#on intergenerational trauma

[liberaljane]

Your feelings are valid on too. Special shoutout to all the cycle breakers. 💐

Created with Mother Wound Project

Digital illustration depicting three generations of women with a ribbon linking all of them. The scene includes an elderly Latina woman shrugging, a middle-age Afrolatina woman dodging the ribbon & her daughter cutting the ribbon. Text reads, “pain travels through families until someone is ready to feel it” by Stephi Wagner

[virtualplushy]

intergenerational trauma has me losing my mind bc it’ll have you looking at your mama like “well i woulda been batshit crazy if i was raised by her mama too.” and then you look at your grandma and you’re like “well i woulda been batshit crazy if i was raised by her mama too!” and rinse and repeat

[mad-girlslove-song]

when ethel cain said “i tried to be good am i no good am i no good am i no good” which started with her self-loathing after being abused by her father and neil perry said “i was good. i was really good” and then he killed himself because he knew that he would never be good enough for his father

[historic-meme]

Found out yesterday my great-great grandparents died in a pogrom in modern-day Ukraine in 1920. The violence lasted for 5 days and killed about 700 people.

I don’t know how to make goyim understand that when finding this out I was so devastated and yet unsurprised. I was unsurprised because when learning Jewish history, starting around the middle ages to modernity, I always feel as if it is “my history.” These events happened to my ancestors. Even if technically that isn’t true.

I did not realize until the start of my MA program in public history that it is not common for people to feel this close a connection to their ethnic/religious groups history.

This phenomenon is what I want goyim to understand. That feeling of when i found out the specific event of violence that killed my great-great grandparents felt more like a final nail in the coffin than an unexpected blow. Yes, it hurt and i cried as i always do when i found out the specifics of my families deaths to antisemitic violence. But it was not a surprise. Why would it be when since at least middle school I remember learning about jewish history and internalizing it as my own history that happened to my own family.

And this phenomenon is also why jews react so strongly when violent antisemitism is in the news. Yes, it has to do with intergenerational trauma but also this deep connection we feel to all of Jewish history. That we can see how this is just another atrocity in a long line of atrocities. That there is no tangible difference between the victims and ourselves. This is all of our collective history.

[mortalfaerie]

i can flesh this out with a longer post later but watching gravity falls as an adult, with the knowledge of ford and stan's history from the get go, it just hits different.

like, i'm jewish. i also come from a immigrant, slavic, ashkenazi family with plenty of just-below-the-surface inter generational conflict. you can really read ford and stan's stories as being different ways children (and especially, in immigrant families) react to that conflict and pressure. ford is a compulsive overachiever meant to be his family's "ticket out" of poverty. stan can't live up to his family's expectations and becomes estranged, perpetually running to and from something. bill is the promise of something better that ends up being too good to be true and ruining ford's relationships with everyone. (read that as alcohol, drugs, what have you) he is the literal manifestation of that trauma.

dipper and mabel are several generations removed but still wary of that conflict that looms over them like a specter. but they break the cycle of trauma by learning to trust in eachother, and help their family to heal. the literal manifestation of inter generational trauma is defeated when the family is reconciled and works together. they are stronger together than they are apart.

and in the end it's not too late for stan and ford. it's not too late to heal, to grow, to start again. it's never too late. there's still time.

[shu-of-the-wind]

i read somewhere that grey whales can live upwards of 150 years, and that there are likely grey whales out in the oceans today that were alive and saw the massive whale hunts of the 19th century that inspired herman melville's moby dick.

to be clear, i have no idea if this is true. it could just be apocryphal, or something someone made up. but even if it isn't true, i think there's a something to read into that in terms of trauma and repair. if there really are whales on this planet today that are alive after seeing so many other creatures like them slaughtered and dragged out of the water by unknown hands for an unknown purpose, then those whales know the dangers and flee from them even after the people who hunted their kin have been over a hundred years dead. and they taught their calves to flee the same way. and those calves taught their calves.

150 year old whales teaching younger whales who teach younger whales who have no experience with the reasons why they must avoid boats, but know in their blood and bones that their safety relies on it.

something something trauma long outlives the people who inflict it. something something trauma transforms how generations grow.

[star-anise]

Ask I got on my sideblog but am answering here:

Hi there! I know you're a therapist and I have a question: I saw some people arguing on Twitter about the impacts of trauma. There was a therapist among them, and they had a masters degree in social work, they post about it often. They say that people who have experienced trauma hurt other people because it benefits them or gives them pleasure, and they are disconnected from empathy and sympathy. That seems wrong, but maybe it's not? That's all, thanks!

Ooof, yeah, that's... complicated. It's technically true, but also frequently used as a lie.

Trigger warning: Child abuse, child grooming, interpersonal violence, trauma (childhood & intergenerational), true crime, totalitarianism

Because basically, that describes MOST humans who decide to hurt other humans on purpose without a strong ulterior motive. That's not a trauma thing, that's a human thing.

I babysit for a family with a 1-year-old and a 3-year-old. When the 1yo does something to upset their older sibling, and that sibling winds up and smacks them, that's the same basic thing. It benefits them (makes 1yo go away), brings them pleasure (having an outlet for their anger is very satisfying), and they're disconnected from empathy (they're often surprised and confused when the 1yo is crying, because they're 3 and THEY feel fine and they don't really understand yet that other people's feelings really exist) or even sympathy (understanding that if you hit someone, they will probably be upset). That's something we adults have to watch out for and intervene in, because empathy and impulse control take time to learn.

But as for where trauma figures into this... how to explain.

There's this old logical puzzle about categories, where you say things like:

All dogs have four legs*

A dog is an animal

And then the catch is that you can't extend that to say

All animals have four legs

*RIP to all the tripods and legless animals that apparently aren't dogs anymore for the purposes of this logic exercise

Animals obviously include fish and millipedes and whales and snakes and jellyfish. The number of legs an animal can have is HIGHLY diverse, and will eventually lead to a debate on what the definition of "leg" is.

So there is this common thing we see:

Some people are much more violent and aggressive than other people

These violent and aggressive people have almost always experienced some form of trauma/abuse/neglect

And the link people are really prone to thinking is:

People who have experienced trauma/abuse/neglect will go on to being violent and aggressive with other people.

This is incorrect. To some degree, I can see why it's widely believed - after all, way more people tune in to learn about a serial killer's abusive childhood than for the more common story, which is survivors of trauma slowly going about their lives in ordinary undramatic ways.

Because the thing is, trauma is REALLY diverse. Humans are inherently varied and a bit chaotic, since we can choose very different ways to live and operate, and trauma splits that variability like a prism turning light into a rainbow. Only about 30% of abused children grow up to be abusive themselves. The other 70% choose very different lives.

And yet. My eternal question is: WHY is this such a meme? Why do so many people with a shitty childhood flinch at the 30% statistic and think, "Is that me? Am I destined to be a monster?" Why does this story have legs, when so many other facts about trauma have way more empirical backing and usefulness and get very little attention?

I submit that there is one group that fucking LOVES the idea that traumatized person equals abuser. One group that pushes it into the discourse, in international media or around the family kitchen table, with great ingenuity and gusto.

Abusers.

They love it for two reasons. The most obvious reason is: It absolves them of their actions. "It wasn't ME who hit you, it was my childhood trauma!" A veritable classic excuse that takes their agency out of the equation. And it really can be hard to tell when it's a good excuse and when it isn't!

Reason two is the more insidious one: It cuts their victim's sense of goodness, worthiness, and moral certainty out from under them.

It's as simple as saying, "Look at how you pushed back at me (when I was abusing you)! You're the REAL abuser here!" It's the heart of what domestic abuse researchers call DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender). It can be that simple, or it can be so complicated and byzantine it makes your head hurt.

I only really got a handle on understanding this thanks to a friend, who said she was okay with me sharing this story if I didn't identify her. I won't go into any unrelated details of her abuse, but for the record, hers is probably the most extreme case of anyone I've personally interacted with, and I used to work as a therapist and in domestic violence shelters. Her dad heinously abused her as a child. He'd also studied psychology in university. I have been trying to fathom how the fuck anyone could do what he did to her for YEARS, and I think I've got a few viabletheories.

So. She was an ordinary child, bright, warmhearted, well-behaved, and a bit autistic. A bit more naive and trusting than your average preschooler. I imagine that from his perspective, there was the convenient benefit that he often had unrestricted access to her, and he could relatively easily overpower and manipulate her.

But she had one serious downside: If anyone ever found out what he was doing to her, they would go fucking apeshit. She wasn't really prone to lying or acting out, so people would treat her as a fairly credible reporter; several other adults found her she was lovable, innocent, and endearing; and what he wanted to do to her was, I repeat, heinous.

So while he abused her, one of the things he said was: "I'm doing this because I was abused as a child. That's how it works. All abusers come from abuse. There are statistics proving it. This means you're an abuser too. See what society thinks about child abusers? That's what people will think about you, if they know that you've been abused."

And she was, you know, a child, not someone who studied psych research. He was her dad. So she believed him.

She thought that he was using his adult brain to correctly assess the truth about her as a person, for purely objective reasons. The way you'd try to teach a kid who talks with their mouth full about table manners. It's been a couple decades now, but she is still very slowly chipping away at her core belief that she is inherently awful and only her father recognized the truth about her.

Sometimes when we talk about it I have to bite my tongue because I'm sitting here trying to figure out what the fuck was going on with him, an adult man who wanted to abuse her because he'd really enjoy it. I think about him trying to figure out how to manipulate an innocent child into accepting being abused, and minimize the risk that he'd go to jail for it. And although I hate his everloving guts, I'm almost a bit impressed at his level of machiavellian audacity, to come up with a line that was SUCH hot bullshit that people have devoted their entire careers into proving it false, and yet, because it hit exactly the right psychological issue at exactly the right psychological stage and his intended victim was so trusting, he could get her to believe him enough to turn that lie into her core identity.

Praise be to G-d and Criminal Minds, he did not, in the end, get away with it. She got enough courage to tell people, and get free of him. And she is not, in fact, a horrible abusive person.

But I think what he did so very brazenly is what a lot of abusers do, in more disguised and indirect ways. Probably partly because it really helps, when abusing people, not to treat them like human beings with their own thoughts and feelings, but if one must posit that they have something going on between their ears, it's easiest to assume that everyone else responds to trauma with aggression and abuse. After all, considering the possibility that someone like them could choose not to be abusive takes all the fun and plausible deniability out of the whole affair.

But now I see echoes of that "my victims are just as bad as I am" tactic all over the place. I honestly think it's a very similar mechanism that Hannah Arendt pointed out in The Origins of Totalitarianism. She observes that violent totalitarian regimes routinely accuse their intended victims of the very act they intend to commit themselves, to justify a "retaliation" that's actually just aggression. Think claiming "Our opponents are rigging this election" as an excuse to rig an election in the opposite direction.)

To sum up: You're human. Humans can do good and bad things. It's not necessarily good to completely forswear anything violent or angry in you, but to come up with a framework of how to be assertive and get your needs met in an ethical fashion. There are times it is appropriate and even necessary to escape or fight against somebody else's will.

On the other hand, If find yourself inflicting pain on other people on a regular basis, get some support and take a good hard look at your life choices. Sometimes it's hard to figure out how to solve problems in your life without violence or aggression, and you might need some help with that. Maybe talk to a counsellor or learn anger management skills.

But in no way is it predestined, inherent, implicit, or doomed, that your experiences and brain wiring make you violent or evil. You always have the choice to define yourself beyond what was done to you.

[homoquartz]

if you consider yourself someone who cares about palestinians, i think it's worth stopping and really thinking about how these exact same tactics, the same lies and same propaganda, were used in the creation of the united states

maybe it will open your eyes a bit to the violent settler-colonial state you may also live on

they may not have had smart bombs back then, but they still struck tents full of sleeping families in the night, just the same

the struggle is shared among all of us

[ladylightning]

the way the absence of john winchester haunt sam and dean in ways that are more real than any ghost they have ever faced. the way john echoes so loudly in the narrative even in episodes he’s not mentioned, in seasons where he never appears. the way john possesses dean when he’s angry and sam when he’s grieving. the way john is the one true god of the narrative, the absent father who does not answer prayers or phone calls. the righteous man who does not break in hell but breaks down and hands his child a gun. john and the memory of his holy mary. john the prophet and his sacred text. john and his prodigal son that he knows has to die. 

[awkwardandeccentric]

You ever notice how Blitz and Stolas were so traumatized by their fathers that they went too far in the other direction, accidentally hurting their daughters in the process?

Blitz was physically abused, the family scapegoat, constantly made to feel worthless, and taught from a young age that he’s only worth the money he can provide? So he’s overly doting and protective of Loona. He never lectures her, even when she’s causing trouble, because he doesn’t want to upset her and make her feel worthless or disposable. He won’t let her have a boyfriend, despite the fact that she’s an adult. He borderline infantilizes her.

Stolas is more a product of neglect and while he had a better time raising Via, it’s easier to raise a kid that you’ve had from birth as opposed to one you adopted only a month before they aged out of foster care. But he still swung too violently in the opposite direction. He has no boundaries with her. He protects her from the wrong threats (the knowledge of his abuse as opposed to the abuser, herself). It looks like she’s home schooled, so he still hasn’t worked out that the extreme isolation he suffered is a large part of why he’s Like This. He’s spent so much time attending to her every whim that when he decides it’s time to start chasing his own happiness, she can’t empathize because she was his happiness.

It’s a great depiction of intergenerational trauma. Both of them are trying so hard to never make their daughters feel as awful as they felt, but they’re scarring their daughters in different ways.

[multiplicity-positivity]

Shoutout to Indigenous systems on this day for Truth and Reconciliation!

Today, September 30th, is the Canadian National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. This is a day of remembrance for victims and survivors of Indian residential schools in Canada, though it could likely apply to those who live on Turtle Island in general.

If your system or someone you know is or knows a survivor of an Indian residential school, or has a loved one who did not survive their time in a residential school, our hearts go out to you. We are wishing for you and family a future full of strength, peace, and resilience. Inter-generational trauma can have significant impacts, and the pain imposed on your loved ones and ancestors should not be forgotten as time passes. We hope that their lives can be honored and remembered throughout history, and we want to do our part to help preserve their legacy.

For allies of Indigenous peoples, if you are able to, please wear an orange shirt today to honor those whose lives were forever changed due to the negative impact residential schools has left on indigenous communities. Remember that, even today, Indigenous peoples face hardships, disparities, and inequalities in our society. The closure of residential schools does not mean rest, healing, and proper compensation for the victims of such institutions. Let’s vow as a community to make our spaces safe and accepting of Indigenous systems, and do our part to educate ourselves on their histories so that we may be better allies in the future.

Friends, please show some support to the Indigenous people in your lives today, and do not take their presence for granted. Take a moment to learn more about the history of Indian residential schools in Canada and the United States, and the grim legacy they have left which many Indigenous communities are still dealing with today. If you are able to, please reach out to the Indigenous systems and non-systems in your lives to provide support in whatever ways they have requested.

We will include links to sites and organizations where you can learn more about the Canadian National Day for Truth and Reconciliation and the history of Indian residential schools in both Canada and the USA, along with links where you can directly support survivors of Indian residential schools. Remember, if you cannot support these organizations or individuals financially, you can show your support by educating yourselves and providing a space in your own communities where Indigenous voices can be acknowledged and uplifted.

Indigenous systems, we love you, we are in your corner, and we want to support and uplift you however we can. Please do not hesitate to get in touch if there is anything we can do to help make our spaces more welcoming for you. You have an important and treasured place in the plural community, and we are honored to be able to share this space with you. We hope that you can do your best to treat yourselves and your system with compassion and gentleness today, and take care!

‼️ Non-indigenous systems are welcome and encouraged to reblog, but DO NOT derail or try to center your voice over actual indigenous systems and those who are actually affected by inter-generational trauma due to Indian residential schools!‼️

[lurkingshan]

The Miracle of Teddy Bear Saved the Gays

Last weekend, both @twig-tea and I had time off and were in the mood to binge something, so Twig suggested we finally watch The Miracle of Teddy Bear. Both of us had missed it while it was airing live (because it didn’t have international distribution) and had been given the impression by others that it had a sad ending that included some anti-queer messages. It was also very long, so we were not exactly rushing to get to it. But we are stubborn and like to judge things for ourselves, so we decided since we had the time and the show was now available, we should jump in. And imagine our surprise when we found out everything we had been told about it was wrong (we have our theories about why). This is one of the best queer dramas we have ever seen, with phenomenal acting, writing, and direction, and we have so much to say about it. The post that follows is co-written by the two of us. Strap in, folks, because it’s a long one.

If you haven’t seen this show yet and don’t want any spoilers, stop reading this right now and head over to YouTube, where international fans can now watch it for free with English subtitles. We’re going to go deep on the show below, and because this drama is designed to slowly reveal information in a very deliberate way, nearly everything counts as a spoiler. We’ll try not to give too much away in the early sections, but be warned!

The Story

The Miracle of Teddy Bear is the tale of a deeply traumatized gay man in desperate need of healing, and the teddy bear who comes to life to help him. In the process of taking care of his person, our bear uncovers deep family trauma and many secrets and lies, accidentally solves crimes, makes lots of friends, heals a family, and saves several lives. He is a very good bear, and through this adventure he contemplates his own existence, learns how to be human, and discovers what it means to truly love someone. 

This is primarily a family drama with important things to say about queer truth, and while it includes several bl storylines, it is not a romance. Intertwined with the family drama is a bl show within the show and a series of interrelated mysteries that slowly get unraveled as the story goes on. One of the things this show does best is parcel out information from various perspectives at the perfect time to keep the viewer one step behind—we found ourselves constantly almost guessing what the show was going to do next, but it always chose a direction a little to the left and surprised us in the best way. 

In the end, every question we asked was answered, and every time we thought a character’s motivation felt a little too shallow, we were given more. The experience of watching this show was deeply satisfying and really made us feel seen. This show gets us. 

The Characters

The Bear: Tofu

Tofu is the titular teddy bear who comes to life via drama magic and does his best to support his person. He starts the series incredibly innocent, and the show and his actor, Inn Sarin, do an incredible job of depicting the change in him as he lives life as a human, becoming more complex and less naive. Tofu is the heart of the show, and it is his love and kindness that enable the growth of the other characters in this story. 

The Core Family: Nut, Na, and Kuenchai

Nut is our protagonist, and his struggles with life as a gay man are the soul of this story. He lives with his mom, Na, and their dog, Kuenchai, and Tofu is his beloved teddy bear. Yes, Nut is a cranky ass grown man with a beloved teddy bear. It will make sense eventually, we promise. Nut is a bl novelist working through old trauma via adapting his work for the screen. Na is a woman who has been Going Through It, and while we start the story with only the vague sense that something is not quite right with her, we spend a lot of time on her history as well as her growth in the present until we get the full picture. The way Nut and Na’s stories are tied together gets to several of the core themes of this show (discussed more below). 

The Sides: Gen, Song, Prib, and the nosy neighbors

Our cast of friends and allies who support Nut and Tofu and have romantic trials and tribulations of their own. Without giving too much away, we’ll just say this: all of these characters have satisfying arcs, and some of them may have caused us to squeal in delight. 

Specters of the Past: Neung and Tarn

Telling you literally anything about them is a major spoiler so just know they are here and they are important and you will fully understand why and how by the end. Oh yeah, and Neung looks exactly like Tofu (or should we say Tofu looks like Neung?) for Reasons (which are explained! We love this show).

Villains: Saen, Sib, Jan, and Parit

Expect these four to show up often and cause a lot of trouble. Their motives and exact crimes are revealed over the course of the show.

Other Elders: Anik, Juea, Kanya and Sittha

They are mostly here to serve a few key plot functions and represent a spectrum of parental figures (related by blood and not) and acceptance of queerness.

And we cannot forget: The inanimate objects

In this show, inanimate objects can come to life under a certain set of magical conditions, and they are Tofu’s friends and helpers along the way. Some of their stories are shockingly touching! They also add some needed levity to the show, especially the grumpy ones. Special shoutout to the cactus and the spare blanket, our crime solving MVPs. We have to admit, the animation for these took a bit of getting used to, but within a couple of episodes we were cheering these creepy blinking eyes on. 

The Themes

And here is where we start to get into spoiler territory about specific character arcs. This show had so many clear and well-articulated themes, and they stayed consistent throughout the story.

Queer people can be happy

This is stated explicitly as well as demonstrated through multiple storylines: gay men can love each other, have good relationships and fulfilling sex lives, and get their happy endings. Those who argue that people should fight against their queerness because it will make their lives harder and keep them from happiness are not just wrong, they have it backwards. 

Queer people can only be happy by living their truth

This is perhaps the main thesis of this show, and it comes across in so many ways over the arc of the story. We see this theme exemplified in particular through Nut, Tarn, Song, and Gen, with each of them representing different versions of the queer experience that shape who they are and how they show up in the world. Even before the story tells you, it’s clear what kind of experiences each has had from his relationship to his own queerness and his general demeanor and outlook on life. Nut has survived an abusive homophobic father, and that shows up in his anger, his self-protective rejection of others, and his struggle with emotional regulation. Gen has been raised by loving and accepting parents who support his choices in all ways, and this shows in his good humor, balanced perspective, and confidence to be himself. When we say good media should show, don’t tell us its point, this is a fantastic example of what that means. 

Accept and love your queer children or pay the price

Relatedly, this story is very interested in the consequences for parents who fail their queer children, and explores a whole spectrum of acceptance from enthusiastic support to negligent ambivalence to misguided suppression to violent bigotry. We see so many different parents and parental figures react to learning about their gay sons and gain insight into them by how they respond—and only the ones who manage to get it together to love and support their kids get to keep their families. Critically, the adults who fail their queer children are convinced they’re acting in their best interests at the time, and we are along for the ride as the redeemable ones go through the stages of first admitting they were wrong but still thinking their intentions justify the pain they caused to fully acknowledging the damage they have done and making amends. 

Be patient with others, you never know what they’ve been through

That said, the show also invites us to stop and consider what might be behind aberrant behavior before judging it. Tofu is unfailingly patient with others, and even with the worst people in this story, he always seeks to understand why they are behaving a certain way before giving up on them. The show slowly and methodically reveals information that recontextualizes things we thought we understood and encourages us to keep digging for empathy and missing context. People in this story behave very badly and make a lot of mistakes, but a lot of it becomes more understandable once you have the full picture.

Unprocessed trauma will prevent you from healing and cause you to perpetuate harm on others

Speaking of bad behavior, so much of what’s wrong in this story is driven by unprocessed trauma of one sort or another. Nut’s anger is at its core a deep hurt from being betrayed by the person he trusted most to be on his side. Na’s refusal to live in reality causes her to continue to hurt herself and her son. Saen’s denial about his own actions leads to far-reaching consequences he could not imagine. And the healing process depicted in the show is not linear; people who have made mistakes in the series make them more than once and advance and regress as the situation around them changes. 

People are responsible for their own actions and inactions

And while the show is clear that trauma is the source of the bad behavior of these characters, it is also clear that this is not an excuse. Everyone in this story is held to account for the things they do, as well as the things they don’t, no matter how understandable their reasons are. The people who refuse to heal face serious consequences in addition to seeing the damage their unprocessed trauma causes others. 

Noble idiocy leads to everyone being unhappy

One of the biggest sources of said unprocessed trauma in this story is characters making self-sacrificial choices for the ostensible benefit of others and bringing misery to everyone in the process. We love a drama that recognizes noble idiocy for the selfish and destructive act it truly is and clearly says you have to communicate with your loved ones if you don’t want to make a mess of everyone’s lives.

You can’t appease an abuser

No amount of hiding who you are or making yourself small will convince an abuser to treat you better or guarantee your safety. This theme is most obvious in the main storyline between Nut, Sib, and Na, but Jan is another example of a manipulative and emotionally abusive character who other characters continually try to play nice with, to no avail. She takes every opportunity to be cruel, whether the person she’s talking to is kind or combative in return. The show reinforces that abusers will always find an excuse to justify their behavior; changing yourself for them is pointless. 

Love is wanting the best for someone, even if that means letting go 

This is really the show’s core point where romance is concerned: being with you may not actually be what is best for the person you love, and if your love is true you have to accept that. The people who could not see this—Saen and Jan—were the ones who continued to cause harm to their loved ones and themselves, while the characters who honestly worked towards the happiness of their beloveds even if that happiness was not with themselves—Tofu, Tarn, and eventually Prib—were rewarded by seeing that happiness play out and ended our story truly content. The MVP of this theme is Tofu, whose pure teddy bear love for his person became more complicated and selfish as he became more human. But in the end, he held to the truth at his core that Nut’s happiness was his happiness.

You can have more than one great love, and one doesn't tarnish the others

Which brings us to one of the most beautiful takeaways from this show, and something that dramas so rarely do well. Nut loves two different men, neither more than the other, and he never chooses between them. They both hold important meaning in his life and he honors that whether they are with him or not. When Nut is with Tofu, he remembers his past love with fondness but he is clear that these memories do not make his love for Tofu any less real. A lesser show would have had those moments where Nut was thinking about his past cause him to distance himself from Tofu. But in this show, Nut sharing his past and working through his lack of closure was when he and Tofu had some of their closest and happiest moments together. This show is extremely clear that we can have happiness with more than one person over the course of our lives, and it is not only okay but encouraged! 

The Resolution

From here, we will be talking about the ending, and so by necessity will no longer be avoiding major spoilers. If you’re intrigued by the above and want to avoid being spoiled fully, stop now! One of the things that is so brilliant about this show is the way information is slowly revealed, so if you think you would like this show we recommend experiencing it for yourself. If you’re still not convinced and need to know the ending before you decide, read on. 

In our view, this story ends exactly as the show signals it will from the very beginning—and the way it should—and the ending is unambiguously a happy one. Tofu realizes that he and Tarn’s life forces are tied together, that it was Tarn going into his coma that caused him to awaken, and that as long as he continues to live as a human, Tarn will not recover. We and the characters have come to love Tofu in his guise as a human, but the truth is he does not belong there—he is a teddy bear, and for him to stay by robbing an actual human being of their life would be wrong. The story took pains throughout to show us how tenuous and restricted Tofu’s existence is, because he is not a real person and thus can’t live a full life (for example, he can’t get a job or safely leave the house because he doesn’t have documentation or any life experience). We also see Tofu struggle so much with the added complexities of the human experience that he becomes ill with overwhelm multiple times. He repeats to us through the whole story that all he really wants is to be a comfort to Nut. While he finds value and joy in being human, it does not change who he is at his core. And so he allows himself to be poisoned by Jan, sacrificing his human existence to bring Tarn back and exposing Jan and Saen’s crimes in the process. 

With this decision, the other characters get the chance to mourn him and move on. Nut grieves, finally makes the connection between human and teddy bear Tofu, goes to therapy (!), makes peace with his mother, and writes his love story with Tofu as his next show. Tarn wakes up and begins his recovery, and he and Nut slowly reconnect and rekindle their relationship over time. Na finds joy in her lucid moments and enjoys time with her family, finally free of the hell Saen and Sib unleashed on her life. Gen and Song get their happy ending with acceptance from Song’s dad, and Prib’s fixation on gay men becomes clear when her new female love interest enters the scene (let’s go, lesbians!). We get confirmation that the nosy neighbors are, in fact, an elder gay couple. Even Kuenchai and some of the inanimate objects have character arcs! Kuenchai is instrumental in making sure Nut is reunited with bear Tofu, and we get to see a slipper gain some independence from her other half and a grumpy bolster cuddle in to comfort her people when they need it.

We end our story with several happy families who love their gay children and a call for marriage equality via Nut and Tarn deciding to marry whether it’s legal or not. Tofu is a bear again but his human life is very much not forgotten—Nut speaks to him every day, honors the love they shared, and talks about him openly with Tarn. And we even hear from Tofu again, see a final moment between him and Nut in a beautiful dream, and are reassured that Tofu is happy to still be with Nut in his original form and to see him living so well. It’s everything he wanted, and he made it happen. He truly is the very best bear.  

The Purpose

We wanted to take some space to get a little extra meta and talk about why this show matters so much in the broader queer media landscape. First, it was a landmark queer television event in Thailand—please read this post by @flowerbeasblog to get the background on its significance in the cultural landscape. This show was broadcast very intentionally to educate and send a message to a broader audience in Thailand than is typically reached via bl dramas. And that’s why understanding and taking its themes seriously is so very important.

This is a story that is deeply rooted in queer truth, written by a queer man who wants people like him to be seen and understood. The show puts forward an unapologetically pro-gay message on broadcast television (on a major national network! during primetime! that does not shy away from the sexual component of queer love!) and embeds important political commentary in a fantastic and engaging story in a format familiar and comfortable for the Thai audience. It’s not meant to be received as a romance, and its nuanced and mature take on love and relationships is certainly not designed for ship wars. The writer even turns directly to the camera and underlines this in the final episode: while he respects the importance of bl in the media landscape, he has a bigger agenda in mind for this show and important things to say.

And that’s why some of the discourse around this show is so frustrating. A small portion of international fans who watched this show live seemed to misunderstand it deeply and created such a false impression of it that it caused others to stay away. Contrary to some of the takes out there, this show does not have a sad ending, Tofu’s resolution is not remotely anti-queer, and there is no woman who ends up with Nut (we are so confused that this was anyone’s interpretation; Nut at every age and several times within the show explicitly shouts about how very extremely gay he is). To see this story as a tragedy because Tofu “dies”—which he doesn’t; his human body disappears but he returns to being a conscious and content teddy bear—is to misunderstand Tofu’s character journey, his narrative purpose, and his agency. We can only assume that shipping got in the way of comprehension here, and people who wanted to see human Tofu and Nut end up together focused on that to the exclusion of pretty much everything this show was saying and doing.

At the end of this story, Tofu is happy. To think that Nut was better off with Tofu than with Tarn is to not allow for the complexities of human experience; Nut did love Tofu, but he loved Tarn, too, and their relationship was a positive force in his life both before and after Tofu entered it. And Tarn was an actual gay human man in a coma who could not wake up while Tofu existed. Tofu was the creation of Tarn’s love for Nut; his existence was limited, and he found being a human extremely difficult. All Tofu wanted was to be Nut’s teddy bear and stay with Nut forever. He wanted Nut to be happy, because Tarn wanted Nut to be happy, and during his time as a human he worked to enable that happiness. He was instrumental in moving forward several stuck characters and uncovering many secrets, all of which were necessary for Nut to get to where he ends up at the end of the show. Being in a relationship with Nut was a bonus. He enjoyed the experience of being in love with Nut, but in the end he chose to sacrifice his human life so that Nut could have a permanent, lasting happiness with someone who was real. Tofu’s human death is not an example of the bury your gays trope; in fact, it is a total rebuke of it. Tofu, and this show, saved the gay men in this story and gave them full and happy lives. We cannot recommend watching and supporting this show enough.

[sail-not-drift]

911 | s05e17 | HERO COMPLEX | Maybe we can both be better.

[mad-girlslove-song]

"my mother" by lea jane

[lesbianjudasiscariot]

He Made Me In His Image

The Woman Destroyed - Simone de Beauvoir / Seventeen Going Under - Sam Fender / The Cruel Prince - Holly Black / Swan - Nicole Dollanganger / Elektra - Sophokles tr. Anne Carson / Sun Bleached Flies - Ethel Cain

[0dde11eth]