#shit on someone is disgusting. BLAMING people for what they say/do for their mental illness is disgusting

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

Oh man I really agree with your tags on that one post. The whole king of delusion thing is terrible to me bc like. Delusions aren’t some gotcha you can use against him? It’s a serious mental health issue? But I’d also like to add I hate when people mock him for smelling bad or having poor hygiene or w/e… :/ It’s not funny when people with mental illness can’t properly take care of their hygiene lol I thought we were all understanding of this?

EXACTLY. It's not like "wow look how wrong you are and how terrible you are for being delusional".

Also the hygiene thing pisses me off too. I know lots of his fans use it as a joke, even affectionately, but like... he was homeless. He was living in the slums. Most people around him probably smelled bad. I'm sure they and he cleaned up whenever they could, but buddy, the slums isn't a public showering area. They'd be lucky if they were able to bathe. It's not something they take for granted. Even the "smelly cape" jokes bother me.

I've met homeless people. I've lived in a shelter where I met people who prior to that shelter lived in tents. Showering and bathing isn't something they could just get up and do before being in the shelter. Those people are lucky if they can even go to the bathroom in a proper bathroom, let alone being able to bathe.

Then like you said, on top of that, he's mentally ill. He's not thinking about his next bath. He's talking to people who are dead, believing they are answering him back and responding to their answers to him. There's also the general idea that Lambert's last words were not actually what were told to us via Dimitri's flashback, but the words he remembers because of his illness. He is very likely remembering wrong, because that version of Lambert matches the version of him that Dimtiri talks to, but does not match the version of him in Rodrigue's flashback.

Even depression can cause a lack of proper hygiene, and that's also a mental illness. In his case he has full on episodes of either psychotic breaks or having conversations with people who aren't there, and when he's out of those states he's desperately trying to do what he's been told to do by those voices. He's trying to do it both for those people and because, as he expresses later into AM, he wants them to stop. Those voices harass him day in and out and ridicule him and it hurts him, so he becomes desperate to do what they tell him so they stop tormenting him (which is part why he's so hellbent on hurrying to finish his tasks in the first half of AM).

It's an absolute spiral of a situation, where he already has these delusions but now on top of them feels absolutely terrible and like someone who has been emotionally abused by loved ones for years and years. He loves them but is terrified of them because they always say awful things to him or try to say things about him that aren't true. The worst part is that these are delusions of people who loved him and were nothing like this, so it causes even more suffering for him.

I don't really understand why it's so funny to people to poke fun at characters with or for bad hygiene. Like, firstly it's... just not a funny thing/topic? And secondly I'm sure there are people uncomfortable with it because they have bad hygiene or lower than "socially acceptable" hygiene due to mental illness and feel they're being laughed at as well for their hygiene. That's definitely a stereotypical mindset and something society does to make fun of people less fortunate than them, be it physically, mentally or both (like not having access to bathing.

Rich people can bathe whenever they want and often in media look down on "stinky people" who are always the poor, generally living in the slums). It's a very unfortunate dominant mindset and almost always comes from people who are more well off and haven't experienced it for themselves to realize how awful it can be (and there are of course people who don't need to experience something to know how bad it is, and I wish there were just more people like that).

I just don't understand what's so funny about hygiene. If anything it just feels like people laughing at the concept of someone not being up to society's standards about health, and it's what literal kids do to make fun of each other. Like, if someone smells bad, I feel like we should be more concerned about the person and why that is... and that would be the case if society raised its people to think that way, but since society raised people to be the opposite (to make fun of smelly people), most people who haven't experienced it for themselves make fun of it.

Like... idk am I missing something lol, I just don't see the humor in someone smelling bad. Even without considering any implications behind it I still don't see the humor in it. Considering Dimitri's circumstances though it just feels very wrong to see people make fun of him for that. I know fans of his that do it are doing it harmlessly and most likely wouldn't make fun of real people for similar things, but it just doesn't sit right with me. There's just nothing amusing about poor hygiene.

Using it as fuel to hate on him though is just is a show of someone's true character and who they really are. :/ Anyone who makes fun of him for his hygiene and mental illness are the kind of people who look down on people with those problems and deserve to experience it for themselves to see just how awful that shit can be. It being fictional doesn't change the fact that it's a show on someone's true character to be able to make fun of someone suffering, and especially to the extent Dimitri does.

Like yes, Edelgard suffered, but she has her own way of moving past it. She's not suffering in the same way as Dimitri or handling it the same way and comes across as "strong" for that - another societal mindset from people who think it's "strong" to not show that you're suffering or have suffered. It's how she handles it, sure, and that's fine... but it's people's reactions to how differently they handle their trauma that's so obnoxious.

People can only be pushed so far, and people hate on Dimtiri for his violence despite that being part of his illness and trauma. Hating on people for being violent as a result of their feelings or past is an awful thing and I really think anyone who can hate on a good and well meaning/intentioned person (real or fictional) simply because they're violent toward bad things needs some serious introspection (like Dimitri having violent reactions to seeing innocents being slaughtered in front of him at Remire. It was an impulsive reaction that he would've hid if he could have, but he wasn't able to).

Like oh no, how dare someone be violent and aggressive toward murderers! How dare someone say off with their head when they've done terrible things! Not everyone is perfectly peaceful and puritan. Hell, Edelgard isn't either and chooses violence as her first and foremost answer to everything, and only considers "negotiations" (i.e. anything that will benefit her/the Empire and only her) if she's losing and only stands to gain from them.

Her first solution to everything is violence, and yet Dimitri is the one who gets shat on for... being violent. Because of his trauma and illness specifically, both in game and out. But since Edelgard has been able to moved past her trauma for the most part and has a different way of handling it that "looks better", he looks "bad" for not having gotten past his trauma yet. Good for her to be able to handle it the way she does, but why is it "bad for him" that he can't handle it "better"?

[wcrriorhearts]

I will preface this post by saying two things: I am really, REALLY hard to anger and I am normally very much against call out culture, because I feel like publicly addressing someone in this fashion leads nowhere, but I will make an exception this one time, because I lose my patience when people attack my friends and this is exactly what has been happening. I will not stand for this. I will put the rest of this under a cut and apologize in advance for polluting your dash with negativity, because I personally hate this too, but this needs to stop, NOW and since no one else is speaking up, I will do it!

Leah, Anna, Angelika, whatever the hell your name my be, because you change it constantly, this needs to stop! I am addressing you personally, because we have surpassed the point of vague posting. You have crossed more lines than I can count and I am SO DONE with your behavior. It is hard to get me to this point, but you have managed to make me so livid, that we're here now and this needs to STOP. Not only have you scammed half the hotd fandom out of money in the most ridiculous ways by making one donation post after the other with various claims, but you were also not very careful with your many lies. I will have enough decency not to talk about them here at length but please know that if your vile behavior continues, I have proof of all the bullshit lies you told and all the shady things you did and I will NOT be nice enough again to keep them out of the public eye.

Lying and scamming is one line you crossed but sucicide baiting people and then when this didn't garner the attention you wanted making another 'goodbye' post in which you basically attack my friends blaming them for your decision to supposedly ending your life? That is one too many steps over lines and boundaries and I cannot stand for this. Also once again you lied in that post. You never asked Daze for money??? I have screenshot proof that you did, so PLEASE for the love of everything that is fair, shut up and leave everyone alone. I am sorry to say this, but once again it is VERY suspicious that you only posted your heartfelt goodbye messages on platforms Daze could see. Coincidence, isn't it? That she confronted you with your lies privately and then this is the escalation of it? Were you scared that all of your lies would unravel? Perhaps, given this is not the first fandom in which you have done this. I am not someone who lightly discredits people who are desperate enough to end their lives, but I don't believe you a single word anymore. You made the first post about it, then nothing happened and it gained no traction, then the second, just like you did with all of your fundraiser posts. As soon as you didn't garner the attention and traction you wanted, you just upped the dramatics. Aber wie man so schön hier in Deutschland sagt: wer ein Mal lügt, dem glaubt man nicht!

I have absolutely no doubt that you are severely mentally ill and I hope that you get the help you need, I truly do, because no person in their right mind would ever do the things you did. I don't care if you attack me, or if you go behind my back and talk shit, because I know who is in the right here and it's not you. Mind you, neither one of us - and there's more than just the three of us you know of - would have ever made this public. We would have let this fizzle out and you get your head straight, but you had to cross yet another line. I am disgusted by what you have said and done in order to guilt trip my friends, who were nothing but kind to you, until they started to notice all the lies and weird things you told them and confronted you.

Sadly I have seen many people like you in the rp world, who will lie and live at the expense of good, honest people who want to do good in the world and help others in need. If you take anything from this, please consider how damaging your behavior has been. You might have gained a shit ton of money for free, others are traumatized by what you have done. I don't care about what you do from here on, I just hope you get professional help for whatever has led you down this path and come to see the error of your ways. Should you ever shade, attack, or even mention my friends, the next post will not be so comparably friendly anymore. Lass es dir gesagt sein Leah, du willst wirklich nicht, dass wir alles was wir gegen dich gesammelt haben öffentlich stellen. Also tu uns und dir den Gefallen und verschwinde aus dem Fandom, oder zumindest unserem Dunstkreis, denn dich will ich definitiv nicht mehr sehen hier. And to everyone else who read this: I am sorry if you have been affected by this too. Please feel free to reach out if you want to talk. And if you should choose to unfollow me for this post, I will have no hard feelings. Had this been me in the center of all of this, I wouldn't have said anything. But if you attack my friends, it's on sight.

[bohemian-nights]

I can’t believe there’s excuses for what Rhaenyra says about Nettles, the only Black character in the Dance (“a common thing”, “low creature” and “you need only to look at her to know she has no drop of dragon’s blood in her”). Trying to pass it as her paranoia due to Mysaria and cheating doesn’t work. If you call a POC a racial slur, that’s racist regardless of whether that person did something to you. Rhaenyra isn’t Daenerys or Arya, she tried to murder a teenage Black girl. I am not here for any Rhaenyra’s stan trying to excuse or downplay a white woman’s misogynoir and classism because her sons died. Grief doesn’t make you suddenly racist, or compel you to say racist things. You were always that way. The grief just brought out the racism and supremacism that was always simmering beneath the surface.

Actually, Rhaenyra reminds me of the racist Southern plantation owner Mary Epps in the film 12 Years a Slave, who feels jealous and threatened by Patsey (played by Lupita Nyong’o) when her husband Ed constantly rapes Patsey and other female slaves. Mary hates and blames her and the other Black slaves for “seducing” her husband, while making excuses for his outbursts of rage, violence and lust.

And the fact that some of these people say that they like Nettles is what makes it worse.

(This also goes out to some of Team Green who any other time are capable of admitting that Miss Maegor is in the wrong, but suddenly when it’s a Black girl it’s all Missy Anne is a victim too).

If you actually liked Netty you wouldn’t downplay her hurt. You wouldn’t downplay how she was almost killed in her sleep by Missy Anne. You wouldn’t forget that she’s vulnerable. You wouldn’t forget that she is a too woman.

Any way you slice it, she being Black, homeless, a bastard, and the daughter of a whore, is the lowest person in the racial/social/class strata. You don’t like someone and ignore their identity and the role that plays in their treatment(both inside and outside the story).

Septon Eustace(the one who reported on what happened during the council meeting where Nettles death was given a death sentence) may be biased against Missy Anne, but remember who Nettles is.

Remember that even when he was defending her Corlys of all people still called her dirty and ill-favored.

Is it really so hard to believe that Missy Anne would call her a low creature without a drop of dragon’s blood?

Is the woman who ordered her head truly supposed to suddenly be a beacon of morality?

Murder is fine, but she wouldn’t stoop to racism. Eustace totally just threw in those lines for shits and giggles.

As if he needed to do such a thing when she was fine with breaking guests rights and murdering her in her sleep.

Missy Anne is in the wrong here. Not Daemon who was the one person(baring Maester Norren, shout-out to him, he seems nice) who didn’t have a thing to say against her and protected her with his life. Or Mysaria, who while is a conniving snake, she’s not the one who signed that letter.

Like it or not the moment Missy Anne ordered Nettles to be murdered she became the big bad wolf in her story.

The “mental breakdown” excuse is old. She was perfectly fine with Mysaria sleeping with her husband, but only flips out when a Black girl does it.

To not acknowledge that shows me that you value her feelings, personhood, and “suffering” over Nettles(and there are broader implications with that).

Rhaenyra is just like the women from old yonder. The only difference between she and a woman like Mrs. Epps is that she has more power yet she still chooses to punish Nettles rather than her husband. Point blank period she’s a racist.

Then again it’s not hard to see why these people don’t think Missy Anne is racist given how quick they are to say Nettles should be cut because she is Black, are comfortable with calling characters the N-word or comparing Black characters to monkeys, don’t see the problem with calling Dettles disgusting even though they ship an abusive incestuous relationship, yet somehow they aren’t racist a**holes.

Anyone taking these people remotely seriously, let alone viewing them as an authority on racial issues is out of their mind.

[legendoftherisingtide]

Man, you think there’s persecution now? The normies, neutral people or those on the fence just picked sides and it’s not with the trans community.

Idk what you’re specifically talking about or what side you’re saying people picked, but the fact is people are highlighting that they were a transgender more than anything.

What does them being transgender have to do with things? Why is it such a key detail in someone doing something so disgusting and monstrous.

The media has portrayed trans people as dangerous for years now. And usually it is for them simply existing. You can not deny that. However when a trans person does in fact do something disgusting like this, it is not because they are trans. It is because they are an asshole.

An asshole can come from anywhere. A murderer could be any race, gender or identity. The fact that you are mistreating an entire group of people for the actions of one asshole is the genuine definition of persecution.

Dissect your bias and figure out why them being trans is so important.

In my humble opinion, I don’t care. I don’t care what their identity is. I don’t care if they’re mentally ill. They killed people. They killed innocent fucking kids. And I am never going to justify that shit.

But if you really think him being trans is important to the conversation then really think about it.

Why are you like this with trans people when 2000+ cis men have done mass shootings in the past five years. Why is him being trans the reason why we should rally against trans people? Why are you so quick to be against trans people when the majority of shootings are white men; why do most people jump to say white men are mentally ill rather than their identity when they do the exact same crime?

When a shooting like this happens, do you think white men fear for their lives?

Do you think white guys are scared to continue to be who they are openly because they might be discriminated or mistreated because of the gruesome actions that members of their community have done?

Do you think they fear that their rights to simply exist in this country are going to be taken away?

I don’t think they do. But trans people are.

Because of this situation, you, yes you anon, are actively persecuting trans people by buying into harmful rhetoric that is going to end up hurting so many lives.

But I don’t blame you. I am angry too. I am so angry, beyond words. I can not believe that some self-righteous asshole thinks that he can murder people. I am so fucking pissed that someone who was as mentally disturbed as him got their hand on multiple guns and had the option to shoot up a school. I am so angry that this can and has and will happen. It is gut wrenching and it is heartbreaking.

And the fact that it is being used to spread more hate to a community that is already having their rights questioned is terrible.

But the most we can do as a people is be kind. Beyond politics that is out of our control at times, we can prevent this kind of thing from happening again.

We can provide more supports for mental health. We can support people for who they are. We can spread awareness. We can help people before they go down a dark path. If we foster acceptance, we as a world can become better.

I know that people are anon for a reason. I know it’s easier to just say whatever you want and my words might not reach. But I hope there might be something in what I said that can stick and maybe later down the line, you can look back and maybe see my perspective.

[bogchampion]

ugh............

I can't keep fuckign doing this I feel constantly fucking sidelined I'm a goddamned failure we had something and then it got stale and boring and you moved on and I didn't and I've felt so fucking hollow ever since and now I just have to sit and watch everyone else around me bonded and happy and thriving and inspired and I'm just sitting here a sad pile of slop in the corner just begging for connection and interaction again even though I don't bring anything to the table anymore because my life is ruining me. and I can't slow the damage that the stress deals because it's a feedback loop I get worse at rp and oc stuff which is my only escapism anymore, so I get more stressed, which makes me worse at it. And the whole time i want to claw my own skin off because I can't stop thinking about what I used to have, how happy I made someone how we both played off each other and now it's just not good enough anymore it's so fucking ugly and selfish too it's fucking disgusting and maybe it's better I just don't bond with anyone if I'm going to be like this but in that case I should also just die because that won't get rid of my desperate little need for dopamine from playing imaginary games.

so im just screwed I guess. Maybe people are just humoring me because it's so visible that letting me down even gently would just fucking break me but. whatever I'm going to break regardless eventually, I drive away everyone because my emotional bullshit and fifteen years of mental illness is just too much. And y'all deserve better than me anyways. someone who can handle change in topics and doesn't retread the same boring paths constantly and can draw pretty pictures in return. someone who isn't constantly trying so hard that it just loops around to being pathetic.

say what you want but everyone seems happier when creating with anyone other than me.

and I get it. The last two years have left me a shell. I have no passion for anything anymore even though I thirst for it so fucking desperately sometimes, there's just a block and I don't know where or what I'm doing wrong but it just adds to the fucking loneliness okay. watching everyone else play without me is just a theme of my fucking life

No one is reading this and there's maybe one person alive this even makes sense to in which case im sorry I can't say this to your face I probably shouldn't but I'm upset in a parking lot and this is all I can do.

I just don't know what else to do. What I did wrong. Or how to change it. There probably isn't. I'm just fucking alone again. Pathetic dramatic little piece of shit creature, clingy and jealous and ready to see the worst. no wonder everyone gets sick of your miserable ass.

only so much of this I can blame on hormones I'm just a shithead at the end of the day.

I just want to escape but I can't it all makes me too sad just remembering what I don't have anymore.

[ghost-of-the-machine]

im so ashamed actually!!!!!!!!!!! so terribly ashamed i feel like the most disgusting person in the world, cuz thats how intense my brain works it thinks like. oh have yr friends ever called furries weird or implied they thought furries were weird? that means they think you are weird which means they basically want nothing to do with you you should kill yourself NOW!!!!!! i said damn bitch!!!!!! god forbid a man be passionate about. things.

it really is just cuz it has nothing to do with them i think thats one of the core reasons, its completely unrelated and i dont think theyd be interested so... do not RISK IT. maybe im selfish, i just.. i cant stand the thought of something i do being unappealing to them, i cant stand the thought of them looking away. any little thing could be a huge thing!!!! could be the worst thing ever actually could be the end of all things could ruin this

do i think being a furry is going to ruin my relationships? realistically, no. why would it? ive ALWAYS been a furry artist, so.. why am i so scared? sorry if you have to see this its very VERY embarrassing but LORD i am not winning the mental illness rn dear god

its like my head constantly makes hurdles for itself, but like. FOR OTHER PEOPLE. like okay.. they dont hate you cuz yr trans, cool cool... they dont hate you cuz yr have bpd, surprisingly!!!! alright. they dont hate you cuz yr fat, right.. but heres this NEW thing, they SURELY will hate you cuz you draw anthros like you are FUCKED say goodbye to everything dipshit. erm........... whats it gonna be next? theyll hate yr taste in fictional men, thatll do it!!! theyll hate yr music taste, theyll hate you for yr mental illness (not that one, the other one. they were fine with that one but THIS one theyll hate you for surely)

it pisses me off too, i KNOW my friends are good people. i dont seriously THINK that of them, i dont think theyre vicious and waiting to toss me away at any turn but... im still scared of it. i said it before, im scared ill be the one to bring that out of them like im somehow SO terrible ill make the best people ive ever met turn on me like that. FOR DRAWING FURRIES? are you actually stupid (yes)

i cant blame myself too much im. doing the best i can im unmedicated untherapied im . IM DOING PRETTY GOOD for someone whos been carrying several weird ailments and still just chugging along, i manage my symptoms when i can i do my best!!! but fighting yr own brain is FUCKING HARD... why is bro sabotaging me? why is it making me impulsive and scared like that? stupid quit it!!!! i got furries to draw i MISS IT SO MUCH I MISS MY GUYS. IM JUST... im a coward!!!!! i cant ever be like. well so what, who cares what they think? ME BITCH I CARE WHAT THEY THINK.. i hear everything they say, i remember all the things they say they like and dont like, and i internalize it subconsciously. they think this is weird and they personally dont like it? alright well you dont have much of an opinion on it OR you do actually like it so thats BAD we need to cut that shit immediately you will feel SHAME for something harmless cuz you think itll make them keep you longer

dont you get tired of it? YEAH i get real fuckin tired of it. so many times ive tried to like.. force myself back into what i love but as embarrassing as it is to admit, in my head their opinion on things is greater than my own. i struggle with putting people on a pedestal and ive actually been doing REALLY WELL with that like no they are my equals they are my best friends i love them i give them kiss but. The Horrors 💀 like i said it all comes out of fear, fear of being rejected and left to DIE ALONE IN THE COLD. do i think thatll ever happen? no!!! but do i fear it? absolutely. its less of like 'i see you as better than me' and more of 'im afraid to disappoint you and make you leave' which i feel like is pretty standard for someone like me

WHATEVERRR i should stop being such a litle bitch about it, ill try. i just hate feeling like everything i do is a test, i hate feeling so unsure about myself, if i move too fast itll shatter. it wont!!!! relax 🙄

[j3tlagg3d]

i still feel extreme extreme disgust w any irl happenings of incest and pedophilia and zoophilia. like hearing abt stories of irl cases of shit does srsly at times give me a physical feeling of disgust & makes me feel ill and gross. but like seriously you cannot put a drawing of feral porn on the same level as real life raping a dog. im sorry but the ppl in the picture DO NOT EXIST and u cannot say w evidence that the enjoyment of fictional content shows a persons personal beliefs or hurts real people. i used to be anti proship and would say shit like "well think abt the slenderman case that was fiction affecting reality!" but its like. idk shit like that just doesnt happen without other factors at play, the interest in slenderman itself isnt what led them to hurt someone its layers of other mental shit going on. its like blaming violent games for school shootings. there is no correlation between fictional media and genuine influence to cause harm. Just saying

contrary to popular belief i have actually had a far far far far far far far easier time ignoring horrific intrusive thoughts that made me think abt hurting others sexually and made me feel disgusting and horrible and like i should kill myself ever since ive started engaging w "proship" content and not treating it like its bad. having a Fictional outlet for my intrusive thoughts has helped me figure out that wow no i actually really really DONT want to hurt real people, i just have a kink for dangerous and bad situations that i can safely take out on drawings. my mental health has improved greatly and i feel far less effected by my ocd making me spiral

[kisstytea]

KisstyTea’s introduction page

Hi I’m Eli! My pronouns are She/He/They if that’s important. I’ve been a huge fan of classic rock since I was about seven (you can blame that movie KISS made with Scooby Doo for that one <3), so I decided to make this stupid lil shitty writing blog for fanfics of my favorite bands! Oh uhm also this is an x reader writing blog because uhh yeah. 

Who I’ll write for atm:

KISS

Mötley Crüe

Queen

Guns N’ Roses

Probably more in the future <3

What I’ll write: 

Fluff

Headcanons

Platonic stuff

Smut 

What I won’t write:

Angst (it makes me sad)

Suicide mention (I lost a close relative to suicide, no I won’t answer questions about it)

Anything where someone dies (again it makes me sad)

It takes me forever to write shit but please send your requests!!

Extra Thing:

I am aware that many people that I will write fanfics for have done disgusting and horrible things, and if you feel kind of uncomfortable with this blog, please block me and move on. I never want to start any trouble!

Also, I am neurodivergent and mentally ill. I’ve struggled with this for my entire life. I’m incredibly shy and I have a hard time understanding social queues. Sometimes, I tend to say things very bluntly and I end up offending people. While I’m not using my problems as an excuse, I do believe that I should give a forewarning that I may make you upset by pure accident. If I do offend you in any way, shape or form, please let me know so I can correct myself.

Don’t flirt with me for the love of God, I’m currently in a relationship that I am very happy with. Being flirted with by anybody other than him would make me feel so indescribably uncomfortable.

DNI LIST:

MAPS(pedophiles), Anti-LGBTQ/Homophobes/Biphobes/Transphobes etc., Anyone who tries to shame me back into religion (I don’t care if you’re a religious person that follows me, but don’t try to reconvert me, it’s not going to work), Anyone who believes sex and gender are the same thing, Racists, Anti-Semetics,Nazis,Holocaust deniers etc

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

normally i don’t do this BUT since the medication i took yesterday brought out a rage in me i have not felt in a long time, there is someone i would like to warn you all about below the cut. i won’t mention any names, but if you want to know who it is, just message me privately (i will not answer anon asks about it publicly). i have evidence via logs that this happened if anyone needs them.

if you have mental illness, STAY AWAY FROM THIS PERSON and do not share your experience with mental illness anywhere they may see it. they are active in the three houses community.

this person is someone i used to talk to in a server. however, after i shared my experience with mental illness and how it affected me at a young age, they told me outright in front of a lot of other people in a server that my issues were my own fault. yes, after sharing my experience with mental illness as severe as clinical depression and borderline DID/MPD, they told me those things were my own fault.

they ALSO told me any actions of my sixteen year old self, within my depressive MPD state, were my own fault and implied that the actions of my sixteen year old self were the fault of my 28 year old self. yes, i’m saying that this person outright expressed that whoever i am now is still the same person as who i was at sixteen during extreme depressive episodes that i had blackouts during (blackouts meaning, i have no memory of what occurred during the blackouts and did not have memories of such things at the time they happened). they are saying that anything i did at age sixteen due to my mental illnesses are now the fault of my 28 year old self.

PLEASE for the love god stay away from people like this. they are dangerous and terrible people for those of us with mental illness.

i’ve been terrified of coming out with this and admitting it publicly, but at this point i think you all should know someone has recently done this to me and is still active in a community on tumblr. PLEASE do not make people, who tell you that your mental illness is your own fault, feel like good people, because they are not. they are even worse people when they try to tell you these things in front of many other people, and also do so with the intention of driving you away.

in other words, this person decided they didn’t like me (evidently bc of something i don’t have any recollection of happening that supposedly happened over five years ago. mind you i did not know this person back then, and what they said happened, to my understanding, did not happen after speaking about the supposed incident with friends who knew me those five or more years ago), and bc they didn't like me, they pushed me out of a community by blaming me for things that occurred due to my mental illness over ten years ago. basically, they didn't like me so they tried to use my mental illness as ammunition to drive me away.

basically, if you were involved in anything over ten years ago due to mental illness and you still have mental illness today, they will tell you your mental illness is your fault. i have logs for this if anyone wants to see them.

this person is extremely toxic and people like this are disgusting horrendous brats to me. sorry about the yeehaw language, but people who are this horrible don’t deserve to exist as far as i’m concerned. oh also, they talk hella shit about other people for doing exactly this stuff... that they did to me.

no amount of “but i have mental illness too uwu” makes it okay to attack others for their own mental illness. you are NOT better than ANYONE just because you  have a different mental illness.

[twistedtranslations]

Rook Hunt - The real culprit is... you!

You can unlock this story by getting Rook’s SSR Dorm uniform

Translation under the cut

Rook calls Epel “himeringo”, the Japanese word for plumleaf crabapple. I shortened it.

As we know already, Epel sometimes slips in his country accent, hence the weird wording.

Chapter 1

Courtyard

Vil: …8…9…10! Next up is the camel pose. Push your chest out and lean your upper body backward. Hold your ankles with your hands and keep that pose.

Everyone: Yes!

Epel: Ugh… Rook…

Rook: What is it, monsieur Crabapple?

Epel: I came to help with the shooting of the next work of the cinema studies club, but… Argh! Why are we doing yoga… Ugh?

Rook: Epel, you know, it's because we wanted you to take part in relaxing activities. If people relaxed, they will become more flexible mentally, and more active in discussions and communication. Yoga is the best exercise to improve your blood flow, metabolism and it soothes your mind. Moreso, your posture and physique will become much more beautiful! That's why Vil does yoga before his cinema studies activities.

Epel: I, I see… Is there…. An easier method?

Rook: By the way, Epel. You should bend your back more if you want to call it a camel pose. Okay, I will help you out and pull your arms back!

Epel: Eh, no, I'm fine- OUCH!!!!

Rook: Hahaha, monsieur Crabapple, you're body is quite stiff.

Savanaclaw Student A: Hey, look, it's the guys from the cinema studies. What a weird-looking pose is that! Man, I'd be way too embarrassed to wriggle like that in front of everyone.

Cinema studies Student A: Why are you guys butting in suddenly? This is just yoga…

Cinema studies Student B: Leave it be. Those muscle brains from Savanaclaw wouldn't understand our graceful bodybuilding.

Savanaclaw Student B: Huh? Are you picking a fight!

Rook: Oh please, there's no need to get angry! Why don't you join us? We can polish our beauty and deepen our friendship with yoga!

Savanaclaw Student A: Who'd do that! Beauty won't fill your belly. C'mon, let's go.

Epel: … friggin' irritatin'. Rook, I don't know how or why you could invite those guys…

Rook: I thought they might understand the benefits of yoga if they did it. How regrettable. Oh, me of all people! While I was talking, I forgot to help you out. My bad, let's continue.

Epel; Um, no, I don't need it… OUCH!!!!

Vil: Epel?

Epel: Ah… Vil.

Vil: I thought I heard a crushed frog's ugly cry, but that was my imagination, wasn't it?

Epel: Ugh… I'm sorry, I'll pay attention to it.

Vil: Rook, I think there will be no problems if you are by his side but… If anything happens, I hope you will "properly" discipline him. Not only does he lack in manners and aesthetics, but many other facets as well.

Epel: Is… that so?

Vil: Didn't you get frustrated when the Savanaclaw students reprimanded you? Do not involve Pomefiore in trivial arguments. Understood?

Epel: Understood…

Vil: Rook. If Epel quarrels with other dorm students during the shooting period… I will expel you two from the cinema studies- no, the dorm.

Epel: … I'm only here because you asked me to help.

Vil: Did you say anything?

Epel: Nuthin’- I mean, I said nothing.

Vil: In any case. Please refrain from idiotic behavior that could tarnish Pomefiore's name.

Rook: Oui, Roi du Poison. Leave it to me!

Cinema studies Student A: Those three seem to get along well as usual…

Cinema studies Student C: Epel and Rook are amazing. Leaving out the fact that they're from the same dorm, they can talk to Vil so casually. Perhaps I'm still too nervous because I saw him on the TV and in magazines before I entered the college?

Cinema studies Student A: Right. They're amazing for being able to to talk with him without constraints.

Interior Hallway

The next day

Epel: Ah, Rook.

Rook: Hello, Epel. You're here early.

Epel: Yes. My class finished early…

Students: Congratulations!

Rook: You guys too… We are the most enthusiastic people in the club today.

Classroom

Rook: Vil isn't here today because of work, therefore I will instruct you on the activities…

Cinema Studies B: … Is something wrong?

Rook: La vache (Oh the cow)… how terrible. Look at that.

Epel: Argh! Vil's clothes are torn into pieces!?

Cinema studies Student A: And it's not only his clothes but also the photo sets on the wall…

Everyone: !!

Epel: The heck, what are those weird words written in red…

Rook: "A defective beauty"… It must be a message from the one who tore up the clothes. Fufu, this is quite a case… And a direct declaration of war on us!!

Chapter 2

Classroom

Rook: Fufu, this is quite a case… And a direct declaration of war on us!!

Epel: Is there anyone in the cinema studies club who’d tear up his clothes with ill intent…? Who would do that…

Cinema studies Student A: Hey, those marks on those ripped clothes… Don't they look like they've been made by sharp claws?

Cinema studies Student B: Claws… Then this could be the work of the Savanaclaw students. But why would they…

Cinema studies Student A: … Could it be those guys from yesterday?

Epel: Do you mean the ones who made fun of us..?

Cinema studies Student A: Yeah. The guys from Savanaclaw said it then, right? "Beauty" won't fill your belly.

Cinema studies Student B: So a Savanaclaw student with a grudge from yesterday wrote a message on the wall and tore up Vil's clothes?

Epel: If they didn't like it, they can face us up front. This is cowardly.

Cinema studies Student A: Epel, you are a good person. Even though you aren't part of the cinema club, you still get angry for us.

Epel: I ain't forgivin' them for goin' behind our backs… I mean, we cannot allow them to do this.

Cinema studies Student C: Yeah. We won't stay quiet about these precious clothes being destroyed!

Epel: Yeah! Let's search for those guys from yesterday and have'm complain to our face!

Everyone: Yeah!

Cinema studies Student A: Hey, wait everyone- ... And they went.

Rook: Oho, everyone seems very passionate.

Cinema studies Student A: Rook, are you not following them?

Rook: The sadness of losing such a beautiful thing stunned me for a moment.

Cinema studies Student A: … I see. I'll stop Epel and the others.

Rook: Oh my, to be in such a situation on the day Vil isn't here. Or to be more precise, "because he isn't here". Moreso… "A defective beauty". I should solve this case before Vil returns. 

Rook: I should investigate to see if I can find evidence that links to the culprit. Let's start at the place where the fabric was torn. …As I expected. It's not a scratch even though it resembles one. They used 25 cm long scissors with 9 cm long blades to cut it. From the angle of the tears, I can guess that the culprit is right-handed. They held it with their left hand by the torso and used their right hand to cut from the shoulder to the waist with the scissors… 

Rook: The culprit is probably around 168-172 cm. That narrows it down a bit! Fufufu…  Even though I've experienced the hunt for an animal's traces many times, it still elates me. Oho, I can't let myself get carried away. I have to concentrate on the investigation… … Aha. I see… Fufu, I have deduced the animal. Now it's hunting time!

Courtyard

Savanaclaw Student A: Shut up! We didn't do it. Who gives a shit about your clothes!

Epel: If there's anythin' you wanted to say, tell 's up front instead of harassin'… you're so unmanly, senior.

Savanclaw Student A: What!?

Cinema studies Student B: If we cannot agree and don't progress then… We will have a duel!!!!

Savanaclaw Student B: Hah, come at me. I don't think you culture boys will be much of an opponent though.

Everyone: HAAAAH!!

/Fighting sounds

???: Stop it!

Savanaclaw Student A: Huh…

Cinema studies Student A: All our magic was swept away!?

Epel: Rook!?

Rook: Turn your magical pen in, everyone. It's forbidden to use magic for your personal struggles. Besides, you’re in the wrong by blaming them. They have nothing to do with what happened.

Epel: Huh…

Savanaclaw Student B: Pf! You got us involved in some weird stuff. We did nothin' so we're off.

Cinema studies Student B: … How foolish! If they didn't do it, then please tell us who did such a horrible thing!

Rook: The cause of this tragedy is deep love. The real culprit is… You!

Chapter 3

Rook: The cause of this tragedy is deep love. The real culprit is… You!

Courtyard

Cinema studies Student B/Epel: Huh…

Cinema studies Student C/D: No way…

Cinema studies Student A: …

Cinema studies Student B: He can't be the culprit, Rook! He's the costumer of the cinema studies club!?

Cinema studies Student A: That's right. You saw it, right? That "A Defective beauty", what a disgusting and criminal declaration!!

Rook: Yes, I saw it. That felt out of place. As the Savanclaw students said, they don't only not care , but even negate the very existence of "beauty". Despite that, do you think they would use an eloquent expression like "Defective"? While I was thinking about that, I inspected the garment that seemed to be torn apart by claws carefully.. And followed the clues to you.

Cinema studies Student A: Why… Me?

Rook: The scratches on the garments. They were cut by scissors in the shape of a beast's talons. And by examining the traces of your cut, I could deduce their height and their dominant arm, which happens to concur with yours. And there's more evidence. What I hold in my hand right now is a piece cut from the garments… Look at the lining?

Epel: The lining? What's wrong with it?

Rook: It's loosely sewn. This garment hasn't been used once for a photoshoot, and it's not the only part that doesn't harmonize well on the camera… Vil is the kind of person who strives for perfect quality from the fabric to the sewing and the accessories. He wouldn't have let this shoddy tailoring pass.

Epel: Um, so someone tore up the garments of the cinema studies club. But it was a fake, and not the real one…? I, I'm confused.

Rook: He hesitated at the moment of the crime when he was about to tear Vil's clothes, so he replaced it with a fake. The essential part is that the fake was made intending to fit Vil perfectly. There are only two people besides Vil that know his measurements exactly. The first one is me. And the other one is…

Epel: The costumer… who is in charge of taking his measurements?

Cinema studies Student A: Ugh…

Rook: I suggest you don't make more excuses now. Won't you tell us your reason?

Cinema studies Student A: I-, I did it because… I was jealous! You and Epel get along great with the esteemed Vil!

Epel: Huh! You think we're getting along great? The only thing he does is scold me though…

Cinema studies Student A: That's plenty! I admire Vil, studied what he likes, and devoted myself with all my might to the cinema studies club! Even so, I never got any closer to him since I enrolled! So I tried to make you two fight the other dorms…  and have you expelled from the cinema studies club.

Epel: Well ain't you a peach…

Cinema studies Student A: … I'm sorry for causing an inconvenience to everyone in the club. I'll take responsibility and quit the club.

Rook: Quit the club? Non!! That would be outrageous, my dear costumer!

Everyone: Huh!?

Cinema studies Student A: W-Why…

Rook: This case. His love for Vil created and destroyed it. Thus… Love only won't make you able to finish a piece that can be mistaken for the real thing. The way your fingers assembled this with thread and needle, it's actually beautiful. If the cinema studies club were to lose a talent like yours, Vil wouldn't be pleased. Your atonement will be your contributions to the club.

Cinema studies Student B: It's just as Rook says. You are the best out of us at dressmaking, if you weren't here it would stump us. Come on, let's go back to the clubroom. Let's repair this garment before Vil comes back from his work!

Cinema studies Student A: ! Y-Yes!!

Rook: Okay! That settles one case.

Epel: Rook! That was splendid. You are so observant, to tell it's a counterfeit just by the seams.

Rook: Ah. That was a lie! No one hand-sews anything these times. They all use a sewing machine. You can't see that with the naked eye, right? It was a trick.

Epel: Huh… Huuuh!? Then how did you know it was a fake?

Rook: Fufufu, the truth is much simpler. Smell. The counterfeit clothes didn't have a single atom of the characteristic and unique mellow fragrance that Vil has, so I knew immediately.

Epel: What!? That investigation method is kinda… gross, you know?

Rook: Listen, Epel. I regard the information you can get by smelling highly, as it's useful for hunting. You can know the places one visited or in this case, the person's characteristics, by the traces of their smell. For example… sniff sniff. What you had for lunch today-

Epel: Argh!? S-Stop this!

Rook: Hahaha! Just kidding. My nose isn't that good either.

Epel: I thought you were amazing like a detective, but… maybe you're really just a weirdo.

[ethrenisnotthehero]

@hogwartsmystory is a predator (final)

If you haven’t read the other parts of this callout, I encourage you to start here. As in both previous posts, the normal tags are not included in order to allow this to reach as many people as possible. Potential triggers are listed below, and the main content is hidden to keep sensitive individuals from being unintentionally exposed.

TW: Pedophilia, Abuse, Gaslighting, Sexual Assault, Self Harm, Suicide, NSFW Topics, Faked Illness, Faked Mental Illness, Faked Death, Victim Blaming

Originally, I intended to craft this final part to you, the reader, as an emotional appeal. To be wholly honest, there’s only so much evidence that can be utilized without either forcing Jill to relive unnecessary trauma or exposing deeply intimate or personal parts of her life. Until now, everything I’ve told you and everything I’ve shown you is what was enough to convince me when Jill first reached out to me. If you, the reader, don’t believe the factual information that’s been presented so far, then I don’t think that you will. If you, the reader, believe Jill and her story, then no further evidence is going to magically make her story more true.

However, I don’t have to. Instead, I can let the friends-- the family--that Ren created on his website speak for themselves, and show you with their own testimony just the kind of person he was. Jill wasn’t the only person that Ren hurt. Jill wasn’t even the only person Ren preyed on as a sexual predator. Many people on staff, and many people outside of it, knew Ren and grew to have what they thought was a close relationship with him. People regarded him as someone to look up to, to find comfort in, to aspire after, to lean on; people thought of him as a friend and a hero in his community.

On April 12, 2021, at 9:57 AM Greenwhich Mean Time, the current administrators of Advanced Scribes issued a statement addressing Ren’s actions and his faked death. An additional announcement was made the following day. While the announcements themselves and the replies (including moderator statements) are publicly available, I have saved a print-to-PDF versions on Google for you to browse at your leisure. 

I intentionally waited until the initial panic and outrage died out a little to let the most important statements come to light. Included in the PDF are sentiments that I personally thought were the most important sentiments; edits have been made and pages have been deleted, so you can see the current state of the conversations by visiting them directly. You can find the first discussion at https://advanced-scribes.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=42100#p1454263 and the second discussion at https://advanced-scribes.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=42107#p1454361.

Before you continue reading, please look over the statements and replies. The words of former staff former friends say more than I can ever hope to about Ren and the kind of reality that he stood for. Additionally, Jill herself has added to the conversation (username Rakuen), so you can read a bit from her perspective by looking into these announcements. After you’ve taken a look, continue below and I will sum up my final thoughts on this predator and his legacy.

Advanced Scribes • Our Statement (PDF)

Advanced Scribes • Change (PDF)

The Act of Grooming, Part 3: Entrapment

One of the reasons that predators get away with their crimes for so long is because they trap their victims. When they gain access to and successfully lure in their prey, they then engage in entrapment behavior to separate victims from other people and build reliance. The reason why kids are so prone to predation is because of how vulnerable they are. Young people just want to belong. They just want to have community, security, and affection. When they can’t get those things in their lives, they seek it out and take it where they can get it even when the situation is obviously bad. Kids can’t be held accountable for being smart because they’re kids. Jill was vulnerable. She wanted belonging and support. She fell into Ren’s lures, and he trapped her. He used his affection as a tool to solicit sexual favors and pictures from her, but never shared his face with her. She was always chasing his love, and all the while he was simultaneously preying on other individuals in the community. For God’s sake, this man had a selfie thread where underage girls would send pictures of themselves publicly on the site for him to look at, and he even intentionally disabled the website’s COPPA features.

Before Jill, there was Buttercup. Buttercup was also an admin, and she was also 13 when she met Ren. While Ren was a minor during he and Buttercup’s relationship, his behavior with her was just as predatory and Buttercup attempted to warn Jill via PM before she ended her relationship with him.

The picture he sent Buttercup wasn’t even him.

The entire time that Ren was convincing Jill that Buttercup was evil, and jealous, and a spiteful, hateful person, he was manipulating her the same way he was manipulating Jill. Ren is a predator who knows what he’s doing; he always has. He draws in his victims and makes everyone hate them so that he’s the only person they have. He makes them so desperate for his approval that they let him screw them over time and time again, and for what? Just to see his face. Think about what you read. He didn’t just do this to Jill and Buttercup. He did this to every person he cheated with or got close enough to get a grip on. Even if he didn’t sexually exploit someone, he emotionally did. An entire community of people suffered through this over and over and over again. Read the statements again. If you only read the live version, read the PDF. 

I also want you to bear in mind that everyone on staff was equally a victim as they were an enabler. It doesn’t erase their responsibility, but their roles in this story or more nuanced than “moderator bad, burn the witch!” Some of Ren’s supporters were as young or younger than Jill when they met him. The two people most notorious for standing at his side right now were both “rewarded” with a relationship with him in the fallout of his faked death.  

At some point, this man looked at his behavior and not only decided that he didn’t need to take responsibility, but that his victims daring to try and claim some kind of ownership over their own story was a personal affront to him. 

Ren is a monster of his own creation. He chose to be that monster again, and again, and again.

What makes his enablers equally to blame is when they became adults and made a conscious choice to ignore what was happening, which brings us to the next topic.

Finally... How Old Was Jill?

Despite everything I’ve said and shared so far, I still get this question in my inbox.

How old was Jill? Did she lie about her age? Is she free of guilt because she was a kid? Did he know how old she was? Was she legal in her country?

I gave you all everything I had. There were some things I just couldn’t confirm because there was no proof either way. However, all of that changed when the announcements were released. I now know exactly how old Jill was when they began dating, exactly how old she was when people knew about their relationship, and even that Ren was public with all of this information. I also know that staff knew everything, and chose to do nothing.

As you can see in the screenshots above of Buttercup’s message, it was sent on Jun 17, 2015. At that time, Jill was 14 years old. By Buttercup’s estimation, they had been dating for around a few months, which is how I was able to discern the previous exact age of 14 years old at the time they began dating.

However, Ren himself refutes that fact in a Valentine’s post for Jill. As pointed out in the “Our Statement” thread, the post that user amnesia. references includes very sexual and disgustingly graphic descriptions of Ren’s activity with her. It also says this:

As per the timestamp of this particular post (as seen below), Jill was 16 at the time. Ren, a man claiming to be twenty-five years old at the time, was proud to admit that he had been with Jill since she was 13.

You can view the full PDF of this post to see what else he said here, but please be warned that his descriptions are NSFW and absolutely disgusting. 

Warm Fuzzies Post (PDF)

No adult should talk about a kid like that. In the statements, several staff members admit that they knew that the two were dating when she was 16, and that it grossed them out. But none of them did anything. To amnesia.’s credit, they claim they tried to pursue legal action but found no viable routes. 

From the discussions and statements, we can discern five things:

1. Jill was 13 when she started dating Ren. 2. She did not lie about her age. 3. Ren did not lie about her age. 4. Ren knew how old she was. 5. Staff knew how old she was.

Jill’s feelings and her opinions on staff and their behavior are separate from my own. She does not share my beliefs here, and I need to make it very clear that what I’m saying next is entirely my own opinion.

To everyone who was staff at that time: shame on you. It’s one thing to be a victim yourself and to not understand how or when to stand up for what’s right, especially when you’re young; it’s another to become an adult and to have let something like this permeate your legacy and your community for all this time. From what I understand, none of you are completely innocent in this. Ren wasn’t secret, he was loud and proud and he didn’t give a shit what anyone thought. Everyone who was an adult then and is an adult now shares some responsibility for that. Those of you who mean your apologies, thank you, but those of you who are using this event as a stepping stone to make that website into your own personal playground know who you are. Stop. There’s an entire generation of kids between AS and CS who have lost years of their childhoods to this shit and the only right thing at this point would be to turn the site over to the police so that Ren can answer for his crimes the right way.

To everyone else: protect the people around you. People like Ren don’t think about how other people think or feel. They don’t care who gets hurt or who they trample under their feet. Look around at your community, and ask yourself if those who interact with you know that you are safe. Inevitably, someone is going to get hurt. Are you the kind of person that they can come to when it happens, or are you the kind of person who will turn your head away? 

Be the person that everyone knows they can come to, because, eventually, someone’s going to need you.

[butwhatifidothis]

3H and Bleach: Where the Fuck am I

So, I’m finally hunkering down and trying to write out this post lmao. I’ve mentioned here and there how my personal experience with the 3H’s fandom is similar to my experience with the Bleach fandom’s in more than one way, and - look. Like, I get there’s definitely a semi-universal thing that goes on across all fandoms. I don’t mean for this to say that this only happens within these two fandoms, because duh, of course they don’t. But!! This post is partly me wanting to air years long annoyance towards the Bleach fandom that just so happens to coincide with my feelings towards the 3H fandom, sooo... yeah lmao

I’ll probably be skimming over some bits about 3H, since most people who come across this will already be familiar with what I’d be talking about in that regard vs Bleach, so just a heads up

Note: This is gonna talk about Bleach which will spoiler territory (writing this off the cuff so not sure where this is goin’ yet lmao but I know that much), so if you don’t wanna see that then don’t read this post lol, I know for sure I’ll be spoiling something ahhhh... noticeable, lol

Ableism against the mentally ill

Now, most people reading this post will be familiar with the blog and how this very, very much applies to 3H, but for the sake of this post I’ll lay it out anyway with a brief summary

Dimitri and Rhea are both characters within 3H that suffer from severe trauma that heavily impacts their mental state. Both are the sole survivors of a horrific slaughter, with that slaughter redefining who they are and leaving a permanent marker within their minds in some way (Dimitri with having auditory and visual hallucinations, Rhea with having obsessive tendencies towards bringing her mother back from the dead). Specifically in CF, both characters are set up in the plot as antagonists, with both characters having to relive their trauma in some way due to the actions Byleth and Edelgard take against them (for Dimitri, having his home be razed to the ground and everyone he cares for dying around him, for Rhea having someone use her mother’s mutilated remains be used to end her and her race) and express extreme anger towards Byleth and Edelgard before they are killed to progress/end the story

Now, uh, sad shit right? Not exactly fuckin’ happy sunshine rainbows. These two characters are put through the wringer and are then murdered. They are rightfully not the fuckin’ happiest because of what happened to them before and what happens to them within the present story. But we’ve heard it all before: “They were crazy!” “They couldn’t be reasoned with!” “They had to be put down out of mercy because they were too ~far gone~ to live happily!” “They needed to be killed for the good of everyone!” It’s an extremely ableist rhetoric that gets passed around the fandom as though it’s totally fine to directly state that mentally ill people should be put down if they’re deemed a “lost cause.” Especially worrying because. You know. If they are a “”””lost cause”””” then it’s directly and specifically because of actions Byleth and Edelgard take against them. 

But how does this remind me of Bleach? What kind of similar extreme, worrying ableism exists there? Well, let me introduce to best girl a certain character with... a reputation, to say the least:

Meet Momo Hinamori.

Holy shit it’s so weird writing this out because I’ve been wanting to for years but have never worked up the nerve to do it lol

It should be noted, in the Bleach verse there’s two worlds out of three - Soul Society and Hueco Mundo, though I’ll only be talking of the former - that deal with “souls” (the essence within a living human). Souls age far more slowly than human bodies do in terms of body, not necessarily the mind (so a teenage soul will likely behave as such for a long while) so keep in mind that I’m going to be using numbers that may seem weird to someone who hasn’t seen Bleach lol.  With that out of the way, here’s a similar, if longer for context to those who haven’t seen Bleach, summary for Momo’s character as it relevant to this post:

Momo is a character in Bleach that grows a deep admiration towards Sosuke Aizen, a respected captain of the military force called the Gotei 13. She comes to views him as the most important person in her world due to him both noticing and paying direct attention to her as well as saving her and her friends’ lives during a training mission gone wrong while she was younger. Note that “younger” here means 40 years ago from the start of the story. Aizen would praise her all the time, allow her to sleep over in his quarters, would drape his cloaks over her when she looked cold, and would overall treat Momo as though he was his daughter for most of the time we see them interact in the beginning portions of the show. Note that none of this is sexual in nature, nor is it ever implied to be seen as such. That’ll be important later in this post

To make a long story short, Aizen comes to betray her. He stabs her through the chest and shows and tells her that she never meant anything to him, throughout the 40 years they’ve known each other (which, mind, for a soul Momo’s approximate age 40 years is still a noticeable amount of time), and he was only using her to help bolster his image as a loveable captain so that he can hide his plan from everybody that much easier. He did horrible things to Momo - from setting her alarm clock back to a later time so that she would more likely come across his pinned, bloody fake corpse. to framing her childhood friend for the apparent murder and tricking her into fighting that friend, to far later in the series tricking that friend into stabbing her (hypnosis shit, to sum that up) for literally no stated reason - that ended up mentally breaking her. She couldn’t believe that the last four decades were all nothing but lies and she fell into a deep denial about Aizen’s true nature - someone else made him do everything he did, she must have missed something that would have warned her about Captain Aizen’s unfortunate situation that forced Captain Aizen to hurt her and everyone else. This denial would take the majority of Bleach’s entire runtime for her to get over completely, with her having hiccups in her recovery even as she works up the nerve to fight him.

Now, uh, also not the fuckin’ funnest of times to be had here. The deep, long-running mental and psychological manipulation of what approximates as a teenage girl from a trusted older figure is something that is very clearly horrific and bad of the older figure, right? Like, we’re on the same page here on that?

This wouldn’t be in this post if that was the case. No, Momo was the one constantly on fire for what happened to her. She was one of the most hated characters in the western audience, and there were endless jokes about “lol look at Momo, the pincushion!” “Crazy bitch Momo, better watch out!” making fun of her and her trauma relentlessly. If you managed to find a Momo fan in the early 2000′s you should have also bought a lotto ticket because holy fuck, everyone hated her. She acted in a startlingly real if deeply uncomfortable way in regards to years long manipulation and she was lambasted for it. She didn’t immediately get over decades long psychological abuse and she was called useless, weak, a horrible representation of female characters, stupid - you name it, she was likely called it. To this day I still tense up when I hear that someone likes Bleach and they mention Momo at all because I’m always thinking “does this person think this abuse victim is dumb for being abused?”

Dimitri, Rhea, and Momo are all victim-blamed to a disgusting degree in the 3H and Bleach fandoms. Dimitri and Rhea are always hit with “well if Dimitri hadn’t have fought back against Edelgard/Rhea caused the “”tyranical systems” in the first place, nothing would have happened to them!” and Momo was constantly hit with” well, it’s not Aizen’s fault Momo was so clingy to him, what could he have done!” and I get so fuckin’ mad dude.

But for Dimitri and Momo specifically, there’s one thing in particular that caught my attention:

The “Rejection Theories”

This had my head spinnin’ a bit when I first heard it, cuz I had managed to avoid the theory for a while in the 3H’s fandom, but apparently a sizeable amount of people seem to believe that Dimitri wasn’t just mad at Edelgard in the Holy Tomb because of... you know *waves hand* fuckin’ everything, but that the primary reason for his anger was that Edelgard... rejected his advances to her? And that the dagger he gave to her when they were 13 was a phallic symbol of baby Mitri’s want to have sex with Edelgard? And. Like. What in the fuck are you talking about. 

But like?? Bleach did this shit too with Momo?? It was also a sizeable amount of people - not everyone, but a noticeable amount - that believed that Momo was just mad that Aizen wouldn’t sleep with her? You’d see it pop up in fics so often, that Momo would want Aizen to fuck her and she’d “go crazy” when he denied her and Momo was actually just this shallow bitch who wanted a good fuck like... what.

Like, when I first heard the Phallic Dagger take the first thing that came to mind is “wait Momo was also accused of just wanting to have sex with the person who traumatized her wtf” 

“Actually it was the perpetrators that should be forgiven because lonely and also some shit about ruling better”

Those in the 3H fandom know how often the “Edelgard was lonely!” line gets thrown by just about every one of her stans. Edelgard was lonely and couldn’t trust anyone, so of course she did what she did! If she had someone near her she could trust she wouldn’t have acted like she does in the rest of the game! Nevermind that she “gets” this in CF in the form of Byleth and still acts just as shittily as she does in the other routes, or how being a little lonely doesn’t fuckin’ mean you get to start war. But anyway, we also hear that Edelgard was justified in doing what she did because her ruling Fodlan would have lead to more peace in the end, once she got rid of the power structures in place now (except that doesn’t happen but whatev I guess lmao)

Aizen? He was lonely too! He was far too strong for anyone to truly be able to understand him, and so he tragically fell down a dark path. If he had known someone who could be considered an equal to him he would have never done all the horrible things he did. And the Soul Society is unjust! It needs to be reformed! So him slaughtering hundreds of thousands of souls at the minimum to harvest all of their power to use as his own is justified because it’ll be used to create a more just society under his rule!

Like. Y’all. Lowkey? I’m so fuckin’ glad Edelgard proved herself to be just as fuckin’ awful with Byleth as without because this shit drove me up the fuckin’ wall back in the day. There was 0 ways to prove that Aizen would damn sure be just as fuckin’ bad if he had an “”equal”” to stand by him than if he didn’t, and I get to kinda be right because without fundamentally changing these characters’ backstories they would not give two flying shits about whether or not they had someone “equal to them” (which is still kinda degrading to think about anyway).

Now, this is where I move away to a different topic lol

A split in the narrative cause divides in the fandom

With 3H houses this is really fuckin’ easy to point at: there’s 4 routes, three consistent stories and one radically different story, and that difference in story causes heavy contention within the fandom. It’s very obvious so I won’t go over it much.

But how in the fuck is there a divide in Bleach? It’s not a fuckin’ Choose Your Own Adventure manga, it’s an anime and manga showing off the characters of Bleach’s stories and interactions (with, you know, plot and shit thrown in).

Well. It’s more accurate to say the anime told a story about the characters, and the manga told... the story about the characters.

In terms of plot, the anime didn’t change much from the manga, but hoo fuckin’ boy, did they change shit about some of the characters. Specifically, they changed a shit ton about three characters: the two main protagonists, Ichigo and Rukia, and another main character, Orihime.

Orihime. Got. Fucked.

The anime would make her far more ditzy and clumsy, her crush (turned growing love later on in the story) for Ichigo during more deeper moments that showcases her feelings for him were downplayed if not removed entirely in exchange for talking or thinking about food, key moments she has with Ichigo early in the manga were cut or deadass changed to something else in the anime, some key moments with her relationship with Rukia were cut, her backstory was watered down - so much of Orihime was fucked with in the anime (her fuckin’ introduction was changed drastically). Meanwhile Ichigo and Rukia were given moments that didn’t exist in the manga, they have filler arcs (remember those lmao) that would be stuffed with shit ton of moments for them that have no basis in the manga, other characters would change their behavior from the manga to reflect a sort of “thing” going on between Ichigo and Rukia.

Look, guys, the anime fucked up so bad the fucking mangaka, Tite Kubo, has said he gets stomach aches watching the early anime because it was that awful. And this divide between the anime and manga’s portrayal of these three character helped spawn the ship war of Bleach: Ichiruki vs Ichihime (oh but more on that in a bit). It tanked Orihime’s popularity because people thought she was the stupid dumbass that would stumble ass first into situations when that wasn’t her character at all. And because the majority of anime watchers only watch the anime... yeah, you can see where this went. So just like in 3H in Bleach you have these radically different tellings of the same characters that drove a big-ass wedge in the fandom

Marketing

Imma be transparent, like I’ve said before I managed to avoid nearly every marketing tactic for 3H so it’s a tad hard for me to speak personally, but from what I’ve been told Edelgard was heavily marketed towards the player base pre-release. She was the poster child of 3H, she got the figma, she was in the spotlight - unless you cleansed your board of 3H content you knew exactly who she was. On top of that, it doesn’t stop in-game - loading screen messages would assume you picked BE, Adrestia is the first option to pick when you want to impress one of the lords in the prologue, the BE class is the first option to pick in choosing which route to play, every character has some moment in the game post ts where they express sympathy with the woman who waged war on them for five years (even characters with no business doing so, like Seteth entertaining the idea that maybe Edelgard isn’t that bad during Myrddin). With all of that good PR for Edelgard in and out of the game it heavily impacted how people saw her, and much of it is used by stans to justify her being a good guy (mostly in the game marketing) despite everything else in the game clearly showing that Edelgard is the bad guy

With Bleach in that regard... you have Ichiruki

holy shit it’s so weird talking about Ichiruki i’m still lowkey nervous about talking about them lmao

With Ichiruki stans, they would cling onto outside material that promoted Ichigo and Rukia together as proof that their ship was going to be canon. Spreadsheets, calendars, poems (some of which didn’t even apply to Ichigo and Rukia’s relationship but they insisted they did anyway), novels - outside material that either wasn’t canon or didn’t pertain to Ichigo and Rukia’s relationship. They would shove it in the face of Ichihime shippers that “see, we have all this stuff for us! We ain’t starving tonight!” when the canon (note: in the manga particularly) would clearly show Ichigo and Orihime’s relationship being the one that leans romantic in multiple significant ways. They would latch onto irrelevant shit that ain’t had nothin’ to do with anything and wave around as a paragon of romance when it literally wasn’t even canon

Just fuckin’ ignoring the creators deadass

Creators and developers of 3H: Edelgard is the typical Red Emperor the only difference is Girl

Stans: that’s just a headcanon

Kubo: Ichigo and Rukia have a platonic relationship and I’ve publicly said this since 2008

Stans, now, to this day: Ichigo and Rukia were robbed

Making people reject what they’re stanning for

I’ve seen a few people express that the more they interact with the fandom and see what her stans are doing, the more they grow to dislike Edelgard despite (some) initially liking or even loving her. To put it simply, the same thing happened with Ichiruki - hell, this happened with me with Ichiruki. I can’t fuckin’ stand the ship anymore because every time I think about it I’m reminded of the absolutely rancid, disgusting things Ichiruki stans have to done to others in the fandom, and even after nearly five years after Bleach has ended I still tense up when someone says they like Ichiruki over Ichihime precisely because of the behavior of the stans, just like I side-eye people who say Edelgard is the best lord. Do they like them because they simply prefer them over the other(s) and they’re not totally fuckin’ bonkers, or are they totally fuckin’ bonkers. 

And, like, that’s not fair! I know that! But I can’t help but think that when such a loud amount of people act in such deplorable ways just because someone didn’t like a bunch of lines on paper/pixels on a screen.

To all the nice Ichiruki and Edelgard fans, hope y’all are havin’ a nice day.

Long, crazy ass explanations as to why X =/= X (and if anything actually means Y)

Teacher theory for 3H. How Edelgard totally didn’t hire Kostas to kill Dimitri and Claude and was only thwarted because Claude booked it, but how she definitely actually meant to simply scare away the teacher that was with them so that Jeritza could be pulled from his already existing position in Garreg Mach to teach one class so that Edelgard can kinda keep a sorta closer eye on exactly one of the other classes (and just do shit all about the other one I guess), because Jertiza’d be able to gleam so much from teaching a class for a few hours a day I promise 

But for Bleach, you also have one particularly infamous theory positing shit that don’t real, with enough renown to be known by a specific name, and that’s the Lust Arc = Fail essay

To explain what the essay is about, I have to set the scene up a bit. Imagine, you, with your tiny little monkey brain, are watching Bleach, and you get to the part where Main Boyo is fighting against Villain to save Girly. Other Guy is there too - this is important. Main Boyo tries his hardest to fight Villain, but is ultimately shot through the fucking chest with a laser from Villain and dies. Like, for bit actually dies. Girly breaks down, has a straight up mental breakdown because she always “knew” that Main Boyo could do anything, and now he’s been killed and is dead in front of her. She screams out Main Boyo’s name, hysterically begging him to save her and protect her because holy shit the love of her life has been brutally murdered in front of her what the fuck. But Main Boyo, from literally beyond the line of death, hears her pleas and snaps back to life as a monster, with the sentence “I MUST PROTECT” repeatedly running through his head and being the only sentence he ever says while in this form, with him fucking destroying Villain and even going so far as to directly hurt Other Guy when Other Guy tries to stop Main Boyo from utterly stomping on Villain. Girly is the only person Main Boyo does not directly hurt, and when Villain is damn sure gonna fuckin’ kick the bucket that is when Main Boyo reverts back human. Everyone is more than a little shocked at what happened, but it’s clear from how relieved Girly is when Main Boyo comes back safe and sound that while this event fundamentally will change their relationship (and it does), it is still one that is extremely strong and they won’t let it get between them (and they don’t).

Now, when looking at the summary, you, with your absolutely miniscule peanut of a brain, might come away thinking, “Hm, Main Boyo might kinda care for Girly given that he literally rose from the dead to protect her and only her and went back to normal once she was safe” and you poor fool would be oh so wrong, because actually, this is all proof that Mian Boyo doesn’t care for Girly and that Villain actually cared more for Girly than Main Boyo ever could.

Without diving too deeply into the absolute lunacy of the Lust Arc = Fail essay, that was its main premise. That Ichigo, after rising from the literal dead directly after Orihime begged and pleaded that he protect and save her and then going on to protect and save specifically her (as Uryu - Other Guy - is also a friend of Ichigo’s and got his fucking arm cut off by Monster!Ichigo), is proof against Ichihime being romantic in any way and was not, in fact, a fuckin’ giant neon flashing sign that read THESE TWO ARE GONNA GET TOGETHER. It was the dumbest shit ever, but Ichiruki stans, much like Edelstans with Teacher Theory, clung to it like white on rice. It didn’t matter how much it was utterly debunked, it didn’t matter how the base premise was stupid as fuck, they point to it as the pinnacle of meta for their respective fandoms in their respective spaces.

And all of this leads me to um... the one I’m kinda the most worried about?

Stan Behavior

Edelstans are their own unique brand of awful in that that the shit they spew is particularly... worrying (”genocide isn’t bad if they aren’t human and also they kinda deserved it” “imperialism isn’t that bad really” the mentally ill should be put down if they’re deemed ~too far gone~” among other... wonderful takes...), and their behavior is also quite shitty, harassing content creators that go against the Approved Opinions (Ghast) or forcing people to take down fanart and in general infecting nearly every Rhea space with all kinds of disparaging comments no one asked for. They actively make the fandom a worse space, and when they flare up it’s almost always noticeable (again, Ghast)

Bleach?

Oh boy.

Guys. If you weren’t there for the Canonization of Ichihime (2016). You dodged a fucking bullet.

The outrage was out-fuckin’-rageous. Their behavior was some of the worst reactions anyone has ever seen come from the canonization of a ship in a shounen. This includes, but is not limited to:

Someone tearing apart all 70+ volumes of Bleach and burning it in their bathroom

In fact, multiple people tearing up Bleach and burning it, while keeping the Ichiruki moments and taping it to their walls

A Rukia cosplayer, in Rukia cosplay, printing out the final color spread of the end-game couples and their friends lounging about - with colored ink and all - and burning it, while filming herself doing so

Ichiruki porn being sent to Tite Kubo

Tite Kubo being accused of grooming a 15 Orihime cosplayer with no proof

Tite Kubo being accused of lying about his various health issues

Ichigo and Rukia being drawn cheating on their spouses with each other - and some of that also being sent to Tite Kubo

Tite Kubo being chased off Twitter by Ichiruki stans... again

Ichihime shippers getting sent death threats

Ichihime shippers getting called delusional for thinking their ship had a chance before the endgame couples were revealed, and then being called delusional for thinking their ship had any real basis and wasn’t pulled “out of nowhere”

Tite Kubo being accused of hating women because of Orihime being shown in an apron in the last chapter and Ichiruki stans jumping to the conclusion she became a housewife, and then Tite Kubo being accused of hating women because when it was revealed that Orihime has a job in a bakery to pay for college later they insisted what Kubo should have done was have Uryu, who’s a doctor at that point, pay for Orihime’s college instead of having Orihime pay for it with her own money 

And mind you, this is only the stuff I’ve personally seen and experienced

I am hoping and praying that Edelstans never get as bad as Ichiruki stans did in 2016, but with how otherwise similar they are my hopes are dwindling more and more. I guess I can take solace in the fact that they aren’t quite... that bad yet? In terms of actions, at least? Their sentiments though are infinitely worse, so like... cool

[lassieposting]

Bit late and random but it's the anon you leave food out for here to give away I am also bi and I think exactly the same as you about bi val pretty much, every time Derek offers me representation my reaction is to slowly, hesitantly take it and say "thaaaaaaaaanks..." while rolling my eyes, in much the same way one accepts their least favourite flavour of sweet from an annoyingly enthusiastic uncle-type-individual. Ironically I feel I had more in common with her before the bi shit started up.

What I find really amusing is that Landy actually did reasonably well at representation when (and only when) he wasn’t trying. 

Oh god, this got long, anon, my ass rambled.

tldr; I'm glad actual bi people dislike bi val (or how Laundry handled bi val) as much as me, this will probably offend at least one person but i don't really care, Dirty Laundry wrote better rep when he didn't mean to write rep at all, and if he ever starts trying to "represent" groups I'm part of I'll take him out back like a dying horse and shoot him.

Like, yes. He had stupid and potentially offensive shit - I say potentially because what offends one member of a group won’t necessarily offend all of them. His attitude to mentally ill people is, frankly, disgusting. We’ve had “Skulduggery can’t be abused, he doesn’t have feelings”. We’ve had “eVeRyOnE iS bI eVeNtUaLlY”. We had Ping, who seemed to be pretty much universally offensive. And that's what's always going to happen when a straight, cis, white, wealthy, male author tries to write marginalised groups he doesn't know shit about, because inevitably he's going to fall back on stereotypes.

But we also had:

SEXUALITY REP: Phase One's nonstraight characters were treated like the straight ones, and like, isn't that the whole point? There was no need for a massive Coming Out Story TM to grab for those sweet sweet Woke Points, because sexuality isn't supposed to be important to mages. I never understood why Val needed that whole Coming Out Panic storyline. Like...Des and Melissa are ridiculously supportive, encouraging, loving parents. They accepted you dating a ~19 year old when you were ~16. They accepted you revealing you could do fucking magic and that you'd been lying to them for like seven years. They took your undead buddy in stride and the most pressing question your dad had was whether magic toilets exist. There is zero reason to think that "I'm bisexual" is gonna be the thing that makes them flip and throw you into the streets in disgrace, Valkyrie. Come on.

Tanith had girlfriends and it was just mentioned casually, because it's normal.

China had massive UST with Eliza. That was an opportunity right there to not only include a f/f relationship, but also to bring back one of the few precious surviving characters from Phase One, using characters and a relationship that already had several books' worth of setup and tension and interest from fans.

The Monster Hunters have a casual conversation about which one of the Dead Men they'd date.

Ghastly has a conversation with Fletcher about the pain he's been through being in love. He never uses any pronouns.

It was confirmed at one point re: the Dead Men that at this point, after 300-odd years, everyone's been with everyone else at some point.

Thrasher is gay, and while Scapegrace's...everything...is treated as a joke/comedic relief, Thrasher's love for him isn't. He's completely devoted to Scapegrace, and that in itself is not played for laughs, even though the rest of the scene usually is. Thrasher's description of their first meeting is essentially a love-at-first-sight situation for him.

"ABNORMAL" RELATIONSHIP REP: Age gap relationships are normal for mages. Off the top of my head, using only canon, canon-implied or almost-canon ships:

Ghastly/Tanith (~350 year age difference)

Tanith/Sanguine (~250+ year age difference)

Tanith/Saracen (~350 year age difference)

Caisson/Solace (~250 year age difference)

China/Gordon (~400 year age difference)

Kierre/Temper (~500+ year age difference)

If you include fan ships, there's also things like Mevolent/Serpine or my Mevolent/Vile, which are both ~600 year minimum age gaps based on the timeline, or Valdug (and its variations) which is ~400 years.

Now, whether you consider this kind of rep positive or negative is up to you, but it’s there.

MENTAL ILLNESS REP: more like "Which characters in this series don't have a mental illness or a personality disorder?" I have some of these issues, but not all of them, so this is just how I read it, but:

ADHD: Skulduggery

Dissociative Identity Disorder: Skulduggery & Vile

Dissociation: Skulduggery again, most notably in DD and DB

Schizophrenia (or similar): Valkyrie & Darquesse, Valkyrie "seeing" Darquesse's ghost thing in Phase Two

Impostor Syndrome: Reflectionie

Autism: Clarabelle

Trauma/PTSD/CPTSD: Skulduggery, Valkyrie, China, Ghastly, Erskine...pretty much everyone has a believable, understandable, morally grey trauma response in this series. People struggling with trauma are spoilt for choice of characters to see themselves in.

TRAUMA REP: This series is a trauma conga line, but everyone has a believable, understandable, morally grey trauma response in this series. I see little bits of myself in more than one Phase One character.

Childhood Abuse (of varying degrees & types): Skulduggery, Carol & Crystal, Omen, Fletcher, Ghastly, China, Bliss, Sanguine...

Estranged Family: Skulduggery abandoning his crest, Fergus & Gordon, China & Bliss

Bad Romantic Relationship: Skulduggery is also very clearly an abuse victim. He’s got a solid history of romantic attachments to women who manipulate, use and gaslight him for their own agendas.  There's a whole paragraph in SPX about how Abyssinia broke him down, isolated him from his friends and preyed on his desperate need to be loved, all classic abuse tactics.

And I’m personally a huge fan of this backstory for two reasons:

1) Society likes a plucky victim in media. The "My suffering made me stronger" type of victim. And it's not always like that in real life. Not all survivors come out of their abuse stronger or kinder or more understanding. Some of us come out cold and fucked up. Some of us end up as emotionally stunted, bloodied-nails-and-bared-teeth survivors, broken in ways that can't be fixed and sustained by enough rage to power a small sun. But society doesn't like to tell the story of that kind of survivor, because we're not usually a likeable protagonist. When we're shown in media, we're usually the sympathetic villain, or maybe the antihero. But Skug is someone who's done awful things and lost pretty much all his faith in humanity and been burned more times than he can count, and he still makes the conscious choice to try and be the good guy when he could so easily go Evil Supervillain on the world, and I don't know about any of y'all, but I've modelled myself on him in that. I've made the choice to do something good when all I really want to do is just become a horrible, shrivelled ball of nastiness and revenge. And that's because I saw him do it and realised that I could do that too.

Skug is an incredibly capable, strong, masculine Man's Man. He gets in fights all the time, and he usually wins. He's military, an industry that's Really Bad for stigmatizing weakness and mental illness, and he's right up at the top of the hierarchy. Almost everyone is afraid of him. He's a straight up cold-blooded killer. Skulduggery Pleasant is precisely the type of person who's not normally portrayed as a victim of anything. Nothing about him screams "victim" at all. But his abuse history is insidious. He's so conditioned to respond in a certain way to abuse from the women in his life, probably from a very young age, that despite all that strength and capability and stubbornness and ego, he just goes along with it. And it's an established pattern going back hundreds of years. He keeps going back to China, even though he knows she's bad for him and his friends keep telling him to stay away from her. Abyssinia latched onto him when he was traumatized and vulnerable and weaponized it against him to make him easier to control - and when she reappears, hundreds of years later, she jumps straight back into using, tmanipulating and gaslighting him and not only does he let her, he doesn't even seem to realise that behaviour is abusive. He thinks it's normal! That's how he's always been treated by his long-term girlfriends, with the notable exception of Wifey. Even when Val is being fucking nasty to him in the first couple books of Phase Two, sniping and lying and blaming him for everything under the sun, he just takes it. There's no attempt to tell her she's being unreasonable, no telling her to fuck right off and give her head a wobble, no defending himself even when she's bitching over something that isn't even his doing. And this is a man who has an absolutely gleaming steel spine the rest of the time; Skug has no problem saying no to anybody else, but he can't get past the way he's been taught to treat the important ladies in his life. Skug is a walking reminder that anyone can be a victim of abuse, even the ones who seem least likely to be susceptible.

GENDER REP: This one is the most iffy out of the bunch and definitely was not done very well in the eyes of the people who matter most, but I'll include it anyway because it mattered to some.

So there's Nye, who's...agender? Genderless? And uses "it" pronouns? Nye was generally considered horrible rep because it's also a war criminal and experiments on people and I've seen people say "Well I don't want to be seen like that" but? It's still possible to be a war criminal and also genderless. I never saw the two things as being related or relevant to each other.

There's also Mantis, who's in exactly the same gender/pronouns boat as Nye and always seems to be forgotten about, which sucks because Mantis is a war hero. It fought for the Sanctuary during the War and they never lost a battle when it was in command. It's called out of retirement to fight for the Supreme Council in LSODM, ends up fighting alongside Skulduggery during the Battle of Roarhaven, and ultimately dies attempting a very brave, very risky strategy. Mantis is, unreservedly, one of the good guys. It was also my introduction to sentient beings using "it" pronouns, and did it in a way that felt natural, so when I met my first person online who used "it" pronouns and hated to be referred to as he/she, it was...weird, but not as weird as it would otherwise have been, because I was like, "Oh yeah, like the Crenga. Okay."

And then there's the Scapegrace sex change plotline, which...I might have an unpopular opinion on this one. From what I’ve seen, trans people don’t seem to think was handled well or with any sensitivity at all. I’m not trans, so if the trans community says he was being offensive to them, I’m not going to claim otherwise. But...I first read the Scapegrace plotline as a young teenager in a tiny rural school with zero diversity, going through a period of being deeply confused about my own gender identity. He was more or less my first introduction to the idea that genitals =/= gender. I was relieved, at that point in my life, to read someone having a lot of the same thoughts I was having about being in the wrong body. So while it may have been badly done and yeah, the series would probably have been better without it, it did make at least one kid suspecting she might not be cis go “Huh! So there are other people who feel like this.”

Thrasher is also implied to be legitimately trans/gender-questioning, and that's not played for laughs either.

So? Phase One, while it absolutely had faults and issues and things that were just "Oh god why", was actually full of rep, at least compared to the other series that I read as a child/teen. But? As soon as Dirty Laundry started trying to be woke? He fucking sucks ass at it. Aside from confirming Phase One's hints that Skug has a background of abusive relationships, every single attempt at shoehorning rep into Phase Two is Bad.

The painfully OOC, forced, badly-written awkwardness of Val suddenly being rabidly horny for women out of fucking nowhere. The stilted, forced cringiness between her and any of the women she's flirted with - contrast that with Sorrowscorn's interactions, full of natural chemistry that had us all like 👀 I mean, I never shipped Val/Melancholia, but I could always see why people did - they had miles more chemistry than Val/anyone in Phase Two.

The fucking mess that is v*litsa, because if someone says "I'm really not interested in friendships/relationships right now", clearly the route to true love is to bulldoze their boundaries and forcibly insert yourself into their life and proceed to treat them like a delicate soft uwu flower, completely ignoring the horrible things they've done, while gleefully damning their best friend as an irredeemable monster for the exact same things, which is. You know. Gonna affect your so-called love's self-confidence and self-esteem because she knows she's no different to him. Y'all know I love an angsty ship, an unhealthy ship, a ship with fucked power dynamics, but I literally cannot roll my eyes any further back in my head at this shit. I never read Demon Road, but from what I've heard from friends who did, it does seem like every time Laundry tries to write an f/f ship, he comes up with a cringey abusive/manipulative caricature and tries to call it rep, and he needs to Stop.

Val's Mental IllnessTM arc. It's funny how he wrote Skulduggery as a wonderfully complex character with deep-rooted psychological damage and long-lasting trauma, but believes he wrote a character with "no feelings" - but when he tries to delve into the damage the world of magic has done to Val, he turned her into a weak, whiny drug addict who treats everyone around her like garbage and is so selfish and dislikeable that I? Honestly can't even reconcile Phase Two val with Phase One val. They're two completely different people. He's shown on Twitter that he doesn't have any respect for mentally ill people, and it shows. Other mentally ill people might see it differently, but the whole thing just makes me go "yikes".

Never, who has no personality outside of being genderfluid, and whose pronouns make no sense. I'm sorry, I have never met an nb person who insists that you change from male to female pronouns multiple times in a sentence, every time you refer to them. It's confusing as fuck. Now I have been told that Never has apparently received some character development in the last couple books, and if so, fair play, but I quit reading after Midnight, and Never and the rest of the personality-less new characters introduced in Phase Two who just seemed to be 2D Stereotypes to snag Woke Points were a big part of why, so. Development too late, I'm afraid.

(Now, if anyone is looking for a well-written genderfluid character, I recommend the Tawny Man trilogy by Robin Hobb. I have a lot of issues with her as a writer, and unfortunately I hate her POV character which puts me off the series as a whole, but she wrote the Fool/Amber/Lord Golden and their gender identity/approach to sexuality with so much more respect and realism. That is the kind of rep nb people should be getting: 3D, complex, realistic characters whose gender is only a tiny fragment of their personality, not the be-all-and-end-all of their existence. You know. Like cis people get. Nobody wants to be represented by a 2D cardboard cutout stereotype.)

Anyway idk how much sense this makes it just really amuses me that Laundry would include all this rep completely unintentionally and then go on Twitter and remind us all that actually he's a massive asshole via insensitive/offensive tweets about the groups he'd actually done a fair job of including (i.e. Skulduggery has no feelings, mentally ill people should find another series to read, the bullshit about Val being "heteromantic bisexual" on Twitter and then spouting all the "the woman she loved uwu" shit in the books (proving he has no idea what he's talking about), eVeRyOnE iS bI eVeNtUaLlY. He can only write half-decent rep when he's not trying and he inevitably outs himself as having a really shitty attitude towards those people anyway, proving that ultimately it's all either unintentional rep or performative wokeness.

[queensdivas]

Peonies Chapter 8

It has been a while since I've posted about Grigor or The Great. Y'all I have been busy with finals and another fic on archive that has been my favorite thing to write. If you've ever watched The Terror from AMC then you'll enjoy this.

But I haven't forgot about one of my favorite fics. Never.

Other than that! Here we go after weeks of not writing.

Previous Chapter

Masterlist

The idea of falling asleep after today just sounds nauseating. Seeing the horrors in front of me then coming back to my apartment for Peter wanting to kill me. Then for Grigor to storm off due to the fact that he thought I would lay with my own cousin by marriage. Yes I’m well aware that’s still a common practice amongst the Monarchs of the world but not in my book!

Turning my head to watch the flames slowly begin to die down before my eyes. The room was beginning to spiral into that infamous Russian cold. I didn’t feel like throwing another log on since part of me thinks I deserve to be in the wintry world that I have chosen to live in.

This plan for making Catherine the ruler of all Russia is becoming stale. What have we done that’s been achievable anyhow! Go to the front to feed a bunch of soldiers! You saw what happened when I alone tried to help Peter! Catherine influenced a new Patriarch yet the women of the court still find Catherine to be an annoyance. There has been absolutely no effort or somewhat change Catherine has done to make things more in her favor. God she is a child thrown into a world that she has no idea what she's doing. Although I should be guiding...but...

What good am I doing here! I feel as if I’m just now a fuck toy for Grigor to feel a womens touch since his wife is with the Emporer on a daily basis! Throwing the blanket off me to march over to the nearest vase and chuck it across the room!

A screech left my body as I cleared everything off the vanity onto the floor. I could feel the blood rushing through me for this anger to spiral out of control! This stupid country! Grabbing a book to throw it against the wall!

THIS STUPID COUNTRY!

HOW CAN ONE FUCKING BELONG TO THIS COURT!

HOW CAN ONE SINGLE HUMAN BE SUCH AN ABSOLUTE MORON! AND YES THAT HUMAN IS ME!

WHY DOESN’T HE TRUST ME!

I’M NOT HIS WIFE!

THIS STUPID GOD DAMN COUNTRY!

IT’S MAKING ME QUESTION EVERY SINGLE THREAD OF INSANITY I HAVE BECAUSE THE MAN I’M BEGINNING TO FALL FOR HAS MAJOR TRUST ISSUES! CAN’T HE SEE THAT I AM A ONE MAN ONE WOMEN SORT OF WOMAN!

YES I’M A WHORE TO A MAR….

Huh...would you look at that Chiara? All because he lit a fire under your own ass because everyone else around you stays clear of it.

I…..

I feel nothing….

Maybe the cold will make me feel something in this empty body. Grabbing the handles of the window to pull them out. They smacked against the walls for the wind to soar through my room. It flew through my hair for the first few seconds for it to stop. The cold swaddled me up but I didn’t move from the window.

I do not deserve the things I have been given in life. For I am a cold hearted bitch with almost no remorse in my actions. I could possibly kill a hundred people and proclaim it to be for the greater good. No sense of remorse or sadness.

How could Grigor want to love someone as vile as me..I am cold..evil. Someone like me doesn’t deserve the warm embrace of what love is. This lust is beginning to form into the most dangerous tool one can have in their life. For it can bring life and destroy it in a matter of seconds.

I miss his touch..the way his fingers would glide across my arm as we snuggled together on the bed. The way he kissed my forehead after a long time of making love. Him showing me his drawings and I know he’s drawing me in my sleep! It hurts to feel this sort of way! I don’t want to feel anything! This feeling is almost heart wrenching and...beautiful.

My breathing began to choke till the only warmth that was on my body was the singular tear that had escaped my eye. I’m not a crier. Though we Italians embrace our emotions and turn it into something beautiful, I think this tear is a sense of relief. If I didn’t feel anything. I wouldn’t be whimpering in front of an open window.

A gentle beat from the door echoed through my room as I didn’t even move. If Peter was sending his soldiers to kill me I get the feeling there would be no knock. Please let it be Grigor. I need to feel his touch and tell him the truth. Not all of it but at least enough that I don’t spoil my plans for Catherine.

I closed the window to hurry over to the fire and toss a log in. If it’s Grigor then he probably would prefer something a little warmer. Please him please. Grabbing my robe to put it on as I opened the door. My eyes expanded from the confusion of who was standing before me in my bed robes.

“Elizabeth?” Well if she was coming to kill me I imagine my room has some sort of secret entrance and would’ve done it in my sleep.

“I hope I didn't disturb you. I think we need to have a little chat.”

“We do?” Dear God if Peter opened his mouth about what he started and what I finished I’m going to go kill him myself!

“Yes. May I come in?” Taking a step back for the door to open. She was in her bed clothes as she noticed the mess I had made in my room.

“The work of Peter no less?” I kept my mouth shut for once waiting for her to say something more. She’s going to defend Peter as much as she can. Probably for his own father who I imagine she secretly loved. From my understanding Peter the Great was also quite promiscuous just like his mother. A family of harlots.

“I heard from Peter what happened here early today. I highly doubt that you called him a bastard since he can be quite over dramatic.” So she’s aware that he’s a sniffling bastard whose inability to rule is quite prominent.

“Not talking much tonight are you? Usually you have a comment to say if I were in here talking about Peter.”

“For once Elizabeth. I could truly give a shit about Peter and his antics. I’m not here to please him and make him happy. I’m here for Catherine and making her more comfortable with her new station.” Try not to think that we might kill her own Nephew in a good amount of time. If not by Catherine then by the military.

“You’re not angry that he was in here and wanted to kill you?” She sat down in front of the fire in the love seat for me to stand before here.

“Your nephew. My cousin by marriage is a harmless little bug in my life Elizabeth. His actions were not even worth a single drop of sweat from my brow.”

“Did the stabbing of a major General not scare you? As an outsider I thought it would have scared you horribly.”

“Not scared. More gasping which then leads to utter annoyance. I am more than capable of handling Peter when he’s in a state of anger trying to kill me. What do you even want because I would like some sort of rest.”

“Be more gentle when it comes..

“Just because his mother was a horrid woman does not excuse his actions Elizabeth! That’s saying Zeus should be considered a kind man even though he raped Leda because of his own mental state. Peter thinks of him as Zeus when in reality he is worse than Hades himself! Life is horrid Elizabeth and constantly blaming his issues on his mother is disgusting and you standing here trying to defend him holds you accountable for his actions.”

“What an interesting comparison. You are a very bright woman and that wicked tongue is able to strike anyone down.”

“I can strike down anyone with tongue and steel.” Taking in a sharp breath to walk over to a full bottle of sweet red wine.

“Would you like a glass?” Asking for her to nod. Popping off the court to grab two glasses then bringing two glasses over for us. Sitting down across from here to begin pouring her a glass. She motioned for me to stop for me to pour myself some as well.

“I apologise dear Aunt Elizabeth. I sometimes forget to catch my tongue before it falls out of my head.” We both took a long drink to the point when we were done I had to pour a little more between us.

“It’s quite alright. I’m just grateful you didn’t kill my beloved Nephew before it was too late.” Before I could answer the doors bursted open.

“Excuse me mam?” Turning to see a serf was standing by the door of my world. Did something happen to Fernanda?

“Zasha? What is it?” Elizabeth stood up from my chair to approach her.

“It’s the Emperor. He’s fallen gravely ill.” Well. That is going to solve our problems much faster than I thought it was going to happen. She wrapped herself around her robe as we began walking out of my bedroom.

“Why are you coming? I thought you despised him” She asked for me to nod but was still walking.

“We’re family by marriage. He is now my cousin whether I like it or not.” Turning the corner to see that Orlo, George...and Grigor were waiting outside the room. Splendid. I imagine his wife was ready to lay in bed yet stumbled into that mess.

“From what I’ve seen and heard it sounds bad. A lot of vomit and blood.” Orlo told us to stand next to Orlo. One of the priests that was in the room came out with the black mask on his face to then take it off before us.

“You may not enter the room. For it might be contagious till the doctor tells you differently. For he’s running a high fever, a lot of vomiting, and has been seeing strange visions. The Archbishop is there with him now. He’ll tell you more once he comes out.” Is...Is that vomit on his mask? Or...dear god. He walked past us heading down the hall towards the apartments.

“How is he?” Catherine came in with a very well detailed look of uneasiness.

“Very ill.” Elizabeth told Catherine for my eyes to drift over to Grigor. He was holding onto George but staring directly at me. Stupid man. Stupid man!

“Can we go in?” Catherine asked Orlo but I’m assuming not.

“Well everyones being kept out here.”

“In fear of contagion.” Finally looking at Grigor again for us to lock eyes for a brief instant till I turned to Catherine.

“He’s been vomiting continuously throughout the night, and he runs a high fever, and he has fits of wild delirium.”

“The Doctor and Archbishop are with him.” I told her to place my hands on her shoulder to give some comfort to this poor wife and my cousin. The door opened for a child to come out with a bowl filled with blood and vomit. Not to mention his entire body was covered head to toe in Peters upchuck...and from the smell..the back door was also used as well.

“Excuse me.” Oh the smell! Covering my nose for Grigor and I to look at one another again. He doesn’t look concerned. Is that a smile?

We all leaned into the doorway to see what was happening in there since we could only hear the sound of Peter vomiting and coughing more and more. I did the sign of the cross to hold onto my cross necklace. I don’t pray for Peter. But I pray for the Doctor inside the room that he stays safe from whatever disease has fallen upon Peter. Peter could go to hell for all I care, but I have to keep up appearances.

The Archbishop popped in the doorway for us to straighten our backs. He came out of his bedroom to close the door behind him. Grigor inched a little closer to me to the point I could sense the warmth radiating off him.

“How is he?” Grigor asked for the Archbishop to stare directly at us.

“Extremely ill. The fear is that it may be Cholera.”

“Cholera?” That’s a rough sickness. Even I wouldn’t wish that sort of death on my enemy.

“Which I suspect he will have caught from a possessed, nocturnal animal. Probably a badger.” If I ever get sick in this country I would rather just endure the ride home and die in a carriage. These doctors are not touching me with a ten foot pole!

“Where would he have come across a possessed badger?” Catherine asked thankfully. That sounds absolutely unrealistic and not how you even got Cholera. Not that I don’t know how you get Cholera but I imagine it’s not from a possessed badger.

“If it is Cholera, he will die, will he not?” Holding her a little tighter as a cue to sound a lot more concerned. You have to make it believable that you’re distraught that he might die!

“It’s a strong possibility that we must face.” Looking at Orlo who kept the same straight face he usually has.

“Oh my little man.” THE POOR BABY! I WILL WEEP WITH A BOTTLE OF WINE AND GLORIOUS MUSIC!

“The Doctor is working hard on cures. It may be something else.”

“Has he said anything? Is he talking?” Why would he be concerned if he’s talking? Grigor might as well give a shit if he truly dies or not.

“He speaks intermittently. Much of it is deranged. Said he was a wolf, and wanted to eat Swedish children for breakfast. And there was some talk of what he’d like to do to Chiara and with various ladies of the court. I’ll spare you the details.” My body ran cold for Catherine to turn and face me. The blood in my body felt as if it dried up as I wanted to vomit. Looking at Grigor as I felt so disgusted with myself.

“Before more bouts of diarrhea and vomiting.” The Archbishop went back in for Grigor to take in a deep breath.

“I will go in to see him.” Say what?

“Do not risk your life.” Elizabeth told him as he stopped in the doorway.

“I want to be there for my friend.” Bullshit! He could give an absolute shit about Peter at this point!

“I had no idea your husband was so brave, Georgina.”

“Oh yes famously so.”

“In more ways than one.” Adding into the conversation for George to turn and face me.

“Just being honest.” An angry snake she is when I add my own little comments. Settle down hypocrites.

Orlo, Catherine, and I huddled into our own group to see the expression of Catherines face change from the fake grieving widow to an excited future ruler. Must admit this is a little exciting for me as well.

“If this is Cholera, he could be dead within the day.” Orlo told us as Catherine was beginning to smile slightly but trying to control herself.

“Right. That means..”

“Yes. Yes it will be yours. You will rule Russia.” By God it’s going to actually happen.

“After all our planning..it just..”

“Falls right into your lap.” Orlo finished as the doors opened back up. The ArchBishop came out of the room to take off his mask. Remember when I said that this planning became stale? I stand corrected and I was completely wrong. This just made everything better.

“In light of this terrible situation, a meeting is being called to deal with the possible transition of power.”

“To me.” Easy Catherine. That’s a little too exciting for someone who's losing their husband.

“Indeed. It seems so. You are the next...should the worst happen.” Seems like the worst is about to happen right before them. If it’s going this quickly then I might be going home soon! Finally an end to this horrid nightmare and cesspool!

“Prepare with prayer, and the senate will be called.”

“I look forward to it.” Damn it Catherine!

“Not him dying. That is bad. And sad. And we hope for the best and a speedy recovery.” If I could slap my own face I would without making this seem like we’re excited that Peter is dying.

“God will be with us. He always is.” The Archbishop left the hall for Catherine and Orlo to talk amongst themselves. I need to talk to Grigor. I can’t stand being apart from him at nights for it is his warmth I believe that is keeping me sane. I don’t think I can tell him that I think I’m starting to love him but atleast telling him I need him is a good start.

*Grigors P.O.V.*

DIE! DIE YOU HORRIBLE HUMAN! YOU THINK YOU CAN SLEEP WITH MY OWN LOVE BECAUSE YOU’RE THE EMPEROR! DIE DIE DIE! I WILL KILL YOU AND WILL LIVE PEACEFULLY IN MY OWN LIFE!

Removing the pillow to see that he was still breathing! Bastard! Slamming the pillow back onto him to push down even further in hopes that I might finish the job! Just die! How hard is it to kill someone who's already dying! Talking about Chiara as if she’s just a common peasant!

“What are you doing!?” George yelled as I continued to push down harder and harder.

“What is right and you know it George! I have to do something!”

“Fuck!” George pulled me back as we stopped to see Peter was still breathing. Dragging me from his bed towards the middle of his room.

“I was given the choice to be a man or a child! I’ve decided to become a man for the sake of my sanity!”

“You poisoned him?”

“Arsenic. From the wall in his borscht!” Feeling the cold slap from George as she was in full rage of my actions.

“What happens to us when he’s dead? Think what Peter provides for us!”

“You...you..”

“You’re a stupid fool Grigor!” She took a deep breath to calm herself down.

“Our situation is complex. Yet also simple! We have a safe life with Peter! Luxury, security, a place in court. Who’s he gonna be replaced by? Catherine!? We’re nothing to her! What happens to us then? Not to mention Chiara is making it much more difficult to handle this situation. No thanks to you!”

“So you may have a lover but I may not!” I love Chiara and this marriage is non-existent!

“Grigor?” Peter called for me as I turned to see him barely awake and moving. Say something George! You hypocritical bitch say something!

“We’re here.” George, like a mother goose, flew to Peter's aid. Well. It’s very clear now on where my life stands now. George has made her bed and it is time for me to make my own with a Duchess who isn’t afraid to get the job done when it needs to be done.

Letting go of the pillow to march out of the room and slamming the doors shut. Taking in a few deep breaths to calm myself before scampering off to Chiara. Chiara? Where is she? Perhaps in her chambers!

It was like seeing a light at the end of the tunnel heading to her apartment! The outline of the room was glowing before my eyes. Chiara..my love. The only woman in this world that can make my knees buckle to bow at her feet. That fire is intoxicating to the point that I might die of happiness.

Slamming the door open to see Chiara was in front of the flames looking directly into them. Her head slowly turned to face me with a somber look. A bottle of wine sitting next to her looked thoroughly used. Oh my precious flame. Closing the door to sit down next to her as she went back into looking into the fire.

“I placed my blade against his neck threatening to take his life away. Why didn’t I slice it open? Tell me why I didn’t Grigor?” She asked for me to place my hand on her cheek.

“What happened before I came in?”

“He was mad that I helped Velementov at the front for strategy. He drew a sword on me and I fought back. I won and threatened him that if he were to ever draw his sword on me that I would win. I...I should’ve sliced his throat open and strung him up as if he was game to place on my wall.” I feel like I should tell her that I’m the one that poisoned him. That he is dying in his own bed because the world would be better without him! She was literally going to kill him before I even came into the room!

“Chiara. I’m the one who caused him to become ill. I poisoned him in the borscht while he was eating dinner.” Her expression was the same as before till it clicked in her mind. Her entire face went from a beautiful red to a ghostly white in a matter of seconds.

“Holy shit..” She whispered to turn her attention to the fire. Is she going to tell Catherine? Not that Catherine might care much but what if she does? Would she tell the court? No...no what have I done!

“I would ask why but that..oh my god.” Turning her head to face me as I gulped.

“If it helps, I did it for you. For us..for everyone in the court that his idiocy will go away.” Her lips were slightly open with her breathing beginning to rise.

That lovely color began returning to her cheek as she climbed on top of me and wrapped herself around me. Those entrancing lips striked against mine as my hands traveled up her back to pull her shirt. She stopped to place her index finger on my lips.

“For you committing such a horrendous act. Allow me.” Removing her finger to place a kiss on my lips, to my cheek, then right underneath my jaw line. I could see the stars from how well she was working those luscious lips. Her hand gripped my cock to start playing it through my pants. God her touch. It’s almost too delicious to even allow. My eyes rolled back for me to lay down on the rug for her kisses to start moving down my body.

I love her...I hope that she knows that I would kill an army for her without regret...

~~~

@mirkwoodshewolf @bonafiderocketqueen @johndeaconshands

@jd-johndeacon-or-jackdaniels @amethyst-serenade @radio-ha-ha@i-have-a-wonky-eye-too @deck-heart @actuallyanita @the-baby-bookworm @ewanmcgregors​ @panagiasikelia​

[the-bjd-community-confess]

Big TW: mental health, si/sh, suicide mentions/discussion

Mod: Compiling all the anon responses to one post from last week into this one, so anyone who is sensitive to this topic can scroll happily by.

This might be particularly intense reading for the Anon it’s in reply to, so only open the post if you feel like it Anon. They replied/updated on the original confession also (I think it’s the same Anon), and imo they were just venting in their original post and it was not made with bad intentions.

Thank you Anons for submitting your varied perspectives and insight on this topic.  ❤️

are you fucking kidding me? if your cope is a bjd that's fine, but here's the thing, buy a cheap legit!!! Or buy your fucking recast and enjoy it in silence instead of trying to legitimize it! Having a mental illness does NOT give you a free pass to be a asshole nor absolve you of the consequences of your own actions. Signed, someone who actually acted out on their suicidal ideation but thankfully didn't succeed.

~Anonymous

Mod: I’m glad you’re ok now Anon ❤️

"Don't be mean to anti artists because they might unalive themselves?" Ok. Now make the post saying "don't spit in the face of the artists who make this hobby possible and support the theft of their work because crushing their spirit and breaking their heart might make them unalive themselves." Or maybe you're just playing favorites in your suicide narrative?

~Anonymous

https://true-bjd-confessions.tumblr.com/post/649109294780907520/tw-suicidal-ideation-before-you-bash-someone-or I hope you realize that you are committing actual gaslighting with that. And just to be sure that people don’t think I’m just claiming this to deflect. In this specific case, I’d say it’s the: Gasligthing of someone spreading information, in an attempt to make someone doubt their own judgement (of a situation, or their own morals). There are other additions to the definition, like, over time gaslighting, or questioning ones own sanity, and memories, but I was just going to point out this one, or one part of gaslighting. Since it really sounds like it wants the reader to doubt their own morale judgement, about a situation, by inserting a very emotional, and serious topic, and pushing the idea of the persons opinion is going to cause someone’s death. Basically: What you are doing is gaslighting people into questioning their own judgments, and deliberately pushing them into the idea they might cause someone’s self harm, and subsequent death, if they dare, openly, hold a bad opinion, about recasters, and recast buyers. I would also like to just openly say that I find it incredibly gross to use topics of suicide, to guilt trip people, and it really sounds like a way to play the oppression game. You could just have mentioned how bullying people is wrong for owning recasts, something that is known of, and even frowned on by many, but instead, you used suicide as a tool, and even clearly use it, with no actual situation backing it, just to guilt trip, and make sure to try and make the person into being a bad person, just for holding an anti-recast stance, just because someone owning a recast might be suicidal. With this point: “ Your words might be that one drop that… ” you are literally shifting the blame to the anti-recaster, or a much larger issue a person suffer. Which isn’t only ridiculous, but also incredibly damaging to people who might suffer this mental state. Honestly, I’ll just say it again, using serious stuff, ranging from abuse, verbal-physical-sexual, to self harm, and in this case: suicide, just to make people feel bad, because they disapprove of your fake doll, is incredibly manipulative, and disgusting, because you’re using the specific topic of suicide, to just further a personal agenda. I’m not really sure what else to say. Using suicide to push this agenda, is incredibly disgusting, and even if you suffer from thoughts of self harm, it’s not the way to go, to pull strangers into this, and basically blame them for these actions. You also clearly didn’t seem to think, what implying blame to another person, or group of people, might do to their mental state. If you suffer from thoughts of self-harm, please call the suicide hotline, or try contacting, or receiving help. This links has a FEW numbers for suicide hotlines, and if you ever think you might need it, one call can help you find help. https://ibpf.org/resource/list-of-international-suicide-hotlines/

~Anonymous

I want to rebound on the confession with a suicide ideation. As others pointed out, it's not because you are unwell (as in clinically depressed) that you cannot be called out for your bad behavior. However,  bullying is never acceptable in my book. Never. Being called out isn't harassment. Cyber bullying and threats, however, are harassment and are more illegal as, let's say, owning a counterfeit. Two wrongs doesn't make a right and some people must remember this. I've seen it too much.

~Anonymous

It's SO nice to see that Shit-posts and Vic3mage are pro-suicide. Yes recasts are theft but that should NEVER be an excuse to verbally abuse someone to the point of wanting to commit suicide or self-harm. "That's on YOU." So what you're saying it that this type of behavior is okay? It's disgusting.

~Anonymous

Ok, so, I’ll just say it straight, or gay for those who need that. If you use suicide to guilt trip people about disliking recasts, you’re an asshole, like, goatse levels of asshole size. What is it with people, and using the most extreme examples, to try and make others the villains? It sounds really fucky, to put recasts, and the dislike of them, in the same situation suicide blaming. If someone said that for the opposite side of things, would you, or other recasters agree with the sentiment of: “You as recasters, and pro recasters, are to blame, for sculptors, and artists not being able to feed themselves, and considering suicide. Your actions, might be the last drop for them to do it.” This is just an example to show how fucked up it is to say that by the way, if it was the other way around as well. Would you agree with this? Would you think it’s fair? Would you accept the blame if that happened? Would you say that recasters, and pro recasters, are the reason someone is “at the brink”? Oh you do mention that people should get help, sure, but it in no ways justifies the absolutely 1 guy, 1 jar level of butthurt you show, when pushing the idea that anti recast people might cause someone to end it, just because they’re vocally against recasts.

~Anonymous

Anon from the depressed recast confession from earlier. Thanks to the mod for the kind words and support. And thank you for the comments. I understand your point. But you don't seem to understand mine. I've owned this recast for a few years. I bought it second hand from a friend that got me into the hobby and didn't really understand the whole recast legit thing back then. I just really loved her collection and wanted to be part of her hobby, so I was more than happy when she offered me one of her dolls. I have changed her face-up and built a story around the doll. I put a lot of own effort in.

It wasn't like "Oops, I feel depressed. Guess I'm gonna buy a recast on the internet to piss people off and harm artists. My depression justifies this action", no. I just think telling someone they ain't worth shit, telling them "kys" and witch hunting them aren't the right way to go. You don't know anything about that person except "they own recast. bad person". For exactly that reason I think it might be good to just block them, or explain to them without any hard feelings if they don't know anything about recasts. They're still human beings worth of life. Maybe talk to them on a respectful level to understand each other better. Sorry for the long confession or if it upsets anyone, that's not my intention.

~Anonymous

[rpbetter]

Urgh. Okay, full disclosure, I haven't been on tumblr much over the last week or so, because I was one of the people that Raven initially called out after the COAR mess, and it was in the interest of my own mental health to fuck off for a while so I didn't stress myself out into oblivion. So I'm scrolling through most of this stuff for the first time, and talking to other people who were targeted. And pardon my French here, but I'm fucking disgusted at the lengths Raven has gone to assert themselves as a victim, how many people they've affected, and the waving around of something as serious as suicide for brownie points.

I have sympathy for people who overinterpret things in a strictly emotional and mental sense (actual reactions aside) because they lack the maturity. There's always a reason for that, and it's not their fault. And I have sympathy for people if they legitimately feel suicidal. That, too, isn't their fault. If I hadn't been blocked, I would've reported Raven in case their claims were true as well, because yeah, I don't mess around with that stuff either. But what's unacceptable is how Raven acted on those sentiments and behaved towards others, even after people tried to provide perspective. How Raven claimed to be done with the drama, but continued inciting it; how they claimed to be suicidal and had left tumblr, but wrote what amounts to a "fuck you" in their header and were still putzing around on their blog, and were apparently still editing their posts until as late as today; how they claimed to have deleted but only changed the url; how they weaponized all of this stuff and used it as a tool for guilt-tripping. Like, come on. It's okay if you're down in the dumps, but it's not okay to treat innocent people like garbage, and carpet bomb half the RPC. To me, it really feels like there was an intent to weaponize all of their hurt, offense, anger, and suicidal ideations, despite the possibility it did come from somewhere genuine, and that's so harmful to anyone who is actually struggling with depression.

Every time someone weaponizes mental illness in this way, it just makes people more and more apathetic the next time someone is genuinely just hurting, and saying they feel like they're at the end of their rope. And it makes people suspicious of whether those words are being used maliciously, or legitimately. That suspicion and that association is now there, unconscious or not. And every time this kind of stuff happens, the association gets stronger. What happens if Raven does this again? Some people will still report, but some people might just scoff and walk away - people who might've actually acted before. So in a way, that kind of behaviour impacts Raven as much as it impacts other people.

And you know what? They're not the only one dealing with serious shit. I've been suffering from MDD for the last fifteen years, and I've been in the process of changing medications and having little success for months. I've been going through hell offline. I have a shit list of people I want to yell at because they're dragging their feet on really important things I need to function; I'm constantly running a deficit on spoons. Until a week or so ago, roleplay was one of the only ways I could unwind. So for Raven to bully me by sticking that stupid post in my tags, because they needed to make a scene on COAR, which I was obviously going to comment on (like many other people), then to "like" an unsubstantiated callout about me and other innocent people related to that mess, it's only worsened my own mental health. It sounds melodramatic, but really. Someone else mentioned this too, but the fear of being in another callout, and the fear of that first callout somehow exploding, was in the back of my mind all week, despite being away from tumblr. So that was a little anxiety-inducing, much as I tried not to think about it.

And I'm debating whether to return now, or take more time off, and I have no idea what to do. Because that callout post is still in my blog's tag. I'm freaking out because I was planning on approaching some people to roleplay, which is something I rarely ever do, but now I'm concerned that I'll contact someone, they'll look at my tag to get an idea of my writing/partners/who I am, and see the callout post, and immediately dismiss me because even seeing the word "callout" on its own will send up red flags, by unconscious association with more impactful drama. And as long as that callout is up, these fears are going to be there.

That's just not fair.

And Raven's "apology" is completely unacceptable. Like you and others said, it doesn't reach anyone who needs to hear it, because they've all been blocked. I would fucking love an apology if it came from a place of honesty, but am I going to receive one? Probably not. And even for the followers who can still see that apology, it doesn't address anything. It isn't directed to anyone in particular. It doesn't mention the specific behaviours that were wrong on their part. And miss me with the "my intentions were good" part. No, they weren't; going around blocks and sticking shit in peoples' tags is vindictive and entirely intentional in all the worst ways, and shame on them for pretending otherwise, and by leading with such a poor example for many roleplayers, some of whom are in their teens. One of the people who tried to message Raven (they, too, were called out on Raven's blog) was speaking to a nineteen-year old who was completely clueless about the extent of the manipulation Raven was pulling. They thought all of it was normal and acceptable behaviour. That genuinely terrifies me. And while I imagine if Raven was genuinely apologetic, they would've gone to the callout blog and ask them to delete the callout post (attempt it, at the very least), somehow, I don't think that would've happened given all of their prior actions. God forbid something else is going on there.

Phew. Yeah, I'm angry. Maybe I'm just biased and tired. But honestly, I have a right to be. Raven's apology is a handwave, and they know it. It's a slap in the face to me, to you, and to everyone else who was involved in this clusterfuck. They're not the center of the universe. They affected real people, with real problems of their own. Anyways, I am so sorry for this, argh. Really had to get this out, and I didn't want to dump it on discord or somewhere else; I sure as heck didn't want to go to COAR with it. But hey, maybe people here will feel less alone if I added my own account to the mix. The more, the merrier? In a sense, anyways. Sometimes if you feel like you've been singled out, it's nice to know you're not actually the only person it's happened to.

Sorry for saving your reply for last, Anon. It's such an important one, I wanted to be properly thoughtful!

I think that it is going to make some people feel less alone, and there is always some relief in sharing one's trials. That might be especially true when one has been unable to share them anywhere else. It's not like you can address this on your own blog right now, COAR is definitely not a safe place to do so, it's a very isolating feeling that is made worse for having done nothing.

Coming back and being required to wade through this shit was really damn disgusting to me as well, but at least in my case, I had neither been obliged to distance myself for the sake of mental health nor was I treated to the sickening display of drumming up ideas of victimization from someone who victimized me. What I experienced was just incredulity and disgust, I cannot imagine how incensing this must be for you, I am so very sorry. If it makes me angry having a degree of removal and watching in it real time? What you're experiencing...there really isn't a single word to adequately encapsulate that, I'm sure.

You've still expressed so many of the things I've thought and felt. I found all that initial behavior uncalled for, shameful, yet another display of what's actually wrong in the RPC, but it was increasingly upsetting to me the more I looked into it because it did feel a little (a lot) too reminiscent of the sort of bullying experienced in person. It's really something else to be viciously picked at by someone who keeps upping the game until such point as it begins to cause them trouble, then get to be painted the wrongdoer and punished in some way for it because they're presenting as a sympathetic victim. A more sympathetic victim than you, that's really what I mean, I'm just going to say it.

And that was already in swing by the time I got from the launch point to the smoking crater of then current events. I got to Raven's again after bouncing back and forth between their interactions with others, largely from COAR, yes, and the shit on the callout blog...to see...everyone else being blamed in increasingly drastic ways.

Because on tumblr, unlike reality, if you throw out enough times ahead of time that you have disorders people can get behind, you're more sympathetic, not less. So long as one has set that foundation and has others to broadcast it once convenient, any horrible action one undertakes is given a pass. Anyone disagreeing, anyone not tolerating the abuse, is in the wrong now. In the worst possible way, of course.

This whole thing began with incredibly unnecessary bullshit and every, I mean fucking every, further action taken was a new level of fucked up, but the trivializing of and damage done to the perception of mental health and differences is quite possibly the worst. Are those things that need any more of that? It's already such a problem! I already see suspicion and fatigue with this, every time it's given validation, it grows.

Even if I wasn't mentally ill, with one of the disorders that gets vilified even on tumblr, even if I were not autistic, even if I never knew a single person who suffered worse than I do from the the complications they won by way of being born, hadn't anyone I loved that took their lives, this would be extremely upsetting to me. Using the idea that "whatever I do, it's got to be acceptable because I am X" while not caring that anyone else is X, Y, and/or Z. Weaponizing it for bullying and sympathy simultaneously. Way too much. Incredibly gross and harmful, legitimately fucking problematic.

I want people to be taken seriously when they choose to speak of the boundaries their mental health requires, I want muns to be able to say that they are having a difficult time without it coming off (even to the rest of us with mental health conditions) as a ploy for attention/guilting for whatever action they desire be taken by partners, and I want people to take threats of oncoming, serious harm seriously. How are they to do this, when it is continually used as tool or weaponized against others? At very best, it becomes another thing to ignore and scroll by on the dash.

As we've all had the misfortune to experience or witness so recently, once it is weaponized, it's a problem of priority. I've said in damn near every message I've gotten that Raven isn't the only person involved here who has serious shit going on, but like the absurdity with trying to spin an accident as transphobia, or having the audacity to attempt speaking from a place of peace in a way that might benefit everyone, Raven included, resulting in a callout about being against ND people...it doesn't matter. Doesn't matter that any of us are neurodivergent, have serious chronic mental health complications, or are not cisgender. Raven was swinging that around like a flaming sword to drive off bigots real and imagined before we ever got their attention.

Attention they fucking asked for.

Reblogging that post from COAR was just like posting those rules. The intention was to get attention, and it was asked for with extreme hostility. I have no idea how that is coming off to anyone as simply them defending themselves. It was a great moment to either not out themselves as the person in the confession at all, not engage with it, quietly remove the post, or to reblog it and take responsibility in a meaningful way at that point. Can you imagine what a difference that would have made then? If Raven had chosen instead to reblog it and apologize for doing what they had. Just that. No shitty, snide little comments about how they're sorry, but still absolutely correct and here are five reasons why everything they've misconstrued won't be tolerated. Just an acknowledgment of wrongdoing, an apology for doing so, and awareness gained moving forward.

Their decision to interact with that post in the way they did wasn't just more of the same nonsense, it was actively upping the game. I don't really care if it was intentional bait or just continuing to let malicious impulse run free, it was used as bait. Everyone who interacted with that post was effectively consigning themselves to harassment, and if they happened to interact on literally any other topic that group held a passionately opposing opinion on, they were attacked for it. Curiously, it became necessary for them to be harassed by way of the callout blog, but that is getting a little close to off-topic, so, I'll leave it at that.

So, while I initially really wanted to have the appeal to Raven work because their expressions of regret that I was greatly on the fence about being genuine, I'd say those flags were accurate. I cannot believe that someone who took every opportunity to do the wrong thing is genuinely sorry. Sorry for themselves, absolutely, sorry for anything they did, not so much. This constant narrative I got of "they SAID they were sorry" and "they apologized again and again and took the posts down," including from Raven, is incredible. On that last one, they, yet again, couldn't actually address me.

Appropriate response: messaging me or reblogging that post (you know, the rules snippet I found right the hell there still, despite the claim of it being deleted and the final catalyst of me needing to say something after I saw that, nope, surely was not) with the acknowledgment of a single thing I said.

Extra appropriate response: ^ plus going to everyone who could still be located that they harmed with a genuine, individual, private apology.

Inappropriate response that was had: new post, shitty, childish tone like they at once wanted to argue with me and didn't want to drop the act, restating of this apology that had already been deleted and meant exactly shit while it existed, restating of how they deleted this post and couldn't control reblogs, ignoring that I literally reblogged the original copy from their blog.

Apology neither believed nor accepted. Just as it wouldn't be if my nephew came to my house, broke a bunch of my things, said he was sorry while throwing the pieces at my pet, then threw himself on the floor screaming that he said he was sorry when I told him to go have a time out.

(Yes, I absolutely did just make a comparison to a child, y'all can shit yourselves again. It's not my problem if you want to misconstrue "this person's actions are not befitting of an adult" as "Vespertine said autistic people are children!" Fucking miss me with that. I'm an autistic adult who pays my bills, apologizes, doesn't treat people like shit while trying to excuse it by being ND. You're offensive with that shit, and contributing to the negative perception people have of those on the spectrum. Be a good ally today! Don't valid that! Free ninety-nine offer!)

Again, sorry for yourself does not equal being sorry for what you've done. The former can contribute to the development of the latter, but as I said in a response yesterday, there has been no display of that beginning to transpire. I genuinely hope that will eventually be the case because that would be the best outcome, the only "best" outcome at this point. Even if it was two years from now, if it did happen, I certainly would not be kind to people refusing them any such growth in peace, and I hope that, by some distant chance, I get to prove that.

But...stating "my intentions were good" over any part of this is not remotely promising. When? Where? At what point? Oh, right, when you took it upon yourself to label a random mun you took issue with. That's when your intentions were good. Then, when you vehemently needed to defend that point by callouts and individual attacks under the guise of it definitely not being about your pride, no! It was the defense of everyone else! Defending the community by carpet-bombing it, yes. This is not a "the path to Hell is paved with good intentions" situation.

I am so disturbed about the nineteen-year-old mun, my god. I'm telling y'all, my anger and disgust almost reach what I think is a pinnacle, then there's something new like this.

I don't even subscribe to tumblr's ideology that anyone under twenty-five is an actual infant who needs be kept in a protective bubble and forgiven for all bad behavior with infinite kindness, nineteen-year-olds deserve the agency of the adultier adults they are becoming, but it is a transitional age. Especially today. Most socialization and formative ideas take place online, and by the time younger RPers are entering the adult sphere of RP here, they've already got some really unhealthy ideas. About themselves, about others. There is such a demand for rabidly performative action that gets internalized, it shouldn't be being heartily fed by people in the community they might look up to.

At that age, someone like Raven is going to be a person looked up to. They espouse all the right ideas, and it's an age in which aggressive interaction over those things is seen as amusing and correct, no matter how wrong the actions taken are or the basis upon which they are founded. When these people foster an environment of cruelty for questioning, of course, that is not going to be the natural response. The response is now going to be the requirement of being told otherwise with adequate proof.

I have suspected that many of the hateful anons I've gotten were from Raven's even younger followers who feel like it's normal, acceptable, and that everything they're being told by Raven's sales team over at the callout blog is absolutely true. Of course, they're now morally obligated to come harass me for the things they were told I did! I think it's likely that several of the anons people got were from actual minors, which is so many levels of scary and irresponsible. Really great example all around, yes!

Because whether it is one's intention or not, that is potentially exposing minors, or muns who are still close enough to be more negatively impacted, to who even knows what. As well as violating the rules of blogs who do not interact with minors for good reason, setting those blogs up for yet another callout for treating someone they didn't know was a minor the way they did or having "freak shit" on their blog. Setting up the other party to be treated with full hostility as an adult would be. Very cool, very responsible.

There is just so much here that is unacceptable, I don't think people who were not directly impacted or have never had a callout against them understand the results, and that is one more unacceptable thing you've been good enough to talk about.

Even while taking a break from the RPC, it affects you negatively. Wondering what you're coming back to, your blog is no longer a safe feeling space, and there's nothing you can do to "cultivate your blog" to change that. They've taken away the ability to simply block and avoid others, the thing that keeps all of us comfortable here as well as allowing that to be all of us no matter how disagreeable we might be to each other. Callouts negate adult behavior. Callouts mean that one doesn't know where more potential for harassment might be coming from, or how long we might have to be worried about that.

It would be a major concern for me as well about what putting myself out there to new writing partners might bring. What the success of that might be. It's incredibly unfair that they've made finding new people precarious and more unpleasant than it can be anyway. That puts all of the future of your RP here in question, and if you're like me, just dropping a muse, picking up another, and moving to a new URL isn't going to be a good choice for you. It isn't that simple if you dedicate time to a muse for a long period of time, when that's the case, that's the RP you want to do and have laid the groundwork for.

I don't know if it will help at all, but it has seemed to me, over the past several days, that there are fewer people in the RPC who are inclined to believe or support callouts than there once was. I was hoping that was the case, since there is always so much interaction on my posts against callout culture, but until this crap went down, I had no idea just how many people are not positive toward it. It has seemed to be that the people who are inclined to listen to callouts are just louder.

I've also noticed that those people have the same set of red flags, so maybe sharing that will help you or others?

They don't have simple, basic, reasonable Do Not Interacts. It isn't simply asking that minors don't interact because the mun is over eighteen, that muns writing a triggering topic not interact, or that sort of thing. No, it's URL dropping of specific muns, outright links to callouts or "receipts," and an accusatory tone about any topics or types of muns who shouldn't interact. Such as "nasty ass proshippers" or "pedo apologists shipping incest."

Their rules are reflective this as well. A statement cannot be made that they do not write, let's say, toxic ships and left at that. There will be some morality wank present about normalizing or romanticizing toxic/abusive relationships.

There are less assured flags, but literally, anything that stands out as an interest in RPC or fandom-based activism as opposed to an interest in writing, their muses, or even their friendships with a variety of muns. I don't mean a rounded-out interest in things, I really do mean a glaring predominance of buzzword-laden reblogs and PSA's while they've not written a reply, headcanon, or answered a meme in months.

I'm not saying any of that because I feel like you, or anyone else's, judgment is terrible or that you're oblivious to warning signs! It's just that when we've experienced bad situations, it can compromise our ability to see clearly. It becomes easy to see a potential threat everywhere, and maybe that seems contrary, but it's then easy to fail to see real threats from those we're blowing up. We question whether we're being just as judgmental as the people who wronged us, putting words in other muns' mouths and thoughts in place of their own as was done to us. While we still are afraid to be wrong in giving someone an in to ruining our time again.

So, please, don't feel like I'm questioning your intelligence or speaking from a place of ultimate knowledge, never making mistakes in such a choice! I just really hate that you, and many others, are going through this, and anything at all that I can think of that might help you move forward from this utter bullshit you've been through, I've got to try to grab it.

Because, Anon, like all those sharing their experiences these last few days, you sound like the kind of mun we need in the RPC.

You're someone willing to share with others for the benefit of others. You're being honest about your feelings of anger and even the hopeless sensation of whether it's even worth it to try to return, having your progress on and offline stomped on, while still maintaining a sort of fairness and calm that I know is not easy. Because that's the mature thing to do, it's the right thing, and unfortunately, those are usually the harder things to do as well.

You did the right thing in expressing your opinion and doing what people like Raven's group love to be on about, can only do through bullying: not tolerating it. I'd hate for the RPC to lose someone like you!

Just as your message matters to more people out there than myself, I have no doubt that your choice to not quietly allow this behavior mattered to more muns than you'll ever know. I'm sure that none of them would have wanted this result for you, but so many muns have experienced such toxic, bullying behavior over the years in which not a soul spoke up.

Many of you proved something very important with challenging Raven and the callouts blog, that unlike them, it isn't necessary for good people to even know each other to do the right thing. They have to dogpile and engage in cliquish behavior, what they do isn't coming from a place of inner ethics and strength, but what you all did? It's the opposite.

So, not only do I thank you again for sharing and providing the important support of simply not being alone to others, I thank you for being the example to the RPC that people dealing in callouts and generalized shaming cannot be, no matter their platform.

I hope that, whether you choose to remain, leave, or take a very long break, everything you've been dealing with starts to look up. I know it's easy to say things made hollow for their repetition and flippant use, like telling you not to let them win, or that their bullshit just isn't that important. So, I'm not going to say them.

It doesn't work that way when you're dealing with mental health concerns! You can logically know that this is just petty bullshit not worth being run out of something important to you, but that doesn't stop the worry, frustration, or depression. You can have all the determination in the world to hang in there, even the spite to back it up, but neither is a match for the things you cannot control coming from your brain. That is the cruelty of mental illness on the very best of days.

You have all of my respect, support, and genuine sympathy that this happened to you. No one should be allowed to continually and unapologetically go out of their way to throw a wrench into someone's hard-won progress. You did nothing to deserve this, and the people out there worth interacting with are going to be the same ones who will have no question of that.

Lastly, I also hope that some of the anons sharing their experiences have helped you feel less alone, or like you're not just irrationally upset. Please know that you're seen and supported as well! And that you are always welcome to talk more, vent, share successes here.

Thank you, Anon.