differences come from a few key factors that should be kept in mind.

Some of these factors are:

1. Separate community starts and development in isolation. For a long time the two communities only bumped into eachother on occasion, and at least on the tulpamancy side the plural community was seen as strange and misinformation heavy, but also seen with curiosity for what could be used to improve the practice. It wasn't until later in the community timeline that the two groups started to directly interact and mix, with mixed spaces now being much easier to find.

2. Different approaches to understanding plurality/tulpas and how that affects worldviews. Tulpamancers have a much more experimental and analytical approach to how tulpas work and develop, while the plural community often runs far more on emotion and empathy first, accepting a much wider slew of experiences without as much skepticism. Both communities have a wide range of experiences more and less believable than others, but tulpamancy culture promotes focus on what makes an experience, while plural culture will focus on assuring the validity of the experience.

3. Lack of exposure to non tulpa plurals leading to tulpa specific concepts, models, and advice being common which may be incompatible with wider plurality. Building off the first two's points, the tulpamancy community has beliefs and advice which can work well for us, but could be useless or actively negative to many plurals. Concepts like these include dissipation, host/tulpa dynamics, approaches to system health, and others. This certainly doesn't apply for everything, and we know many non tulpa systems who have benefitted from a tulpamancy switching guide, or have made tulpas for their system. There's just a certain amount of caution needed when adapting concepts from one group over to the other, especially for tulpamancy and CDD interactions.

4. Roots going back to 4Chan instead of Tumblr. This one doesn't need much elaboration. 4chan has a very different set of rules compared to tumblr, and some of those subcultural views persist despite tulpamancy mainly being a reddit and discord focused community now.

5. Different demographics leading to different things being commonly accepted or taboo socially and politically. For instance, the tulpamancy has a much larger center to right wing demographic than the plural community, even though both still have large left leaning populations. This can lead to more ideas and perspectives in the tulpamancy community which would be frowned upon in the plural community, and vice versa.

These are just some of the things to keep in mind when discussing the tulpamancy community specifically in comparison to the usual broader endogenic label and plural community. As always with this blog, please remember that this post does not contain nearly the full nuance of the situation and subculture. We are a stressed procrastinating college student who has worked on and off on this and other post drafts all year in short bursts. Some of it is definitely going to be biased and scatterbrained.

Thank you for reading, and we're always open to asks even if we're not the fastest at responding!

[mallloryrowinski]

I know this has been said already, but I'll say it again regardless: the normalization and blind acceptance of transgender ideology for what it has become—where identity is seen as fluid and anyone can claim any gender, with immediate access to spaces previously defined by biological sex—raises questions about the boundaries of identity itself and will inevitably open the door for the normalization of other types of "trans" discourse, such as being "transracial" (or worse, because yes, it can get even worse).

When we normalize the idea that you can be born in the wrong body, which is somehow incompatible with your soul, we set a precedent for identity to be based entirely on subjective feelings rather than biological reality. This concept could easily extend beyond gender to race. If we accept that feeling like the opposite sex is enough to change one's social or legal identity, then by that same logic, someone could claim to identify as a different race based on how they feel.

Let’s also note that many transgender women claim to be no different from women because they’re "submissive, like pink, enjoy wearing dresses, like doing makeup, enjoy doing housework," and many other harmful misogynistic stereotypes. So, it would be absolutely unsurprising if we started seeing people identifying as Black based on harmful racial stereotypes that we’ve been fighting so hard to eradicate. Just as transgender ideology sometimes perpetuates stereotypes about women by associating femininity with submission or appearance, it’s not far-fetched to imagine someone claiming to be Black based on superficial or racist ideas about what it means to be part of that community—such as liking rap music, wearing certain styles of clothing, or embracing other cultural markers that are reductive and damaging.

I’ve seen people argue that it's not the same thing because culture is something that's learned, and whatnot. But Black people don’t suffer racism because of the culture they’ve been brought up in. Just like young girls under the Taliban rule right now aren't banned from schools because they "identify as female."

This poses serious issues for the rights and protections of people of color. Lived experiences of oppression, discrimination, and cultural heritage are tied to their biological realities. If someone who has not experienced those realities can claim to be part of that group based purely on self-identification, it risks undermining the significance of both racial and gender identities. Worse, it trivializes the very real social, political, and historical impacts of race (just as it has already done for sex).

And to those who say, “That’s impossible; race is fixed,” I would point out that biological sex is fixed too—yet here we are.

[edwad]

do you not view capitalism as a system whose driving force is the accumulation of profit or something? because if you do, it becomes pretty hard to square with your statements about 'market anarchism' or 'social democracy.' nobody's saying capitalism is incompatible with social welfare in an absolute sense, but it is clearly incapable of being a system that prioritizes social welfare over profit in the long term, even if under limited circumstances it might make concessions to it

lots of liberals see capitalism this way, and many of them specifically support it *because* it's profit-driven, which means that market forces around shifts in demand and competitive downward pressures on prices actually become a mechanism for delivering on social welfare. there's nothing meaningfully communist about this position and stacking communism on top doesn't actually connect the two together, it just has a different set of unjustified normative commitments tangled up in it.

[c0rpseductor]

“family” as a lot of people conxeptualize it — a place of particular love, care, closeness and security — is incompatible with family as a mode of social organization and hierarchy. i’m not feeling particularly well so i’m not sure i’m articulating this great but like, what i’m trying to say is that the traditional family is authoritarian by nature, and to achieve what most people think of with the word “family,” as in a place of constructive, loving, safe relationships, it must necessarily not resemble the nuclear family — in particular meaning that the family cannot be isolated, cannot inherently supersede other relationships, and cannot be driven by authority or exist as a hierarchy. the concept of “family” as a set of positive and nurturing relationships is fundamentally incompatible with shit like discipline.

i think a lot of people think like, “the problem is we should try to get parents to be nicer to kids,” but really the problem is that parents have absolute power over kids, and often fathers have absolute power over the household. it’s an authoritarian system. the problem isn’t that we have to replace mean despots with nice ones, it’s that these hierarchies exist at all. there’s nothing wrong with loving your relatives or parents or whatever but The Family as a system of power and as a little island you’re trapped in and receive all your care from is fucked.

honestly i wish there were separate words for these two conceptions of family. i think the idea of a particular set of people with whom you feel safest and most supported is great, and that doesn’t necessarily need to coincide with who you’re biologically related to. and it’s obviously useful to have a word for people you are related to and raised with. but i think lumping all these things under “family” when family is also a system of harm can make it difficult to criticize that system without sounding like you have a problem with like, support networks. sometimes it’s difficult for me to disentangle those ingrained associations, and i feel pretty critical of family as a victim of familial abuse.

i guess im not sure where i’m going with this post beyond that i generally agree with what i know about family abolition and also that i still feel really mad that people who don’t understand these things about family will try to talk about family in a like, transgressive anti-patriarchal way, and then just end up reinforcing this stuff

[construingseacats]

Umireread - Turn of the Golden Witch: Chapter 7: 'Furniture' and 'People'

Sat, Oct 4 1986 - 6:00PM

The following contains spoilers for the entirety of Umineko. Please do not read if you are yet to finish it.

Is the sky worsening? Or is the mood? With the talk of blue and grey skies, could the typhoon not just be a plot device to facilitate the classic setting of a murder mystery, but relevant to the deeper commentary of perception as a whole?

Poor Yasu. It must hurt a lot whenever she hears about George’s eventual dreams and desires and how they’re incompatible with her. The reality of the situation setting in, I suppose.

We’ve talked about finding joy in the mundane, and I do find myself wondering about the silly details of reality that don’t get addressed here. Who’s eating all the extra meals that get made? I presume whoever takes Kinzo’s meal to the study gets his, Yasu probably has to eat for both Kanon and Shannon whenever Gohda is cooking for everyone (since they can just cook a single meal and pretend both Kanon and Shannon has eaten when they do it themselves), but how are they handling Beatrice’s meal? Is Yasu eating all three? Are they throwing the food somewhere and hoping no-one finds it? This is one of those things that really doesn’t matter, but is fun to think about.

I do really love Gohda as an outsider to the servants - he adds a nice dynamic by not having everyone in the staff automatically being together on team Yasu. Thinking about it, I kind of wish we had more of a dynamic between Battler and Gohda, given they’re both “outsiders” to the family. I could see a natural bond happening there - and while the Ushiromiya tend to be naturally prideful and look down on the servants, we’ve already had scenes with George and Shannon falling for them, so there’s a precedent there for the new generation to look at them as humans rather than furniture.

And Kumasawa’s at it again. Still not quite sure what to make of this.

So this scene is interesting by itself - but it’s also another reflection on the absolute meaninglessness of tradition and seniority (even if it’s being done through Gohda’s tinted lens of desire). Is there something to be said about the western fascination detailed through the Ushiromiya being tied to a criticism of Japanese society unconditionally demanding respect for elders? This would be a pretty hot take for a fairly fundamental part of society, but I don’t think it’s inconceivable - we’ve already seen how Krauss, as the eldest, is easily the most incompetent of Kinzo’s children; and a good portion of the tale dwells in Kinzo’s sins as well. Perhaps, once again, Ryukishi’s past as a social worker has made him reconsider this axiom of society, given the amount of terrible elders he’s no doubt had the misfortune of encountering?

Another pretty heavy scene of Yasu questioning herself regarding the upcoming events of the night - although the phrasing of this “discreetly” taking place in the corner of the kitchen is rather amusing given how emotional Kanon is getting. Of course, if this was all taking place as an internal dialogue…

Yasu literally caught daydreaming, ha.

Can’t wait for the Nanjo black magic arc. I wonder if the book he picked up is one of the ones in a foreign language that he can’t read? Wouldn’t put it past him, if he’s sufficiently bored.

Interesting comment - is this reflective of Battler for this game?

I think there’s something to be said about all the times that Umineko is stating the central message in the early episodes, but you’re not going to pick up on it while your brain is focused on solving the mystery. Kinzo talking about how chess is about having fun isn’t going to tell you who the culprit is, why the murders are happening, or reveal any new information - but that’s exactly what’s happening on the meta level, isn’t it?

And we’re even literally talking about it going on in purgatory. It’s incredible how on the nose we can get at times.

It feels odd to ignore the Shannon-Beatrice scene here, but I’m withholding my thoughts on that. The inner monologue is inherently intensely complex, so it’ll be better suited to the Wake than a liveblog.

Another classic “Obvious” from Umineko.

Gee, Rosa is saying this like she’s under gunpoint. I wonder if she’s been coerced into something.

Well yeah, we have an entire Epitaph designed for that exact purpose.

There’s certainly something to be said about how the clock sound is the same one used for the guns being cocked. Quite a loaded concept, eh?

[halite-jones-reblog]

Dealing with intrusive thoughts.

I will never be good or pure enough for anyone's absolute philosophy. This makes me feel bad, and like I have failed at being a good person, but the thought is a negative delusion, and does not undo the good I have done in my life previous to my failing to fit in with people who have refused to or are incapable of understanding me.

This also sets me free enough to think beyond simping for someone who simply never cared for me, or didn't care enough to make me feel like I was accepted or supported.

This sets me free enough to think about what I want to do in my life that is totally unconnected to things previous people who tried to be the leaders of my life.

I want to be open to the idea that maybe I should correct my thinking if it's bent or inappropriate or making people uncomfortable. But I have been made uncomfortable countless times, and sometimes I've been made to think that I owe the person who made me uncomfortable an apology, and that has made me even angrier. I have been apologized to before, but for other things.

My brain sticks to situations where no one has apologized to me for hurting my feelings. Some of it is me never speaking up for myself when my feelings are hurt, but I'm afraid to say it because of the inevitable shout-down of "your fee-fees don't matter, toughen up, crybaby!" Which of course just makes me cry more, and builds up my silent resentment that I hope will dissipate on its own.

But when I can't talk about my true feelings, they just stay where they are, for years. Not being able to talk to people about complex shit on equal terms makes me shut down.

I've been intimidated into and out of quite a lot of social groups, and in my desperation for community and acknowledgement, I've overextended myself.

I am healing every day I don't force myself into a situation where I feel like I've wronged someone just by standing next to them.

Learning to put myself first is scary because, as a very neurodivergent black sheep, my needs are mostly incompatible with others. I judge myself a little bit every day when I can't fit in or even silently disagree with those I care for or about, but not everyone is ever going to agree with everything someone else says.

I have attempted full agreeableness, and it has ended in misery, and resentment that is difficult to resolve. I need to fix it, but the thing I need to fix is not my incompatibility with others. The thing I need to fix is the feeling of inferiority I feel when I can't fit in.

In general, no one is telling me there's anything wrong with me but me. My notions of inferiority are echoes of past trauma, and don't apply to every situation.

I try to act with honor and respect, to bring humor and levity, and to share the works I've done with people that I hope are at least somewhat like-minded. I am not always met with the same, and it breaks my heart when I'm not.

I put so much effort into my dealings with others. It is difficult for me, with my neurodivergence, to just naturally connect. I have to work to appear human. It is work that very often goes unacknowledged, but I want to have friends and be around people so that I'm not just stuck with myself.

But when I can't really articulate that, people can't know or see what I'm doing. I need to stop sacrificing my calm to be in spaces I'm not ready to be in. And some people mislabel their spaces as safe, but I can't put my guard down until I know a space is safe for me.

When my brain is at its worst, every space seems like it is dangerous, and I feel like I cannot trust anyone, even when it's not the truth.

I'm trying to calm myself back down, and get back to a thought-space where I'm not consistently agitated. I don't want to hurt or disappoint anyone, or give an incorrect impression of myself. But I'm also in the negatives, and in the interest of keeping myself from lashing out at others, I would rather remove myself than hurt someone else. But that also hurts me, and prevents myself from getting closure, and I need to re-adjust the re-adjusted re-adjustments, which is very frustrating!

[kathleenkatmary]

Noirvember: Strange Impersonation (Anthony Mann, 1946)

WARNING: This entire write-up is pretty much about the ending and how it seriously hurts an otherwise really good exploration of identity. So if you haven't seen it and you don't want to be spoiled, you've been warned.

I would have given this four stars were it not for the 'it was all a dream' ending.

Expanding on this thought from a day or two ago... I think there are a lot of problems with this ending that really do hurt an otherwise very, very good movie. I think one of the biggest ones is that it does, at least in a way, feel kind of tacked on so as to give the movie a happy ending rather than a bleak one. Which just seems unnecessary. There are a lot of films of this type that absolutely do have incredibly bleak endings, and the way this would have ended without the 'it was all a dream' ending would have been bleak, but in a way that I think would have been cohesive with the story. So much of this movie is about identity, with the main character trying to reconcile the things she wants, all of which are deeply tied to he she is, with each other and trying to figure out if she can have all of those things or if they're in direct conflict with each other. There are also aspect of her trying to reconcile the core of who she is and what she values as a scientist with the expectations the other people in her life, and society as a whole, have for her. Without the tacked on ending, Strange Impersonation is a really effective exploration of what it can do to a person when the things they want are treated by people and society as being incompatible, what the things are that actually make up our identity, and what other people see as making up our identity. And the bleak ending really fits with that because it explicitly shows how much removing key aspects of a person's identity can break their psyche.

But with the "it was all a dream" ending, especially with exactly what they did with that ending, all of that pretty much goes out of the window. Instead, it becomes about how it was wanting things outside of those accepted social norms of what her identity, as a woman, should be that led to such an identity crisis, and that she learned from her dream that she should just marry the guy because she's luck he wants her.

I think that's enough to deem the ending a failure, but that's not the only problem with the ending. I don't think the people making this movie really considered what the whole thing being a dream would really say about the character. With it all being a dream, that means the way the characters are framed in the story from the point where the dream starts is all coming from her. It's what she thinks of those people. And the way her minds frames her lab assistant and the woman she accidentally hit with her car are pretty damn nasty. The lab assistant is a scheming monster who intentionally botched the experiment and set up an explosion to possibly kill her, and at the very least seriously kill her, all because she wanted to still her boss's man. And the woman she hit with her car is a terrible, lying drunk who has no problem with holding a woman at gunpoint and robbing her. All without really any reason to think these things. Looking back at the movie at everything that happened before the point where the dream starts, there is nothing that happens that would suggest these women are these monsters she's imagined in her dream. There's a point where her assistant talks about how if she had a man like our main character's fiancée, she wouldn't put off the wedding, but that's really it. There really isn't anything that she does that would suggest she'd scheme and maim in order to get that guy.

When it comes to the woman she accidentally hits with her car, I think it's even more egregious because she knows nothing about this woman beyond the fact that she was drinking the night that it happened and that she was clearly struggling both emotionally and financially. That's it. But in her dream she imagined the most horrible version of her based on that.

So really, the (probably) unintended consequence of this 'it was all a dream' ending is that it ends up making our main character, who we're supposed to be sympathizing with, look like an insecure, jealous, suspicious, judgmental, and with a heaping dose of bias against the socially marginalized.

Twist endings can work well when they're done with very thought out and specific intention. This is a really good example of how bad a twist can be when it's clearly not well thought out and considered. Honestly, the ending is so bad that I'm tempted to give it an even lower rating, but everything that came before the ending worked so well and fit together really nicely. So I just can't bring myself to give it anything lower than a 3.5. Just know that yes, the ending is handled really badly.

[meloshbielka]

"What is gender artifactualism?" par Julia Serano

Why is this term needed?

I created the term to make a distinction between the idea that gender is “socially constructed” versus the idea that gender is “just a construct”—both of which are common refrains within the aforementioned academic and activist settings, but which imply very different things. As I put it in Excluded:

To have a social constructionist view of gender (by most standard definitions) simply means that one believes that gender does not arise in a direct and unadulterated manner from biology, but rather is shaped to some extent by culture—e.g., by socialization, gender norms, and the gender-related ideology, language and labels that constrain and influence our understanding of the matter. By this definition, I am most certainly a social constructionist. Gender artifactualists, on the other hand, are typically not content to merely discuss the ways in which gender may be socially constructed, but rather they discount or purposefully ignore the possibility that biology and biological variation also play a role in constraining and shaping our genders. Sometimes, even the most nuanced and carefully qualified suggestions that biology may have some influence on gendered behaviors or desires will garner accusations of “essentialism” in gender artifactualist circles... [p.117-8]

Is gender artifactualism correct as a theory?

Absolutely not. In Chapter 13, “Homogenizing Versus Holistic Views of Gender and Sexuality,” I thoroughly detail why gender artifactualism (along with its sparring partner in the nature-versus-nurture debate, gender determinism, which presumes that gender-related behaviors arise solely via biology) is flat-out incorrect as a theory to explain why gender differences exist. Instead, I forward a holistic perspective that acknowledges that shared biology, biological variation, shared culture, and individual experience all come together in an unfathomably complex manner to create both the trends as well as the diversity in gender and sexuality that we see all around us. This holistic perspective is completely compatible with the idea that gender is socially constructed (i.e., shaped by socialization and culture), but incompatible with the idea that gender is merely a social artifact (or in activist parlance, “just a construct”).

Why bother debunking gender artifactualism?

The prevalence of gender artifactualist thinking within feminism and queer activism has led to two major fallacies that have undermined these movements. The first is the idea that gender artifactualist positions are inherently liberating, progressive, and anti-sexist in contrast to gender determinism (which is why artifactualist views are so often touted in these settings). However, as I point out in Excluded:

The truth of the matter is that gender artifactualism can be used to promote sexist beliefs just as readily as gender determinism can. For much of the twentieth century, Sigmund Freud’s hardline gender artifactualist theories were used to pathologize queer people and to portray girls and women as inferior to their male counterparts. Similarly, contemporary feminists and queer activists are outraged by stories of intersex children being subjected to nonconsensual genital surgeries, or gender-non-conforming children being subjected to rigid behavior modification regimes, yet the justification for these procedures is founded in the gender artifactualist theories of psychologists like John Money and Kenneth Zucker, respectively. [p.145-146]

Indeed, I go on to make the case that both gender artifactualism and determinism have an “exception problem,” in that they focus on explaining typical genders and sexualities (e.g., the preponderance of heterosexual, gender-conforming people), yet “...fail to provide a reasonable explanation for why so many of us gravitate toward various sorts of exceptional genders and sexualities.”[p.147] As a result, both approaches can provide a rationale for pathologizing gender and sexual minorities on the basis that we represent “mistakes” or “developmental errors” of some kind.

The second fallacy of gender artifactualist thinking goes something like this: If our gender and sexual identities and behaviors arise solely as a result of culture, and given that our culture is hierarchical and sexist, then we (feminists, queer activists, people more generally) must simply unlearn these oppressive ways of being that we were indoctrinated into, and instead “do” or “perform” our genders in more liberating, subversive, and righteous ways. While this line of reasoning might sound promising on the surface, in reality, it is often used to condemn and police other people’s genders and sexualities:

After all, if gender and sexuality are entirely social artifacts, and we have no intrinsic desires or individual differences, this implies that every person can (and should) change their gender and sexual behaviors at the drop of a hat in order to accommodate their own (or perhaps other people’s) politics. This assumption denies human diversity and, as I have shown, often leads to the further marginalization of minority and marked groups. [p.134]

Granted, not all gender artifactualists buy into this idea that we can readily change our genders and sexualities in order to better conform to some political view or another. But those who do will typically cite gender artifactualist mantras (e.g., “all gender is performance,” “gender is just a construct”) in order to make their case. In Excluded, I borrow Anne Koedt’s phrase ‘perversion of “the personal is the political” argument’ to discuss how this premise has been used repeatedly to police gender and sexual expression within various strands of feminism over the years. In contrast, the holistic approach that I forward accommodates gender and sexual diversity both within our movements, as well as in the world more generally.

[yuriswitch]

The first time we see a piece of discourse that we generally agree with to a degree, we instinctively pass it on without really spending a lot of time going over the argument, since we're not really aware of the pitfalls yet at that stage. And yet, over time we see more and more arguments on the same direction, and that reveals a whole pattern of oversimplifications and logical extremities that eventually make it difficult to engage or even just keep reblogging. It tends to come with limited and biased understanding of counter arguments from the other side, which is falsely presented as a big monolith and always engaged with through the proxy of a set of reduced versions of the arguments - with the unspoken assumption being that there is nothing more than those bad arguments of the wrong side and the good arguments of the right side, also organized into a fixed list.

Nobody will ever tell you that there doesn't exist anything beyond those "pro" and "anti" options, but everyone still acts like those are the only two things that ever exist and that freedom is when you choose the correct one (sounds familiar?) because the other will destroy the universe or something. Even though there's always more to it than the "pro vs anti" question, everyone still keeps constantly going from one object of that question to another like there's nothing else out there than this narrowly defined discourse.

And it's a serious problem, because not only does it result in everyone posting ready-made conclusions without any prior investigation, but also leads to a perpetual failure to engage with the ideas themselves, instead trying to advertise a distortion fixed into a bad faith argument purely for the sake of advertising a logically extreme position. It's either "literally nothing about it is ever bad stop wanting to do something about it and just give up on reacting altogether, it's fascist not to let it go completely no matter what" or "literally everything short of complete eradication of this thing is pure evil and you're evil too unless you do the one right thing" applied to things that absolutely shouldn't be treated in the same way as rape or torture.

And this always comes with a spectrum of more thought out positions that aren't as popular as the much more shareable extremities are, so they get conflated with the most popular one, all because the very idea of "pro vs anti" discourse relies on the assumption there is only one abstract cultural object to judge as allowed or not, rather than a wide variety of different particular cases of the same general type, that nonetheless have wildly different implications depending on context. Again, unless it's literally something like rape or torture.

And what that leads to, is different valid grievances being rejected and dismissed by association with their assigned stance, even when they don't necessarily imply a "pro" or "anti" position. And what really worries us, is that this only further pushes reasonable takes out just to create more room for the more shareable takedowns and callouts of the other side, aggravating a pointless conflict to the point where any kind of wide collaboration, for the sake of identifying when the thing in question leads to harm and what can be done about that, can no longer happen.

All because the fundamental question of how things affect different people is entirely incompatible with a simplistic "should we exterminate it or let it happen no matter what" routine, built into the surrogate of real agency that is the online system of social control through discourse and exclusion from entire social spheres

/Hachikuji

[thetldrplace]

Fascism, Integralism, and the Corporative Society- H.R. Morgan: Codex 6

The Corporative Society: How Social Life will be in the New State 

Planning: The Force Factor  It is the refusal to see the inevitability of force in order to realize social values which condemns most reformers to futility. 

Social systems represent a balance of power between consent and pressures brought to bear on the governed. There has never been a free society in which men and women enjoyed much sovereignty over their choices or conduct. All government has a monopoly on force or violence. 

Everyone disapproves of certain coercions and wants certain liberties. Calling what I like liberty and what I dislike 'license', just means that when the law suits me, it is liberty, and when it doesn't, it is coercive and oppressive. But we can't demonstrate scientifically that there is more or less coercion under capitalism, communism, or fascism. Under any of these, we can point out different liberties and coercions. 

The inevitable uniqueness of a social plan for a given nation is going to require coercion to realize that plan. Clearly, only one plan can be operative in one country at one time, if it is to enjoy public order. 

Freedom of conscience has never been an absolute freedom under liberal capitalism. Social order, not individual or group self-expression, must be the highest ultimate value of any social plan. When self-expression is incompatible with social order, the result is anarchy. 

No matter what system it is, some administrative body will have the authority over the imperatives of social order, and those imperatives will demand some limit on individual self-expression. 

It isn't necessary to prescribe every activity, it is only necessary to prevent any associative activity from being used by leaders to defeat the national plan. Tolerance of safe differences, even within as broad and inclusive a way as possible, are good. But there can't be unlimited tolerance. 

One of the strongest arguing and operating points of liberal capitalism has always been the fact that its most vital and often its harshest coercions, those of economic necessity, under a given regime of property distribution and deprivation, legally enforced with the might of the state, have been applied with impersonality, anonymity, and a large measure of irresponsibility. 

Here Morgan refers to loss of jobs through measures that were beyond the control of workers. 

Dave note:  I think there IS something to the fact that the market forces of capitalism, because they are impersonal, do make it a more fair system. If the market, which is society, chooses A over B, B may not like it, but it wasn't like someone up in the government arbitrarily chose A and screwed B over.   The free market system of capitalism will always include a very dynamic set of circumstances where workers are losing jobs in industries that are outcompeted by others. That would happen in the purest, fairest version of the free market. I will grant that there are plenty of forces involved trying to put fingers on scales and manipulate things in their favor. That IS unfair and should be seen as such. But the free market, as a system, is fair, despite the negative consequence of market losers. 

State Absolutism  The state must enforce a country's unique social plan through government institutions. These can follow either liberal or fascist methods, but it will require the absolute power of the state. The popular denunciation of fascism is that it is state absolutist, requiring unlimited powers, as contrasted with the limited powers of the liberal state. But this misrepresents the issue. The powers of every state are in theory, unlimited. The difference between fascism and liberalism is only in which certain things the state does without limitation, and in which the state is inhibited. Therefore, state absolutism isn't really the issue, but rather the specific applications of the absolute power of the state. 

Here Morgan delves into military conscription and authority, which he considers absolute even in liberal systems. He contrasts this with private property and notes that private property is respected more than life (given that individuals can be involuntarily coerced into the military). 

The reply is that the Constitution protects not the right of the hungry to eat, but the right of the rich to keep what they have and to eat while the poor starve. "Nothing augurs so impressively the end of liberalism today as the changing temper of those on relief who are coming more and more to feel and assert a vested right to be cared for by the State." 

Dave note:  I'm not sure, given his last sentence, if Morgan disagrees with me, but as to what the constitution protects, the framing is wrong. The hungry being hungry isn't a matter of a 'right' being denied. No one would deny them the right to eat. But the right to eat isn't the same as the right to be provided with food. The government should protect the private property of its citizens, rich or poor.  But I think he is right in that the common acceptance of this idea that the citizens have a right to be fed or housed or clothed, does signal the end of liberalism. Freedom entails responsibility, and the more people offload their responsibility to take care of themselves to the government, the more they offload their rights to make decisions in those areas. 

The idea of liberalism was to limit the unlimited powers of the State in ways suitable to supposed property interests. But, Morgan writes, the time has come to acknowledge those limitations in respect to his property, aren't actually calculated to protect his interests in the long-run. Fascism is saying that property and capital be called to colors as well as conscripts in time of war, and further, that this term of service is not only for war, but a permanent scheme of social organization and operation. 

Dave Note:  While there is much that I grant in his analysis, I think it deliberately reduces the problem.  We, of course, grant that individual self-expression isn't limitless, particularly where it would infringe on fellow citizen's rights. Moving from the consequent necessity of some limitation to "it's just a matter of degrees" is true, but also misleading. The smaller limitations in liberal society may only be 'degrees' less than under fascism, but it's precisely in just how much that is important. 10% limitation isn't the same as 90% limitation. There's a reason why communist countries had barbed wire keeping people in, and it wasn't because there was essentially no difference between a few degrees of limitations on individual freedom.  

Planning: A Problem in Value Choices  Morgan outlines an interesting discussion over the choice of values. He starts with the impossibility of expressing the fascist scheme in the language of liberalism or communism or another system. Each has its own language. The liberal scheme rests on the ideology of supposed eternal and absolute truths. These he calls mere verbalisms, like 'equality before the law', 'freedom of contract', democratic self-government', 'just compensation', and so on. They sound impressive, but the majority couldn't possibly explain what they mean in terms which harmonize the definition with the reality. 

The fascist scheme is an expression of human will which creates its own truths and values from day to day, to suit its changing purposes. Fascists start from a situation of fact and a human will to do something about it- either to alter it, or preserve it. Fascism is an expression of the human will reacting to changing situations of life in the eternal struggle for existence. 

The fascist plan is what the people want, or the leaders want, and fascist planning is the way to get it. 

The chief plank in the conservative platform is inhibition- inhibition of government, inhibition of the underprivileged, inhibition of anything in the nature of a vital plan of a nation. To talk about fascism or communism in the language of liberalism will end up reducing the content, and changing the values from virtues to monstrosities. 

Under communism, a small shopkeeper with a few helpers is changed into a dirty bourgeois capitalist oppressor. What the fascist regards as an ennobling love of country, becomes mass hysteria under liberalism. What fascist cherish as social discipline, becomes tyranny in the liberal language. 

Two fundamental notions are essential to understanding of planning, or the formulation of a new social system:   1) Any social system represents a scheme or hierarchy of ultimate values or objectives, the upholding of which is one of the chief duties of the state and its citizens. 

2) These ultimate values can't be validated by logic or reason. 

Morgan says there is little difference in the way a social system is enforced under any system. Liberal states may be free of many of the repressive measures of communism or fascism in peace, but in war, they are quite similar. 

So essentially, there are no real disbelievers in planning per se, only disbelievers in certain plans and planning by the other fellow. 

There are a wide range of values or objectives for national planning from which to make choices. Planning for America must proceed from an analysis of our own problems, assume a set of values, and explore the possibilities of their realization and possible means to this end. 

Whatever these ultimate values are, they can't be validated or proved good or desirable by processes of logic. Rational statement, analysis, clarification, and comparison of values are useful for two reasons: 

1) values are realized, made to triumph, or enforced, through the instrumentality of reason. In other words: you know what you want and reason will help you to get it, if it can be had. 

2) values can be clarified and compared only by the processes of reason. 

But Morgan says we need to dispense with the rationalist notion that assumes reason as normative, instead of being instrumental. Reason is the tool of our will and emotional drives.  

Morgan writes: "As the scientist knows, facts have to be selected according to purposes, or preconceived theories and intuitions, or hunches, or, more definitely, according to the conclusion or verdict which is desired to reach, or according to the hypothesis it is desired to build up." 

Dave note:  This is NOT the way science is supposed to work. Certainly, facts have to be selected, and we all work according to preconceptions. But the point of doing things scientifically is to look for flaws and undermine the test, which should lead one closer to the truth. Of course, we have to acknowledge that people do use the method at times in a manipulative way to bolster their position, rather than in a genuine search for truth. 

Morgan proceeds: Fascism is not anti-intellectual or antirational. It uses observed fact and logical deduction as well as liberalism.  

Reason is useful as a means to an end, and as a selector or clarifier of ends about which one is not clear. Had I lived in 15th century Spain with my present religious convictions, I would have understood the futility of trying to dissuade the heads of the Inquisition from their pursuit of heresy. Their rational capacity was just as good as mine, and their understanding of the implications of religious persecution and consequences as complete as mine. But their premises and emotional attitudes differed. They felt those unpleasant things had to be done, and those heavy prices paid in Spain, to save the souls of most of their compatriots. They undoubtedly believed this with deep intensity and fervor.  

Today, we need to rational clarification of values of a plan for America. Using reason to clarify momentous social values and their consequences brings the choice down to: fight, or make concessions. Trying to make the other fellow see that God, reasons, right, etc is on your side will only exasperate him more and make him all the more eager to fight. 

In the discussion of values or social objectives, it is useful to clear as to what one wants and what the other fellow wants, and to find out at what point either will fight. Taking this view will usually produce more concessions on both sides rather than an appeal to justice or reason to support one's own scheme of values. 

The National Plan: An Expression of the Popular Will  Fascism holds that the national plan or social scheme is always an expression of the might of the people, and this expression must be made explicit through the administration of those in power. 

The beguiling myth of liberalism is that people can be governed by laws and not by men. This myth relies chiefly on the assumption that while administrative men are unreliable and prone to weaknesses, judges are not. But the trouble with any theory of impersonal government, or government by laws and principles, rather than men, is that it attributes to documents or statements of principle, qualities only humans can possess. The written word always requires interpretation and application by a given person. 

The law can only express the will of the people with regard to current problems, subject to contemporary thought and feeling. 

Morgan writes that trial by battle is one of the most essential features of the theory of liberal jurisprudence. The underlying assumption is that there is such a thing as absolute right and wrong, and that if both parties to a dispute select a champion, the champion of the right side will win the battle.  

The champion used to be a knight in arms, now he is a lawyer. This is justice by sporting event. 

This theory of pursuing absolutes like justice, fair competition, equality, etc, by means of trial by sporting event is incompatible with any rational theory of national planning. Its vogue under liberalism is probably due to two considerations: 

1) It makes right theoretically superior to might. Even though settling right by a legal battle contradicts this theory, it eases Christian consciences to the predatory features of the economic struggle under capitalism. The successful in the acquisitive struggle can exculpate themselves all wrongdoing or abusive uses of force and violence if they can say they have kept within the law. 

2) it is in the professional interests of the lawyers to have a social system operated on this principle because it means highly remunerative work on their end. 

Instead, while courts and judicial processes have a place in every social scheme, their function must be that of an instrument of the popular will, not that of making interpretations of the popular will, and not that of making economic relationships a racket for lawyers and bankers. 

The fascist State repudiates the liberal idea of conflict of interests and rights as between the State and the individual; such conflicts being settled through a trial by legal battle under the umpiring of a supposed neutral third party represented by a judge.  

The main concern of the administration of justice under fascism is not the protection of the individual against a state assumed to be prone to abuse the individual. The chief purpose is the protection of the State against its own mistakes. 

Liberalism assumes the individual welfare and protection is largely a matter of having active and powerful judicial restraints on governmental interference with the individual; Fascism assumes that individual welfare and protection is mainly secured by the strength, efficiency, and success of the State in realization of the national plan. 

Morgan then adds:  "Conceivably, of course, a State and government might fall into the hands of a few individuals whose every act would be an abuse. But such an eventuality seems most improbable in any modern State, least of all in the United States." 

Those in charge of government would have the most obvious self-interest in making these tribunals function efficiently. They would not have an interest in upholding mistakes of the State that could be corrected. 

A View of the Corporate Syndical State  Each corporation, which is an occupational group, is responsible for its own corporate life. It must protect all those engaged in the branch of activity with which it is concerned; it must see that they are adequately rewarded for their work, it must defend their rights, it must provide for them in misfortune. 

Society will regarded as being divided vertically, according to trade or profession, instead of horizontally, according to social status, or worse, income. It is elementary that all class war is to be repudiated. 

In each industry, the hierarchy of functions is to remain; there will be authority and obedience, but not absolute authority and wage slavery. Strikes and lock-outs and such methods of class defense are specifically declared illegal.  

All national syndicates are to subordinate their own interests to the interests of the national economy. The key principle in all corporative theory is the principle of the common good.  

Reference to an older Portuguese tradition of fishermen's associations is made. The Casa dos Pescadores includes both masters and men, and is designed as an organ of social cooperation. It's functions are classified under three heads: the representation and defense of professional interests; the instruction of the young in the art of fishing; the care of the sick and assistance for those who have suffered loss in storms, and general welfare work. These confraternities were the accredited representatives of all seafarers, and were designed to help the widows, the sick and disabled, and even to make good the loss caused by shipwreck or damage. Such confraternities were local rather than national, and demonstrated an essential traditionalism that fascism seeks: something rooted in the history of Portugal. 

The spirit of fascist corporatism is found in this application: it is rooted in the national traditions, it has a power of adaptation, avoidance of state bureaucracy, and it recognizes the reality of the time- the illiterate and impractical nature of the Portuguese people, as well as the need for coordination, which necessitated a modicum of officials. 

The Coming Corporate State  Alexander Raven Thomson (British writer)  The Corporate State must replace the liberal system. The reason is that democracy [probably he means the liberal system] is failing everywhere, most likely due to its mistaken belief in absolute individual liberty, which has negated effective government, and deprived people of their essential freedom. 

The British Union wants power to govern, including power to control and direct industrial and financial organization. Not only will it then be possible to clear slums and cure unemployment, but the productive powers of the nation will be released to raise the standard of life in the entire community. 

The nation is higher in the order than the individuals comprising it. 

We want a social order that maintains the family and freedom of self-expression and initiative within the bounds of national well-being.  

Prosperity is attained by the functional organization of economic and industrial groups. 

Freedom is realized by the individual once he is released from political corruption and economic oppression to enjoy leisure for cultural self-expression.  

Fascism recognizes the desirability of individual freedom of expression and initiative, as a basis of healthy social life, but it does not place this principle before all others, as does decayed democracy. 

Individual freedom can only follow economic liberation.  

The government will establish prosperity by planning both production and distribution. 

Dave Notes:  In a later section of the book, Ziotio Garibaldi, a Mexican fascist, is expounding his ideas of fascism, and he mentions the 'ruling class of exploiters who cheat them (workers) of their share of the profits...'  It made me question how much of the profits the workers are entitled to? It doesn't seem to me they're entitled to a share of ANY of the profits. They are contracted for a wage. As long as workers are paid the wage they have earned, they have received their full payment. On the flip side, they have no more responsibility to the company either. If the company loses money, they must still be paid, since they were contracted only to work a certain amount of hours for a certain amount of pay. They have no responsibilities, and consequently no rights to the profits or loss of the company.  If a company, like Amazon, does particularly well, the warehouse workers there are not more entitled to the massive gains of the company simply because the company has been successful.   Assuming Amazon's success has come from its wide range of products, easy purchasing process, and quick delivery, there is no more effort on the part of the warehouse workers than there would be if they were working at a competitor who is not successful. The workers output is the same. It is the process itself that is the difference. Now if all things were equal and the workers at one company just bust their butts to produce more, then yeah, they should be sharers in the profits, since the profits are due to them. But the average worker has no more right to company profits than anyone else. 

[spectaculardistractions]

To Ricardo Urgoiti Hollywood, 6 August 1946 Dear Ricardo, I am hugely amazed and, I have to confess, somewhat peeved to find you read reservations and reticence between the lines of my last letter. Either you have read it completely the wrong way or I must, unintentionally, have expressed myself badly. I haven’t got a copy of that letter, but I know myself and I know my feelings towards you are absolutely cordial, so I can guarantee that, whether written by me or imagined by you, I meant absolutely no offense in that ill-fated letter. If I quoted your phrase from a few years ago it was only because I found it so convincing at that time, and it seemed a really good way to justify your silence. The proof that I liked it is in the fact I remembered it. I’m going to say it again: I am amazed you read any reservations in my letter. I see you have set off down the artistic path. That you have started to paint is already a worrying symptom: musician, painter, film-maker… I’m not surprised, and I hope that you will continue, but professionally. No hobbies. You could easily trump the local film-makers in Spain and directing would allow you to live well and pursue your other activities. Your ‘atomic’ tendencies please me less. Everything about working in this lousy technological era makes me sick. If I make my own personal contribution to the ‘disposable sub-art form’ that is the cinema, it is really in spite of myself and because I’ve never found, nor do I know how to express myself better in an alternative more longstanding and durable medium. Nuclear fission doesn’t shock me any more than steam power for example, and humanity could have got by very well without both. I don’t mean I refuse to believe in, or that I am opposed – because that would be madness – to the terrible, prosaic, technological reality of our times: I just want to note that I have no admiration or affinity for it, and that it does not interest me. As far as I’m concerned, the atom has not revealed anything new, it has just confirmed the moral depravity of our age. As an example, and symptom of this, I choose a quote from Churchill (a character as vile as Hitler, but without the aura of paranoia): ‘Divine Providence has placed in our hands, in the hands of the Anglo-Saxon nations, this terrible, destructive force. What would our enemies have done had fate placed it in theirs?’ This is from a speech he gave the day after the criminal attack on Hiroshima. Such cruel and blasphemous cynicism contains the seeds of the entire ‘social’ atomic programme we’ve subsequently seen put in practice. And so on and so forth. I’ve no more to say on this topic. Men of good faith are working on it out there. But they are the rarely heard minority with negligible influence on the people who wield the guns and the money. I’d be very grateful if you have time, to hear a few objective and honest lines about what the ardent defenders of the so-called Caudillo are saying about me in Spain. This may be a childish and masochistic interest of mine, but it is genuine. Of course, I’m not going to insist, because I imagine you won’t have time to write now, and you might well not want to. You can satisfy my unhealthy curiosity another time. Wishing you a very good trip, my friend, and until as soon as possible, with my warmest regards, Luis PS All the projects I mentioned in another letter, in spite of having signed contracts and options, are still just projects. In the meantime, I’m almost completely broke. I couldn’t even afford a trip to New York to see you and sort out a few little things at the same time. I feel I’m incompatible with Hollywood. With Mexico even more so.

Jo Evans & Breixo Viejo, Luis Buñuel: A Life in Letters

[greenplumbboblover]

(Original post from my Patreon)

Hiya Everyone!

Some might have followed all the cool things that I've been slowly but carefully been working on :) I figured I've worked on plenty of things to make it worth another post!

I don't have much to offer regarding individual interests yet, since I've been mainly focused on the basics of 'leveling' up the interests passionate score at the beginning of participating in an hobby/interest.

1. Visually seeing a sim's interests score

I wish I could've added this to the relationship panel, but that would mean this mod would become a core mod just for this UI piece :p So I decided the best approach would be to click on any sim and showing which interest your sim has OR showing what interests your sim has discovered. It's a bit easier to find out than the trait 'discovery' of another sim :)

To do:

Adding actual score numbers OR percentages into passionate/dislike

Adding a button that shows the hobbies linked and how far your sim is into that hobby (Novice, Intermediate, Master)

Clean up the UI a little (Top space needs to be way less, text is not 100% centered.) Maybe adding icons for each Interest? And adding the name of the sim whose interests you're currently checking out.

2. Debate About...

A social Interaction! If your sim loves the interest AND has finished the Research (which means your sim has now 11 points into said interest), then your sim can debate the interest with others!

It pretty much works the same as discovering a trait of a different sim; through this, they can find out if that sim HATES or LOVES that interest. And shows the animation accordingly to that. They'll also leave a notification. Another cool thing is, if you find any sims that are compatible with the interest AND your own sim has a passionate score of under 13 (20 is still the max), they can get skill points to higher their passionate score!

If a sim does know that another sim loves said interest, they'll just be talking and nothing interest will happen.

There is however a 25% chance (which can be tuned) That they can convince a sim to at least try the interest and you'll be giving the other sim a passionate point into that interest. This will only work if the sim you're talking to is between 10 and 13 points.

Two Compatible Interest sims:

Two Incompatible Interest sims:

(Which is Ironically Gunther and Cornelia :p I actually ported their pre-set interests from TS2, so they have a lot of conflicting interests... So that's on EA lol)

When Successfully convincing a sim to try an Interest....

Pie menu:

3. Rant About...

While Talking and debating about an interest your sim is passionate about is cool and all, sometimes a sim just needs to rant about that ONE Interest they absolutely hate (and maybe the entire town is into!)

(Fun fact: most of Sunset valley's sims are super into the Environment because of their traits or TS2 interests > TS3, except for Agnes Crumplebottom... I guess she was destined to also grump about people's interests rather than just love...)

Rant about's animations are pretty much just the 'complain about' animations. However, as you might have guessed, if 2 sims hate that interest, they'll show you and express the happiness of finding another sim who hates it. If its a sim that loves it, they'll let you know they don't appreciate the rant...

Here are Bella and Mortimer loving their little rant about Sports:

4. Convince To Pursue...

If that 25% success rate is not working on a sim you absolutely want to go into that interest, Or because they simply just happen to be exceeding over that 9 (or lower) or 13 (or higher) score, then this is a great workaround!

If your sim is a master in at least one hobby and are 100% passionate about that interest, then they might have a chance on getting that sim actually interested into trying. Of course, this comes with a 'success' score which is depending on the following stats:

Compatible traits with the interest (if incompatible, then that will subtract points from the final score too!)

Their relationship score

Any skills they've been up to that might fit with the Interest type?

No worries about the chances though and having to calculate all this yourself on a spreadsheet, the interaction will exactly show how much chance your sim has on convincing said sim!

5. Books!

Part of researching an Interest is reading! Unfortunately, I'm still looking into a way to get them to work properly in the bookstore, but for now, your sim can look for them in the Library :)

(I might have had too much fun with the titles :p)

The very first time your sim finishes it, they'll be getting an interest point. After that, it's 0.10  per reading (Also tunable). So it's possible to use it as a 'skill book' basically, just not the main element of participating in an interest.

Each interest-only has 1 book.

6. Magazines

You might remember from TS2 that each hobby has a magazine you can get. However, that can only be purchased in a magazine rack or being phoned up for a subscription.

However, I felt it was more suitable for it being a phone interaction or through a computer. Plus, it's just more or less a "nowadays" thing.

I was thinking of also making the magazines you get per week accessible to read on your computer/phone, but that yet has to be implemented.

About the magazines:

Each interest has a magazine that you can subscribe to. That magazine will be getting a randomly generated title. Now it may happen that "issue number 44" has the same title as "Issue number 3" because of that. But then, if you've ever had a magazine subscription, you might have noticed that magazine companies have a tendency to also re-use or recycle already written articles/sections in newer magazines whenever they seem fit.

Of course, you can only purchase any magazine interests you've actively been researching ;)

And after that, the computer will let you know all the details!

(I still need to fix that weird cancel button thingy :p)

And in case you're scared that you're not sure which magazines you have a subscription with and what's a new interest you can get it for...

The interaction will be greyed out ;)

And then just wait till Tuesdays to find your magazines!

I'm still working on a new cover for each different interest type magazine. Otherwise, I might just use TS2's :) But currently, they just got the comic covers!

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

And that's about it! A lot of the things changed are very 'behind the scenes', like rewriting the instantiation of interests and fixing bugs and glitches while I was playtesting it :)

[mbti-notes]

INFJ. Processing past Fe failures. Want to get better at socializing / having deeper relationships/friendships. Muddling through Ti development - desiring to get better at self-awareness + communication. A lot in my brain and it'd be a lot to share the entirety of recent exchanges that have ended up in failed relationships, so I'll try asking this and hope it's enough to get critical thinking help from you, thank you much in advance. (1/2)

[con't: I notice a pattern of me trying to communicate and express myself to be understand by, or be emotionally met by Fi users, and them responding by saying things like "I don't know what you want from me", "I don't know how to help you," "I'm sorry you feel that way" or them even saying variations of "Maybe you're not used to my communication style" (ENTJ) if I express that I feel dismissed, uncomfortable, or disrespected.

This isn't ALL Fi users thank God & I'm in therapy now to address my downplaying of my emotional needs, being willing to work through anything even though the romantic relationships I'm attracting are woefully incompatible or unhealthy. But I want to get better at doing my part to increase the chance of relationships building. What am I doing/expecting/judging in my communication with Fi users so they respond that way or has me feeling being unseen/misunderstood? Is it the basic INFJ recs?]

You point to Fi specifically. Fi doesn't require outside validation, so perhaps what you're encountering is their lack of concept of outside validation, in the manner that you're seeking it with Fe.

All of those example statements sound like they could be taken sincerely. "I don't know what you want from me" could be an opportunity for you to better explain what you need/want. "I don't know how to help you" could be an opportunity for you to provide better instructions. "I'm sorry you feel that way" could be a helpless admission that the two of you don't see things the same way. "Maybe you're not used to my communication style" could be an indication that there is a need to investigate the big gap between what was perceived and what was actually intended.

Not everyone is going to see eye-to-eye with you, not everyone is going to agree with your version of events, not everyone is going to care about your needs and feelings enough to address them kindly and patiently. This should all be okay with you unless you were walking around expecting everyone out there to have the capacity to meet you emotionally or validate your emotions (unhealthy Fe)? That's simply not gonna happen, so it's an unreasonable expectation. That's why it's so important that YOU be the first to take care of yourself and own your emotions, set proper personal boundaries, and navigate interpersonal boundaries more gracefully.

If you feel someone has violated your boundary (i.e. you feel hurt by them), the answer isn't to violate theirs in return. You're trying to fix a problem in the relationship, so further damaging the relationship isn't going to help. Whether you are right to feel hurt is not the main issue. Feelings themselves are always true and tell you something true about you. However, what you DO about the feelings isn't always right. There are two main ways people deal with negative feelings: 1) bottle them up, which amounts to self-harm, or 2) express them, which opens up the possibility of doing harm to others, if they don't have the means to process your feelings. Neither way is ideal.

If your main approach is to expect people to change (when they can't or don't want to), expect them to give you more than they are capable of giving (due to not having the means or resources), expect them to understand something that they are not really capable of understanding (when they just don't think in the same way as you), etc, your expectations are easily perceived as "demands". You're essentially pressuring people to be what you want them to be, which amounts to dishonoring them and violating their boundary. This approach is usually met with submission or resistance. If they submit to you (because they care for you), they will be unhappy for having allowed you to violate their boundary, and the problem will recur because it was only swept under the rug. If they resist you, conflict ensues, and the relationship bond will be tested and possibly threatened, especially if the conflict recurs without resolution.

There is a way to honor your feelings while also honoring others' feelings. It requires you to have good emotional intelligence and be a good communicator. Good emotional intelligence means respecting your feelings and taking full responsibility for them. Instead of seeing yourself as the victim (i.e. "you made me feel this way"), you see yourself as an agent with the power to decide what is best (i.e. "I feel this way and this is what I should do about it"). Positioning yourself as a passive or helpless victim means that you cast blame and eventually demand reparations. Positioning yourself as an active and influential agent means that you survey the situation objectively and then try to act in the best interests of everyone involved. This is what healthy and confident Fe should look like.

For example, when you feel dismissed, maybe you bottle it up for awhile, until you can't take it anymore (because the problem remains unaddressed). Then you confront people and say, "I feel dismissed". This implies that the other person has done something bad to you. You are the victim, which puts them on the spot, feeling like the bad guy, and then they can't hear you, due to becoming too preoccupied with not wanting to be the bad guy. Communication is likely to stall there, unless they have the wherewithal (emotional intelligence) to keep their focus on you and your concerns.

Instead, you could say to yourself, "I feel dismissed". You take full responsibility for your feelings and validate them for yourself. When you are good at validating your own feelings and emotions (something you admit you really struggle with), you'll eventually find that you won't need to rely on others to do it for you.

What does it mean to feel dismissed? It means that you believe you're not being taken seriously, or something to that effect. Not very difficult to understand. What to do about it? The feeling of disharmony is a message to you that you have to do more to advocate for yourself and make space for yourself within the relationship/group (it is good Fe advice). There are many ways to advocate for yourself without stepping on others. If you choose the right way, in terms of honoring everyone involved, the feeling of being dismissed will dissipate naturally. If you choose the wrong way, in terms of honoring yourself but dishonoring others, you'll encounter the problem again, because you haven't addressed the underlying problem of you positioning yourself as the victim in every relationship conflict. Chronic victim mentality is often an indication that you depend too much on outside validation of your self-worth.

Unless you are stuck in a very toxic social environment, the majority of people are not malicious for no reason. Before accusing or blaming, are you absolutely certain that they INTENDED to dismiss you? If not, wouldn't it be wise to gather more info? For instance, you could ask something like, "Have you had the time to give my idea serious consideration?" No blaming, no battling, no victim-victimizer dynamic. Do you understand how communicating without blame, through genuine inquiry, avoids trapping the both of you in a vicious cycle of seeking emotional reparations? You give people the benefit of the doubt. You give people the chance to clarify or explain. You give yourself the chance to grasp the FULL picture so that you can make a more informed decision about what to do (based on their response to your question). But this presence of mind isn't possible when you can't accept your feelings/emotions and they run wild as a result.

One common misapplication of Ti is the tendency to jump to illogical conclusions or make up illogical stories about what is motivating people's negative behavior, all the while believing that you're being completely logical. It's a destructive way to deal with negative or disharmonious feelings. Once the false narrative infects your mind, you can't help but perceive the person as attacking you, even when they're not. This misuse of Ti is a major impediment to relationship building.

The problem with victim mentality is that you are hyperfocused on your perspective only, so you only have half the picture, which means making ill-informed decisions. If you are prone to Ti loop, you need to get to the bottom of why you're so quick to position yourself in the passive position of victim. A healthy relationship should be an equal partnership based on trust, which means that you should always try to 1) give people the benefit of the doubt, and 2) gather the facts of the situation before drawing a conclusion about what they intended or what kind of character they are.

If the fact of the matter is that the person really doesn't care about your feelings, then you know not to seek validation from them, and perhaps distance from them for your own good. Don't play around in toxic or abusive relationships. If the fact of the matter is that your perception of the situation doesn't match up with what they intended to say/do, then it's up to you to straighten out the situation in your mind before proceeding.

Trust your feelings, validate your feelings, but don't act blindly on them (i.e. without fully grasping what's happening with the other person). Figure out why exactly you're feeling what you're feeling, then take it up with the person in a way that addresses the root of the problem and in a way that doesn't immediately put them on the defensive. Conflict is sometimes unavoidable, but being more skilled at communicating your concerns will certainly reduce the amount of pain required to reach a resolution.

[obeymematches]

Hellooo amazing person~♡ Could I request how the brother/or just lucifer would react to MC proposing to them first?

hiii!! thank you for sending in a request, i'm so in love with this idea bestie you have no clue 💕

Proposing to your om! bf first!

who would yall propose to, come tell me, don't be shy <3

oh also; all of these scenarios assume you and him have talked about it at least once but didn't agree on exact dates or anything; so it is still a surprise but it isn't out of the blue!

Lucifer:

Your plan must be kept as top secret for him not to find out too early. One suspicious mistake and it's over.

For this reason you had to limit the relatives you involved in the planning; however, regardless of what you think of him or what your relationship is like, you must have asked Mammon for advice and suggestions (just trust him!). He knows his older brother the best, after all.

The place of your proposal had to be private but meaningful; perhaps at home after you came back from a theater date. (it is okay if his brothers are at the scene, but nobody else is allowed or it's ruined!!!)

He is highkey surprised, never would have thought you would propose first; but he finds it so bold and charming - he wouldn't reject it!

Mammon:

Honestly, when you plan your proposal you only have to worry about him being attached to you by your hip. Other than you having almost no privacy at all, your plans can easily succeed!

With him you don't really have to keep it simple, in fact, it is better if you don't!

You can plan out an entire day of activities; playing cards, going to a casino, maybe an amusement park, just make sure it's a special day, you know!

I think a good spot to propose would be the beach in the late afternoon or evening - a couple of strangers might be there but that's alright, he ain't shy!

He would be confused by you going down on one knee at first but he catches on very quick what is going on. Jokes on you MC he is also pulling out a ring as a reaction to your proposal!

Leviathan:

Definitely do it at home and keep it very private, not even his brothers are allowed to be there and see.

I think you should praise him and compliment him a little extra that day. Also consider giving a speech before it so while you talk he can gain some strength to recover.

He always wanted the wedding ending with you though so don't worry, he wouldn't reject you! Might ask for some time to think about it but in general he is very excited and turning you down is unlikely.

Clings to you so much afterwards it's very unlike him to be honest, but can you really blame him in this situation?

Finds it so hard to believe he is going to talk about it for days.

Satan:

With him you have to be sneaky if you don't want your plans to be busted; unlike Lucifer, Satan is going to pry much more. Very curious fellow!

Satan would appreciate something like proposing through a book or through a detective game with all or at least some of his brothers involved. You don't want to go all out but you don't necessary have to keep it simple either.

He is going to find himself dumbfounded when he realizes you were the mastermind behind planning it all and he noticed nothing.

He might pretend he did know where everyone was going with it but that is a white lie, don't worry about it.

Similar to Leviathan he might ask for some more time to think but he already knows he is so in love with you there is no way he could avoid marrying you.

Asmodeus:

Okay you definitely need to talk about it before you even think about proposing to him first, but if any of the brothers he is the one who is OK with proposing in public, even if the place is a bit crowded.

Though? I think he would actually likes a private proposal more. I'm just saying if you really wish to have a public one then he is your demon.

(If you want to go public you can set him up to go shopping with someone you trust and by the time they finish, have everyone he and you are close enough to (or just a flash mob?) line up outside in a maze, cheering him on, you being at the very end with your ring and a huge bouquet.)

Please have a cheesy speech about him and your love for him and about his love for you !! Appreciates it so much more than you'd think!

Also, whatever place you decide to propose at, you must have someone take pictures. Yes they are going on social media, it's ok!

Baby is going to shed tears of joy be prepared for that 🥺

Beelzebub:

I really didn't want to go the food related route here but listen there is something so romantic about it, hear me out!!

So you need to figure out what his favorite restaurant is - not going to be very easy by itself, one day he might say X but then the next it's Y.

Then you need to book a private table (absolutely do not let him pick a fast food restaurant even if he really likes them :( ) and make sure to pick an hour when it's not extremely busy. (the best would be if it's just you two but that's not easy to guarantee) and have the ring served with the food!

He is going to be surprised for sure; he never seen this item on the menu before, what is that??? oh.

Wouldn't ever reject you unless the two of you really are incompatible but by now that would've been figured out already

Belphegor:

You don't have to be super sneaky around him which is for the better because if you were, you'd need to explain yourself.

It is definitely better to have a private proposal; the only third person allowed to be there is Beel.

A calm, starry night is probably the best timing for your plan!

I don't think he is a big fan of cheesy speeches so really it's better to just keep it simple and straightforward.

Oh he might tease you into thinking he changed his mind or needs more time to think but really he is just messing with you a little

He is going to apologize, don't be too mad at him for that