#so the arguments the thing I am vaguing are trying to debunk are not what is being argued!

[clover-system]

The longest list of anti-endo sources I've ever seen

While trying to find something else using Tumblr's infamous search engine, I came across this absolute gem:

NINE SOURCES!!! That's a record!! This is incredible!

@radpocalypse, listen. I am about to tear these to shreds, but before I do, I want you to know that you have my respect for not only compiling the longest list of sources I have ever seen an anti-endo provide, and not only doing so seemingly not directly prompted, but typing out every single link by hand, on mobile, without making a single mistake. Incredible work.

And also, to be completely honest, if I had nine sources supporting a belief, I almost certainly wouldn't look into them this closely. But, hey, that's what strangers on the internet with opposing views are for.

One more thing before the debunk: Endogenic systems do not claim to have DID etc. without trauma. They just don't. Whether it could be possible is often debated as an edge case, usually just to win an argument against someone of the opposing side, but really, it's irrelevant for 99% of the community. A good chunk are questioning OSDD based on later trauma, but as far as I am aware, no one on this website is claiming a completely endogenic plural disorder.

However, I don't want to dismiss entire pages based on this alone without further commentary, and it's a fun intellectual exercise regardless. So, whenever I use green text, I'm just playing Devil's Advocate under the premise of "If I was claiming to have DID without trauma (which neither I nor anyone else afaik is), would this source actually debunk that claim?" My syster will also occasionally pop in with purple, since she was cocon while I was writing this.

My dad just walked into my room and literally said "hey how it's going". You know, like. Like that one post. Amazing.

Anyway, civility established. Now come along with me on this long long journey of ten minutes of reading. Maybe put some music on in the background, if that will help you get through it. I had Near's Theme on while writing.

Here we go.

Link 1: McLean Hospital

Ok, main thing that caught my eye was

According to a 2010 Psychiatric Times article, only 5% of people with DID exhibit obvious switching between identity “states.”

Very interesting! Even with all of the "idk who's fronting" memes, 5% is really not that high. Though maybe online spaces like these help train the ability to identify it? The reference trail leads back to a book by Kluft but I don't really feel like going through dozens of pages for this. Definitely making a note of this though; I wonder if there have been any follow-up studies on this.

Not much to say here other than that. No mention of plurality outside DID.

DID is associated with long-term exposure to trauma, often chronic traumatic experiences during early childhood.

Dissociation—or disconnection from one’s sense of self or environment—can be a response to trauma.

Dissociative identity disorder—a type of dissociative disorder—most often develops during early childhood in kids who are experiencing long-term trauma. This typically involves emotional, physical, and/or sexual abuse; neglect; and highly unpredictable interactions with caregivers.

Why "associated", not "is caused by"? Why "can", not "is"? Why "most often", etc.?

Why such weak language?

Not that it couldn't be weaker.

I vaguely remember McLean getting into some hot water regarding a video they posted about DID, but didn't find anything concrete. Half-remembered anecdote aside, the author seems well-qualified.

C-tier debunk of this position. It's not nothing but it could be a lot better.

Link 2: Psych Central

It occurs in women 9 times more often than in men.

Very interesting statistic, but no citation provided.

Alters can show striking differences. For instance, one alter may speak with a different accent or have a softer way of speaking. They might have different opinions or a different gender identity, and even physical differences — like left- or right-handedness, or the need for a glasses prescription.

That's quite a stark difference here compared to the McLean article. What happened to "alters aren't that noticeable"?

But whatever, these are just interesting tidbits. None of this has anything to do with endogenic plurality. Nothing like "this is the only way to be multiple", no comment whatsoever.

DID is usually associated with adverse experiences in someone’s past and traumatic memories.

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a mental health condition with strong links to trauma, especially trauma in childhood.

Bruh. This again?

In fact, the American Psychiatric Association reports that 90% of people with DID have a history of childhood abuse and neglect, based on research from the United States, Canada, and Europe.

Bruh. Seriously? 90%? You know what that leaves, right?

According to your own source, 10% of DID systems are endogenic.

But let's break this down. There's a big difference between the system being endogenic, and the DID being endogenic. This statistic is specifically referring to childhood trauma.

The wording's plenty vague though. This can absolutely be read as completely endogenic DID.

One review article from 2017 about the causes of DID noted that there was relatively little research on the condition to date.

The authors said researchers hadn’t yet investigated potential genetic and epigenetic factors. With epigenetic factors, the experiences and behaviors of your parents and ancestors can influence the function of the genes they pass down to you.

The authors of the review said scientists needed to do more research to investigate whether a person with DID might carry genes that can influence if they develop the condition or not.

This is particularly promising because studies have already shown that genes can influence dissociative disorders in general.

So you're telling me DID might be able to be passed down one or two generations? Wow. Again, this still has nothing to do with endogenic plurality, but I'm really glad I decided to play with this second angle, because it's so much more fun. We're certainly not at intentional self-inflicted DID here, but we are at this point a long way from certainly needing childhood trauma in all cases.

And also the reviewer is a military psychiatrist who specializes in ADHD. So uh. Not bringing our best here.

Link 3: Mayo Clinic

Gotta love an article that's nice and short. This is just a brief summary of a bunch of dissociative disorders. Again, nothing about endogenic plurality.

Starting to run out of things to say about this. This whole post could probably be a fifth the length if I didn't feel like playing on hard mode.

Formerly known as multiple personality disorder, this disorder involves "switching" to other identities. You may feel as if you have two or more people talking or living inside your head. You may feel like you're possessed by other identities.

Each identity may have a unique name, personal history and features. These identities sometimes include differences in voice, gender, mannerisms and even such physical qualities as the need for eyeglasses.

Hey, that reminds me of someone.

There also are differences in how familiar each identity is with the others. Dissociative identity disorder usually also includes bouts of amnesia and often includes times of confused wandering.

Again, McLean looking really odd with its declaration of DID's covertness against great detail like this. However, its author is so far the best qualified. This one just says "Mayo Clinic Staff". Can't even know which of them worked on this. Some of them are psychs, but if any of them specialize in dissociative disorders, it doesn't say so.

Dissociative disorders usually arise as a reaction to shocking, distressing or painful events and help push away difficult memories.

I won't bother quoting even more wishy-washy language because this post is already at an ungodly length (about 1300 words so far) and we're barely a third done. But yeah, suffice to say, no nail-in-the-coffin 100% link to trauma.

Link 4: Rethink

We are a trusted information creator and accredited by the Patient Information Forum (PIF).

Their bold, for once. That's an alarm-ringing corporate phrase if I've ever seen one. Also, first thing on the PIF's website is "balancing the risks and benefits of AI in the production of health information". So this article might've been written by GPT. Awesome. And yeah, a lot of this whole website looks to me like a bunch of interconnected pages with stupidly long articles written by stitching together LLM generations. Does pass GPT0's test though.

This one is so long. I'll take the ten minutes to read through every word, which I don't think @radpocalypse did, just to make sure there's nothing here, but one thing that does catch my eye scrolling down to near the bottom is that they misspelled their first citation.

A quick look at this Carolyn Spring shows a lot being sold and credentials nowhere in sight. Awesome.

So already I don't need to read this. The information here is not at a high level of trustworthiness. It's maybe better than nothing, but seriously, one can and should do better. But I'll read it anyway, just for bonus points. Thanks to AccelaReader for making this bearable.

Many people will experience dissociation at some point in their lives. Lots of different things can cause you to dissociate. For example, you might dissociate when you are very stressed, or after something traumatic has happened to you.

Some of the symptoms of dissociation include the following:

You may have clear multiple identities.

It‘s important to remember that you could have the symptoms of dissociation without a dissociative disorder.

So according to this, multiple identities can be caused by intense but non-traumatic stress, and might not necessarily be a disorder. So, while I admit this is a little bit of a stretch, we're four links in and this is the first mention of plurality in general, so I'll take it. One point for endogenic plurality. (And again, none of this really matters anyway because this is the worst source so far.)

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is sometimes called ‘Multiple Personality Disorder.

If you have DID you might seem to have 2 or more different identities, called ‘alternate identities.

Two missing closing quotes. Really not a good sign.

They suggest that DID is caused by experiencing severe trauma over a long time in childhood.

Aha! Finally, something concrete against endogenic DID! Too bad it's buried in the worst source yet. If we believed we had DID, we would absolutely not reconsider that based on a sketchy webpage with suboptimal syntax and no credentials.

Ugh, finally done with that one. What a slog.

Link 5: DID Research

Aha! The infamous psych student's blog! That's what Sophie said, anyway. Not taking her word for it though. Let's see what we can find here, independently.

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is the result of repeated or long-term childhood trauma

Why wasn't this first? First sentence, so crystal clear. No two ways about this, transDID destroyed right out of the gate.

DID cannot form after ages 6-9 because individuals older than these ages have an integrated self identity and history.

Why wasn't this first? It's so plain, so refreshing after four pages of strategic ambiguity. Nothing left here for green. But still no mention of non-disordered plurality.

The author is impressively credentialed but doesn't seem to specialize quite near this area. She's certainly better than most, high above any random Tumblr user talking out of their ass, but the good stuff would be to get a DID specialist to explicitly spell out that endogenic systems are not possible.

Also should make note of this big fat legal disclaimer:

While the author strives to make information on this website as complete, reliable, and accurate as possible, the author makes no claims, promises, guarantees, or warranties about the accuracy, completeness, or adequacy of the contents of this site and expressly disclaims liability for errors and omissions in the contents of this site.

If we did claim to have DID, this would rattle us a little but could ultimately be brushed aside.

Link 6: SANE

As usual, literally nothing about endogenic plurality. I'll just greenmode this.

The majority of people with DID have been through severe trauma in early childhood

And now back to our regularly scheduled nondefinitive language.

Fun fact: highlighting text on this website turns it invisible. Awesome.

A person needs to meet the following criteria to be diagnosed with DID:

- Two or more distinct identities or personality states, each with its own way of thinking and relating. - Amnesia and gaps in the recall of everyday events, personal information or traumatic events. - The experiences are not part of normal cultural or religious practice, or part of childhood imaginary play. For example, a child having an imaginary friend does not mean they have DID. - The symptoms are not because of substance abuse or other medical conditions.

Ah finally, a direct quote from the good ol' DSM. Notice the lack of a trauma requirement.

Funny enough, using only these criteria in isolation, we actually would count as having DID due to our grayout memory gaps when switching. DID is also listed in the dissociative disorders section of the DSM, not the trauma disorders section, so there is no implied criterion there either. However, there still remains the universal criterion of distress, which we do not fulfill. We are quite happy with ourselves.

DID is caused by severe childhood trauma, such as physical, verbal or sexual abuse.

Well, which is it?? Is it a majority association or a direct cause? Why the contradiction? Or is the emphasis on early childhood trauma?

Eh, whatever. Point is, green is once again shut down. But there is still no mention of endogenic plurality anywhere here!!

And no indication of who wrote this article, though the citation for direct cause is a dissociative disorder specialist. Does he actually say that in the cited paper, though?

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is multifactorial in its etiology. Whereas psychosocial etiologies of DID include developmental traumatization and sociocognitive sequelae, biological factors include trauma-generated neurobiological responses. Biologically derived traits and epigenetic mechanisms are also likely to be at play. At this point, no direct examination of genetics has occurred in DID. However, it is likely to exist, given the genetic link to dissociation in general and in relation to childhood adversity in particular.

I hope you have a dictionary on hand. That sure is a lot of big words that aren't in Firefox's built-in spellchecker. Still, after making sure I got everything, it's clearly not so cut and dry here. And we're back on the "it could be genetic" point.

Tangentially related: I do like the dismissal of the iatrogenic model on the basis of the brain scans.

Neurobiological differences have been demonstrated between dissociative identities within patients with DID and between patients with DID and controls. Given the current evidence, DID as a diagnostic entity cannot be explained as a phenomenon created by iatrogenic influences, suggestibility, malingering, or social role-taking. On the contrary, DID is an empirically robust chronic psychiatric disorder based on neurobiological, cognitive, and interpersonal non-integration as a response to unbearable stress.

Anyway, we're not even on the original page anymore, so I'll call it here. No mention of endogenic plurality, and the citation that claims to dismiss endogenic DID doesn't.

Link 7: NAMI Michigan

While the causes [of DID] are unknown

I'm tired. Aren't you tired?

Treatment for DID consists primarily of psychotherapy with hypnosis.

Yeah I'm calling BS on this one

And no citations on this entire page, nor even the author's name.

Statistics show that DID occurs in 0.01 to 1 percent of the general population.

Research has shown that the average age for the initial development of alters is 5.9 years old.

No sources listed. This is definitely the worst link. Literally on the same level as a rambling Tumblr user in terms of credibility.

Doesn't matter that it says

This disorder is believed to be triggered by physical or sexual abuse in childhood

Couldn't even get this dogshit source to be firm.

This one gets an F.

Link 8: The Psychology Practice

Got scared for a moment there that it said ai. No, that's AL, a name. Also this was written in 2022, so we're definitely safe. Can't actually find any other info on this AL character, but at least we can look up the co-author.

Hm, can't find anything on her, either. Well, at least this is a step up from the previous link. Let's see what it has to say.

According to the Dissociative Identity Research Organisation (2018), DID is formed in childhood due to repeated trauma in early childhood (before age 10) before the personality is fully integrated.

I do like that these later links are direct with this. They don't seem to have a citation for that DIRO, though. Unless...

No. Oh no.

Ok, so this one was written by a couple of clowns who definitely didn't do their homework. Cool. I'm getting tired of humoring awful sources like this, so moving on to the grand finale.

Link 9: NAMI

Wait, this is the same group behind the zero-citation article from Michigan! But that was just Michigan. Maybe the main site can do better.

Ugh, it's just another list of dissociative disorders instead of DID specifically.

The symptoms of a dissociative disorder usually first develop as a response to a traumatic event,

Aren't you tired? Aren't you tired? Aren't you tired?

Often these identities may have unique names, characteristics, mannerisms and voices.

Often? Wow. Sure is a far cry from 5%.

Dissociative disorders are managed through various therapies including: - Psychotherapies such as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) - Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) - Medications such as antidepressants can treat symptoms of related conditions

No mention of hypnosis, allegedly the primary method of treatment?? (/sarc)

and there was no mention of plurality being exclusive to dissociative disorders

Oh, and no listed authors either.

So, after three thousand words of analysis, all we've come up with are nothing burgers, dogshit, and dogshit nothing burgers. Out of nine links, only one briefly and indirectly touched on endogenic plurality, and it was in favor. Even the argument against the traumaless DID strawman is weak at best. These sources are bad, to put it lightly.

@radpocalypse, if you're reading this, firstly, thank you for powering through your ADHD and dyslexia to read thousands of words dunking on your masterpiece. Secondly, if you have any more sources that you think are backing you, feel free to send them my way. Just uh, maybe read them more closely next time?

And that goes for everyone here. If you think you have a better source, or if I made a mistake or missed something here, I am open to correction. I am open to the idea that I'm wrong and I have some unknown trauma to work through, but I certainly won't go digging unless I have good reason to believe it's there, and I haven't seen any good reason. And if you haven't either, maybe it's time to reconsider your position.

One last thing before I go.

Have you ever actually seen a pro-endo carrd, let alone one cited in standalone? I haven't.

Here's a much longer list of much better sources than yours supporting endogenic plurality compiled by the traumagenic Guardians System. I don't expect you to read anywhere near the whole thing; just pick a few links at random. And yes, while many of them are peer-reviewed papers, some of them are Tumblr posts, but those Tumblr posts cite peer-reviewed papers, so it's all good.

Thanks for reading.

[blender2902]

IN DEFENCE OF QUEEN MARIKA PART 1: THE GUIDANCE OF GRACE-

Welcome to the first part of my Elden Ring lore series where I defend Queen Marika from slander. For the past 2 and a half years she has gotten a lot of unfair shit thrown at her, most of which she never did. With this series I hope to prove that Queen Marika loves Godfrey and all her kids excluding Radahn, Rykard(cuz they are Radagon’s not hers. I do think there is something going on between her and ranni tho.) and godrick( no one does tbf). But to do that I must first analyse the guidance of grace and then refute the many allegations thrown at her due to that. I will be using logic and evidence for most of my analysis, if I see a flaw with what I provide, I will say so. If I don’t feel free to point that out.

(Disclaimer: I am not trying to say that ‘Queen Marika did nothing wrong’ as that would be stupid and a massive disservice to the writing. What I am trying to do is portray Marika's complexity using evidence that I have seen no one else use and to clear her name of the crimes she did not commit. She is objectively a bad person just like every major character in the game but just like them she is complex, except her complexity is much higher than the rest in my humble opinion. Her complexity is far more than just ‘tragic past boo hoo’ and I want to show just that with this series.)

If you have any disagreements with my logic or you see that I have missed a piece of evidence then feel free to point that out. Either my delusions break or yours do and both are a win for me! Please present your arguments pointwise though as that will make arguing a lot easier.

DEBUNKING THE GUIDANCE OF GRACE ALLEGATIONS:-

The nature of grace is left pretty vague by the game. What matters to us is, what does it tell us about Marika? I have seen many people claim that Marika has complete control over grace hence she guides us to kill her kids in cold blood to fulfil her own selfish desires. There are several factual and logical problems with this argument. For the sake of this analysis, I will do 2 things 1) Go along with the perspective that Marika has complete control over grace and where it guides us. I will prove that if this is the case, then Marika’s motives simply can’t be selfish by using logic and evidence. 2) I will give an alternate interpretation of the nature of grace based on in-game evidence. What I want to prove is that Marika loves her kids, but besides maybe Ranni, she doesn’t love the Carian demigods since they are not her own children but Radagon’s. She doesn’t love Godrick either(no one does tbf again lol).   

1) Let’s go along with the narrative that Marika controls grace completely.

So the first question we must ask is why is she guiding us?

Well, the answer is clear, she wants Radagon and Elden beast to killed. Everyone can agree on that. Now, what is her motive for wanting them killed? I have seen some answers painting Marika as some Machiavellian Evil Mastermind, so let’s debunk them one by one-

She wanted to rule eternally even as a husk: Ok so, there are many holes in this answer that refute it.        

1) The biggest hole is that even after we inherit the frenzied flame, we still have the guidance of grace. If she wanted to rule eternally, why would she allow someone who inherited the frenzied flame, you know the thing that fucking destroys the entire fucking world all the way down to the fucking spirits. Why in the name of fuck would anyone who wants to selfishly rule eternally ever guide the dumbass who is willing to destroy the world including her. Her guiding the tarnished even after inheriting the frenzied flame alone refutes all claims of ‘Marika had a masterplan that after Radagon and Elden beast were killed she would blah blah blah’ but I am not done destroying this line of thinking just yet. Also, don’t even try to argue ‘Oh it’s a game Mechanic not lore accurate’ as that would also apply to grace itself so you are refuting your own argument.

2) If ruling for eternity was her goal then why did she shatter the Elden Ring? She had zero fucking threats to her rule. I have legit seen someone say that she felt threatened by Miquella as he was a prime candidate to replace. Now that argument is just plain dumb because 1) Miquella had to go to the shadow lands and do a whole bunch of fucked up bullshit to himself to even be able to ascend which he was able to do only because of Mohg and we know from Freja’s questline that Miquella was doing the stuff at Mohgwyn after the battle of Aeonia, so don’t tell me that Marika got scared as fucked of what Miquella was going to do and 2) even if Miquella had gone to the shadow land and had ascended what the fuck would he do without Radahn being there. All Marika would have to do in this fictional scenario is to keep Radahn alive which would be easy considering how strong he is. 3) She can just send Malekith to kill Miquella if she felt so threatened. The other empereans were Malenia (who is loyal to Miquella and shows no interest in becoming a god) and Ranni, who is literally fucking dead. Why would she take everything down when she has nothing to feel threatened with? The only other argument I have seen for this is that Radagon was usurping her so she wanted him gone, which has the major problem of - SHE WOULD BE IN THE SAME GODDAMN POSITION AT THE END OF THIS PLAN AS SHE WOULD BE IF SHE HADN’T DONE THIS EXCEPT, SHE WOULDN’T BE FUCKING CRUCIFIED. Like ok, so she did not want to be a tool of Radagon so she instead plans on becoming a tool for the tarnished? The latter is way worse than the former because 1) she is a fucking husk and at least in the former she wouldn’t have that pain and 2) Let’s face it, 90% of us are degenerates including me and our player character would reflect that, why would anyone want us to control them. Again, all of this is assuming she even had control during Radagon’s age and was all around malicious both of which I think is untrue (I will discuss this in another post in the future).

There is a lot more I could say to refute this answer but these two points should be more than enough.

She had a plan to ascend to a higher being somehow:

1) Again, the frenzied flame argument refutes this

2) So we are just assuming that she can ascend further even though zero things say that? Yeah. I think I am done with this answer.

So, what does she want from us? I believe that she only wants us to go kill the Radagon and Elden beast. Radagon is keeping the world in purgatory via his seal whether it be by his own will or the Elden beast’s depending on your interpretation so her wanting them to be killed is not really selfish especially considering that she would also die. Now at many points in the game the light of grace guides us. What does this tell us about Marika? Let’s take a deep look.

Here is the Elden Ring map with all graces active:

UNDERGROUND:

DLC:

Let’s analyse where grace guides us and prove that Marika’s motives for each case is born out of love (even if its morally complex) and is never selfish using simple logic. I am excepting Godrick and the Carian demigods (except maybe Ranni) as I believe she is apathetic towards them. We are going from hardest to explain to easiest to explain-

DLC: I have 2 explanations here.

1) I have seen many claim that Marika just wanted Miquella killed for some self-serving reason but this just logically cannot be true. Grace stays with us even after we inherit the frenzied flame which would destroy everything including Marika and reset the world so we can’t logically argue that she has any plans for her future. Therefore, the only sensible motive for her guiding us towards Miquella is to free him from godhood. Lets look specifically at where she is guiding us in the dlc:-

Something very interesting to note here is that she only starts guiding us if we rest at the divine beast arena. She never guides us in any other open world area other than ancient ruins of rauh. If her intent from the moment we entered was to kill Miquella then we would have been guided in gravesite plains or scadu altus but no, we get guided when we kill divine beast at which point she realises what Miquella has fallen into. This suggests that she does not want us here at all but after seeing that Miquella is going to fall in the same trap as her, she makes the choice to end his suffering before it begins, for she knew better than anyone how horrible of a fate godhood truly is. This does mean she guides us towards Messmer so we can get his kindling but I do think she is doing this out of love as well. Think about how Messmer is feeling after all these centuries. The last sign of he felt from his mom were her shattering the elden ring which was seen as a sign of wrath as per the wrath from afar description. He was suffering immensely too and seeing his mom as a crucified husk would have probably made his life worse than it already was, so bringing him peace and ending his pain would be much a better fate. Now Messmer will have his own post in the future as there is a lot of stuff about him that is unfortunately not brought up enough but that is beside the point. tldr Marika loved him but circumstances forced her to seal him in the shadow realm which happened very late in the timeline, like night of the black knives late. Again, I know this sounds kinda ridiculous to most of y’all but I will make a post with all the evidence in the future where we can discuss this. Her motives just logically cannot be self-serving because if it was then she would have stopped guiding us when we inherited the frenzied flame.

2)The grace at divine beast is simply pointing towards the entrance to enir ilim leading us towards a dead end. This could have been an attempt from Marika where she tried to tell us ‘hey ya can’t reach Miquella so let’s just get out of here!’ but she unintentionally points towards Messmer. When we kill Messmer she decides its best to free Miquella from his prison as well so she starts guiding us again. The fact that its only the divine beast grace that points towards Messmer and not a single other one does, supports this argument quite well.

Pick whichever explanation you want but logically her motives here have to have been born out of love and not some selfish shit because she has no problem guiding us when we inherit the frenzied flame. Me personally, the first explanation is quite sound with logic so I would pick that but there is plenty of merit with the second one. The thing going against the second explanation for me is that I just find it kinda silly that from would just have the grace point towards messmer but have it just be for enir ilim. Like important details like that being mistakes is just not it. Nonetheless the second interpretation is logically valid as we can see it as a desperate attempt from Marika trying to save her son but end up doing the opposite so feel free to think that way.

Caria Manor: Sorry for the low-quality pic-

So, Marika guides us towards caria manor which is where Ranni resides. Now I have heard some people say that she guides us here to get a great rune, but that cannot be true since Ranni is stated to have cast her great rune aside. Now something very interesting to note here, is that the site of grace that appears when you give Ranni the fingerslayer blade guides us towards Renna’s rise where we can continue her questline. This would mean Marika supports Ranni’s goals. Now I know you will say that I dug myself a grave because this ‘proves that Marika planned Godwyn’s murder’ but no my friend I did not. I will go in depth about the night of the black knives in the future but I will leave a few explanations here- 1) Marika supports Ranni’s goals even if she killed Godwyn. Marika very much holds resentment against Ranni for killing Godwyn but she realises that Ranni does have the right end goal so she is willing to have us help her. 2) Even in the scenario where Marika did help Ranni in stealing destined death, what says the goal was to kill Godwyn? Nothing, from what I can tell and motive wise, this falters a lot too. What could have been the end goal was for Ranni to steal the rune of death so that Marika could use that to kill herself but the assassins double crossed them. 3) Maybe Marika doesn’t even want us to help Ranni but kill her instead which would be really funny cuz most ER players ended up marrying her lol.

I will make a future post that will debunk the Godwyn allegations so I will ask that if any of you wish to refute this post, leave out this particular section.

Church of the plague: sorry again for low quality pic-

So why does Marika guide us towards church of the plague? Well, the simplest explanation is that she is not guiding us towards that church, but toward Radahn. If she was guiding us towards Millicent, we first have to assume that she even knows about her in the first place which is a bit of a stretch if you ask me. Now we can definitely argue that Marika is trying to use Millicent to get to Malenia as Millicent leads us towards castle sol. I will explain that is the next point about castle sol.

 Castle Sol: Sorry again for low quality pic

So, she guides us towards the secret medallion in castle sol. I have seen people say that ‘Marika wants us to kill Malenia so we can get her great rune but that makes zero fucking sense when you consider the fact that when you reach this point in the game, you do not need any more great runes. If she really wanted us to get all great runes then why does she not guide us towards Mohg in Mohgwyn palace?

Simple, she does not want us to kill Malenia nor Mohg. If try to argue by saying that ‘Oh she doesn’t know about Mohgs palace’ don’t, because my guy, she starts guiding us towards Ranni after she disappears from her tower and she immediately guides us towards Miquella after finding out what he is upto. She is shown many times to actively react to what is happening in the present so if we were to discover Mohgwyn and her motive was for us to take all great runes then she would immediately guide us towards Mohg the moment we touched a grace over there but no, she does not which refutes all claims of her wanting us to slay all her demigods. Now begs the question, what does she want from us getting the secret medallion? Well, we have a few answers- 1) This could be another Ranni situation where she thinks Miquella can succeed her properly and she wants us to help him out but she realises that it’s too late for him. 2) Gideons dialogue does seem to suggest that Marika knew that Miquella got kidnapped so maybe she hoped we could help him but we know what Miquella was up to. Again, like I have said multiple times before, this will require a post of its own but the point is that Marika’s motives here just can’t be selfish as all the logic and evidence says otherwise.

Leyndell and Morgott: Same thing as with Messmer, Morgott was defending the capital for a very long time which caused him a lot of suffering. Marika just wanted him to be at peace after everything. It is very, very important to mention that Godfrey was likely also being guided at around the same time as us which I will elaborate on late in this post.

Castle Morne: I guess she guides us here to get stronger cuz that is the only logical explanation.

The rest either guide us towards a  shardbearer who Marika does not really care much about.

Another very important point to mention in this discussion that supports my stance of Marika actually loving her kids- Vyke and Godfrey. Vyke was a tarnished guided by grace and is stated to have almost become elden lord but failed due to frenzied flame bullshit. Now he somehow got to the point of the forge of the giants without killing any of the demigods. This flat out tells us that Marika tried her best to help her kids live but her attempts were met with failure as seen with Vyke. But at the same time she guides us, she is also guiding Godfrey. Godfrey would definitely come to peaceful agreements with Morgott letting him live. This means that even after Vyke failed, Marika still tried her best to save her kids it seems. Unfortunately, we were just faster than Godfrey. In Godfrey’s cutscene, we see that his grace guides him towards us. Now what does this say to us? Let’s logically break it down. Is Marika trying to see which one of us is stronger so she gets the best chance to be freed? Well, this makes little sense logically speaking. Her goal is to be freed, so it’s best to have both Godfrey and the player kill Radagon and Elden Beast together instead of doing a dumb battle royale which might result in failure. Like at least send them one by one to weaken Radagon and Elden beast for the other. So logically Marika is not being calculated over here which means emotions are at play. The only way this makes sense is if Marika wants Godfrey specifically to come and rescue her. Looking at Godfreys cutscene and the Ashen Capital site of graces, I find it quite odd that Marika seemingly stops guiding us when we release destined death but then Godfrey is immediately guided towards us. This is, in my opinion, a very strong clue that Marika wants Godfrey over the tarnished.

Ok, done with the first perspective.

2)An alternate interpretation of grace-

So, if we go kill the final boss of the base game, we kill Radagon which in turn kills Marika also. Now if we go light a grace that gives guidance after this, it still gives us guidance. This does seem to suggest that grace works independently to Marika even though she is the one who gives it. Now the reasoning can definitely be chalked up to gameplay reasons but that can also be applied to every site of grace so that the argument goes both ways. There is another thing that suggests grace works independently to Marika-

The other tarnished called by grace seem to be following their own path that does not really lead to lordship. Fia, Dung eater and Goldmask seem to be doing things that don’t really lead to them becoming Elden Lord.

This suggests that grace does not necessarily guide all the tarnished to become elden lord but instead towards their ambition. This seems to check out with everyone- the player and aspiring lord, Godfrey wanting his wife back, Fia doing shit with Godwyn, Dung eater eating shit and Goldmask moving his fingers. There is a distinct possibility that Marika does not have complete control over grace at all. Now having said all this, we can explain the behaviour of all the tarnished using logic but I don’t think that is necessary for what I am trying to prove.

Conclusion:

If you have read this post thoroughly, you should either agree with what I am saying about Marika’s motivations or concluded that the nature of grace is left too vague to come at any solid conclusions. Either option is good enough for me. Like I said earlier, if you disagree I am more than happy to discuss with you, when I get the time(life has been quite busy for me the past month🥲). The point of my blog is to create an environment where we can have proper discussions about the lore whilst being friendly. We can disagree without having to tear each other's throats out.

I have some more work to do irl so it will take some time before I post again or reply to anyone so I just wanted to post. Once my irld work is done I will become a lot more active here. Have a great rest of your life to all who see this post!

[kachuusha]

implied mutual feelings of love between levi and hanji—an analysis based on chapters 126 and 132.

note: this is a more in-depth version of what I have posted earlier.

This post is an attempt to make sense out of Levi’s nuanced dialogue in chapter 132. But before proceeding please read this tweet first to understand the context of this post: link to original tweet 

Please also read this analysis done by shunkani, explaining the nuance present in the original Japanese text. 

it is important that you read the posts I’ve linked above because what I am about to say here is not gonna make sense if you don’t.

Like always, note that what I am about to say is only my own interpretation of the events and should not be taken as absolute canon confirmation.

In chapter 132, Levi has a line that lost its nuance in the English translation. As explained in the linked posts above, Levi comments on Hanji’s unrequited love for titans but there is an implication that a mutual love shared with someone else.

What if that someone is Levi? When you think about it, it is not farfetched to assume that it was him considering how close he is to Hanji.

Other than that, there is an incident in the chapters prior to 132 that presents a strong case on why Levi could be referring to himself. Yes that's right—Hanji asking Levi to live with him.

Now I've seen people try to dismiss what Hanji said to Levi in the forest and insist that there is nothing possibly romantic with it and that Hanji was simply expressing their want to run away because they are tired so here is my take on it:

After tending to Levi's wounds, Hanji says,

"Maybe we should just live here together. Right Levi?"

If Isayama only intends to have Hanji express their exhaustion and desire to run away from everything, why didn't he just make Hanji say something like 《"I want to run away Levi. I am tired."》 ?

Why did it have to be Hanji expressing their want to live together with Levi? It was like Isayama tried to hit two birds with one stone. He had Hanji say their desire to run away and also to be with Levi.

Another factor in this is Hanji blushing after realizing that Levi heard what they said. Again, some fans have tried to refute this by saying that Hanji blushes all the time.

Yes Hanji blushes a lot but also consider the context of the scene. For second let us pretend tha these two characters are not Levi and Hanji—let's pretend that they are Character A and B.

Character A is with Character B, and the former thinks the the latter is asleep. Character A then takes this as a chance to voice out their feelings for Character B.

A few moments later, Character B brings up what Character A said. Character A realizes Character B heard their confession and so they blush.

I mean look at it, you could easily pretend that what happened in the forest was something that came out straight from a romance novel or a shoujo manga.

And come on are we going to pretend that the run away and live with someone to start anew isn't a common trope in romance?

Another argument I've seen is that maybe Hanji was just embarrassed that Levi heard them expressing their want to abandon their duties. This one is very easy to debunk.

Remember the beginning of Uprising Arc? Hanji shows their hesitation to Levi in continuing the titan experiments with Eren because they are afraid that the MPs might go after the SC just like what they did to Pastor Nick.

In both situations, Hanji was trying to run away and evade something and Levi was present in both situations. But did Hanji blush after showing their want to run here? No they did not.

Then what else could possibly the reason for Hanji's blush other than a hint for romantic feelings?

Next let's talk about Levi's response to Hanji.

Levi subtly implies to Hanji that he heard what they said by asking,

"If we keep...running and hiding...what will that get us...?"

Some say that this was Levi rejecting Hanji but I disgaree. To me what Levi said sounds more like a We can't run away yet if we still have things to do.

Levi also said that because he is aware of Hanji's strong sense of responsibility.

"I know you...you're not able to stay out of the action..."

He knows Hanji would't be satisfied in being a bystander.

Another thing to note here is that Hanji is the one who arrives at the conclusion that they can't.

Levi himself did not really gave a direct answer—and that is expected from someone like Levi who seems to be awkward and inexperienced in romance. It is understandable if he was caught off guard with what Hanji said and thus couldn't give a proper response.

Now getting back to chapter 132.

After seeing Hanji's exchange with Pieck, Levi says:

"...So, four eyes. yet another love for a titan gone unrequited, I see."

So like what had been explained in the posts above, Levi comments on Hanji's unrequited love for titans but implies that there is mutual love shared with someone.

With what happened in 126 in mind, who would be the most reasonable choice for that someone if not Levi? What if this was Levi's response or way of acknowledging Hanji's words back in the forest?

Just think about it. Hanji gives Levi something like a confession and then a few chapters later Levi suddenly implies that Hanji shares a mutual love with someone. The connection between the two events is not really difficult to make.

Like I said earlier, Levi not being able to form a direct answer is expected considering he seems to be the type who would be extremely awkward at love. Maybe he just needed time to sort his feelings first. Another thing to consider is they are both soldiers in duty.

Also can we talk about how Levi suddenly decided to call Hanji "four-eyes" again? It was like Levi is making an effort to go back to those days of normalcy.

An ambiguous and vague confession is also something that is so in character of Levi because of his awkwardness with words. Another is because he doesn't have to be direct with his words because Hanji and him share a deep understanding of one another.

Before anyone tries to brush this line off as nothing, I would like to point out that Isayama changed the kanji used in the dialogue in the volume release. This was pointed out in the tweet by @/kasumi_kasa as shown above.

The point I am trying to make here is that if this line is something we should just simply brush off, then why would Isayama bother making changes to it in the volume release?

The kanji in the original chapter release was 片思い but was changed into 片想い in the volume release. Both are read the same way (kataomoi) but just like what @/kasumi_kasa had explained, the kanji used in the volume release which is 想い, is indicative of a deeper form of love.

Also take note that the latter is an unusual way of writing unrequited love in Japanese.

Taking that into consideration and the implication of a mutual feeling with someone, does that mean Levi and Hanji share a deep form of love?

See the lengths Isayama is going through just for this one line? It really feels like the is trying to push something here.

Now onto Hanji's side. If by any chance we are correct that Levi was indeed confessing his feelings to Hanji, then did the latter caught what Levi was trying to say?

In my observation, it is very likely that Hanji had caught on to it because of their seemingly flustered and hesitant reply towards Levi. The hesistance is present in the pause (the three dots) before Hanji's dialogue.

"...We"ll be friendly in no time."

Another thing I would like to point out is how Hanji suddenly diverted the subject.

This is actually kind of ironic if you think about it. In 126 Hanji was the one who is seemingly confessing and Levi was the one who brought up their duties. Here in 132, it was Levi's turn to confess but Hanji was the one who brought up their duties.

My honest take on here is that it feels like Hanji was on the process of moving on and abadoning whatever feelings they had laid down in the forest so they could focus solely on their cause but then Levi suddenly drops something like this on them.

Hanji would be understandably flustered just like how Levi was in 126. Honestly in the end, both of them are just so awkward at romance.

So this is where I am gonna end this attempt at analyzing what was said in 126 and 132. I hope I was able to convey my thoughts properly. If you have made it this far then thank you.

If ever I am mistaken with my assumptions in here, it still doesn't diminish the beautiful bond that Levi and Hanji share.

[dereksmcgrath]

I had said before that the number 108 can be unlucky. It wasn’t unlucky at all for My Hero Academia: Vigilantes. But 108 is kind of unlucky for this episode: not only are we focusing on the Villains, but we just aren’t giving their story the structure and emotional weight it deserves.

(I either opened with those remarks or just made a bunch of corny jokes about how “Meta Liberation Army” can be abbreviated as MLA--and I’m saving those jokes for a future review.)

“My Villain Academia,” My Hero Academia Episode 108 (Season 5, Episode 20)

An adaptation of Chapters 220, 221, 222, 223, and 224 of the manga, by Kohei Horikoshi, translated by Caleb Cook with lettering by John Hunt and available from Viz.

My Hero Academia is available to stream on Crunchyroll and Funimation.

Spoilers up to My Hero Academia Chapter 325.

When I teach literature, I refer to the plot as a problem: it is something that the protagonist is trying to solve. This problem can take various forms, but it is often as an antagonist that the protagonist confronts. When this episode has the Doctor refer to a “villain” as someone “who turns nonsense into action,” that’s kind of the point: the villain is here to get the plot rolling. Without them, you don’t have a hero, you don’t have a story.

It has been long accepted by a lot of fans and scholars that superheroes tend to uphold the status quo. I think the first time I gained awareness of this popular argument--although likely not the first time I encountered it--was Dr. Horrible’s mangled remark that “the status is not quo.” More recently, however, I have been reading academic books on superheroes, and not only does that argument persist--that superheroes represent law, order, and upholding traditional norms even in the face of new evidence or out of sheer obliviousness to the need for systemic change--but the argument has become that, if a superhero story does not have the heroes doing something to effect systemic change, then it’s not a good story. I may be misunderstanding that argument, but if I don’t, then it’s not an argument I can stand behind.

The argument is that superhero stories tend to reduce complex issues to having avatars for each side of the issue--the good guy and the bad guy--get into a fight, where we are focused on the spectacle rather than on seeing actual people engaging in the actual work needed to address problems not on the individual level--again, one good guy physically fighting one bad guy--but on a larger scope.

I am oversimplifying this argument, as even those same scholars will point out that, initially, of course there were superhero stories that had the protagonist taking the fight against the system. Superman is one of the ones named most frequently, whether in his initial comic book premiere doing what police and media would not to face down a corrupt senator (a sign of things to come in his later fights with Luthor and in Justice League Unlimited) or fighting the Klan (in the meta sense, fighting their analogue on the radio show and, more recently, literally in the comics). It kind of makes Superman look like one influence on the Peerless Thief in My Hero Academia, but we’ll get to him far later in these episodic reviews.

Even with that exception of Superman, it’s not hard for me to agree with the argument that heroes prop up the status quo. That has been the plot point for My Hero Academia and why this war against the villains has been incoming: a system that depended on just All Might, now depending on a wife-beating abusive father like Endeavor with his crimes not popularly known, has a level of corruption that cannot stand up with just one man’s shining example of honest goodness and integrity to be the Symbol of Peace. It was why I appreciated the manga eventually showing that, yes, there was an entire network of assassins within the Hero Public Safety Commission to keep All Might’s hands clean--and, in retrospect, while Lady Nagant was our first named example, given what Hawks ends up doing to Twice, deadly force may be frowned upon by law in MHA but has to have been something Hawks was told he had legal authority to do. (Also, as I will never stop pointing out, Endeavor unintentionally and unknowingly killed another Pro Hero in Vigilantes, and we’re just supposed to pretend that was fine.)

But going back to this academic argument, about how superhero stories tend to stick to one-on-one battles and don’t let the heroes effect systematic change, I’m ambivalent. There have been a range of superhero or superhero-adjacent stories that have the protagonist making on-page, on-screen, obvious work to not just get into fisticuffs with the bad guy. I already pointed out Superman’s first appearance and his fight against the Klan. I can also identify other examples, some hamfisted like Captain Planet, others more nuanced like Korra reaching out to Kuvira in The Legend of Korra. While the scholarship I read bristles at the idea of reducing these fights to just avatars for good and evil, I shrug and say that kind of comes with the territory of a superhero story. I hate justifying tropes: it’s like saying “this fanservice is acceptable because that’s part of the genre”--which leads to its own set of problems, especially when I hear fools defending sexualized fanservice that is just not needed for the story and is abusive by gender and representation. Heck, The Brave and the Bold animated series had Equinox and Batman battle as giants representing the avatars of chaos and order--which is confusing enough, with Equinox having a vaguely yin-yang motif that debunks any clean separation between chaos and order. And yet, here I am, arguing that this kind of fanservice of a hero and a villain beating each other up is to be expected: you have a debate about ideals of what a hero should do when you see Iron Man and Captain America each representing a side in a fight, whether the poorly handled comic book Civil War or the better film version, and even then, that film also lets the individual personalities get in the way of saying anything meaningful about government oversight and individual agency, ideas better handled in that other Captain America film, The Winter Soldier, and even then that film also gets stuck in just being about Steve and Bucky’s relationship.

All of this is me saying that, when you add a superhero to the fight, you’re going to feel disappointed that almost nothing systematically changes in its setting, not only because, as I’m hinting, these are stories about individuals fighting each other and not stories about the individual against society or nature, but also because a superhero can only change so much of their world for the better before that world no longer looks like our own or a new societal problem has to emerge to create the problem that is the plot itself for wherever the story goes next. Once a hero makes the setting into a utopia, either a new problem emerges to show the fiction of that story and that a dystopia is always married to a utopia, or the utopia is revealed to be hollow (Shigaraki’s word of the day) and fake. My Hero Academia already showed the utopia of a world where people get to live with their Quirks is fake, not only by (largely necessary) regulation of those Quirks but also, as we’ll see more with Spinner, Compress, Toga, Gigantomachia, and others, looking different, or being socially aware, or having disabilities, or being the “wrong” size, excluded you from that society.

What I’m trying to say is that, once you add superheroes into a story to fix the problem, you can’t show what systematic change looks like. How do you write a story where it makes sense that no hero came to save Tenko Shimura from becoming Tomura Shigaraki? What’s a story like My Hero Academia supposed to do to show the problems with a society, if you have superheroes who can fix those problems by beating up the bad guys?

Solution: You have the bad guys beat each other up.

In this corner, the League of Villains, people who were made outcasts because they did not fit in--which reveals the flaws of a society that is not accepting people who may not be able to change their past or their bodily conditions.

And in this corner, the Meta Liberation Army--which reveals how society breeds people in business, media, and politics who abuse laws and societal norms to elevate themselves and create a social Darwinist nightmare.

Granted, these are some foolish schmucks for starting up this fight in public, but I’ll address how the MLA just doesn’t work in a later episode review.

But for now, let the fight begin. No matter who wins, at least we see how society at large allowed these Villains to emerge--and we can either see All For One’s dictatorial forces get wrecked, or see Re-Destro’s fascistic oafs get wrecked.

Unfortunately, no matter who wins, the Pro Heroes are going to lose, too.

I am overly impressed with myself for realizing all of this. And I say “overly” not only because this is arrogant of me but also because I’m pretty sure just about every other person following this series already came to this conclusion: if you want to show actual systematic change, you have to show what the villains are up to, because they are the ones showing the holes in our society that need to be fixed. Either a villain exploits those holes to cause damage to people, or the villain is themselves representative of unfairness in the system and, by breaking the law to save themselves and others, are unfairly maligned as villains.

That being said, I’m not a big fan of the “[Insert villain’s name here] was right” arguments. Yes, Magneto is justified in his goals and ethics, and the debate is the means he takes to them, so his existence is to show why the X-Men are screwing up and need to be more radical. Yes, Killmonger is right that Wakanda’s isolationism is reckless and allows for travesties to persist, but his choices are largely out of individual desire for vengeance, so he’s an example that T’Challa can follow. Taken too far, though, and you get people who preach anti-establishment notions without having an alternative or are just trying to sound edgy rather than actually pointing to the actual problem: it’s someone who celebrates the Joker without recognizing that, no, you don’t want to be that asshole, or who celebrate villain-turned-hero Vegeta just because he looks cool and without appreciating what steps he took to change and what fall he experienced before he got to the point of being a villain.

In all these cases, if done poorly, you have the same tired trend of a villain existing only so long so that the hero changes for the better. It’s as tiresome as I unfortunately sometimes feel reading post after post celebrating how complex and sympathetic the League of Villains’ members can be when, still, a lot of them are just assholes using empty excuses to defend atrocious behavior (primarily, just All for One) or, for the most part, are people put into desperate situations (Shigaraki, Toga, Spinner, Dabi, Twice) who are doing the best they can (Twice, Spinner) even if their actions are not defensible (Toga) or also out of line (Shigaraki) due to their own refusal to seek the legitimate help they need to work through their issues (Dabi).

It’s hard to read posts online calling the League members sympathetic when we have not had a chance in the anime to know their full story. And as with the slow revelation that this setting is not really as welcoming of people of all shapes and sizes as initially hinted, so too do the villains’ backstories show that they were justified in some actions they took, except for those that led to deaths. Too bad none of that really pops up in a meaningful way in this episode that would rather tease out Shigaraki’s back story, keep dangling the obvious answer to who Dabi really is, and short-sells what should be a meaningful friendship between Twice and Giran but is just dropped as fast as Shigaraki takes off Twice’s mask. Jeez, Shigaraki, that is a dick move to Twice…

But I’m already on Page 4 of this rant, so let’s get to the episode already.

Pulling back the curtain yet again, these reviews tend to follow a pattern. Since I first wrote about the MHA anime, my process would be to first re-read the chapters, then watch the episode in Japanese, then watch the episode in English, so as to retrace my steps in how I first encountered most of these stories, as well as to see any patterns in the production process moving from manga to anime to localization. But with this episode, that practice was made nearly impossible given how prevalent the hostility towards this episode, this arc, and this season have been, especially when a friend shared numerous reactions from other viewers about this episode. Seriously, for all the whining I just did the previous four pages, you could read this person or this person who are much better at explaining why the introduction of Re-Destro to the anime sucks, for more than one reason.

So, I had a different approach: I already had the flaws to this episode shared with me by other viewers, then I listened to the English dub, then I re-read the chapters, then I watched the Japanese dub with English subtitles.

And, boy, am I grateful I took that approach, because this episode is a ton of talking--too much talking. For an anime adaptation that cut so much of Spinner’s Leonardo from Ninja Turtles narration, I’m shocked that they kept the boring parts of his narration and cut the only good parts, including the very opening that had a lot more action and gave us a reason to sympathize with these Villains.

I know I’m a snob regarding animation; I have expressed before how, despite my love for animated works, I tend to appreciate them more for what they do with storytelling rather than the spectacle of the visuals. I really dislike works where the value of the work is in the animation alone: I am here to see a story unfold, and if there is no narrative, no plot, no beginning-middle-and-end, then what I’m encountering is a museum piece, not a work of cinema. (Feel free to bash me for that hot take: I’m still railing against Patty Jenkins’s ridiculous argument from this week.)

And as with most forms of karmic punishment I experience, I pay the price: if I rail long enough about works that are only all about the animation and not the story, then my punishment is an episode where all we get is a lot of story and not much in the way of animation. Yet I can’t even say we got a story here, so much as back story, exposition, needless narration--it’s Blade Runner only bad. As much as I have loved how this anime’s storyboards stick so close to the manga panels, the pan over the League listening to Shigaraki’s vague back story felt like the least interesting way to handle this scene, especially when it excises so much of Spinner coming around from questioning Shigaraki to sympathizing with him. Who would have imagined cutting so much of Spinner’s initial narration and the opening from Chapter 220 would screw up how to adapt Shigaraki’s back story from Chapter 222.

The anime cuts how this arc begins in the manga: Chapter 220 starts with Spinner facing off against an extremist group that hates him for his reptilian appearance--a moment that would have garnered more sympathy from the audience for these Villains than this episode is exhorting. We needed a scene to get behind these villains and agree with them, before we are shocked to hear Shigaraki say what we have long expected, that he just wants to destroy everything and make everyone as miserable as he has felt, to wake us up that, no, you may sympathize with these outcasts (to use Twice’s one-word self-description), but you shouldn’t agree with Shigaraki’s goals. (I know Shigaraki relents somewhat when asked by Toga, but it’s hard to backtrack from “destroy it all” to “destroy it all but not the stuff my friends like.” How on Earth is Shigaraki going to destroy Izuku when Spinner somewhat admires the guy and Toga...well, yeah, best left unsaid.)

While watching this episode, I also was reviewing other topics about anime and manga I’m going to go into more detail about later this month, and one topic of discussion is the assumption that anime and manga, by their visual style and story tropes, especially shojo and shonen, tend to be about big expressions--emotional outpours in words, movements, facial expressions, and actions to more easily communicate what is happening, regardless of context.

I hate to keep repeating “ambivalent” in my reviews (another academic word I need to expunge from my lexicon for a bit), but I’m ambivalent about that argument, that anime and manga, especially shojo and shonen, are better at communicating. If your character is unreadable, that likely has an intentional reason: we don’t get much of a read on the Doctor in this episode, not helped by his mustache and glasses, but we also don’t get a read on what Shigaraki is up to.

This episode only heightens my regard, not just about anime, manga, shojo, or shonen, but in animation and comics at large, that not everything is readable in what a character is planning.

On the one hand, I do agree that visual works tend to make ideas easier to comprehend for some people who can engage with such visual works. As someone who teaches English literature and writing in a United States setting, I use comics in my teaching to cross language and cultural barriers, especially for students for whom English is not their primary language or who are the first in their family raised in the United States. And this teaching approach also helps in reverse: I include manga and anime in my teaching to show how not all details cross language and cultural barriers in a one-to-one correspondence, hence the challenges of translation and localization, and how all of us struggle to make ourselves understood within our own primary language to someone else who is fluent in that language, let alone trying to translate into another language or to present ourselves in a different set of cultural norms.

On the other hand, anime and manga are not a fixed genre. Yes, I agree that the images tend to emphasize big eyes, big expressions, and big motions--but that’s like saying all animation is Looney Tunes, or all animation is Disney, or is Dragon Ball, and so on. Likewise, as I’ve discussed elsewhere, shonen is more than just one type of storytelling, and the same goes for shojo. This arc of My Hero Academia is placing focus, after admittedly far too long, on the Villains as the protagonists--and their behavior pokes holes in the idea that things are obvious, when the Villains are themselves such liars, so crafty, have their own hidden agendas, are keeping secrets from each other. It’s as if their behavior is a commentary on this plot and how BONES is adapting it: the Villains are keeping secrets, so this plot is going to keep its secrets for just who Re-Destro and the Meta Liberation Army are, what their personalities are like, and what Shigaraki and the Doctor have in mind for getting what he wants. We’re even kept in the dark as to Shigaraki’s full back story; we’re in the same position he is, knowing just little bits and able to make assumptions from a handful of visual cues and memories, without fully knowing who the hell Tenko is. Add to that Spinner’s struggles to narrate all of this and to get into Toga’s mind and Shigaraki’s mind, as well as Dabi’s own secrets and agenda with Hawks, and we have a story that blows up the notion that anime and manga are easier for reading a character’s mindset: no, they are not always easier, not when the creators deliberately mislead the audience or keep them in the dark for a surprise.

By keeping so much of the audience in the dark, so that we become aware of how deceitful villains can be, and we are put into Shigaraki’s place of not knowing where he came from. This should be a set of brilliant choices by BONES to adapt this arc in this manner. But the problem is, no, almost none of this gets anywhere close to brilliant. It’s not brilliant--it’s frustrating, because we already know what is going to happen. You can just pull up the manga at low cost with a Viz account and read all of this in the order it was originally presented and get the answers ahead of time. And if you’ve been reading the manga all along, you already know how this arc ends, and you know stuff from the next set of arcs so that you do know already what Shigaraki’s back story is, what Dabi was really up to, who survives, who dies. You even learn more about Compress’s back story--stuff that really should have been hinted at much earlier in the manga, and could have been hinted in this adaptation but as of this episode has not.

Maybe that is why the anime removes Re-Destro murdering his assistant: it’s such an odd moment that it is challenging for me to get a read on Re-Destro, as he alternates in the manga between being very friendly and devoted to his comrades but also violent and heartless.

It may be obvious that I didn’t like much of this episode. I think when I stopped taking this episode seriously was when I heard the voices. Like I said, I tend to start with the Japanese dub first before getting to the English dub. And I have nothing at all against English dubs: I would not be listening to them as much as I have, often first before I ever hear the Japanese, and I would not be a fan of so many English-speaking actors in dubs if I had any animosity to the craft, their work, and the benefit they provide for creating a larger audience for these stories. And nothing against Larry Brantley and Sonny Strait, but some of this casting feels off. I wasn’t able to take this episode seriously as soon as I heard the voice distortion that was used for Re-Destro’s phone call: that took me out of the story. If I had the chance for localization, I would really need Twice or someone to call out how freaking ridiculous that Mickey Mouse voice sounded. You have freaking Sonny Strait here: use the Krillin voice, use the Chibi Ragnarok voice, use the Usopp voice--use something, really go bizarre here, it’s just a voice distortion device! And as I said, nothing against Strait, but when I hear Re-Destro when I read the manga, that’s not the voice I have in mind. For right now, HIroaki Hirata in the Japanese dub is closer to that smoothness I expected for this character. But I have no doubt Strait will do excellent as Re-Destro’s empowered form: think Strait’s role in The Intruder II from Toonami. It’s just that Re-Destro in the English dub is lacking that odd refinement I was expecting.

Granted, it’s the same problem for me when I hear Brantley as Spinner: I am making unfair assumptions that don’t suit the goals of the creators when it comes to this character. It is sadly not as obvious in this episode as it is in the manga: this arc in the manga starts with Horikoshi invoking Laird and Eastman’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles by having Spinner, who is already a sword-wielding reptilian martial artist, narrating just like how Leonardo narrating at the beginning of the very first issue of TMNT. I wanted a voice for the English dub that is like Leonardo’s, a little higher pitch and more youthful, like what Brian Tochi brought in the live-action Turtles film or what Cam Clarke and Michael Sinterniklaas bring in the animated versions. I think, for the Japanese dub, Ryo Iwasaki’s performance as Spinner is very close to what I expected. But that also may seem too obvious: Spinner may be young, but giving him an older-sounding voice can belie his inexperience, youthfulness, and naivete, similar to how people make assumptions about him by his reptilian appearance. The anime is putting me into my place--I think of Spinner one way other than who he really is, so I’m no better than the people around him who have discriminated against him for his physical appearance.

Just as I have a set of assumptions that unfairly influence how I would cast Spinner, I also think Re-Destro should have sounded more refined and less graveley in the English dub. But my expectations belie that, just the Joker whom he resembles, Re-Destro puts on this cultured facade to hide that he is just another violent gangster thug, someone who would kill his own assistant. I know I cited examples above about how complex Re-Destro is, but it’s hard for me to see him as sympathetic just because he’s crying over something he did out of his own volition: he coldly killed his office assistant Miyashita, his tears and kind words don’t suddenly make this a warm and cuddly death, we don’t get to think of him as our woobie. It only makes it more irritating that BONES so far has cut not only that scene of Re-Destro killing Miyashita but also Re-Destro’s TV commercial: it would clue us in that the reason he has that gravelly voice is because, no matter how much he tries to present himself on TV, he is not that kind of a man.

But since I invoked the Joker comparison to Re-Destro, yeah, I’m disappointed we didn’t get Troy Baker as Re-Destro, as unlikely as I imagine that would be to happen, regardless of Baker’s previous work with Funimation. It does lend a bit more to conspiracy theories on my part, though, given casting director Colleen Clinkenbeard telling Twitter followers to stop expecting Mark Hamill in MHA, it’s never happening--we can’t even get Troy Baker doing his Mark Hamill Joker.

(I’m not being fair to Baker: I’m not saying his Joker is at all bad--it is not, he has been excellent as Joker, especially playing him and Batman in the Ninja Turtles crossover film, but it is obvious Baker is performing the kind of Joker that came out of Hamill, so I’m trying to say he’s doing the “Hamill Joker,” rather than the “Nicholson Joker,” the “Ledger Joker,” or the “Caesar Romero Joker”).

It’s also a challenge to sympathize with these characters when we aren’t getting what this arc should give them: a re-introduction. I hate approaching this episode in a post-James Gunn The Suicide Squad world, but seeing how much MHA owes to not The Suicide Squad of the comics but that motif in so many superhero comics, there is that missed opportunity to reacquaint the audience with who are the members of the League of Villains. So, where the hell is my freeze-frame re-introduction to each League member? There was that fan theory a long time ago that Giran was really Present Mic in disguise: imagine doing Present Mic’s introduction of characters by name, Quirk, and pithy comment, only it’s Giran in the announcer seat this time.

(Don’t even get me started on how annoying it is to have Izuku handling the post-credit preview: give that to Spinner.)

Again, maybe it is brilliant for BONES not to include some re-introduction scenes, whether narrated by Giran or happening naturally in conversation between these characters. These Villains barely know each other’s back story, so there’s no artifice where they would believably share their back stories to each other in conversation in this context. And as I said, Shigaraki does not know enough about his own past, and Dabi is hiding his real identity. But when we’re stuck with Spinner as our half-hearted narrator, who seems not to know why he and Toga are still here with Stain being gone, and when Toga is this dull in her answer about what keeps her going after Stain’s arrest, and when Spinner himself seems not to know what he’s still doing here, all of that does not communicate a reason for us to keep going with this story.

I know this arc is going to get better, storywise at least, just based on how it went in the manga. I can only hope that the animation can capture the chaos that the original manga illustrations showed. But I am trying to think what a new viewer is going to do if this is their introduction to this series. I’m not invoking the Episode 7 Rule, I’m not doing a hypothetical experiment to gauge which episodes are the best to bring a newbie into this series--I am asking, honestly, if a fan was already into this series, and was watching it one Saturday morning, and a friend or roommate or relative saw them watching, they would be utterly lost about why they should care about this. Even the explanation for why Twice is indebted to Giran is presented as such an afterthought that does disservice to a potentially emotional moment, to what is supposed to be a pretty deep friendship, as deep as it can be for a weapons trader like Giran and an outcast-turned-criminal like Twice, so that, when Twice helps rescue Giran, we feel that emotional payoff.

It is honestly shocking that, for all the throwbacks, recaps, and flashbacks we get, including how Giran’s fingers match up to previous places where the League fought, that this still leaves a new viewer in the dark. And the problem lies at the feet of MHA arriving at a fifth-season slump: the series has gone on so long that things feel lazy and making far too many assumptions on what knowledge the audience is bringing. You’re not getting a bigger audience if you keep appealing to the diehard fans and the people reading the manga. After all, why would you keep doing ridiculous recaps and flashbacks if the fans already know what happened?

But speaking of the recaps and flashbacks, that should have been how this episode redeemed itself. As I said last time, if you re-worked the order of episodes to start with the Oboro Shirakumo story, that would be more shocking. But what if this episode could have been the very first episode of the season, and following the trend of previous seasons, make it a recap episode? We already had Izuku narrating a clip show, Class 1A at the pool, a photojournalist visiting the UA Dorms--it would be so much more interesting seeing “League of Villains camping in the woods while in the background Shigaraki gets squished by a giant.” Have the Villains tell campfire stories about how they got here: it would be a great excuse to re-use the animation and save on the budget. You could fit in a few gags, as Toga starts telling a really gruesome story but gets distracted by all the blood in it, while Twice’s story bounces between sugar-sweet happy and grim-and-dark chaos, while Compress and Spinner are stuck trying to keep them focused. It’d be a hell of a lot more interesting than how BONES somehow screwed up a potentially emotional volatile moment between Izuku and Amajiki that would put into question whether Izuku is going to have to kill a Villain and just how devastated Amajiki feels after Mirio lost his Quirk.

And speaking of whether Izuku is going to have to kill a Villain: obviously, this arc is setting up how much more dangerous Shigaraki is than UA gave him credit. Back in Season 2, I hated how Nezu and UA staff referred to him as a “man-child,” given the connotations that have surrounded masculinity and being a man. I wrote that before 2016; in this post-2016 atmosphere, and the increased prevalence of toxic masculinity, I am, once again, that annoying word ambivalent. I am likewise ambivalent how well this series has shown Shigaraki to be able to form the plan he does by episode’s end. We’re only told by Spinner how much faster Shigaraki is getting and how much slower Gigantomachia has become--but the animation doesn’t show that. And we’re being told how great Shigaraki’s plan is--when it sounds ridiculous.

By cutting so much of Spinner’s narration from the manga, we also don’t get a scene where Spinner confronts Shigaraki to ask him what is his plan. Up to that point, Shigaraki has said that, with Kurogiri gone over the last month and the computers at the old League hideout destroyed, they can’t reach the Doctor. Spinner is insistent: what is the plan? Shigaraki responds that he just told them--as Gigantomachia crashes through their hideout. The other characters explain for readers like me who aren’t following: Shigaraki just said Kurogiri was gone; to contact the Doctor, Kurogiri sought Gigantomachia; Gigantomachia would sniff out where Shigaraki is and bring him to the Doctor. Brilliant--that shows more attention to Shigaraki’s planning and scheming, and now, it’s not even here in the episode to make me think this guy is that smart. (This episode also had Shigaraki reveal his plan to have Gigantomachia attack the MLA, whereas it was Spinner who predicted that was going to be Shigaraki’s plan--so, again, we’re not letting Spinner stand out as smarter than we expected, either.)

I know Shigaraki is supposed to be our chessmaster, given his association with gaming, especially when he was faking his ignorance about shogi to lower Overhaul’s guard before defeating him and stealing his Quirk-cancelling bullets. But I’m having the same problem I had when following All For One throughout this anime: it just feels like these two antagonists are getting ahead out of sheer luck and because everyone else is a fool, not because either of them are that great as villains. Give me a Xanatos, give me a Luthor, give me a Norman Osborne (not Clone Saga Osborne, a different one). Show me Shigaraki is more than a pawn for All For One and the Doctor, because I don’t feel anything here, not even when we’re supposed to feel that Shigaraki has some legitimate concern for All For One that just isn’t getting communicated to me, whether by my stubbornness or because the content is not giving the animators and actors what they deserve. Eric Vale can sell the hell out of a scene, but Shigaraki’s talk about All For One is not giving that opportunity to the actor.

My remarks this time are a lot more disorganized and doesn’t really arrive at any conclusion. I have more to say about how this arc works and doesn’t work, especially when it comes to how ridiculous the MLA comes across in underestimating the League, but we’ll get to that next time.

[mymelancholiesblues]

No, Mia isn’t  "low-tier" compared to Ada (morally speaking, or w/e) – a measured answer?/essay

So, a couple of Ada haters tried to put up a false symmetry between both of these characters there on twitter, and it inspired me to put my own thoughts down in a more articulate essay as to why that's (Ada's somehow being morally worse than Mia) not sustained by canon in Resident Evil.

standing there, killing time

can't commit to anything but a crime

all the good girls go to hell

'cause even God herself has enemies

and once the water starts to rise

and heaven's out of sight

she'll want the Devil on her team. ⁕

First things first: let us debunk the false symmetry that they tried to establish between these two characters with extremely distinct archetypes – and worse, the following replies to this false symmetry and its poor arguments trying to validate it, pointing out that, in fact, no, character B (that would be Ada, btw) – which is so evidently and ridiculously different from character A (and that would be Mia) – is, in fact, WAY WORSE than character A, and then proceeding to assert some unsupported propositions about misogyny in Resident Evil (which, tbh, definitely IS a recurring problem in the franchise, but that in this case particularly, little or does not apply AT ALL) and how Ada contributes to "the perpetration of a biological cold war".

Starting with what differentiates Mia from Ada grotesquely: we know NOTHING of Ada's true alliances in RE's world. Mia, however, canonically worked for a group that participated in the importation and exportation as well as the manufacturing, testing and marketing of biological weapons: "The Connections", a CRIMINAL SYNDICATE which, amongst other things, was also involved in money laundering, assassinations as well as weapons and drug trafficking. I don't care at all about Mia, so I don't intend to waste much of my time going on about her role in the plot, but people should've already realized by just that much how infinitely dishonest is to try to put these two characters as "similar" ones, or argue that Ada is somehow worse.

Another detail that shouldn't escape anyone's attention too, are the origins and nationalities of both – and yes, I intend to briefly bring up racism against eastern-Asian looking characters (a silent plague that takes form by each passing day in all fiction fandoms) and anti-China xenophobia, but for now, hold this tea there just before I drop it: Mia is canonically American, and previously a Texas-state resident; meanwhile, we have no confirmation of Ada's nationality except for her pretty evident Chinese ancestry. But, as I said, hold it there for a while.

i) espionage — the job

red so silent

wait a minute

or just a little while.

what are you looking for? ⁕

At all times that Ada's "job" was brought up in this franchise, in ALL of her cameos, she has NEVER been called a mercenary in the original Japanese. She's always referred to as a SPY. Even in RE2R, the most recent title in which she's featured in, the original text of the game makes a point of labelling her as a SPY (and not a mercenary) in the dialogue that transpires between Annette and Leon.

It's the North-American translation and correspondent localization that now and then falls for the equivocal use of this other term. This distinction is important since espionage NECESSARILY implies operating in an organized service for, perhaps a country, or a political cause, or a class/group, or a corporation, or whatever. While a mercenary is someone who's acting per their self financial interests, indiscriminately selling their specialized "labour" and skills to anyone who'll offer more.

Ada's not a mercenary, she's a spy. But Mia, in addition to being hired to a canonically criminal company, was also the handler personally assigned to Eveline. I don't care how exactly Mia got in that predicament but the fact is: Mia was canonically employed by a company that profited over illicit activities and directly watched as a family was destroyed and toyed with by this new killing machine (Eve). Yet, we can't state for sure that we know to whom or to what Ada is truly affiliated with.

ii) sources — check them

who's a heretic now?

am I making sense?

how can you make it stick?

and I'm on a trial

waiting 'til the beat comes out. ⁕

This fandom should put a little more thought into which translation and localization of the game texts, dialogues and files they are using to support their arguments. I know that in some cases the United States people have a bit of an inclination to think of themselves as the owners of the planet and deem English as the only language that matters in this world, but let's not forget that RE is a Japanese franchise (wow, insane, right?!). Therefore, the most valid script, with the greatest amount of details, and highest credibility, is the Japanese original. Throughout these years, there have been several errors in translation and localization of the Japanese original to North-American English. And, believe me, curiously enough, plenty of those concern Ada, since she's often mentioned or referred to in a very vague way – without the use of pronouns or adjectives or adverbs that could help in indicating gender. This ended up causing those details and mentions to her to get overlooked, even though in the Japanese text it was a clear reference to her character (per observation of context).

iii) the good guys — one of

head in the dust

feet in the fire

labour on that midnight wire

listening for that angel choir

you got nowhere to run

careful son, you got dreamers plans

but it gets hard to stand. ⁕

Yes, as much as haters try to minimize it, it is SIGNIFICANT that Ada saved so many important characters and stood for unquestionably heroic actions in so many moments - like stopping everything she was doing so she could help completely random Chinese civilians with the helicopter she managed to pilot in that chaos in China (yeah, I know you haters love to forget about this, but it happened, it's there in canon, and no, it wasn't her direct OR indirect responsibility what was going on in China: REPLAY RE6 and for the love of GOD, never again argue that what she did was somehow "the equivalent of evacuating a city after selling a WMD to destroy that same city". It's a case of pure intellectual dishonesty to say such a thing. It's canon that Carla was the one who caused what happens in China, PLEASE, PLAY RE6).

Furthermore, Ada shows compassion on some occasions even for characters who are directly putting her in harms ways, like Annette (in RE2 OG, right after - in order to defend herself - she slaps Annette leading her to lose balance and collapse over the sewers fences, Ada makes an effort in trying to pull Annette back and prevent her from falling) and Carla.

Replay RE4 and pay attention to it, pay attention to her solo campaign: getting involved with Leon's journey in Spain hasn't brought any real benefit to her mission or herself: Ada deviates from her main path several times due to worrying about him and trying to help him and almost ends up dead in several of these occasions over her insistence in doing so: by saving him from Bitores Mendez, by helping him and Ashley against Sadler, by confronting Krauser and stopping him.

It's so lazy to only read/listen to a file in which she says in English that "Leon might be useful to her plans" (this is way more nuanced in the Japanese original of Ada's Report), and ignore everything that was SHOWN in the game: every effort she made to ensure that Leon could rescue Ashley, remove the parasite from his and her bodies, and escape from that hell-island.

The jet-ski she left for their escape was ALREADY there before she was captured by Sadler (or you think she arranged it while she was caught?). Leon having to intervene and save her from Sadler WASN'T her plan. It WASN'T her plan to take the sample from Leon's hands. She wanted to help him get out of there with Ashley and she guaranteed he could do so, she wanted to get the sample by herself and escape too while sending that hell to kingdom's come. But, because she chose to help Leon rescue Ashley right in front of Sadler, she ends up captured.

On her end, Mia never did anything minimally compared to that, and all of her "selflessness" or self-sacrificing actions involved a much, MUCH smaller scope than Ada's: wanting to help her husband and HERSELF is not at all comparable to saving a few dozens of unknown Chinese civilians. So no, they aren't "cut from the same cloth". They don't come from the same place, nor do they share the same intentions or goals, and their contributions to the RE storyline are quite different.

iv) unknown true purpose (shades of grey)

lining up in the background

waiting for the crowd shot to be seen

in the shadow of the big screen

everybody begs to be redeemed. ⁕

In databooks, Ada is recurrently described as "a Chinese spy with extraordinary physical abilities, vigorous health and composed mind and spirit, capable of coping with grim situations and handling even the most difficult requests without losing composure". If we are paying attention to the storytelling ingame, however, we know that this isn't always the case: Ada did let her mask of unswerving emotional and physical strength fall and showed a very fragile side under strenuous circumstances a couple of times already.

Also, in these databooks, they often point out that "she has her own 'true purpose' and has FREQUENTLY betrayed organizations and clients to achieve it". Huh, we can AGAIN, by this only, see how completely different she's from Mia, who personally watched an entire family being driven to insanity by Eveline's hand.

Furthermore, in these databooks, it's often said that "this true purpose is still obscure and whether she truly cared for anyone or simply used her charms to manipulate people that crossed paths with her isn't ever clear". If people are willing to be open-minded and exercise their text comprehension skills, though, they'll see that in multiple occasions of emotional confrontation it has been established time and time again that yes, Ada DOES care. She wasn't capable of shooting Leon and there has been a couple of other times that failing to choose a cool, sociopathic calculation and pragmatical demeanour over empathy and humanity towards others has put her in harms ways: nonetheless she still chose it.

v) positive impact

I'm gonna break the cycle

I'm gonna shake up the system

I'm gonna destroy my ego. ⁕

To this point, RE's plot systematically leads us to believe that Ada has been covertly acting behind the scenes of multiple biological incidents COLLECTING INFORMATION (the job of a spy, who would've thought! lmao), that is valuable to numerous organizations, companies, groups and different contexts, but at the same time of allegedly offering to handle this knowledge for the right price to the big players involved with bioterrorism and clandestine trading of bioweapons, she's also working to sabotage said players.

This is evident throughout the franchise: she intended to hurt Umbrella's business. She outwitted and deceived Wesker multiple times. She even undermined Simmons, someone who was in a position of power in the US government and actively using that position to lead bioterrorist ventures on the parallel side.

There's no concrete evidence or hint as to what she does with the information she collects, and for all purposes and effects, I can presume that she's gathering this knowledge to assist in the discovery of countermeasures and vaccination studies. I might as well argue that she is a Chinese spy who is working against European and North-American capitalism and the imperialism that creates such monsters like the biochemical and bioweapons industry and that her real objective is to dismantle the market for bioweapons and bioterror supported mainly by the USA (see: Simmons and The Family).

That is, as long as it is unclear what her true purpose is, I have the freedom to surmise whatever the heck I want and that all of what she's been doing was for the sake of the greater "good" - and I'll even have canon moments to support this reasoning as it's clear that she regularly sabotages her customers (customers that are unquestionably established as playing for the "evil" side, with perverse intentions) - throughout the franchise. She did this on RE2, RE4, RE6 and Damnation. It's there, transparent in canon, people just choose to ignore it.

She laughs in the face of whoever she's talking to by the end of Damnation, saying she doesn't intend to deliver the Plaga; she scoffs at Simmons; she betrays Wesker and kills Krauser. She had been sabotaging Wesker for so long, that he sent Krauser to be the main agent in the mission in Spain, and Ada was just a "side effect" that he didn't have in control and had to keep an eye on, so he ordered Krauser to keep tabs on her. It's not a mutually beneficial dynamic. Ada doesn't want Wesker to succeed, she despises him; this is clear in the games in which they interact. There are even files that indicate that she was trying to double-cross and get in the way of his plans for at least 2 years before Spain, and he was constantly catching up with her. See here and here.

On her end, Mia was employed by and consciously working for a criminal syndicate.

vi) a (secretly) helping hand

oh, I'm a master pretender

just felt more alone

the further I'd go

but I'll stick around

I'll be your master defender

yeah, I'll stick around. ⁕

Ada approached characters such as John Clemens and Luis Sera, and both had a canonical intention to, in addition to putting an end to their connections with the criminal companies and organizations they've been working for, also expose and denounce them for their crimes. It's in this context that Ada comes into contact with them. And why is that?

Check John's background: he had made up his mind about disclosing Umbrella's crimes to the public. Check Luis' background: Ada went to Spain to assist in his extradition since he feared for his own life if he resolved to turn his back on the cult of Los Illuminados, and also dreaded the consequences of the liberation of Las Plagas on an international scale.

Keep in mind that Ada handed over to Wesker a USELESS Plaga sample. Wesker only got the sample currently circulating in the underground market because he went after Krauser's body. We don't know what Ada did with the master Plaga sample she obtained. We only know from Ada's Report and the Plaga Recovery file that she didn't deliver it to Wesker, and he needed to go out for a plan B to get it.

Even the G-Virus sample that fell into the hands of the clandestine business, it's possible to argue that Ada's involvement in it was flimsy, since Simmons CANONICALLY made over a thousand laboratory tests in Sherry, and, as we know, he was a leading figure in bioterrorism and bioweapons trading with the aid of his position in the US government.

But, guess what, Ada clearly is a non-white character with obvious Chinese heritage and Mia is white, so of course, OF COURSE, someone can so nonchalantly affirm that Ada, this "vile bitch", is somehow WORSE than Mia. The same Mia who watched the Bakers being destroyed. Right.

Also: trying to validate one's point by claiming anything related to the misogyny present in RE franchise, while IN THE SAME BREATH AND TWEET reducing Ada's entire character arc to that of "a sociopathic bitch cured by the magic dick of her love interest" is supposed to be a joke, right? No, really. Joke.

conclusion and a word against misogyny

we are waiting on a telegram to

give us news of the fall

I am sorry to report

dear Paris is burning after all

we have taken to the streets

in open rejoice, revolting

we are dancing a black waltz

fair Paris is burning after all. ⁕

To any Ada fan that has been reading this so far: PLEASE, I ask to consider refraining to use the "oh yes, Ada did some bad shit, bUT" take to defend the character because that isn't sustained by canon in RE, lmao. She didn't do anything evil that had an indisputable bad impact on the plot and other characters arcs. For one, I myself do love some villains, but that isn't the case with Ada.

She did do some unconventional shit yes, since she's a morally GRAY character and an anti-heroine, but by the end of the day, each and every action of hers had a positive impact on the journey of other characters and main plot. Just pay attention to it.

Like idk man, Black Widow, Elektra Natchios, Scarlet Witch and Black Cat from Marvel, Catwoman from DC, Yennefer from The Witcher (some pop culture examples that come to mind).

Saying that this is an "extremely selfish prototypal bad bitch except when it comes to the magical redeeming dick of her love interest" it's a grotesque reduction of a complex female character, and, in its attempt to critique the misogyny present in RE's franchise an expression of misogyny in itself.

Remember: Ada has actions and impact on the franchise ASIDE and IN ADDITION to her romantic involvement with Leon.

[wirewitchviolet]

A Little Horrifying Primer on Transphobes

Some time ago, I put together a Little Fact Checking Primer on Trans People, as a basic resource for disabusing people of some of the many completely ridiculous yet absurdly widespread beliefs about trans people that simply have no basis whatsoever in reality. And wouldn’t you know it, every single lie exposed in that primer is not only still widely believed, but is presently being used as a basis to sign some absolutely horrific human rights abuses into law. So it’s high time I follow that up, in this case focused more on who keeps actively spreading these lies and why. I’m going to try and keep things as light as I can here, but we’re going to be looking at the most monstrous side of human nature, so apologies in advance if this is a dark read.

First, let me just note that there are two things I don’t plan to do in this piece. I’m not going to waste time debunking the arguments of the people I’m highlighting (much of this is already covered in my earlier primer, others have done the work in cases where I haven’t, and frankly these people’s claims should be self-evidently utter nonsense to begin with). I am also going to be very selective in what I link to, or even share related images of, as I would frankly not like to fill a post on a blog I generally try to keep safe for all audiences with media directly dealing with, for instance, child sexual assault, and much of the relevant information also involves stochastic terrorism against innocent people, and I would prefer not to throw more fuel onto such fires.

Transphobes lie constantly, about everything.

To some degree this is obvious. We’re talking about people who scaremonger about the possibilities of trans women dominating competitive sports and assaulting people in restrooms, despite the status quo already reflecting the conditions they insist would make these inevitibilities for decades and centuries respectively, and their grim visions never once having come to pass, and also constantly insisting that the woman in the photo below is actually a man, going further to say this is evident to anyone giving her the merest glance.

It goes beyond that though. There’s at least a little plausible deniablity in claims like this, or that “science is on their side” if they were simply uninformed about the world they live in, never actually looking into what laws exist, what science actually says, and never actually meeting a trans person or even seeing a picture of one of us. I’m talking really bold lies here. Like wholecloth fabricating a story that a convicted murder was trans, including anecdotes about wigs dresses and a planned name change, in a major newspaper. Or to cite an old favorite of mine, the time a pack of bigots walked up to a crowd of people peacefully picketing a transphobic legal proposal, started roughing them up and taking closeup photos of members of the crowd to stalk online when they got home, got sufficiently riled up for one to straight up assault an innocent person half her size, filmed the whole thing, uploaded it to youtube, and used stills of that assault as acomanying photos when they went home to write articles about the assailant being a “grandmother” attacked by rowdy trans women. And yes, they did monkey’s paw my wish to see that specific image on newspapers. Interesting side note, when it came to real public light that J.K. Rowling endorsed this sort of hatred, it was because she accidentally pasted some profanity laden rambling about how the imagined moral character of the other party in that incident, years after the fact, into a post praising a child’s fan art of her work.

To be a little less niche, transphobes can’t get enough of spreading the lie that the young fellow in this photo is a girl. Specifically a trans girl, providing proof that all their scaremongering about the dastardly threat of trans girls in competitive sports has finally come to pass.

To be fully clear, that’s a man (or a boy if you want to split hairs about him being 17 in that photo). Mack Beggs. A rather insidious choice for this sort of story, considering the actual context for that photo. See, Beggs attended high school in Texas, during a (still ongoing as I write this) period wherein that particular state had caved to this exact sort of propaganda, and in order to head off a wholly imagined wave of trans girls competing on girls’ sports teams, and enacted a law mandating that in all such competitions must compete under whatever gender is stated on their birth certificates. And as it happens, the first, and to my knowledge ONLY time this has come up was with Beggs here, who again, is a man, as no one with a grip on reality could argue against, has “female” on his birth certificate. Which is another way of saying he is a trans man. The guys in the same boat as trans women who we talk about a whole hell of a lot less because their existence is extremely inconvenient to the majority of transphobic propaganda. Case in point. And this is all information it is really impossible to come across if you’re coming across this photo in any sort of respectable source. Take this story, which is as unambiguous about this as you can get. And yet, in the very comments section of that story, there they are. Carrying on like this story about a trans guy, forced by a transphobic law to compete as a girl, which he absolutely did not want, and received horrific threats over, using phrases like “female to male” and bringing up that he was assigned female at birth and is on testosterone-based HRT, is about a trans woman cheating the system. Or to quote word for word, “Now also transgender female want to be male also compete in female sport. biological born“ That’s not “being confused,” that’s standing next to you in a white desert and complaining about being adrift in a black ocean, bald-faced, not even trying to be convincing just make a power play, lying through one’s teeth.

I could spend this whole article on just this point. Lying about who they are, various people’s falsified credentials, whole websites full of “anonymous parents of children who think they’re trans” turning out to be one single woman documenting the abuse of her very much trans son, or of course the people behind the whole “bathroom bill” panic candidly admitting it was all based on utter fiction. I do have other points to cover though.

Transphobes are firmly entrenched in the media.

It is extremely difficult to find oneself in a position of having to explain to people that a particular group of people is effectively in control of press outlets, as that is rather classically a claim conspiracy theorists absolutely love to toss around at various marginalized groups (including trans people hilariously enough, but of course the most common and lingering version of this is the antisemitic variant). I really can’t get around it here though. Specifically in the U.K., you honestly can say that transphobes control the media. I already touched on this with the assault case I mentioned above and the fabricated story about the murderer, but this is a pretty well-documented situation. I mean, even The Guardian calls out The Guardian on this, and that’s the outlet that gets the most attention because it’s the one with the most otherwise respected name, but every paper in the country has been running transphobic propaganda pieces on a weekly if not daily basis for years now, and while they do get reprimanded by watchdog groups and have mass walk-outs over the worst of it, it’s not like there’s some governing body with the authority to step in about it. Meanwhile the BBC is constantly inviting diehard zealots like Graham Linehan to news programs where he compares being trans to being a nazi, and hosting debates where someone just sits down and repeatedly chants the word “penis” at a trans woman.

Things are better in the rest of the world, but we still have right-wing creeps like Jesse Singal both writing horrific propaganda pieces (we’ll get back to that one) and blackballing trans writers out of covering trans issues ourselves (and personally stalking the hell out of those of us who try). We’ve got our Joe Rogans and Tucker Carlsons out there (no way in hell I’m linking videos here, have a real information link and a still).

The line between diehard transphobes and straight-up nazis basically does not exist.

What even is there to say here? You can easily poke around havens for nazi activity for yourself and compare the particular unique vocabulary used there to the primary bastion of anti-trans hate speech on the internet (the “feminism” section of what was originally a site for parenting tips before violent fascists took the forums over) or just peruse the follows of the thousands of people I’ve blocked on social media and see if you can sort out a clear division in the networks of channers with frog avatars and the accounts with names like GoodieXXrealwoman, or you can read up on Gab and Spinster, the two twitter alternatives that are just different portals to the same server, set up by the same guy. Maybe do some research into “the LGB Alliance,” or WoLF but any way you slice it the only real difference to be found is the general purpose nazis take a little time off now and then to watch borderline pedophilic anime and the really dedicated transphobes think to use language that sounds vaguely well-educated and left-leaning. I mean, this came from the “feminist” side of the fence:

And not to belabor the point here, but the ones claiming to be a bunch of “feminist mums” sure do let the mask slip any time they’re confronted with the fact that “women” includes black women, and oh just have a whole thread about all the weird conspiratory theories these people have about how trans people’s whole existence is some sort of Jewish plot for world domination. I swear a few months ago they were all passing around a story about some bank having an above average number of trans employees and they were all just “and we all know who controls the banks, right?” about it.

Transphobes endorse an awful lot of people who are openly pro-pedophila.

This is the part where I am really loath to link the many many specific examples I have on hand. Or to talk about this at all for reasons of good taste. Or, for that matter, to talk about this in a tumblr post when there’s an ongoing problem of people with backgrounds strongly tied to this site making baseless accusations of pedophilia against every queer person they can find, so let me be very clear just what I’m talking about while avoiding anything too graphic.

That’s James Cantor. Transphobes love him for being one of the closest things they have to a scientist on their side. And I am featuring him in a screenshot here showing that he is followed by current queen of the transphobes J.K. Rowling, while speaking to both another big name in transphobic circles, Debra Soh, and based on their names, what I’m guessing is at least one straight-up nazi. And in case you think “the P” he’s talking about adding to LGBT (or “GLBT” as weird anti-queer bigots who also have issues with women often write it) might stand for “poly” or “pan” he’s all too happy to clarify that.

This is the entire thrust of Cantor’s work and life. He is the world’s biggest pedophile rights advocate. He wants it declassified as a mental disorder, all stigma on it removed, and tirelessly pushes forward the idea that the majority of.. people who feel compelled to sexually assault children are good people who present no potential harm to anyone and should in fact be lauded.

I am not generally one to claim that someone with a PhD is spewing out questionable garbage with regard to their field, but the reason I am aware of Cantor at all is that other transphobes keep trying to hold up a particular post on his blog as "a study” (which it is not) that offers “proof” (in the form of a blurry jpeg of basically some random numbers) of some ridiculous quackery about how trans kids will “grow out of it” if exposed to conversion therapy (another way of saying torture), which Cantor himself seems to be pushing, so I am somewhat skeptical of his academic chops. And I am, of course, REALLY suspicious that all these other bigots gravitate to him purely because they’re that desperate to find anyone with a PhD in anything that backs them up against literally every scientist in a relative field, to the point that they merely forgive his particular advocacy they are plainly all aware of, particularly when such a common fig leaf used by transphobes is “keeping children safe from sexual deviants.”

And of course, Cantor is most often invoked when coming to the defense of Kenneth Zucker. This Kenneth Zucker.

Those are separate papers. Zucker isn’t controversial though for organizing panels to discuss how attractive people agree small children are (at least not exclusively). Mostly, he’s known for running a conversion therapy center which subjected gay and trans children to various sorts of torture in an effort to “fix” them, which at least for those trans "patients” I have spoken with involved a fair amount of having them strip completely naked and talking a lot about their genitals.

Zucker is something of a controversial figure with the transphobic scene, as they are extremely on board with his sexual torture of queer children, but he does actual work (for some value of the term) involving trans people and thus is not able to commit as fully as they would prefer to making life horrible for trans people, due to a professional obligation to acknowledge reality now and then. As an aside, the similarly positioned Ray Blanchard, while not to my knowledge particularly interested in the attractiveness of children, lives in a similar purgatory of trying to reconcile his career, bigotry, and sexual hangups, yielding compromises like this:

Of course, that’s just looking at the straws transphobes grasp at when looking for scientific credibility. Real leaders of the movement include Germaine Greer, author of The Beautiful Boy, which is about what you are afraid it might be, and features a very young child in a cover feature he did not consent to posing for. Or Julie Bindel, who among other things is rather infamous for writing whole articles on subjects like whether a teenage girl she came across maybe has a huge penis you can totally see if you really squint at her skirt. Again, I will not share a link to go along with that one.

Transphobes terrorize and attempt to defund charities and other unambiguously good organizations.

Graham Linehan, previously best known for cowriting some sitcoms and possibly spending a year angling to get into my pants so awkwardly I didn’t pick up on it is now best known for trying to pull the plug on a children’s charity, in a story that somehow also involves Donkey Kong. Well, and the interview about nazis. And possibly the other interview about “defending me from nazis” until it got into his head that I might not be as young and hot as he imagined. Rather not link to a far right extremist youtube channel though.

There’s also a current effort to replace Stonewall (an organization named after the location where a pair of trans women kicked off a riot which is generally agreed to be the start of the LGBT+ rights movement) as the UK’s primary LGBT+ rights organization with the “LGB Alliance.” The hate group mentioned above, with the skull face and the rifle. Closest I can find to an article on that effort on short notice that isn’t propaganda.

Transphobes paper areas in truly disgusting propaganda.

I don’t want to directly link to grown adults skulking around children’s playgrounds and bathrooms plastering surfaces with mass printed stickers of crudely drawn penises, but would encourage you to read this very long post, being sure to load all the images, to really understand how deeply strange this behavior gets.

Finally, I cannot stress this enough, this really extreme behavior I’m citing, and the specific people involved in the examples I’m giving, these aren’t random cranks on the fringe of things. The people going on televised panel discussions, writing up news stories, and testifying before lawmakers in efforts to pass horrifically discriminatory if not literally life-endangering laws (there is a major ongoing effort to legally end all medical care for trans people, and I don’t just mean care directly relating to being trans) are literally the same people involved in the sexualization of children, nazi collaborations, and roving gangs assaulting people in the street. At a bare minimum I urge people, when booking guests and handing out writing contracts, to do background checks and see if they’re platforming actual terrorists. If we could actually bring legal consequences to bear against the worst of this, that would be great too. As things stand though, the whole world is just consistently citing a bunch of racist, woman-hating, serial liars with no real credentials, and questionable attitudes towards the sexual abuse of children, as “trusted experts” and refusing to seat actual trans people or people who have legitimately committed lifetimes to academic and practical work with trans people any seats at the table.

[onisiondrama]

"Onision: In Real Life DEBUNKED” Breakdown & Thoughts

Confirmed by Sarah over a 9 hour phone conversation with Onision

I’ve seen a lot of people speculate this phone call never happened because James’ claim that it was 9 hours long. I can’t lie, that threw me off when I first read it too. 

I believe most likely he is exaggerating the length of the conversation, although it’s not impossible for the them to speak for 9 hours.

The date he claims the call took place on lines up with the dates and times of Sarah’s last 2 tweets. She seemed very upset. I am not going to post them because her account is currently private.

the conversation started January 22, 2021 and ended around 1am her time, it continued laters that morning only to end with Sarah's sister taking the phone away and screaming that she was happy Sarah ruined his life while refusing to give the phone back to Sarah

So they took a break in-between calls. Possibly he is counting the 9 hours based on when their first phone call started and their last call ended.

Her sister taking the phone away and telling him off gives me the impression Sarah was extremely upset while talking to him. I don’t believe this was a confession / begging for forgiveness call like he is trying to make it out to be.

SARAH'S CONFESSIONS DURING COVERSATION 1-22-2021:

I doubt that these were confessions. Based on his past debates and interviews, I think it is more likely James walked her through carefully worded scenarios / events and forced her into answering with a simple yes or no. If she tried to add more or explain herself, he would cut her off and exclaim he was right. That’s how he’s treated others during debates, especially during recent interviews about Sarah’s (& others’) accusations against him, so that is how I imagine the call going down.

- The fraudulent #MeToo'ers were paid to participate in the documentary.

I understand the concept of it being unethical to pay accusers for interviews due to it possibly being an incentive for them to exaggerate, but everyone already participated in free public interviews. Everything they said in the documentary they have already stated multiple times for free. They did not say anything new. I personally don’t see them allegedly getting paid to be on the documentary as a blow to their credibility.

Also, James wanted to be paid to participate as well. So if he participated and was paid, should we no longer consider his claims valid? Especially since he would not just defend himself, but also make accusations against everyone since he claims he is actually their victims. Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was already paid for at least one of his interviews about this whole thing by now.

- Sarah now has enough money to "Make a down payment on a house"

This is so incredibly vague. That could be almost any amount of money. Also, I don’t trust his quotations. He didn’t specify that was a direct quote from Sarah. He could have asked her how much she was paid and she would not say, so he asked if she could make a down payment on a house.

- Sarah again admitted to apologizing twice for raping Onision via sexual extortion.

So she agreed that she said “sorry for raping you guys” twice as she was angrily leaving the house? We already heard that story from him 100 times. He never went into detail about why she left angrily, but I always assumed it was because they got into a fight and that is when he first accused her of rape. I always assumed she said that sarcastically in response to his accusation.

- Sarah made it clear the documentary had her sign a contract of silence so she could not "legally" reveal how much the fraud #MeToo'ers were compensated to be involved.

I don’t think she would know how much other people were paid? I don’t believe she is in personal contact with Shiloh or Regina and I don’t think Discovery would disclose details of their contracts with other participants.

Since Sarah falls under “fraud #MeToo'ers” in James’ perspective, this makes me think she stopped him questioning how much she was paid. Now that I think about it that way,  he may have been taking the “down payment on a house” quote out of context. She may have been giving him an update on her life. He did says she “now has enough money” to do so, but didn’t specify that was because of the documentary.

- Sarah stated she truly hates both Shiloh & Regina (the other fake #MeToo'ers)

We already know this. Sarah and the other victims publicly cut ties with Shiloh and Regina because they chose to stick with Chris Hansen and participate in the documentary. The other victims wanted to stand together and not participate to try to prevent the documentary from happening.

- Sarah admitted Regina & Shiloh are frauds.

If she did, he’s not specifying what was allegedly fraudulent. The way he says “admitted” makes me think he talked about a specific incident and asked her if she agreed it was fraudulent. Like, Shiloh’s tattoo fund or something.

If she admitted she believed Shiloh and Regina were lying about their accusations, he definitely would have said that and not this vague shit.

- Sarah admits she herself intentionally mislead people to make Onision look bad.

Lmao as if she needed to strategically mislead people in order to make him look bad because he was so gosh darn innocent in this whole situation. I definitely believe he lead her into agreeing that she was misleading about one thing that made him look bad and he is using that to justify this broad statement.

- Sarah again admits she was kicked out of Onision's life for comitting a crime against Onision.

He’s just repeating himself. This is the same point as the alleged rape apology.

- Sarah admits she blatantly went out of her way to silence Onision/prevent interviews from happening so he could not deliver facts/evidence.

We already knew about this. Chris Hansen said he decided to drop negotiating an interview with James because the victims asked him not to do it.

This did not “silence” him. He went on plenty of other interviews.

- Sarah admits the laptop she had and mislead people about, in fact had nothing on it.

I am imagining two possibilities:

1. It’s possible James was misleading with his question and asked if there was something specific that he already knew was not on there, like photos of himself or photos of minors.

2. Sarah also sent a cell phone to Chris Hansen and Vincent. Perhaps the internet got mixed up and hyper focused on the laptop when it was really the cell phone that contained the damning nudes Kai sent to Sarah as a minor.

- Sarah admits she only turned her laptop in because the internet pressured her to. Confirming she defrauded countless people to replace the laptop via GoFundMe, not revealing to them the laptop she turned in had nothing on it.

I don’t believe the internet pressured her into originally sending the laptop to Chris Hansen / Vincent. I believe she did it to help the investigation. When she found out it was never given to the FBI months later, she seemed extremely upset.

After she got it back, that is when she noticeably hesitated on what to do with the laptop. People on the internet definitely pressured her into doing something with it before she was ready. Her being pressured into handing in the laptop to the FBI does not prove there was nothing on it. She most likely hesitated because either she did not want to deal with it / needed a break or she did not know who to trust with it.

Sarah was not the one who made the GoFundMe, it was Shiloh. The description said she needed a new laptop while the FBI had it for an investigation. That was true.

I’ve seen the argument that Sarah asking for funds for a laptop was fraudulent because she was fine without one while Vincent had it. Looking back, Vincent told her he was going to remove the hard drive, send the hard drive to the FBI, give the laptop a new one, and send her laptop back. I know during this time she was borrowing a friend’s laptop. This makes sense to me. She was borrowing because she thought it would be temporary. Once she officially handed it over herself to the FBI, she no longer had access to one and needed one for school.

(Washington state law prevents phone conversations being recorded without both parties consenting, Sarah was very concerned the conversation was being recorded, repeatedly asking if she was being recorded - as usual, Onision told the truth, he recorded nothing)

I’ve seen a lot of people talk about ways he could have gotten around this law or legal ways he could have proven this conversation happened. At the very least, he could have taken a screen shot of his call logs to show the date and how long he was on the phone for.

I think it’s worth noting he has recorded people over the phone without their consent in the past. Like Shiloh’s manager and Madison.

I’m not saying he’s outright lying about the call, but I don’t understand why he expected the internet to believe some vague bullet points about a phone call no one knew about about until he randomly made a page on his site for it a whole month after the call took place.

Tl;dr - He’s being way too vague. I believe he is taking a lot of the conversation out of context and manipulatively lead her into answering yes or no questions that would make it look like she’s admitting to the thing he’s accused her of and denounced her past accusations against him.

[chthonic-cassandra]

The world of published Dracula fan fic/spin offs/continuations is a bizarre one, and a continuing source of dubious marvels. Until recently, I did not know that it contained Jeanne Kalogridis’ Diaries of the Family Dracul trilogy, but, now that I do, I am compelled to share this knowledge with you.

This is a Vlad Tepes/Dracula meld, published in the mid-90′s, when that premise still held some novelty, which follows Vlad’s descendants, who are trying to escape a centuries-old bargain which their predecessor made selling their souls to the devil in order to obtain his own immortal vampirism.

The books are marketed as romances, but aren’t really at all, which I imagine has created some disappointed readers; they’re actually really quite dark, with the few scenes of vampiric seduction we get giving way quite quickly to bleakness.

There’s a lot of weirdness to them, and especially in the latter two books, which go increasingly far off the rails as the timeline approaches that of Stoker’s novel (the events of the third book, Lord of the Vampires, are contemporaneous with those of Dracula). 

[cutting here for spoilers and length, though the spoilers are hilarious and you should read them]

The first book is reasonably tightly plotted - nothing special in that regard, but with a contained cast of characters, and a horror narrative that unfolded increasingly disturbing details about Vlad’s plans in a pleasingly ominous manner. I got mildly invested in the story, and in the central characters - Arkady, Vlad’s great-great-etc grandson who doesn’t want to think ill of the man he has been raised to respect as an elder; his lonely sister Zsuzanna, who becomes the object of Vlad’s predations; and Arkady’s British wife Mary, who is the first to suspect something more sinister in the family.

In the second and especially third books, things get more sprawling, confusing, and incoherent. The major twist of the second book is the revelation that Abraham Van Helsing is the son of Arkady and Mary (and thus a descent of Dracula!); the major twist of the third is that Jack Seward is Van Helsing’s son. 

As a Dracula fan, I of course enjoyed the audacity of both twists, and in a few places Kalogridis finds some clever ways of linking her story with Stoker’s own, but generally not enough use was made of the story of Dracula itself, which gets recounted for us sort of laboriously in the third novel without much shading added. (Lucy, Jonathan, and especially Mina also get extremely sidelined in this telling, which is always something of a disappointment.)

What we do get is cosmologically confusing psychic vampirism, vaguely alchemical magic systems, and the inexplicable presence of Ezrebet Bathory, who is confusingly called Elizabeth even by the Romanian characters.

By far the most hilarious element of these novels for me, however, was concealed in the forewards and acknowledgments. Kalogridis thanks Radu Florescu and Raymond T. McNally in her acknowledgments to the second book (and I think also the first?); she tells us that their writings on the historical Vlad Tepes and his linkage to Stoker’s Dracula was invaluable for her, and the source of most of her historical background. Okay, that makes sense - unsurprising source, but it’s nice to see her cite it, sure.

Then, as we open the third book, we see a foreward written by none other than Elizabeth Miller! Grand dame of Dracula scholarship and rival to Florescu and McNally, who has been famously attempting to debunk the association they make between Dracula and Tepes for decades. What is happening here??

I don’t actually have any idea why Miller agreed to write this foreward, which is markedly clipped and restrained; she praises Kalogridis’ attention to some details in Stoker’s novel, while also making sure we understand her argument that Dracula and Tepes are entirely separate people. It’s tremendously bizarre, and I have so many questions about how and why it happened. But the implied academic drama is delicious.

While I can’t exactly recommend these books as books, they were profoundly entertaining as episodes in the history of Dracula reception. If anyone should choose to read them, I must warn you that there are some not great disability representation moments, and some comedic representations of sexual assault (during the vampire brides’ attack on Jonathan, unsurprisingly).

[cloudofash]

Kingdom Hearts - Riku’s Possessiveness and Jealousy Part 3

The Counter Arguments

Please read Part 1 here.

Please read Part 2 here.

Please read Part 2 Addendum here.

So far I have hopefully connected some dots to build up to the claim that Riku was always in love Sora so no one can say I pulled this all out of my rump. While it’s obviously true that I am a HUGE Soriku fan, I didn’t come into Kingdom Hearts with the intention of shipping. Actually, I disliked Riku at first because I looked at him on the surface, but he's now my most favorite character in the series because of his development and I appreciate KH1 Riku now because I looked back and realized why he was such a brat. When I put together that he possibly had feelings for his best friend everything made sense. By KH2 I was like “Hm...Riku seems to harbor very strong feelings for Sora” and by DDD I was like “Oh hell, this boy is in love.” I know that my arguments will not change everyone’s mind, in fact I’m sure many read everything I said and came to the conclusion “Look at this crazy Soriku fangirl, reaching to make her pairing real!” I get it, such is the way in any fanbase. For this reason I would like to dedicate this part of my Jealous Riku series to counter some of the common counter arguments. I promise to shut up about KH1 Riku and his jealousy after this lol, I'll be focusing on current Riku and the series' future.

First and most importantly, how do we know Riku is possessive of Sora because he is in love with him? Couldn’t he just be jealous of others who claim his spot as Sora's best friend? If Riku was just possessive of his best friend in a platonic way then that would pretty much destroy my theory that he is attracted to and in love with Sora. I would say in Riku’s case, no his jealousy wasn't platonic. Riku’s possessiveness goes far beyond what is normal for a best friend. Let’s look back on the scene where he meets Donald and Goofy. If Riku actually bothered to introduce himself and be cordial with Donald and Goofy and Sora sided with Donald even after he refused to let Riku board the ship then I wouldn’t even be here writing this. Riku would have rightfully been angry with his best friend, angry that Sora chose to stick by a rude duck over his childhood friend of however many years. But this didn’t happen. Riku gave Donald and Goofy a hard look within seconds of acknowledging their presence. Though Donald shows that he’s a jerk Goofy was nice, but neither matter because Riku had already decided he didn’t like either of them. This is not normal jealousy, this is clearly a sign of extreme possessiveness. He doesn’t like ANYONE new to be around Sora or act friendly with him regardless of their intentions.

Some will probably claim "It's Kingdom hearts the writing is just bad". This is something I've seen before and I want to stress that this is not an argument it's an opinion. Some think the writing in the series is good, some say it’s decent, it's all subjective. For the sake of argument, let's run with the idea that someone claims "Nomura didn't know how to properly express Riku's jealousy which is why he seemed possessive" to branch off the "bad writing" idea. I have two counters for this: Sora and Isa/Saix. Sora says himself in KH2 that he was jealous of Riku which is why he always wanted to compete with him and hopefully beat him. Sora exhibited a far healthier form of jealousy, he didn’t care if Riku went off and made new friends, Sora never gave any hard side-eyes to Mickey when he found Riku had started hanging out with him. He didn’t start to hate or dislike Riku, he just wanted to compete with and beat him with his own strength. As for the case with Saix, in KH3 he told Axel that he was jealous of his relationship with Roxas and Xion. His jealousy compares greatly to Riku's, he saw someone he was once best friends with get close to someone else. But Saix specifically says:

This is where he differs from Riku, Saix isn't jealous of Roxas and Xion because he's possessive of Axel. Axel stopped hanging around with Saix, stopped helping him look for their missing friend and started focusing more and more on Roxas and Xion which occurred over a period of time not instantly. This goes back to what I said about rightful anger, Saix had every right to feel upset and abandoned by Axel. His jealousy was reasonable. Sora, at no point, alienated Riku the way Axel alienated Saix. Sora never took Donald's side when he said Riku couldn't come, Sora argued with Donald in Riku's defense. Even prior to that, Sora never abandoned or alienated Riku on the island and even when the darkness was swallowing Riku Sora tried to take his hand and go with him. Sora's and Saix's jealousy shows that Nomura/the KH writers (since they do change) know full well how to write jealousy in several different ways, therefore the argument that Riku's possessive jealousy is somehow bad writing is moot. I believe Nomura knew exactly how he wanted to portray Riku. 

Another counterargument that I commonly see is “Riku wasn’t jealous of people close to Sora, he was jealous of Sora himself he said so in KH2″. First of all, Riku said specifically that he was jealous of Sora because he wished he could “follow his heart” the way Sora did and that could be interpreted in a NUMBER of ways that prove my point but I’ll return to that in a second. Some people took this as meaning Riku was jealous of Sora being a Keyblade Wielder but this isn't possible. Riku’s darkness began on Destiny Islands BEFORE Sora even obtained the Keyblade in fact Riku’s darkness is what caused Sora to obtain it in the first place as confirmed by Nomura.

“That part is also a bit vague. In the Destiny Islands when Riku is swallowed by the darkness, there's a sparkle of light, and next comes the scene where Sora first gets the Keyblade, right? In my setting, the darkness wrapping itself around those two is the darkness of Riku's heart. At the moment when Sora enters that darkness, the light you can see is the light of the heart. Sora, trying to help Riku, struggling in the darkness, touches that light and temporarily the Keyblade goes to Sora. “ - Nomura

Riku could not be jealous of Sora being a Keyblade Wielder if it’s HIS darkness, HIS jealousy that leads to Sora getting the Keyblade in the first place. This point has been debunked.

Now if we look at what Riku says about being jealous of Sora because he’s able to “follow his heart”...I don’t know about you but doesn’t that seem like Riku’s admitting that he’s jealous that Sora can follow his heart to Kairi? Sora literally spent all of KH1 following his heart, searching for his crush. Even before that Sora was constantly thinking about Kairi and sharing a papou fruit with her even going as far as to draw himself feeding her the fruit. Riku would only be jealous of this if he was in a position where he couldn’t follow his heart. This point about Riku being jealous of Sora actually backs up what I said about Riku being attracted to Sora and learning that Sora is attracted to Kairi, Riku literally can’t follow his heart to his hetero (hopefully bisexual) crush. This would yet again explain Riku's initial descent into darkness - he had everything he wanted, the strongest, the smartest, the admiration of the other Island Children, the only thing he didn't have is Sora himself and he grew jealous of Kairi, of Sora's feelings for her. Now I’m not saying this is true, because Riku could also be jealous of Sora’s ability to follow his heart to his friends in general and not just his romantic crush. You know, the whole platonic thing which is the most likely meaning behind Riku’s words because KH is all about friendships which is why I did not use this as proof in my essay because I have no way to prove or even show evidence of which way Riku meant it. I’m just saying it is still possible Riku was referring to the romantic side of “following one’s heart”, he could have even meant both.

Now that we have established that Riku’s jealousy was definitely possessive, let’s head to some of the other arguments. There is usually the “Riku is straight argument” which runs along the lines of "Riku said he wanted to share the paopu fruit with Kairi so the one he is in love with is her." Or "Riku is about to be paired with Naminé , he is attracted to girls and is therefore straight." I already addressed Riku’s feelings about Kairi in the 2nd Part, there isn’t really anymore left to add. Namine is also easy to debunk. Nomura confirmed in the KH3 Ultimania that Riku only helped Naminé obtain a Replica body to act on behalf of Repliku’s feelings. In other words, as of now there ain’t nothin’ between them. Riku’s only reason for ever interacting with Namine was to help Sora retrieve his memories and he hasn’t really interacted with her too much beyond that. Not to say Square couldn't pull this pairing out of their ass but it would leave much to be desired since this ship doesn't have the buildup that Soriku has. I hope they never go down the route of throwing random pairs out for the sake of pleasing het shippers.

The final common argument that I see literally EVERYWHERE, in just about any fandom, is the inane argument that “You fangirls just want to make everything gay. Such-and-such is a Japanese work and the Japanese put a higher emphasis on male bonding and intimacy and friendship but it’s not gay, these two characters could never be gay. Japan doesn’t accept homosexuality - blah blah blah”

And wheeeeeew chile, there is so much to unpack here. I honestly didn't even want to touch this but since I see it so much in the KH fandom I felt compelled to address this. First of all, it irks me when people act like homosexuality doesn’t exist at all in Japan. Statistics from 2018 claim that about 8.9% of the Japanese population identify as LGBT+ between the ages of 20 to 59. That’s 1.1% away from being 10% of the ages 20-59 population, that is a significant number. It is incredibly ignorant to claim that Japanese people do not accept homosexuality, they are all individuals and naturally there will be close-minded people who don’t but there are many who do. The conservative Japanese politicians don’t accept it, but then again neither do most American politicians. Don’t mistake the views of the politicians as the views of the people.

Now, while it is true that those in Japan have different views on masculinity than some in America (ie: men soaking in a hot springs together, touching or even sitting on each others laps isn’t incorrectly labeled as “gay” like it most likely would be here in the States) this doesn’t mean that Japanese people don’t know the distinction between platonic intimacy and romantic intimacy. They know full well the difference between the two, it’s awful to claim with such arrogance that they don’t know as if they’re clueless. Even within the anime/manga/videogame industry Shounen-Ai and Yaoi exists with men kissing, hugging, touching romantically. As a matter of fact, the Kingdom Hearts novels themselves heavily imply that there is more between Sora and Riku and that Riku does have romantic feelings for Sora. There was a scene in the KH2 novel where Axel asks Riku "What is Sora to you?" Riku is lost for words, instead Namine answers that they're "best friends" for him. Read it for yourself below:

This is the official Kingdom Hearts novel by the way, the writer and artist (Tomoco Kanemaki and Shiro Amano) are both Japanese. Not a random "fangirl's fanfic". And let's not forget that Nomura approves these novels and the manga. They seem to have no problem writing/approving of Riku being canonically gay. You can dislike it all you want but it’s here to stay so get over it. Don't be the person who makes this horrible argument.

The one last counter I want to make is this: If you are against Soriku ask yourself if you would accept the pairing if Riku was a girl.

This Jealous Riku series focused heavily on Kingdom Hearts 1 but there is content across the entire series which could also act as strong evidence for Riku’s feelings. I could go on for years about how much evidence there is in this series. You can find such evidence plastered all across the net, I will probably touch upon some of it myself. This marks my series' conclusion, I hope the evidence I provided and the counter-arguments I’ve made show that Riku is truly in love with his best friend and that it’s not impossible that Riku could love Sora in a romantic way. Thank you all so much for taking the time to read this!!

[3hmisconceptions]

I doubt you like Edelgard, but would you be willing to do misconceptions for Edelgard? She isn't, for example, a Nazi or facist

So I figured I was going to have to address this sooner or later, and I thank you for bringing it up! In short--for now, I think I’m going to hold off on doing any Edelgard misconceptions. Not because I dislike her--if anything I’m more ambivalent about her as a character (I like her conceptually but was disappointed with her character’s execution, to be specific)--but because there’s a lot of messy writing surrounding her that makes it very difficult to parse out what is and isn’t “true.”

For example, someone could say a common misconception is that Edelgard is trying to take over the continent, and they could point to text in CF about how she’s specifically targeting the church and Rhea. But at the same time, someone could point to the other routes, where she continues the war even after capturing Rhea and her war is specifically described as a “unification” to say that she was intending to take over all of Fodlan. Both claims have textual evidence to support them, so which one is true? Well, that’s up to the player’s interpretation to decide.

There’s a lot of cases like this where there’s directly contradictory things being said and shown. You can point to how she isn’t or doesn’t do something in one route, but then is or does do something in another route (sometimes these contradictions happen on the same route, even), and that makes it very difficult to do this sort of “misconception debunking” like with Dimitri and Rhea, who while different between routes, are still largely consistent enough that there’s not much directly contradictory information. The closest would be Rhea’s extreme actions towards the end of CF, but in that case you can still reconcile who she is on that route with who she is everywhere else because her mental breakdown on CF is consistent with her backstory and PTSD.

Some might argue, “Well you should use CF as the ‘true’ Edelgard because that’s her own route,” but I disagree with this.

I think the appeal of multiple routes in a story is the ability to see different sides to a character, how they develop and change under differing circumstances, what choices they make when presented with different obstacles. A character should still be recognizable as that character in all routes because at their core, they are the same person. I think it’s a disservice to ignore three fourths of a character’s portrayal in a game, which is akin to ignoring three fourths of their depth and development. It’s one of the reasons why, in Dimitri’s case, I make a point to cite evidence on non-AM routes whenever I can, for example. 

With Edelgard, so much is left vague and up for interpretation that I wouldn’t even know how to start with this sort of misconception debunking. Is she okay with faith and only hates the institution of the church, or does she believe faith in general is bad and humanity should live without gods? Well, there’s solid textual evidence pointing to both. 

If I were to include Edelgard misconceptions, it’d probably be less of a “Misconceptions” doc and more of a “Hey here’s both sides to the argument and the proof both sides point to,” which would take significantly more time and research than I currently have the energy to do.

That could change. Once I’m done with the current masterpost, I could begin an “Edelgard arguments organization post,” but as of right now I don’t have any plans to do so.

This has been very long-winded and rambly, but thank you for asking anon! If you have anymore questions, my ask box is always open!

[frenchpichux]

So what is it with the Hannor haters that they will literally scold people for liking them as a couple? The "age difference" (heavy air quotes) even though Connor looks like he's 30... or because too gay? I lose followers in one fandom and gain them in others when I post or reblog LGBT content, vaguely/overtly sexual and otherwise. Just curious if you thought this was a Tumblr user orientation hang up. Who actually cares what people think or do regarding two game characters? I don't get antis.

Honestly haters will find anyjustification to hate on a ship. If they don’t like something.They’ll make sure no one is allowed to enjoy said content, becauseit’s problematic by their standards. And if canon eventually debunkone or their arguments. They’ll bent their back backwards to findanother justification to hate on it.  They like to hyperfocusate onone (1) line taken out of context and act like the word of God. Forexample when Hank said « son » that one time. Peoplealready talked about it so I won’t dwell on it.

The number one reason haters will hateon the ship is because they see it as a Father/Son relationship.Therefore, if you ship them it’s incest or whater. And because it’stheir interpretation, anyone who don’t see it that way is wrong andshould be kick out of the fandom to keep it « pure »

I also think the age gap reinforce theidea of Father/Son. Which is kinda stupid because we all have theseships where one is like a young adult and the other one centuries old,but it’s okay because they’ look young. (Emma and Hook from Once upon atime, The Doctor and Rose from Doctor Who, hell even Bella and Edwardfrom Twilight fits that criteria) So honestly a couple decades is nobig deal. Especially when one is an immortal android and the otherone is only in his early fifties.(at the same age you have RobertDowney Jr and he’ is a delicious snack.Hell Jeff Goldblum is 65 and he’s great too)

I am sorry if you’re loosing followersfor reblogging lgbt content that may be sometimes suggestive. Do youtag your posts ? At least the ship names ? So people caneasily blacklist them. Same thing with nsfw content. But if peopleare just unfollowing because they don’t like what they see, it’stheir right. They control what they wanna see. If they start sendingyou hateful messages, then it’s not okay.  

In any case, anti, haters, are a toxiccommunity, and it’s pointless to try to please them. Because theythink bullying people over ships is more important than knowing howto  control your experience on the Internet.

If you’re still curious about why people don’t like it, you can check  The Shipper Guide To The Galaxy video about Hannor there’s a part about why some people aren’t into it and even if I rolled my eyes at some of them. It’s still an interesting watch.

Note because I know some of y'all willalways find a way to twist words : You’re totally valid if youdon’t like or feel uncomfortable about a ship. What is not ok is tocome at people’s throat and insult them,send death threats orwhatever. Blacklisting and blocking is a thing. You can also alwaysask nicely people to tag their posts(if they’re the tagger type)Otherwise, you can just unfollow and that’s it. We all have a notpand it cost 0 dollar to blacklist stuff.

[totty-chan]

The Truth about Fhujeth vs. Chocho

This isn’t a callout post, it’s a name-clearing and fact-straightening post for @chochomatsu / @domatsu

Before I go on with this post, I’m going to say a few things for the sake of transparency. I have known (or at least known about) both Fhujeth (@totally-totty / @osomi) and Chocho within the Osomatsu-san fandom for roughly a year now. I have had my own share of negative experiences with Fhujeth over that year, not least the Totty Club issues. I met Chocho because of the Totty Club and we’ve been friends since that time. The club is not what this is about though. I just felt I needed to state my relationship with these two people to clear up any potential questions of bias towards one side.

No one in existence is 100% unbiased, one is my friend, the other isn’t. But despite completely different experiences I have tried to maintain neutrality where I possibly can. I already knew there was a past friendship and later breaking of said friendship between Fhujeth and Chocho, and that there was some drama that spilled over into the public domain after that break.

I was told last week that Fhujeth continues to vague post about the situation, suggesting she hasn’t been able to let go. I decided to approach Fhujeth to see what was going on - for the sake of a friend that I care about. Fhujeth knows that I am friends with Chocho but again, for the sake of neutrality, I asked Fhujeth why she sees Chocho as her “abuser”, and what proof there is of this. I am someone who needs proof before I believe. Fhujeth explained her position and gave me some evidence in the form of chatlog to back it up.

After Fhujeth presented her argument to me along with the evidence she had to give, I stated that I wanted to get the other side of the story by talking to Chocho about it. Fhujeth’s nature basically instantly turned more... apologetic? Certainly less fighty. I got the distinct impression she didn’t want me to approach Chocho about this - which to me rang alarm bells.

I then spoke to Chocho about the situation - a story that Chocho has been unwilling to talk about in any detail until now. The reason being that she didn’t want to relive it, hoping that it would blow over and go away. But obviously it hasn’t.

Just to note that Fhujeth (and apparently some of her friends) questioned whether I am being appropriate by mediating between her and Chocho, asking for details as I go. Later on, Fhujeth said this to me:

I try to hear both sides of a story but I also since this summer have been trying not to get too involved in other people's drama. I don't want to because I don't want to get on anyone's badside. I know this is hard to believe but like you, I am someone who sticks up for their friends and fights and often is a diplomat or mediator or a neutral party who tries to hear two sides out. I have been for my friend and someone who wants nothing to do with them who keeps harassing my friend.

My answer is that this is exactly what I am doing here. You are welcome to judge me for making this information public however you see fit.

I have been given explicit permission from Chocho to post the information beyond this point.

I asked for this permission because I feel that it is disgusting that this issue has been going on for so long, an issue affecting a good friend of mine. I am of the opinion that if Fhujeth can go around the fandom spreading chatlogs to incriminate someone, I can use chatlogs to debunk it.

The rest of this post is under a cut - it is a LONG TEXT WALL but it clears up a lot. For those without the time to read a post of this length there is a tl;dr at the end. However you will need to read the post to understand the reasons for the conclusion!

KEY FROM NOW ON:

Normal - Me (totty-chan, Sammy)

[ITALICS] - Chocho’s notes, opinions, etc.

BLOCKQUOTE - Chatlogs - Chocho is normal text, Fhujeth and others are bold

I have been assured by both sides that none of the chatlogs shown to me are edited in any way, except names where appropriate and the occasional note spliced in to better explain certain things. For Jussy, a person unfortunately involved in this, I have replaced their tumblr username with “Jussy” to protect their identity. There is private information (location, etc.) about both parties in the logs which I will replace with “---” for the sake of their privacy. Some chatlogs had images within them - these cannot be shown as they were not logged in the text files and no longer exist. I only sought permission from Chocho to show logs. Anyone who would like to see the evidence shown by Fhujeth will have to ask Fhujeth herself for it.

Both Fhujeth and Chocho mentioned that they used an IM app called “utox”. Fhujeth claimed that this app doesn’t keep logs. Chocho’s logs from this point mostly come from utox (some are from tumblr). This image is proof that logging is possible:

Commissions/Money

The first thing Fhujeth spoke to me about was regarding commissions done by Chocho for other people.

totty You want the chatlogs? I have one that was taken from when her and a friend of mine were talking after my friend found out Chocho had been pretending to be two different people and pleading as both for commissions and I have our last convo that we had before the "we're not talking anymore." That she sent me after I had chosen to stop signing in to get away from her.

Fhujeth gave me evidence in the form of a chatlog about the second issue mentioned here first. I’m going to cover the issue regarding begging for commissions first despite not being given “evidence” about it until a lot later in the conversation. This also involves other people and money which is why it’s the important one.

Fhujeth claimed that Chocho asked people for commissions, claiming that she “needed money for this or that reason really bad.” There was also a claim that Chocho would pretend to be both “Domatsu” and “Chocho” - two separate people - in an attempt to ask for more money from the same person. This person is a mutual friend of both Fhujeth and Chocho.

Fhujeth claimed to have proof that Domatsu and Chocho are the same person but said that Chocho admitted this anyway so it wasn’t needed.

When I asked Chocho about this, she said:

[I never asked anybody for commissions, ever. It's against my morals. I made a commissions promo post on domatsu in order to replace my dodgy old Wacom tablet that was years old, worn down and no longer supported for parts and did commissions for that, people continued to commission me after that, even though I posted when I got my tablet. That was their choice. Fhujeth saying that I squeezed Jussy for tons of money... whilst Jussy did commission me A LOT, she always came to ME asking, I never asked her (unlike Fhujeth who flat out said to me one time that she was going to go ask Jussy to commission her). I never begged Jussy and I never approached her or pressured her to commission me. She always asked first and I always made sure she was okay with the price and knew where all the pricing was coming from in the picture before she agreed to it. I thanked her for all her commissions because she really did help me.]

Chocho gave me evidence of Jussy asking for the commissions:

Jussy Hey, honey~ ^.^ hope you are well? I can't stop looking at my OsoMisha piece~ *u* and I am so happy with it~<3 I would love to commission you again X33 Jussy I will email you again~ ;) with my new idea~

Jussy BTW, when I get paid again, I was thinking of commissioning you again, but for something different ;3 * at the end of the month

Jussy Haha XDD you think you can take on another commission of mine? ;3

Jussy Eeeee, plz let him tumblr XDD and yush~ 0w0 it is <3 such great times X3 Plus, your Kara comic inspired me to commission you for an OsoMisha one X3

Jussy Soon, I'd love to commission an icon X3

Jussy I was thinking of Osomatsu and his brothers surprising Misha on her birthday on the 10th >w< Jussy as a commission

Jussy Hey, ChoCho X3 you up for me to commission you again? c:

Jussy Now I have the urge to commission Misha taking care of Osomatsu in the clothes his wearing~

Chocho also gave me this chatlog between her and Fhujeth regarding Jussy, commissions, the cost of said commissions, and asking for them.

Fhujeth: Jussy wants to pay me 35 (total) for a drawing with 3 chars (dollars) yay or nay Chocho: Fullbody or no Chocho: *? Fhujeth: full body Fhujeth: that's alot less than she was paying Chocho: I'd ask for 40 at least Fhujeth: Did my art value suddenly change Chocho: I don't think so! Chocho: Did she mean £? Fhujeth: Originally she paid 71$ for it Chocho: Or does she not know currency conversion? Chocho: What did she even say? Fhujeth: Cus I'm not sure if I should be insulted and hurt and start crying and just stop doing commissions or think she has no idea about currency conversion Chocho: I'd fall on the last one there first Fhujeth: I really hope so... Chocho: This is Jussy Fhujeth: [9:38:02 AM] Jussy: Yo~ ;3 [10:48:33 AM] Firrymatsu: Hi ^^ I am going to get this commission done fast but is is possible to be commissioned again sometime soon I just had to go to the doctor and my medication was 25 pounds ;.; [10:49:40 AM] Jussy: Okay my darling~ >w< and sure thing my honey~ ^.^ you know, I was thinking I COULD give you back the sketch you gave me, so you can finish it off and I give you 25 $ or more for it~ : 3 [10:49:54 AM] Jussy: Now you have a good idea on Hummingdoe's appearance [10:50:22 AM] Firrymatsu: dollars or pounds :o [10:50:52 AM] Jussy: Dollars ^w^ [10:51:36 AM] Firrymatsu: the one with croc, moosel, and hummingdoe? [10:52:07 AM] Jussy: That's right ^w^ [10:55:32 AM] Firrymatsu: 25 dollars is not very much @_@ [10:56:03 AM] Jussy: Okay X3 35? [10:56:21 AM] Jussy: or 40? Fhujeth: does she even have a concept of money? Fhujeth: I'm taking into consideration the 10 she already gave me... Chocho: I haven't a clue! Fhujeth: I'm too tired for this ;.; Fhujeth: It's 3 full body characters in a style I dunno, one is a fan character with an out of style reference.... Chocho: I'd also consider that you are asking her to commission you and give her money rather than her making that decision herself to ask on her own... Fhujeth: Yeah! I am taking that into consideration. Originally this idea we planned at 70, I think 50 is fair? Fhujeth: or 45 Chocho: Ask her for that! Fhujeth: Ok! Fhujeth: [10:56:03 AM] Jussy: Okay X3 35? [10:56:21 AM] Jussy: or 40? [10:59:41 AM] Firrymatsu: 40 @_@ then you had already paid that 10 dollars towards it, that makes it 50 - I'd normally charge 70 but since I am asking you for help I will go lower?

Fhujeth: i'll reply when i am done with this commission is reluctantly asked if they were willing to commission me again.

[See? She flat out asked/begged Jussy to commission her... and was insulted with the price Jussy was willing to pay. From what I could gather, Jussy wasn't happy with the sketch Fhujeth gave her before so wanted to commission Fhujeth for something else instead of the original pic?]

(Note, Firrymatsu = Fhujeth)

From my perspective it appears Chocho received commission requests - she didn’t go asking for them personally. There is evidence that it was in fact Fhujeth that asked for at least two commissions rather than being approached.

Also (this is just my opinion), what is wrong with commissioning under multiple aliases? Novel authors write books under different names all the time to separate styles - and make money on those separately. It happens in the music world too, songwriters often have multiple aliases or they ghostwrite for other singers or bands, making money as they go. It’s not immoral, it’s just a method of being able to separate different styles of working and still be able to keep on top of things. I do not understand why Fhujeth is using this against Chocho in an attempt to back up the “abuser” claim.

Fhujeth also said this to me regarding Chocho and Jussy:

If you see her collection you'll understand she had no NEED for money, she had a WANT for money. When Jussy found out that not only was her money going towards the same person but also not for needed things like food and health but for buying say, a full set of 45 dollar a piece matsu plush... she was not terribly happy.

I asked Chocho about this and was given this chatlog with an explanation afterwards:

Chocho: We live in a little town. =( Fhujeth: Ahhhh. Fhujeth: That makes it creepier you're so close to Jussy then. Chocho: It's not even that... it's a sub-town? Or village? I dunno. --- is the area, --- is the town... and we're in --- which is considered a part of --- overall so I guess it's a village Chocho: Yeah, we are REALLY close to Jussy Fhujeth: we don't have villages here so I have no idea how to like.... word it. Yeah it seems creepy..... like nothing on her but she is strange... part of me wonders if she is an adult... or a kid.... or an impulse buyer Fhujeth: Like nothing on your fanart I just don't see how someone can afford all that so fast like wow. Fhujeth: That's a lot of artwork of a weird fantasy. Chocho: I dunno. =T Not complaining though, it helped John with his bills this month

Chocho: I finished one of the comms for Jussy Fhujeth: Yay! Chocho: dop Chocho: =image goes here= Fhujeth: you did it!! Fhujeth: cute! Fhujeth: she will love that Chocho: Thank-you! =) Chocho: 1 down Chocho: 3 Chocho: to Chocho: go Fhujeth: are they easier ones? Chocho: Not particularly Chocho: One involves Iyami Chocho: who is a bitch to draw Chocho: And one is hypnotism-esque Fhujeth: from her? Chocho: Well, yeah Chocho: I don't take commissions from anybody but you, John, Jussy and Cathie at the moment Fhujeth: Ahh that is nice and a smart idea Chocho: I really want to help John out. @_@ Chocho: So I'm just having the money sent straight to him Fhujeth: Good idea! Fhujeth: And they have lots Fhujeth: Well, I wonder what Jussy really is she seems to be so mysterious

(And when Fhujeth says that I "didn't use the money on life but on merch instead"... that's not entirely true. I got some merch that I had ordered sent to my friend because I couldn't receive it here and it ended up being way larger than we expected, it was HUGE! If I'd have known they were THAT BIG I wouldn't have ordered them, but they were and we ended up with them. He had to send them one by one and they cost $22.50 to send EACH. He IOU'd me the money and sent them over to me since his house is not very big and they were taking up space. Then it turned out that he was short of funds for personal reasons (I'm not gonna say what because it's private), so I wanted to pay him back ASAP to help with his bills. So I was getting Jussy to send ALL the commission money she paid me directly to my friend (John) in order to pay him back for his kindness and help his bills. So yes, whilst it was not going on MY bills, it was going on my FRIEND's bills. And whilst it was TECHNICALLY going "towards merch", it was actually going towards paying my friend back for the postage it cost him to get them to me. Fhujeth knows this.)

I personally don’t see an issue with spending commission money on merch, or for that matter, anything. In any case, this issue doesn’t seem to be quite as clear-cut as Fhujeth was painting it to be. The obvious conclusion from the things Fhujeth told me would be that Chocho demanded to be commissioned due to a strong “NEED” for money, claimed that it was for “things like food and health”, only to spend it on merch. I’ve seen enough evidence to be able to say that this isn’t the case.

Chocho also gave me further logs about the commissions/money issues:

Fhujeth: I refunded her the 35 when the REALLY EVIL PART OF ME WAS LIKE, "Dude keep it dude, dude, duuude, dude, greed, dude, greed, dude."

Fhujeth: plus the 45 USD she just tossed me for (well, some stuff I paid 3 dollars for basically) Chocho: How much profit are you making off of her? Fhujeth: The camera case/bag was in a super clearance machine I think they put it in there to make it difficult to grab the iyamis and chibitas cus it was big and would catch the claw but I was like, "FUCK THAT" and got all the chibitas and iyamis around it and then pulled it out Fhujeth: and then like there was times I just bulk won tons of osomatsu keychains and she bought 2 of those Fhujeth: cus on golden week they rigged the machines to pay out super crazy easy and I spend like 300 dollars I ended up with like 8 choros and 7 jyushis Fhujeth: contacted jussy about the osomatsu cushion hehe Fhujeth: did I tell you I charged her 10 shipping and her item to ship turned out to be 180 Chocho: 180? Fhujeth: like 2 dollars

Fhujeth: "the keychain and pillow (very huggable) for 65 + shipping (and you already paid for " ya so I know what you'll do with these poor plush so I will charge 15 for the keyring and 50 for the plush juss Fhujeth: me: Well the pillow which I sell for 40 I'll sell to you for 50 and this keychain I sell for 10 I'll sell to you for 15 and I know oyu paid shipping on the other thing you bought but I'ma go ahead and ignore that and combine this all shipping so 15 shipping Fhujeth: yeah I feel bad Fhujeth: but I also am like Fhujeth: she is really Fhujeth: but I Will give her a nicer shipping i think Fhujeth: at least tracking Fhujeth: you: *terrible person* Fhujeth: you're thinking that Fhujeth: a bad person would be if I decided to not refund her that 35 dollars and see what happens x.x Chocho: I didn't say anything! =B Fhujeth: What are you thinking? Chocho: That I'm not sure if Ichimatsu looks right? XD Fhujeth: So you don't care if I charge her for things? Fhujeth: Like a lot. Chocho: Oh, I do, but it's none of my business. =B

Fhujeth: I most def do not feel bad Fhujeth: charging her Fhujeth: because she probably torments many people

[I find it amazing she says about my "collection"! Hahaha! She's shown people her collection what, countless times? She has far, far more than I do and it's not like she needs that any more than I do. XD SHE's the one who doesn't have a need for money, not me, I never inherited anything from anybody! SHE's the one who has a want for money, even though as far as I know, she has a lot already! (She also liked to horrendously overcharge Jussy for things, just because she knew Jussy wouldn't question!)

To be honest, any time Fhujeth offered me something to buy off her it was.... really unnerving... it wasn't like a friendly "Oh yeah, you can buy this if you want", it was always so... like a sharp merchant, not a friend helping another get something. She even said one time that she would only hold a piece of merch for me for "up to a year"... that put quite the unnerved feeling onto me... XD;;; And it was ALWAYS like that... we had to make sure the money was 100% EQUAL AND ACCOUNTED FOR. To be honest, it was scary. She did this with the plush she wanted me to make her too. I didn't really like buying from Fhujeth, it was stressful, but a lot of the time I felt pressured.]

Fhujeth: well, I have one Chocho: One is in 18 Fhujeth: I will sell it Fhujeth: I can hold it Chocho: Oh? =o Well... if you want to... Fhujeth: if you're up for that Fhujeth: I don't mind holding stuff for you up to a year

I’m seeing a “NEED” for money from Fhujeth here - not Chocho. There are also some very obvious nasty and insulting attacks on Jussy from Fhujeth combined with some extremely unfair financial tactics in an attempt to squeeze more money out of her.

Another part of my conversation with Fhujeth involved a claim that Chocho demanded to be commissioned by Jussy to buy a new cellphone:

She threw her phone on her bed and it accidentally cracked and broke (baring in mind this was a phone her dad gave her, had no service, and she used to play games on it). She said she was gonna ask Jussy for help to her a new one. We were also talking about Timezones for another reason. If it wasn't cause the phone broke it was cause she wanted something else but I remember around that part not caring too much.

I think it was the phone.

Chocho gave me this chat between her and Jussy along with comments and chat with Fhujeth:

chochomatsu And my phone smashed yesterday tooooo Jussy B'awww, I am soooo sorry to heat that my lovely ;w; chochomatsu Not having a good time (;m;) Jussy what?? o0o nooo! Anything I can do to help? ;w; chochomatsu Yeah! (;m;) [<--- Note, this is a response to "what?? o0o nooo!", not "Anything I can do to help? ;w;] Some of the glass actually fell out... so... it's pretty much unusable now. (;_;) RIP my phone...I didn't even have it all that long... Jussy Oooh, my...you poor lass ;3; <3 can you get it fixed? chochomatsu And I can't afford to get another one either! At least I didn't use it all that often... (;w;);;; Jussy b'awww ;3; I only use my phone for calling and texting chochomatsu I think it's pretty much gone. (;_;) I don't think you can replace the screens on these... This was my first ever smart phone, I wanted one for years... and I think it lasted... a few months... not even a year! Jussy Ooooh, poopy ;3; what a shame How did it break? chochomatsu It was a really silly thing. (;_;) I went to bed last night and took it with me because I do Japanese study just before bed... I put the charger on my pillow and then gently plopped my phone on top... Jussy b'awww ;3; chochomatsu BANG Glass all over my pillow... Jussy Oooh, my..o.o Jussy goodness it happens darling, don't worry chochomatsu Yeah. (;_;) I feel really stupid... it wasn't even that hard an impact, I guess it just hit it in the wrong place Jussy aww, I am sorry dear ;3; chochomatsu I think we passed your workplace today though! Jussy Really?? 0w0 --- That's where --- is~ chochomatsu Yeah! You work at --- Bupa, right? Jussy I do :D Jussy what time?

[we talked here about completely different things for a while until we had to go, this next part is the next day]

11/23/2016 Jussy Aaaahh, Hey, ChoCho~ X3 I would like to help you get a new phone by commissioning you. I have something in mind and I would like to discuss it ^w^ chochomatsu Hiya, good morning, Jussy! <3 How are you today? And thankyou so much! (;m;) That is so sweet of you! <3 *hugs* Jussy Good morning my darling~ ^w^ I am good, a bit better from my cold >w< <3 and ya welcome, always happy to help out~ ^.^ *hugs*

[In regards to the phone, I never asked Jussy for commissions to cover replacing it. I mentioned it to Jussy because she was my friend and I was frustrated I'd just broke my phone (anybody would be I think), she approached me the next day saying she wanted to commission me to put towards getting myself a new phone, which I was absolutely greatful for. This commission I asked her to send to my BOYFRIEND instead since he'd be the one buying the phone and I wanted that money to absolutely go towards the phone. But before I could get the phone, Fhujeth lied to Jussy about me in order to put Jussy off me and cut me off from any future commissions (knowing that I only ever accepted commissions off of Jussy by that point). Since I no longer had any kind of income, I had to send the entirety of that money to John since he was a priority over a new phone. I still don't have a new phone (but luckily for me, it hasn't fallen apart yet like we expected! Since the crack is right at the button, we expected the button to fall out at any time, luckily it hasn't. I had to stop doing my kanji/kana learning because that involved drawing the kanji/kana on the screen and the sensitivity is basically shot on that part of the screen making it very hard to do anything there.).

(Also, my phone has always had service (you can see that it does, "TESCO" in the bottom corner of the photo I gave Jussy of my phone showing the damage)

It wasn't my Dad that gave it to me, it was my Boyfriend's Dad and I used it to study Japanese with apps because it was too weak to play the phone games without crashing. I tried playing Hesokuri Wars on it for a bit, but it was unreliable and crashed during game play a lot. So whilst I left it on my phone for ages, I didn't open it because it wouldn't load at all eventually (updates made it too hefty). I mostly played things like Hesokuri Wars and Tabimatsu on my PC using an emulator called Andy. It was FHUJETH's phone that didn't have service that she only used for games.]

Fhujeth: My mobile lost service... 3-4 months ago.

Chocho: My phone is too shit to run Hesokuri Wars without endless crashing

Fhujeth: we should find a chat program that works on your phone Chocho: It's like shell shock Chocho: I don't think any will, it's just not powerful enough to be any more than a call and text thing

I don’t think I really need to add to this - the proof is clear enough for me.

Fhujeth also told me this, bringing another person into the issue with Chocho and commissioning:

Cathie had her own experiences with Dexts (commissions being rushed/made poorly).

Like she'd pay 100 for a drawing that was not nearly up to par for what Domatsu usually did. That was one thing she told me

This is Chocho’s response to this claim along with logs to back it up:

Chocho: And Jussy knows I plan to finish hers when it's cooler Fhujeth: Totty: Choromatsu-Niisan is the kind of person who wears..... like... the pads on the elbos and all Chocho: It's okay if I fuck up a background, it's not okay if I fuck up paid art

[The background in this chatlog was regarding the backgrounds I used to draw for domatsus blog updates. All of the art I have ever done on commission for anybody, ever, including Fhujeth themself, was to the best of my ability at the time. I promise that completely, I have no desire to "half-arse" anything. I have no idea where Cathie got the idea that I didn't draw pictures up to par of my others at the time? I always tried my very best... =/ If Cathie said that at all, I wouldn't know! But I honestly had no idea she felt that way.]

Chocho: I don't want to cop out on the story Chocho: That's why it's pissing me off so fucking much Fhujeth: Rush it? Chocho: no Chocho: Absolutely not Chocho: Quality or bust Fhujeth: i mean it's good and i can help you make sure it's in character Chocho: I've got a good reputation I don't want to fuck it up by coughing up half arsed shit onto the blog Chocho: Yeah, it's a matter of pride, but also a matter of respect for my fans

Fhujeth: It's nice to have stuff made by friends! I liked the figure i had from my friend but i was bummed when i realized she made it shitty on purpose ;.; Chocho: did they really though? Fhujeth: I'm 99& sure. Fhujeth: %^ Chocho: i have more respect for myself than to do that Fhujeth: They're those kind of people.

chochomatsu i have far too much respect for my works to do anything less than my best i wouldn't want to crap out a shitty item chochomatsu i never like asking anybody for money

Fhujeth: Apparently I illustrated a book... and it's coming out soonish..... *halfassed all the art they accepted it and took it my mind is blown, all it is I think they changed the cover*

Doesn’t look like Chocho is the one that “halfassed” art for other people. Art is, of course, subjective... but as long as the person drawing it does so to the best of their current ability and with as much effort as they can spend on it, that’s just fine.

An extra note from me... I saw this in the logs I was given and thought it worth mentioning (because it’s just... not right).

Fhujeth: So for a picture I might charge 25 for I charge 50 for to someone who I knew made 6 figures a year and wanted --- KND operatives Chocho: I think my biggest deal is asking for money full stop

Fhujeth is charging higher prices to people who she knows to have more money. I don’t recall rich people walking into a store and having to pay more because they’re rich. This isn’t a variable income tax system.

The Plush

Still regarding commissions and money in reality, Fhujeth told me about trying to commission Chocho for a custom Matsu plush. This is part of what Fhujeth said to me:

She made a Karamatsu plush and it had messy hair, he was supposed to be from her blog. I didn't like the hair but the plush the rest of it came out great. I told her the honest truth about it. Later she made a Choromatsu plush and I LOVED IT and I kept saying how I wanted to commission her for one and she kept holding the thing I said like 4 months prior about the one's hair against me?

We were friends so I wanted to give her my honest answer when she asked what I thought. The rest of the plush was fine but the hair just looked really off on it. She made the Posing Karamatsu too which I loved as well! I really liked the pattern she made for the Choro one but a lot. A LOT of drama would constantly ensue whenever I said, "hey I wanna commission you for one."

I wasn’t at all sure what the real problem was here or why it was brought up with regards to Chocho being an “abuser”. When I asked Chocho about this one it took a long time to explain.

[Ok... this is a complex one that needs a LOT of backstory to explain... so... I can make plush, but I can't make them EASILY because I don't have a sewing or embroidery machine. Everything I do on a plush has to be done by hand using a needle and thread. That includes the face embroidery/embroidery anywhere else. This takes hours and can mess up my hands/fingers because of repeated pressure of a thin, metal stick pressing into them (also because pushing the embroidery needle through multiple layers of fabric and embroidery REALLY hurts. @_@ And you can stab yourself all too easily. I don't like doing it really so try to avoid it and don't take any commissions unless they are specifically for friends. Fhu knew about the faces and embroidery, so she knew it was a hard and painful activity before she even started pressing for a Totty plush later on.]

Chocho: I have a question Fhujeth: sure :3 Chocho: If I were to make Karamatsu plush, should I make it chibi like the official ones or proportional Fhujeth: that would depend on if you want it to be proportional or chibi :O Fhujeth: why not both Chocho: Because it takes a long time to hand embroider the faces. XD Chocho: And I'm limited on fabric. =( Fhujeth: you hand embroider? wooow Chocho: Yeah! Fhujeth: woow that looks like it would take forever Chocho: It does. @_@ Chocho: And it hurts. XD Fhujeth: that is some dedication Chocho: It's the only way I can do it. =( Chocho: Which is why I only do plush commissions for friends. XD Fhujeth: well, otherwise it'd be a lot

[Eventually, I felt like Fhujeth was a close enough friend to me for me to want to make her a plush. So I offered that I could potentially trade some merch for a small, custom demon Todomatsu plush. I was instantly made uneasy by how it all became about "how much are you going to charge me?". What was simply a "maybe you'd like something made by a friend?" had suddenly turned into a hyper-serious TRANSACTION. I was basically put on the spot to give a price for something that I hadn't even planned yet, I wasn't even suggesting actual money, just a merch trade. That felt like pressure and I was a bit unnerved, but I shook it off.]

Chocho: Hey.. I have an idea/proposition Fhujeth: Go oooooon :O Chocho: Would you be willing to take payment for some thing in the form of a tiny demon Totty plush? Chocho: *some things Fhujeth: :O payment for like what, and PROBABLY x3 just what I have here or? like the kara head/buttons? Since I think we're about even on the auction lot Chocho: I think we're about even on the auction, yeah! =D And I dunno, yeah, the merch you get in Japan I guess, yes! XD Chocho: I'm not sure how big he'd be since things always come out bigger than I expect... Chocho: But he'd be custom cos he'd be demon Totty Fhujeth: i'll be buying more blind bags of stuff :O so I can just keep you updated. Yeah @-@ Chocho: I'd have to make a new pattern. XD I can't use Karamatsu's because he is MASSIVE Chocho: Okay! =D Chocho: How much would you be willing to pay for the plush anyways? @.@ If he came out to be about 12-15cm? Fhujeth: What are you charging o_o Chocho: I was gonna make him keychain sized? But I just know he'll end up bigger. B/ Chocho: I dunno because I've never really done it before. Chocho: Well, I've made things for John on commission but yeah Chocho: I know the cost of fabrics and time and pain Fhujeth: Like, how many hours would it HYPOTHETICALLY TAKE Chocho: But that doesn't line up to what people expect to pay so Chocho: Well Chocho: How long do patterns take. =_= Hmm... a few hours Chocho: Making plush can take... over a week Chocho: (It's usually way longer to be honest, but they're usually bigger( Fhujeth: I'm not sure o_o I'd like it but my budget is only as big as what I have ATM. Kara head is 35 + the buttons is 9 (minus one from the doodle just now) Chocho: Watch him end up being half the size of Karamatsu instead of 12-15cm Chocho: We can wait and see! Fhujeth: And as I get more stuff I'll figure things out o_o I'm bad with plush prices. Chocho: It was just an idea. XD Fhujeth: I am interested! And yeah! Fhujeth: If you can give me a number it'd be better!! and you should put a dog squaeky inside it o_O so it makes some sound, if you can, I think you can get that from like... a cheap store and take out of dog toy.... ?? which I can pay for? AHHHH, let's wait till I figure things out but assume right now we're at 42 dollars or something Chocho: Hahaha! XD That's a good idea on the squeaker! Chocho: Yeah, we'll keep it in mind! =D Chocho: (Also gotta remember the face embroidery) Fhujeth: Yeah x.,x Chocho: I wish I had a machine for that. =(

[The idea of the plush stuck around though]

Chocho: I'm really concerned about this plush Fhujeth: Aww don't worry about it too much. Fhujeth: I am not that picky if love is involved. Chocho: Yeah, but you don't want him to be hideous Chocho: I also worry about the quality of the embroidery Chocho: Because I'm not a machine Fhujeth: oh I am not picky on that I will know it is hand made. as long as it wont fall apart. Chocho: It shouldn't fall apart Chocho: But it might be ugly Fhujeth: I got a sculpture from sone, I showed them the example of what I wanted, I showed them a turn around, the got the proportions all wrong Fhujeth: you wont be that bad. Fhujeth: I still kept the loved the sculture Fhujeth: scupture Chocho: Kept the sculpture? Fhujeth: I kept it and loved it^ Chocho: What sculpture? Fhujeth: it was of my knd oc Fhujeth: i commissioned her because i thought she'd do really good Chocho: Was it not so good then? =< Fhujeth: i was disappointed greatly Fhujeth: but said nothing Chocho: Aww.. =( Chocho: I'm sorry about that Chocho: That's what I'm worried about

Fhujeth: I've commissioned some original stuff of my characters and came out really bad, in fact one I think got made bad on purpose.... Fhujeth: But I loved it anyways until one day the head came off because they didn't bake it enough... like the wire just split through the head >< I wanted them to fix it but I moved by then so it's at my dads so it wouldn't break more Fhujeth: And I'll be honest on a technical level and for that person's skill it was atrocious and when I first saw it I felt kind of bothered... Fhujeth: But I thought maybe it wasn't like that on purpose and they did it the best they could so I put it with all my other stuff of that OC

There was a weird situation building up here from what I could tell. Fhujeth wanted a quality plush which is fair enough, and Chocho doubted her ability to match the requirements. Fhujeth saying that they’ve commissioned other people and been disappointed with the result in the past was obviously furthering the doubt from Chocho that the requirements could be fulfilled. Claiming that a past commission had been done badly on purpose was, to me, a step too far. There doesn’t seem to be any proof of that here and presenting that thought to Chocho inevitably heightened the concern about being able to satisfy Fhujeth even further. I know for sure that if someone commissioned me for anything creative and was mentioning past commissions in this sense I would lose all confidence in my ability.

[The concept of a "demon Totty" plush had become a thing and was on our er.... list of things I owe in trade for merch? No merch traded hands though, I liked to pay for them first... but Fhujeth would "put things aside" on the "plush list", though not everything applied. In any case, I eventually decided to try and make a small Karamatsu plush as a test, since Fhujeth didn't like the risk of me making her a plush without seeing the pattern first. I was a little unsure about him, his hoodie kind of pinched his neck because I'd made the opening too small and his hair was VERY fluffy because of the fur I'd used for it. I felt concerned about him, especially since Fhujeth had now set this very high bar in my mind, what with being so money concerned, telling me about how she was certain her friend intentionally made her a bad commission sculpture to spite her and that she was VERY disappointed in the result, but didn't say anything... also with the idea that she didn't want to risk me making it without proving she'd like the pattern first.]

Chocho: Progress Fhujeth: aww that looks adorable! Chocho: NOT WHEN HE HAS A HEAD Chocho: I just placed it there Chocho: I used the long pile fur so it would NOT be that messy if I had used the minky Chocho: OH WELL Chocho: Whatever Chocho: I'm only finishing this really because it'd be a waste of embroidery otherwise. XD Fhujeth: give him bandages Fhujeth: have big Kara care for poor injured baby scruffy kara Chocho: It this particular one worth the effort? Chocho: "He looks retarded because he fell off the roof" Fhujeth: xDDDD Chocho: I guess he's not THAT bad Chocho: but eh Chocho: I don't think he's worth $ Chocho: maybe if the hair was shorter fur but I dunno, can't really tell that because it's not Fhujeth: haircut? Chocho: Nah Chocho: Because once it's cut it can't come back Chocho: And if I fuck it up that's it fucked up further for good! Chocho: But yeah, I don't think I can make you a Totty. @_@ I'm sorry Fhujeth: it is ok ^-^ Chocho: I didn't think you'd like it! XD Fhujeth: you don't seem confident :3 Fhujeth: so it is ok! Chocho: You don't seem to like how he looks anyway though. XD Fhujeth: it's hard to tell with the hair tbh Chocho: It's overall pretty shitty, huh? Fhujeth: Nooo! Fhujeth: The body for sure looks great Chocho: But the most important part is the head Fhujeth: the face is good too! Fhujeth: but the hair is very... wild Chocho: Really? I thought the face looked bad... Well yeah, I used craft fur, minky is like what you have on the keychain plush Chocho: Look at the length on big Karamatsu compared to little here Fhujeth: yeah! that is a hugeee difference Chocho: Yeah

[The small Karamatsu plush's hair kept coming up, even though I had explained that I used a different fur than what I would use for hers....]

Chocho: Be honest, do you want a chibi body like the keychain plush, or a to scale one Fhujeth: whichever you as the artist want. What do you personally thing might look better Chocho: The body pattern I have looks more to scale Fhujeth: I do like the chibi body but a real body, if it translates well, the bunny I got, did you see how it is... Fhujeth: it's like 2.5 heads tall Fhujeth: how is that like... that is ok too... Fhujeth: 3 heads tall Fhujeth: ok Fhujeth: 2 heads ehh Chocho: XD Chocho: I dunno Fhujeth: I like the height of the karamatsu plush but yeah his head (and hair) bugged me Fhujeth: we talk little the big one is fine Chocho: Well, I told you that his hair was not the same fabric. =P Fhujeth: yeah! Chocho: I used craft fur, not minky, cos I wanted it messy Chocho: But yeah, seriously though, no promises Chocho: I've seen a ton of cute plush and I don't think I'm cut out for it Chocho: To be honest, I knew you didn't like it as soon as you said you didn't know if you wanted to trade for it yet Fhujeth: brb my mom got me Chocho: Ok! Chocho: I think for now, it's best to assume I won't be able to do this, ok? The plush. Chocho: To be honest, to make one to the proportions of cute bunny Totty would involve me remaking the pattern all over again, not just the head. And that involves making the clothes patterns again too. It's a lot of effort that to be honest I don't think I'm willing to put in. Chocho: The effort and time to make ANOTHER pattern (especially if it just fails again), considering that I've already made 2 Matsu patterns already, not that one of them was with Totty in mind, but nonetheless... if more time, effort and stress than I think you'd be willing to trade for Chocho: *is Fhujeth: oh the bunny totty is bleg Fhujeth: I like your big karamatsu Fhujeth: bug maybe half the size Fhujeth: but^ Chocho: That would still be making a whole new pattern. u_u And I thought the Bunny Totty was really nice. =( Fhujeth: not just a resize Chocho: The way that big Karamatsu's head is done makes it hard to resize. =( Chocho: Besiiiides Chocho: I'm sure you wouldn't like the nasty darts I had to put in to make his hair work... Chocho: Also, his head flops cos it's heavy, you don't want it Chocho: It's too hot to work on anything plush now anyway. Because I don't have a machine, all the sweat that the hot, muggy weather causes will soak right into the fabric. Which is disgusting. So I avoid it... I also think if I had a machine that would do the face for me in a matter of minutes, it wouldn't be a problem... but I don't.. so every failure is a lot of wasted time and pain and suffering. All in all... I don't think I could make you something you wouldn't be disappointed with. =( Chocho: And not because I think you would rip into it, but because I don't think I have the skills Chocho: Anyways, I better get to bed! G'night! I'll catch you tomorrow! Fhujeth: nooo Fhujeth: i haD TO EAY Fhujeth: eat Fhujeth: so soon Fhujeth: so soon Fhujeth: to when I came back Fhujeth: i was gonna confess eerything to you Chocho: Confess? Chocho: I only send the message a minute ago. XD Fhujeth: AHH YOU ARE HERE MY FRIEND <3 Fhujeth: Yeah but a minute, less than you can walk away Chocho: But really, I do need to go after I've taken my meds, Kirk has to get up early Fhujeth: I love you, I am glad I met you. before we fuss, let me clarify things hsould we get into an argument Chocho: It's probably best we do this tomorrow so I can sleep. XD;;; Fhujeth: please, when we end a day in a huff and you show up not the next day it hurts so bad Chocho: As in, if it takes a negative turn, I can never sleep and Kirk's health tomorrow depends on me sleeping Fhujeth: Affirmative, be well, sleep well. Fhujeth: It was more detailed, that was a summary. Chocho: I didn't think we were arguing or having a huff today. '3' Fhujeth: not today! just anytime~ Fhujeth: like the other day Chocho: I was just expressing that I don't think I'm fit for purpose!

Which way round is this? Fhujeth claimed to me that Chocho was the one that brought up the hair thing and held it against Fhujeth. These chatlogs suggest it’s the other way around; Fhujeth really didn’t like whatever had been done with this other plush’s hair and was holding it over Chocho’s head whenever the idea of the Totty plush commission was discussed.

[I started to pay off the stuff we had on the "Totty plush list" from what I remember, since my first attempt had been not good enough. Fhujeth still wanted a Totty Plush though so that was still in the air. Then there was a set of limited edition... uhhh... lottery official plush I think it was? Of the Matsus in the "I <3 Toto" outfits released. I managed to get the Choro through my friend in Japan and I wanted the Kara (of course) but he was nowhere to be seen. Eventually one popped up on Yahoo Auctions!, but he was expensive, I couldn't afford him. Fhujeth mentioned she wanted it, but would feel bad if she got it (and I didn't), so I figured I'd offer, if she was willing to grab the plush and hold it, I could trade it for the Totty plush (if I could do it to her standards), otherwise she could keep the plush for herself without guilt, or sell the plush off for profit or something since it's limited edition and the value will only go up. She didn't want to "RISK" it, which made me incredibly upset since she, by this point, had repeatedly insisted/hinted that I wouldn't do a job good enough for her to accept and it was getting quite insulting. Why did she keep saying these things, yet keep asking for the plush? =/;]

Chocho: I really want that but it's out of my reach Fhujeth: I like it but I'd feel bad if I got it Chocho: Would you trade me it for a demon Totty plush? Fhujeth: You mean like I buy it, keep it in the package and all and if you design a plush I like we trade or is it I buy it expecting we trade? Because in one regard that is alot of pressure because One I see done, already, the other I don't... so... and then if you make it and there is some issue then I'll feel so bad and obligated to say yes anyways. Like what are you thinking o.x Fhujeth: I mean Fhujeth: what are you thinking/what is your idea Chocho: Yeah. I'd trade you that Karamatsu straight for a demon Totty plush and we would make sure it's a pattern you like. Chocho: Nah, never mind, it was just a thought Fhujeth: Isn't that a lot of work for a plush like that? Chocho: It is Fhujeth: I'm willing to take the risk I guess... I hate calling it a risk but... In the end I guess my biggest fear is you present me with something and I dislike it and then we end in a problem. I'm not picky but my last few non-drawn commissions from people have been all crap. Fhujeth: Not saying you'd do that! Fhujeth: I'm just saying it's like I pay for something and it breaks. Fhujeth: Not that a plush can break, and yours look like good quality. Chocho: You think my plush would fall apart? Chocho: If you think it's too much of a risk don't worry about it! Fhujeth: No, no. Fhujeth: Do you prefer me not expressing just my thoughts outloud? Chocho: I think it's kind of insulting you think that doing a trade with me is a huge risk and you'll probably get something you'll hate... Chocho: But it's fine, don't worry about it! Fhujeth: No that's not my concern! See now I feel guilty ^^;; Chocho: I'd prefer not to do all the work of making a pattern and plush and the face embroidery for one plush anyway Fhujeth: I'll do the trade if that is what you want to do. Chocho: Because it IS a lot of work, effort and, since you seem to think I'd fuck up, heartache for a $55 plush +fees and postage Fhujeth: It's not that I don't trust you I just always jump to the worst conclusions. Fhujeth: Chances are the plush is going to be super cute and awesome. Chocho: I don't really want to make a plush for somebody who thinks I'm going to churn out junk... that is WAY too much pressure Fhujeth: I feel like you're trying to guilt trip me.... Fhujeth: ..but maybe I am misreading it. Chocho: Not really, I just feel hurt that every time I mention making a plush you make it sound like I'm going to make an ugly piece of crap Chocho: You are the only one who has ever repeatedly made me feel like I churn out shit plush... Fhujeth: I really want a plush from you! Fhujeth: I'm just really nervous to buy plush, always. Chocho: I don't want to make a plush for you because you don't trust I can do it Chocho: It's fine, I don't need to spend another $55+ anyway really!! Chocho: And plush take weeks Fhujeth: I do really want a plush from you. Fhujeth; I am patient and in no rush. Chocho: What if I can't make something you like? Fhujeth: You'll make something I like. I'm sorry for instilling fear in you. Chocho: Would you sell it to me in commissions of other kinds or for tutoring/red lining/whatever as long as it's not something I can't teach? Chocho: Or would you just keep it you think? Fhujeth: I want a demon totty plush or I'll keep him, probably... unless there is more art I need i the future. Just take your time. I'm sure whatever you do will be great. I didn't mean to make you feel scared or pressured. I'm just scared of things but yeah...

Wait... what? Fhujeth says here “I feel like you're trying to guilt trip me....” but this whole chatlog continues to read like Fhujeth is almost threatening Chocho that they must get things right if the work is to go ahead. It’s plenty obvious that Fhujeth really wanted a custom plush from Chocho... but at the same time injecting incredible levels of fear and doubt about whether she trusted Chocho to do a good job. I don’t really know why this was the case but I know for sure that if I was in this situation I’d simply say “No, sorry, I can’t do this for you” and refuse the job. Fhujeth obviously couldn’t take this for an answer, though.

[A little while later, I offered to pay off the Karamatsu plush straight and not trade him for the plush so that Fhujeth could have the money since she needed the funds. Fhujeth still wanted the plush though, even though I wasn't sure if I could do it, so it continued...]

Fhujeth: Hey Chocho: Hi! Chocho: I have a proposal for you... Chocho: How much was the postage to get Totty and Kara idols to you? Fhujeth: For both? Well I put them in with some other stuff remember? Chocho: What would be my percentage of it? Fhujeth: Well just the Kara right? o.o Chocho: Yeah Fhujeth: Let me look ;o Chocho: OK! Fhujeth: sorry if eel reallyyy shitty Fhujeth: if you saw my tumblr messages Fhujeth: my mom poisoned me Fhujeth: in short so you don't have to read Chocho: I did and that's why I'm asking this Fhujeth: Okay so he alone was 5500 + Buyee fee 150 + Yahoo Fee 200 + Domest Shiiping Fhujeth: not going to charge for consolidation Fhujeth: it was 3700 yen for all 5 items to be shipped....... the 700 is fine I'll do the other 3000 of that Fhujeth: 5500+ 350 + 1112+ 700 Chocho: Ok! Would you be willing to post him to Kaji too? Fhujeth: Yeah, when I get that other Karamatsu eventually. Chocho: If so, I'll pay you for him flat out (if I can afford to after I've paid Kazuki) so that you can put that money towards getting away from that mother that's trying to kill you. $75.57 he comes to Fhujeth: No, no, no. I want the plush from you. Chocho: We can do the plush later, you need the money more right now

[Eventually I tried again at a pattern, this time a little bigger in a rag doll style with floppy limbs. When I started making the pattern I was already on edge because of the high feeling of pressure, especially since I never know if a pattern is going to work when I first make it. When I had actually put him together, I was really quite disappointed. I felt that I had messed up his body, it was too much like a cylinder and I felt I hadn't tapered him enough to his shoulders so he looked boxy. His eyes also came out wonky (one iris/pupil a little higher than the other...) which I had no idea how had happened since it was straight in the hoop as far as I was aware. I was just incapable of seeing the plush in a good light, I felt like I hadn't hit the standard I was desperately hoping for and I felt the plush was a failure.]

Chocho: he's also naked because i don't have his clothes fabric yet Chocho: yeah i did, but he hasn't turned up in the house yet Fhujeth: Can I see nakey choro? Chocho: i'd rather not... it's... really bad Fhujeth: *it's cool if not* Fhujeth: That's fine! Chocho: i'm just going to make him my hug buddy Fhujeth: I'm sure he's not that bad! Fhujeth: I have Present Jyushi and the one time he showed up I did not be there to pet him Chocho: you thought little karamatsu was bad, this one's not much better Chocho: which sucks because it wasn't easy to make Fhujeth: I did notthink he was bad o.o Chocho: you said you didn't like him, especially his face [<- this here, unless I missed one of the logs, was a mistake on my part. Unless Fhujeth restated at some point that his face was bad too, but I don't remember specifically] Fhujeth: I think the hair through it off for me Chocho: i used craft fur on that one instead of minky Chocho: i did say that... Chocho: craft fur is lower quality and longer pile, but i wanted it to be messy Fhujeth: Yeah, but it made an illusion for me! I think if I saw him in person it'd be different for sure! I am sure it looks great (Choro)

[In the end, after I broke away from Fhujeth and gave my Chocho some clothes, I ended up falling in love with him. The clothes nicely hid the fact that his torso is a tube... XD;;; And I don't notice the eyes now, even though I know they're dorpy. I also don't have that whole pressure over my head to perform any more... So yeah.... this entire thing went WAY past the whole messy hair plush thing... it was the constant being threatened that I better do a good job and the whole air that commissioning/trading me a plush was a "risk" to her and her high set standards etc. had left me feeling hypercritical of all my attempts and feeling at a complete loss. She brought up the hair repeatedly in regards to that one, small, plush. But there were other factors too that made me absolutely want to back out, but I felt too scared to say "sorry, no... I'm not going to make this" because it had gone on so long.]

It’s definitely Fhujeth that brought up the hair issue on multiple occasions, despite using this as part of the “abuser” argument in my conversation with her. There is some context here I’m not 100% sure of but it’s more than obvious that there was a lot of injected pressure from Fhujeth regarding this commission over a period of time. There is no reason for me to believe that this was Chocho being abusive in any way.

The Fat/Slob-love situation

In my conversation with Fhujeth, the subject turned to a claim that Chocho had a thing for “slobbing up characters” which made Fhujeth uncomfortable. This is what was said to me by Fhujeth:

I lost a lot of faith and trust in having close friends because of the way they would make me feel bad if I didn't do something for them or if I mentioned that some of what they drew made me uncomfortable. (example; the drawing in reference to that chat was uhh, Choromatsu, aged 30s where she gave him messy hair as his hair was thinning, laying shirtless on a green arm chair, his gut hanging out, and he looked like a slob)."

"It was more that that was all she drew. I draw some weird stuff but it's never consistent. As you can tell she has some sorta thing for slobbing up characters based on our roleplays and private interactions and literally most of Domatsu and Chochomatsu blogs being.... slob. Our RPs were all about humiliation and Choromatsu being a fat drunk gross slob. It wasn't an occasional thing, it was an all the time thing.

This again had me confused... I couldn’t see where the “abuse” actually came into this. I mean, fair enough, some people find certain things uncomfortable and if that is stated to the person they believe to be making them uneasy with certain types of content, they should speak up and let them know - especially if it is in a one-to-one conversation between friends.

I obviously asked Chocho about this situation and this is the explanation I got:

[See, the fat thing is funny because it was FHUJETH that kept bringing it up. We'd be talking about something completely different, or roleplaying normally and she'd bring the subject in. She KNEW I didn't like it, I said multiple times that it made me uncomfortable, but she just wouldn't stop. I kind of wondered if she was trying to push "desensitisation" of something I don't like on me. And that bit where she said that picture of Choromatsu made her uncomfortable? That's funny too because she sent me this in one of her post-parting ways e-mails;

"There is a common reoccurring theme with your art that screams "slob love" the baggy eyes, messy hair, beer belly/guy, five o'clock shadow. It's okay to like that and I never thought it was gross even though I was well aware you were into that way before we stopped being friends. I never judged you for that because I mean, I'm a fetish artist, lol."

Also, it wasn't ME who drew obese Matsus... that was Fhujeth, I still have some pics she sent me, here.]

For the record, the image Fhujeth was referring to (”Choromatsu, aged 30s where she gave him messy hair as his hair was thinning, laying shirtless on a green arm chair, his gut hanging out, and he looked like a slob”) is this one:

That, to me... isn’t what it was dramatized to be. Dad bod, anyone? “gut hanging out”? Er, nah... if that picture makes Choromatsu out to be a fat slob I really need to sort my life out!! And that arm chair isn't green...(??)

Also, salarymatsu.tumblr.com is publicly visible and the reference for his hair was from canon material (kun).

This is the Osomatsu-kun reference Chocho used for the hair:

It was Ichimatsu with the messy hair (the one with the glasses, last panel)... but this is real canon stuff about the Matsus being 30 years older than their kun age. It’s a bit of a running joke in the series that Choromatsu becomes bald but there’s absolutely nothing here to suggest a “slob” kink.

[Also, she was ALWAYS talking about fetishes. So, so often, more so than anybody I have ever met before. EVERYTHING was(/is?) a fetish to her!]

Fhujeth: The only cartoon network shows that I can argue had any kink content in them was Uncle Grandpa and Kids Next Door and the latter the director told me it didn't.

Fhujeth: Tuttle I think he gets depression after his wife dies and becomes a blob... I really like that video. XD Chocho: Ahhh okay. XD;; Fhujeth: Anyways yes I wanted to share that with you since we talk of kinks a lot and that song is one of my favourite things seth macfarlane's done Chocho: It's not like I choose to talk about kinks! XD Fhujeth: But we do!

Fhujeth: How... how close to "stuffing" should I get before too much is too much because I am not very good at drawing the line between kink and not kink because I have done kink artwork and am 100% desensitized to it

[Another interesting piece of chatlog from Fhujeth is...;]

Fhujeth: I like stupid drunk losers tht are slobs

Fhujeth: Ahh ok! But I like fat slob loser characters a lot, idk why they appeal to me greatly... especially ones that are unaware of how lame they are

Wait... you what?? Fhujeth was blaming Chocho for being into this as a kink and using it in her argument as to why Chocho was an abuser. This is evidence that it was in fact THE OTHER WAY ROUND and the accusation is blatant projection. I don’t get it - why use this as an argument when it’s an obvious lie?? Like I said earlier, if something makes someone uncomfortable, they should speak up. But as proven in the chatlogs it was in fact Fhujeth that liked “fat slob loser characters a lot” or “stupid drunk losers that are slobs”.

There was a LOT more chatlog suggesting Fhujeth liked to bring up fat in random conversations that were, in general, unrelated.

Chocho: Why does Karamatsu go around with his arms crossed in those clothes Chocho: Only in those Chocho: There seems to be no reason Fhujeth: Karamatsu: *feels fat* Totty: OF ALL THE CLOTHES*

Fhujeth: originally a black and white character, is just a fat pig now Fhujeth: Btw this show if you never saw it is brilliant Chocho: Ichimatsu: Actually Todomatsu then Fhujeth: Totty: :// IIRC: She is even depicted as super fat and can't fit into things and like eats an entire car. I feel like there was an episode she gets stuck somewhere from being so fat and she can't get outside to a food mobile that comes every rare time. Chocho: She doesn't look that fat! XD; Fhujeth: They change it for the show, it's very.... cartoonish Chocho: Ahhh okay! Fhujeth: Like, at certain times they make her fatter

Fhujeth:XDD Totty: I'l commission you - Draw Karamatsu really fat and ugly.... and then make his head normal... you know Chocho: XD Fhujeth: Totty, wait, he already is like that Chocho: Karamatsu: ... 8( Totty!

Fhujeth: dayon has a big head. Chocho: XD Chocho: yes Chocho: DAYOOOOOOOOON Fhujeth: and on a perspective level that person is tall Fhujeth: and the one in green is tall Chocho: Yes. XD Chocho: Well, I still think the Matsus are short Fhujeth: they were tall as kids Fhujeth: at least in 66 kun Fhujeth: xD they look like giants Chocho: I love that bit before that though, where they call Karamatsu an idiot and he's all hurt Chocho: XD Chocho: Yeah, but in 66 kun they change height all the time. XD; Fhujeth: "I'm not an idiot" :( Chocho: Karamatsu: *wiggly mouth* Fhujeth: i bought those tickets because i care Chocho: And all the merch. XD Chocho: .... something weird goes on with his body here.. Chocho: ???? Fhujeth: Totty: It's the fat inside him Chocho: XD Chocho: It just couldn't take being called an idiot Fhujeth: THE FUCK DID HE SAY JUST NOW Chocho: XD Chocho: "How so"????

Fhujeth: Totty: Hah, if Choromatsu Niisan wants to do that then I'll go to his stinky idol club and make a fool of himself in front of nyaachan. Fhujeth: Yeah! Chocho: Yeah, exactly Chocho: Feel free to get Totty to get Chocho's dick out in front of Nyaa-chan Chocho: And do whatever with it! Fhujeth: So he sneaks back stage using his "Totty Charisma Charm" and makes a fool of himself. OK! Yeah! This is fun :D Chocho: That doesn't involve a knife or irreperable damage, hahaha Yeah Fhujeth: it was an ideaaaaa ;.; Chocho: Totty can do things like join Nyaachan and idol fansites and post dick pics and nudes Chocho: No no, I mean, you can do dick things. XD Chocho: Just not involving knives Fhujeth: Totty: I AM CHOROMATSU MATSUNO I AM A REAL FAT OTAKU WITH NO PRIDE. I HAVE TWELVE BROTHERS SO IF YOU SEE A GUY WHO LOOKS LIKE ME ITS TOTALLY NOT ME BECAUSE I AM GROSS AND NEVER LEAVE THE HOUSE EXCEPT TO GO TO IDOL SHOWS :>

[This particular chatlog was about a "bodyswap" event we were going to do between Chochomatsu and Totally-Totty where the two (in each others bodies) go off to try and ruin each other's reputation.]

Chocho: Choromatsu's muttering that he'd like some boobies wrapped around him Chocho: Preferably belonging to Totoko and Nyaa-chan Chocho: Because he's scared of everybody else Fhujeth: Kara's man boobs Fhujeth: jk Chocho: I think that's something that people don't tend to realise with these guys... Or at least Karamatsu, Choromatsu and Ichimatsu... Chocho: They're virgins... they're nerds and they're (deep down) introverted... they're scared of girls.. they're gagging for it, but they don't know what they're doing and it's been so long that when a girl DOES approach them, they panic Chocho: Jyushimatsu's too 8D to be bothered by it I think... Totty's practised with being around girls and Osomatsu is just... XD Chocho: But the other 3 don't have a clue what they're doing Chocho: Karamatsu acts like he's this hot piece of meat, but as soon as he actually potentially gets a date

["Kara's man boobs" was, of course, not in regards to ANYTHING we had been talking about. I ignored it.]

Chocho: Besides how weird that is Chocho: Lice prefer clean hair. Apparently. Not that Ichimatsu's hair wouldn't be clean, it's not even that messy Fhujeth: what a werid ask Chocho: Right? Chocho: *picks nose* Fhujeth: xD Fhujeth: ughhh Fhujeth: Totty: Ok, when I say Kara is fat he's not Chubby. -.- Chocho: Ichimatsu: What's the difference Fhujeth: Totty: He's.... fat... *does motion like pregnant*

[The "weird ask" "lice" part was in regards to an ask Chocho got mentioning about how anon was concerned that Ichimatsu would have lice because of his hair. I answered that one fairly close to the end of when I was interested in working on the blog if you really want to see it. The fat comment wasn't in regards to anything that we had been talking about.]

Chocho: This is actually a redraw of something from 2002/3 Fhujeth: Are those all saying he needs to lose weight? Chocho: No. XD Fhujeth: Oh

Fhujeth: Yeah! "Karamatsu Tax" Totty: He's so fat he has to be charged mroe to be drawn.

[This was in a conversation about somebody young who wanted to commission me, but had no money, who had been passed my details by somebody who had no idea that they couldn't afford to commission anybody. I had a waiting list for domatsu commissions at that point, so I couldn't warrant doing anybody artwork for free in that style (I didn't even have time to draw art for myself!) but the person wasn't taking no for an answer. Just before going to pressure the person who gave the young person a recommendation to come to me, Fhujeth said this. I won't share the rest of the log, because it has details (names/urls) about the young person and the person who pointed them in my direction. It was a misunderstanding from their part, so it's not fair to and I won't put them on the spot. This just had nothing to do with the subject.]

Chocho: ah, they're around Fhujeth: AHH Fhujeth: I'll try to see if choromatsu becomes available Fhujeth: i need Fhujeth: tots Chocho: ded Fhujeth: No sign of Pink Legless man yet! The only way he could lose that weight was cutting it off :( Chocho: who totty? Chocho: i take it the idea of that machine is to push kara off the platform? Fhujeth: Yeah! Chocho: however that is don Chocho: e Fhujeth: just.... poke at hit until his fatass falls off... probablly.... seeing if you can scoop it otherwise just start at one end and try to push it in one direction then flip to the other end x.x it looks money consuming Chocho: there is only one claw Fhujeth: Yeah I mean by one side being his butt and then head Chocho: i see Chocho: i don't care for that one anyway, i only want choros

[This was about that online crane game you can win real prizes from, Toreba I think? Fhujeth was talking about the available prizes and how to win them.]

Chocho: choro's the rude one? Fhujeth: XD No. Totty knows he was wrong, he feels really bad. I think he'll get flung back and remain there like, "X.x" and then when he comes to try to "make it up" to his big brother whether it be getting in the way or mentioning that his brother has some issues with his shirt Fhujeth: or fat

[wait what]

What indeed... why is fat being randomly brought up as a subject in the middle of conversations so much if Fhujeth knew Chocho didn’t like it? If I know one of my friends doesn’t like something I don’t try to constantly push it in their face. This, to me, is an example of abuse in the opposite direction to what Fhujeth is claiming.

Fhujeth: My mom LOVES to watch the fat people shows like about the people so fat that they are like nothing but blobs and then they lose the weight

Fhujeth: Totty: EHHH? *huff* I.... I don't care either. Fhujeth: TottY: I DON'T CARE! (almost wrote cake) Chocho: chocho: sure! Fhujeth: Totty: To prove I don't care I will wear this fatsuit. Chocho: chocho: go on then Chocho: chocho: post photos of you in it to twitter too

Fhujeth: Jyushimatsurepliez took the leaf off Totty and now Totty is a Tanuki I'ma draw him kinda fat but not with big balls Fhujeth: But fat animals are not gross like people

Fhujeth: Finally Totty is fat xD

[By the last month this was what MOST of the conversations were about, it always went back to fat, not because I wanted it to. Where my text is lower case, it's because I was fucking done, I was so sick of this topic, the only way I could bounce it back was using humour.]

I would be fucking done by this point too. If someone I thought was a friend was constantly throwing a subject I didn’t like at me, despite me saying I didn’t like it and I don’t want to talk about it, I’d be seriously pissed off.

Fhujeth: I really like Choro! Actually that was one I paid for too today was the idol choro mascot plush, I wonder if he'll be fat Fhujeth: I'll get him in a few days! Fhujeth: And hopefully he'll... be skinny. Fhujeth: but if he is fat he is ffat Fhujeth: Then we know. Fhujeth: But if he is skinny then you were blessed. Chocho: "blessed"

[This was out of nowhere too. For context with that plush, I ordered a Choromatsu from the second set of the first plush (I think?) that were available? It's the small keychain "mascot" where Choromatsu is in the green flannel shirt with glowsticks and a bandana. When mine came, he was overstuffed which made his face look... wide... I was somewhat upset because he was nowhere near what the first one looked like, I wanted one that looked like the one from the first set. Apparently by getting a "fat" Choro, I was "blessed".]

In my conversation with Fhujeth, she claimed this:

Our RPs were all about humiliation and Choromatsu being a fat drunk gross slob. It wasn't an occasional thing, it was an all the time thing.

Chocho gave me this chatlog to explain that the topic was, again, brought into the roleplay by Fhujeth - not the other way round:

Fhujeth: Totty: All old people have hard candy in their pockets, Choromatsu-niisan... It helps them remember what it's like to feel teeth. Chocho: chocho: no idea what you're talking about Fhujeth: Totty: *finds one* Ewww, it's sticky... Fhujeth: Totty: You should use this... *runs away and returns with a green bumbag/fannypack* Chocho: chocho: why would it be sticky in a wrapper in a bag? Fhujeth: Totty: It must've melted. Fhujeth: Totty: *it's not sticky* Chocho: chocho: if you don't want it, give it back Fhujeth: Totty: I want it... Fhujeth: Totty: *opens and eats it* :3c *realizes this was in his brothers pocket* *smiles still despite realizing how gross it is being in an old man's pocket too* :3c;;;;;;;; *spits it out* Fhujeth: Totty: It tastes good at least! Fhujeth: Totty: Is there a bag of fresh ones? Fhujeth: Totty: *carefully places bumbag on Choromatsu's waist* Hopefully it's not too small~ Fhujeth: Totty: *tightens it all the way, too tight* Chocho: chocho: argh why?!?!?! Fhujeth: Totty: Hmm it seems really tight on you... Fhujeth: *steps back, hand on chin Chocho: chocho: what are you doing to me?! you're trying to kill me Chocho: chocho: again Fhujeth: Totty: I'm giving you this bag to store candy and goods in! Chocho: chocho: stop tying it up so tight, i'm not a child i don't need the child setting!! Chocho: chocho: that HURTS you know! just like if i did it to you!! Fhujeth: Totty: Ah, you're right.. *loosens all the way* There, fat old man setting. *it still fits on him* Chocho: chocho: THERE IS NO "FAT OLD MAN" SETTING Chocho: chocho: todomatsu... *puts his hand on tottys shoulder* i'm sorry to break it to you, but... i'm not actually fat Chocho: chocho: here, let's see how YOU like it! *swiftly takes off the bag, whips it onto totty and yanks the strap as tight as it will go, harshly in a matter of a couple of seconds* Fhujeth: Totty: ... :S *ithurts* AGHHHH >< It's tight Chocho: chocho: hmm? what's that? it's tight? does it hurt? what a shame *huffs and stomps off* Fhujeth: Totty: *teary eyed immediately* Fhujeth: Totty: AHH TAKE IT OFF! *can't find the snappy part to undo it* CHOROMATSU-NIISANNNNNN!!!!! Chocho: chocho: *long gone*

[Just reading this I am so done, hahahaha! This is another example of us roleplaying and Fhujeth making it about how fat Chocho is. As I said, I just shrugged it off with humour. It ended up being about ridiculing Choromatsu and/or him being fat because she MADE it about it. She knew I didn't like it, so it always came up.]

I mean... this RP just looks playful and silly without context... but with all the above chatlogs taken into account, the obsession with fat and slobs evidently wasn’t coming from Chocho.

Chocho sent this to me which was posted by Fhujeth after the end of their friendship:

“Stop talking to other people”

Another part of my conversation with Fhujeth was a claim that Chocho had told her to stop talking to so many other people so that Fhujeth had more time to talk to important people, i.e. Chocho:

It was little things like demanding that I stop "stretching myself thin so I can chat with the people who matter (her)" instead of jumping around from the dozen or so convos I am in a day.

Chocho showed me this chatlog of that event:

totally-totty The second the drama was done that is why I went and messaged you on domatsu to tell you my reply so you could see it in the morning but I was just getting over anxiety attack and stuff. I didn't want to tell you to go away or anything because I liked knowing you were right there... chochomatsu To be honest, trying to guilt trip me into swallowing my feelings isn't fair either really. totally-totty I dunno. I guess I just do the wrong things. chochomatsu It's not a case of telling me to go away, I would have still been there I know what it's like to have something come up where your mind feels stretched thin and you need to focus on one thing at once as it's really important totally-totty I am sorry I didn't consider your feelings. chochomatsu So really, you should have just said something like "hold on, I'm having a crisis with a friend over here, it's serious", I don't see anything wrong with that totally-totty I will remember to do that. I am learning just now I have so much to learn socially and that I am still so socially under developed with dealing with other people and that I am fucking retarded. I'm really bad with other people's feelings. chochomatsu Calling yourself "fucking retarded" is another form of guilt tripping, by the way.. trying to make the other person feel guilty for being hurt by your actions totally-totty No. I am not asking you to feel guilty about it. I need to get better and learn. I know I have flaws I need to work on it. chochomatsu That's why I'm telling you how it's coming across, that's all totally-totty Thank you. totally-totty I'm really sorry about yesterday it just started off hectic with the auction, I am sure you know that is very high pressure. So after that I was all antsy and didn't feel like drawing so I went around and just cleaned my whole room and then I swam and then I finally sat back down and we chatted some and I was sorta spaced out and then the drama with my friend started and I immediately went into that anxiety shock, you know what I mean? That anxiety shock where it's all, "omg, omg." totally-totty When I was antsy I also started a bunch of other chat conversations with people. x.x So I was distracted with those all day. So I was ignoring them all... I jumped around and would forget them all.

But back to us. I'm really sorry. It's weird when you're not on anymore... haha. I didn't mean to make you think you were annoying or bothersome, either. chochomatsu That's why I don't talk to many people at once totally-totty I'm starting to think I need to stop talking to so many people now. It's really mucked with things. chochomatsu The feeling of complete and utter disconnection and lack of care you get from somebody spreading their conversation capability so thin is extremely damaging Especially when it's from somebody you really enjoy or need to talk to totally-totty I agree, and I have noticed this has been happening especially as of late. Which is why I need to stop it. Because I'd rather talk to the friends I care about than other people.

[So... I didn't even bring it up, she was the one who said it. I just gave reasons as to why it might help her (and the people she talks to, not just me).]

Yeah, I’m not seeing abuse from Chocho here either. Chocho may have given a reason as to why she thought Fhujeth was doing damage to their friendship by trying to talk to many people at once, but isn’t this a valid concern? Fhujeth seemed to take it well here and agree with the stance. Also I do see manipulation of Chocho by Fhujeth with things like “I am fucking retarded” in an attempt to get a sort of “No you are not” response.

Another claim from Fhujeth was this:

It was little things that getting mad at me for being friends with some other people that hated Choromatsu.

Chocho had this to say:

[I never got mad at Fhujeth for being friends with anybody. I admit I got frustrated at people who hated on Choromatsu endlessly, but I'm sure anybody who had their favourites get hated on would feel the same way. I vented to Fhujeth about it, but never, ever attacked her over it. Who she's friends with is none of my business.]

Venting is wholly different than being mad at someone. There doesn’t seem to be chatlogs of this event from either side unfortunately.

Chochomatsu = Domatsu

This goes back to one of Fhujeth’s main claims of abuse from Chocho - that Domatsu and Chochomatsu were two blogs run by the same person but that Chocho refused to tell Fhujeth about it despite them being friends. Fhujeth said this to me:

We talked all day every day and we did the ask blog thing together. For me, it felt like a massive breach of trust when she pretended to be someone else to me. It's okay to want to start new but to lie to your friend that you're not someone is.... that feels very unsavoury.

Asking Chocho, this is the explanation:

Chocho: Interesting that she puts Chocho highly already though Chocho: He's existed for what half a month Fhujeth: Yeah you seem really tense Chocho: Yeah. =( Chocho: I have the magazine pic, your body pillow, jussy's commissions, that plush (Bob), THE NEXT DOMATSU UPDATE, chocho's asks, this birthday thing, just paid twice for my birthday present, probably going to have to do that again when Chibita finally shows up... Chocho: I'm trying!

[This is proof that Chocho existed for less than half a month by the time I told Fhujeth. I didn't tell ANYBODY about Chochomatsu at first because I wasn't sure if I wanted to keep the blog. If I had told anybody, even my closest friends, I would have basically had to be committed to it and I didn't want to seal myself in on a blog I wasn't even sure I'd keep. After a week or so, I felt I wanted to keep Chocho, so I let Fhujeth in on it and my other closest friends outside the fandom (I didn't really have any friends in the fandom besides Fhujeth. Funny that, huh?). Fhujeth was the only one who took offense. (Also, in regards to "we did the ask blog thing together"? That's because she always forced her way into my blog stories and pressured me when I wanted to use my own Totty. I wasn't allowed to even concept asking another Totty blog to be my Totty for any particular post.]

So, what, 2 weeks that Fhujeth didn’t know Chochomatsu and Domatsu were the same person? I am again finding myself not being able to see where the abuse is. Even if it had been kept a permanent secret, it’s another case of this multiple alias thing just... being a thing in the creative arts. Why is it abusive?

To follow on from the subject of Totty blogs, Chocho gave me some explanation as to what that meant:

Chocho: If I legit went and made a Totty blog instead, you'd let me rot domatsu? Fhujeth: No, what I meant was more like... Fhujeth: I don't think I could stand a chance against you and I'd probably have to quit myself. Fhujeth: And I'd see it as competitiion, I guess. Chocho: Why would you do that? Chocho: You know I can't write Totty as well as you Fhujeth: Because there is absolutely no way in hell I can compete with your art. Chocho: Character portrayal is more important than art though Fhujeth: well, not really on tumblr people care about art lots ;.; well, in the end of it all I'd be incredibly hurt like, "Errr, there's 6 guys and you legit going to drop the one to pick the one I play even tho we work so closely together now I'm doomed and we can't work together so much and now I guess we're frenemies." Basically I'd handly it all in a very immature and very bad fashion because I have a very childish competitive nature.... But you are more than welcome to I just wouldn't be able to handle it at all like a grown adult. Fhujeth: its not a threat lmao I legit don't think I;d handle it well XD I already get really competitive when I see other Totty blogs Chocho: Well, don't worry, I wouldn't. I only asked since you said you'd only let me if it was to make a Totty blog? Chocho: I think? Fhujeth: Noooo. Fhujeth: I don't want domatsu to rot at all I love it Chocho: *only let me quit Fhujeth: yeah because the immature fraction of my brain would say, "Uhhhhh...... this person who was my friend is now my enemy" Fhujeth: like blanca was thinking of making a todomatsu universe I said, "NO" Fhujeth: Not like that Chocho: Uh... how do you feel about my Totty then? =S Fhujeth: I like him! Fhujeth: But since you don't have him as a dedicated blog... Fhujeth: I'm not like, scared. Fhujeth: That he'll become something I have to worry over. Fhujeth: Since you're Karamatsu to me... Fhujeth: of course I don;t OWN him either I just don't want to get competitive Fhujeth: against friends... because I get really bad. Fhujeth: I am crazy agressive competitive person if I wanna be.... or I give up if I don't think I can do it. Fhujeth: this is a bad side of me... Fhujeth: a really bad side of me Chocho: Even if I gave him his own blog, it'd work in the same way as the rest of them. Fhujeth: Right, that is OK. I mean.... your Oso blog doesn't take asks and all really... Fhujeth: Wow I can already tell I would handle this terribly. Fhujeth: I am feeling my blood pressure going through the roof, God I am so immature :/ At least I am aware of this flaw but still... damn. Chocho: I'm not going to make a Totty ask blog, don't worry Fhujeth: T-Thank you..... Fhujeth: You're allowed to though. Fhujeth: I'd figure you'd go for Choro Chocho: Yeah Fhujeth: I'm sorry....... Fhujeth: For how I just was Chocho: Oh, no, don't worry

Fhujeth: I just hope I didn't make you hate Totty Chocho: No Fhujeth: Did you fall out of love with him tho? Chocho: The only thing is that I feel pressured not to include him in blog things (as mine solo) because you've told me in the past that he's yours Fhujeth: Oh, I don't mean like that you can do that.. Chocho: So if you feel like he's not there much it's because I feel you'd be angry with me if I gave him screen time or his own blog Fhujeth: Hmm, I would feel nervous about his own blog but not screen time.... Chocho: Exactly Fhujeth: Because you do so much better than me... XD;; it's more like Chocho: That's why he's not around Fhujeth: You could basically run me out of business... I guess... Chocho: I really doubt it Fhujeth: Look how fast Chocho grew and he is the same popular as Todo Chocho: Apparently he became one of the more expensive ones, so I don't think that's true... Fhujeth: i dunno. Don't let me stop you from doing what you want. Fhujeth: ^^ Fhujeth: If you run me out of business you run me out of business it's just the way it'd go. XD Chocho: I can't run anybody "out of business", it's not a business. ._. People haven't stopped with Karamatsu or Choromatsu blogs because domatsu and chochomatsu exist for example... Chocho: I managed to get enough for a gacha again and I got red hoodie Osomatsu. =/ Fhujeth: No but if I know a new blog comes out that is doing better than me already and faster than I would up and quit and feel "no point". That is what I got and I was so mad. Fhujeth: But my feelings, please, don't let them influence you. Chocho: And that's why Todomatsu isn't around at all on my blogs Because it would be my fault if you quit Chocho: It's not that I don't like him, more that I'm... not really allowed Fhujeth: Ahh, no, please, don't say that. Fhujeth: Please do what you want. Fhujeth: ==inadifferentveinifeellikeishouldquitnowsighs== why is this all so complicated. can we talk this out just so you can understand where I come from and then you can see that you can do as you wish? :3 Chocho: See? Now I've made you want to quit just by saying that I wanted to separate dematsu into 4 blogs. =S Fhujeth: You can Chocho: I know where you're coming from, you've explained before Chocho: But this is why Totty hasn't been around on my end, that's all Fhujeth: It's not like it's going to be super active or anything like chocho or domatsu .... Chocho: Respecting your wishes Fhujeth: no? Or is it Chocho: It is! You told me you didn't want me to be Totty and that you would feel threatened and annoyed if I did Fhujeth: It would be more active? Please do as you wish. Please don't let me stop you.. Fhujeth: Honest. Fhujeth: But now I feel bad because you want to do something and you feel like I am stopping you. Fhujeth: All I was doing was expressing my feelings but I didn't want you to actually not do something because of me. I am not that selfish. I'll deal with it on my own. Chocho: Nah, it's fine. As long as you know that it's not that I don't like Totty! Fhujeth: I don't know I don't want to prevent you from doing something. Fhujeth: I'm really torn right now. Fhujeth: I'm gonna go away for a while and lay down... x.x I am too conflicted. I do not own a character, so please, by all means, you have every right. Chocho: This is why I didn't do anything! >_< Fhujeth: But you want to!

This is quite an obvious example of gaslighting... “You could basically run me out of business” ... “Don't let me stop you from doing what you want.” ... “No but if I know a new blog comes out that is doing better than me already and faster than I would up and quit and feel "no point".” ... “But my feelings, please, don't let them influence you.” ... “Please do what you want.” ... “I don't know I don't want to prevent you from doing something.” ... “But you want to!”

Seriously... that is some powerful manipulative flip-flopping in an attempt to scare Chocho out of making a Totty blog.

Back to the issue of Chochomatsu and Domatsu being the same person...

[Also, she approached Chocho and pressed for conversation, not the other way around.]

05/19/2016 mr-flag hii ^^ welcome to the ask blog world! I am gonna answer you ask, sorry it';s coming form this blog you only follow this of my blogs <3 I am totally-totty too your choro is super cute <3 I might answer it though in a bit I am not sure yet the timing I have..... I wanna answer it now.... chochomatsu Oh! I thought I was following your Totty blog! I can see it on my dash right now! :O Are you sure? Maybe I need to unfollow and follow again???

[Chocho's blog was started on the 17th of May, 2016. Fhujeth approached the blog on the 19th of May 2016. 2 days after the blog was born.]

Chocho went on to explain that Fhujeth had been accusing her of having a Totty blog before the end of working on the Domatsu blog:

Fhujeth: you are capable of a lot.... i'd not be surprised if you had a totty blog already and I didn't know of it XD Fhujeth: not that you'd be that deceptive Chocho: I'd ummed and ahhed about Chocho for a couple of months before I did him... and I hesitated before I posted him first post even... I felt really guilty about him to be honest. Nah, I really really don't have a Totty blog I have domatsu and it's partner blogs, Chocho and Wakuwaku. And I don't do anything with Waku... since he chills out on Chocho's blog all the time. Fhujeth: Oh I am not accusing you of one...

[She was falsely accusing me of having a Totty blog back before I had even stopped doing Domatsu too. She accused me of a lot to be honest, with no grounds. And how do you prove you don't have something when you don't have something? She always put me on the spot for things I couldn't prove otherwise because they didn't exist.]

“Oh I am not accusing you of one...” Oh really? That’s what it sounds like to me.

In my experience, Fhujeth has been accusing Chocho of running a Totty blog for a very long time. A lot of people in this fandom already know that Fhujeth accused Chocho of being Todomatshu/Shu/Boots - another good friend of mine. This is in fact connected to the Totty Club situation as Shu was the founder and the one maintaining the list of members and such. The Totty Club drama is of course where most of my bad experiences with Fhujeth come from and it is difficult to prove to someone that two blogs are two different people when both people have been scared into not wanting anything to do with Fhujeth at all. I don’t have saved proof, but I have personally witnessed Chocho and Shu in a drawpile session together, working on separate drawings at the same time.

Fhujeth’s words:

totty Like I said too, I wasn't there at the drawpile. I guess one of my other friends was and said something how Chocho emulated Shu's style effortlessly and flawlessly but that is all I know. It falls back down to proof, again. I wasn't there just like you weren't there. I don't know. I'm not going to tell people Shu is Chocho. I don't even bring any of them up in name anymore.

I know which friend Fhujeth is talking about and this is not the same drawpile session I’m talking about. They weren’t there. In fact this friend she mentions is almost certainly the one that leaked chat from the Totty Club discord we had that triggered a lot of the drama with Fhujeth to begin with. I wish I had proof of the drawpile claim but I don’t. I didn’t think to take screenshots - we were all busy drawing and having fun. To this day I get the very strong impression that Fhujeth still believes Chocho and Shu are the same person.

I can’t give chatlogs as proof that they aren’t the same person as no logs I have access to have anything that would prove or disprove anything to do with this issue. The only other thing I can possibly add to this is that in the days of the Totty Club discord I could occasionally see Chocho and Boots (Shu) typing at the same time. Again, no proof, I don’t record my screen!

This entire situation was abusive to all of us. It ripped the Totty Club apart - people were unable to trust other members, Shu in particular, because of Fhujeth’s unfounded claims. As always, Chocho preferred to remain quiet about anything to do with Fhujeth at the time. I have to say I now understand why that was. I also finally understand why Fhujeth was so persistent about Shu being Chocho - she was STILL paranoid that Chocho was running a Totty blog and was attempting to be in direct competition with her.

The Pain Incident

Before I go on with this issue I have to explain why this is the last one I’m bringing up despite it being one of the main things Fhujeth presented as evidence that Chocho was abusive to her. It needs everything that has been explained previously to make sense and to give context, otherwise it comes across as very one-sided and it’s hard to see why the things being said are actually being said. The events of the previous months lead up to this final situation.

First of all, the claim Fhujeth presented to me:

Uhh. Okay, day before is what we're talking about. We were in a convo and she was super into collecting all the Choros for it so the first thing she said was like, "aww I didn't get X choro in the roll" she immediately showed me a drawing after that and I replied with a very stock reply of, "I'm sorry" or something, but as I was sitting down my back just died on me. So I started to panic like, "oh my god I am in so much pain holy shit ahhhhhhafsdgsdfhgdhdg" which obviously caused me to not reply to the drawing cause I was in physical pain and now spazzing about how i'm at home alone and scared and that idk what to do and I can't call anyone and idk where my mom is and i am scared. I was freaking out. She mentioned the drawing again but I just was sorta like.... in freaking out mode by then. I eventually got to the floor, got proper care after laying on the floor home alone for an hour with the anxiety now that my friend hated me and that I was home alone and couldn't move. After my mom came home and I got treated for the pain I came up to apologize on utox and what not and the last message she had written was, "ugh whatever i'm gonna go watch tv"

When I brought this part up with Chocho...

[This is another thing that needs FAR more backstory than Fhujeth gives... but of course she wouldn't give the whole story I suppose... =T In any case, this event happened after months and months of her complaining about her back pain (and other pains, she was just apparently constantly in pain and on pain medication) and shooting down my ideas for ways to get it seen to or ease the apparent pain. Eventually, especially by the last month, I was sick of hearing it and starting to doubt it was actually as bad as she always said it was. It ALWAYS came up, but she was NEVER willing to do anything about it because money and weed is more important.]

Fhujeth: Yeah. I hope I can. x.x I am like, really.... blah. Chocho: Do you think it has to do with the med you had to drop and the lack of weed at all? =( Chocho: Some kind of withdrawal symptoms? Fhujeth: Oh, hey, would you be willing to reblog my promo post? You don't have to... because you probably don't want that on your wall right now, but yeah. Any withdrawl would be gone now. Chocho: Combined with the pain of your slipped disc Chocho: Cos that is not pleasant Fhujeth: I am used to the pain, that is not like, a thing that gets me. Chocho: Pain gets to anybody. u.u Fhujeth: It adds to it but it's not like.... what is angering me. Chocho: Is it the education thing? Chocho: Also, brb!! Fhujeth: Nah, it's the "I am pissed at my friend for not keeping me away from game centers even if I beg because I have no self control and will pile through hundreds of dollars easy because I am mentally sick and can't control myself even tho I begged them the other day to keep me away." Fhujeth: "I am pissed at them too for forgetting that shop exists after I spent a TOOOOON of money on blind bags.

Wow... just to comment here... that’s really not your friend’s responsibility. If you can’t control your own spending don’t put the blame on someone else! You’re saying right there that you have no self control and yet you’re pissed at someone else...

Fhujeth: Ahhh the chronic pain is so... Fhujeth: awakening Chocho: Your slipped disc? =( Chocho: I bet it is! Fhujeth: yeah and then like just pain everywhere else it's kinda messed up Chocho: How are you, besides your disc? =< Fhujeth: Sore xD Chocho: <=( How long have you been suffering this for? Fhujeth: Since I got here for sure uhhh, for the one on the higher part my back, since 2012 I had diagnosed a disc in my lumbar that was out but it is ok now Chocho: Hmm... >_< Can they pop back in place? Fhujeth: I don't have health insurance atm Fhujeth: so I can't get it treated Chocho: I meant on their own. =( Fhujeth: It could I guess Fhujeth: depends on the damage Fhujeth: basically it's really tender at this one spot and then it causes all the muscles to tense around it Fhujeth: and all the walking has been really bad Fhujeth: I get back from going out and the pain is so intense Chocho: Yeah... =( Hmm.. Can you get a hold of heat or massage packs that might help? Fhujeth: I have.... some menthol strips I been sticking on they help a bit Chocho: Mm! At least you have something! ;o; Fhujeth: yeah :D Fhujeth: and ibuprofen Chocho: Ibuprofen is amazing

Chocho: Yeah, came back from the doctor and Zenryoku Batankyu had finally arrived. =D Fhujeth: Ramen is not really healthy and the high sodium must ause inflamation and I am in insane pain today from it!! AHHH Congrats!!!! I should pick up those CDs Fhujeth: so are you ok :3 like from the doctor? Chocho: Ahhh okay. XD;;; Yeah, that's not good... I hope you feel better!

Chocho: *PRIVATE STUFF ABOUT MY FATHER* Fhujeth: Woow!! Chocho: *PRIVATE STUFF ABOUT MY FATHER* Fhujeth: That is already more support than I have gotten @-@ That is so cool! Fhujeth: ahh i feel crappppy Chocho: *PRIVATE STUFF ABOUT MY FATHER* I miss my Dad. =( Ahhh, still bad? ;m; Is there anything you can take? Fhujeth: ahh I am sorry you miss him ;.; Fhujeth: Yeah, weed, but I am waiting on my damn mom to finish with the laundryyyyyy Chocho: I haven't gotten to see him in a few years now, darn lack of money. Ohhh, would weed help then? Fhujeth: it helps me with pain, most. XD; It makes me forget I am in it.

Just to be completely clear, that chatlog has obvious edits to protect the privacy of Chocho and her father.

Fhujeth: Totty: See? I'm a lot cuter, and I have like, a better personality, and my eyebrows are well shaped and maintained. :3 Chocho: Ichimatsu: *holds up another drawing similar to the first except it has "shaped eyebrows" drawn on* Fhujeth: Totty: o_o *pulls out phone and checks self* No, wait, that could be deceiving me *runs to body length mirror in closet* *looks ok* ??? Fhujeth: (ugh my joints hurt) Chocho: Is it all the pain? =( Fhujeth: i dunno they just hurt all the sundde l.l Fhujeth: sudden^ Chocho: Hmm.... have you been tensing because of the rash? Fhujeth: not sure o.o Fhujeth: I'm sooo tired tho Chocho: I really hope the doctor can help on Monday. =(

Chocho: The idol otaku I mean Fhujeth: I am looking for those online @-@ They were lottery prizes too Fhujeth: it looks like there was when I was looking a big set and a small set, only the big set has choro and kara with the jackets and all Chocho: Yeah, I wanted the big set! Fhujeth: they look cute! if i seem weird today it's because I am in intense pain !! Chocho: Okay, I hope you feel better. =(

Fhujeth: like the one in the tv Fhujeth: ? Chocho: I imagine so! Fhujeth: it hurts to moveee ffff Chocho: Like the one on South Park Fhujeth: I might lay down with the tens unit -- yeah! Chocho: Okay! I hope you feel better!! Chocho: Thanks for listening to a part of my teens. XD Fhujeth: Not right now! I need to draw... but it just so distracting. No problem same for me! Fhujeth: You said someone you know how a disc issue right? Chocho: Oh, yeah, my Dad has I think Fhujeth: ok ^^ Chocho: Why do you ask? Fhujeth: if you know how it is like at all :o Chocho: Well, I don't have it personally.. =o Fhujeth: Mine is pretty painful at times! Like, "this hurts a lot I might puke" painful

Chocho: I love all the spinning they put into these intros, hahaha Chocho: Skillz Chocho: ZARD... ;m; Fhujeth: i miss the mid 00 Fhujeth: s Chocho: 8th opening with the dancing. XD Chocho: I don't miss the 00s at all Chocho: It was more of a time of suffering for me than I even realised Fhujeth: For me i grew a lot. if I reply slow right now it is because i wanna finish this art and go lay downb ecause pain

Chocho: I wouldn't want to send out my rare badge and get nothing Fhujeth: True! Fhujeth: ahh i slept really bad on my back Fhujeth: i am in so much pain i can't focus that is why i am on so late Chocho: Did you take some painkillers? =(

Fhujeth: Thanks! Chocho: No probs! Fhujeth: "wh-why is everything distorted" Fhujeth: Heh I wish I didn't have caffiene addiction so I didn't have to drink cofffee this morning! Chocho: How come? Fhujeth: It's a stimulant so it's going to make my anxiety worse too.. Though the inital effects the the pot should be out of my system by now I am confused @_@ Oh well. I wish it would stop. I'll shut up about it XD Chocho: I hope it passes for you, really! Fhujeth: I hope it passes too because it's more painful to be sitting on the computer and being awake and trying to be alive than it is laying in bed pretending I don't exist! I'm fighting so hard to go back to bed and not exist!

Chocho: Karamatsu's enjoying it at least Chocho: Vados wasn't even in the 3 episodes we watched, only the intros for a second or so Fhujeth: Sorry for not talking lots I have weird muscle pain going down my arms -.x Chocho: S'all right! Fhujeth: i've felt shitty I hope nothing is seriously wrong lmao Chocho: It's probably one huge body shock combination or jet lag and coming back from Japan and infection and tiredness Fhujeth: yeah ;.; Chocho: Probably sister and mother induced stress to put the cherry on top

Fhujeth: invisible trauma from being fickin Chocho: that's not a work book Fhujeth: nyaachan fanbook Fhujeth: omg i just sorta fixed my back but I hear if I move my disc will slip back in place Chocho: oh? Fhujeth: Yeah I used a TENS to stop all the pain and decompressed my back and it doesn't hurt right now but I am scared to move Chocho: that's no good Fhujeth: no and i guess i don't qualify for obama care or something so I do not get insurance Fhujeth: ahh well

Fhujeth: No. It stinks bad too. Chocho: as do cat farts Fhujeth: Yes. XD Fhujeth: I cannot stay up at all @_@ Chocho: too tired? Fhujeth: pain Fhujeth: and that time of month Chocho: i seeee Fhujeth: but my back being like a squished sandwich cookie is kinda gross Chocho: yeah... Chocho: i hope you feel better Chocho: wanna talk totty? Chocho: would that help at all? Chocho: cos Chocho: i mean Chocho: it's totty

Fhujeth: I accidentally hit end task when fixing something else - I have a lot to do but I am getting it done I am just freaking out some because my mom is making me do the back porch and I am only a third done, I'm in intense pain and I wanna get Jussy this commission by tonight!

Fhujeth: Are you feeling okay? Chocho: why do you ask? Fhujeth: Because you're my friend and I am concerned about your well being? Chocho: oh i meant if you thought i was acting weird or something Chocho: i have a headache and i'm peeved but otherwise ok thanks Chocho: you? Fhujeth: My back wont get better and the pain is intense no matter what I do and I'm running out of pot and the guy who was supplying me left the country I think Chocho: i remember you mentioning about the pot guy... Fhujeth: So I might be weird a few days after I 100% run out. x.x Chocho: ok! Fhujeth: But I need to figure out more pain managment ideas because it's pretty much at the point where I am unable to do very much. It's excrutiating to bend down to feed the cats and I haven't done hardly any housework in the past few weeks that required hevy lifting and when i was powerwashing the other day the pain was insane. Fhujeth: but yeah! That's how I've been! Fhujeth: Otherwise I've bene okay emotionally! Chocho: there has to be other ways Chocho: my friend goes to massage therapy and accupuncture for his pain Fhujeth: I have something that is like accupuncture! The problem is I don't have health insurance, otherwise I'd be all over physical therapy x.x Chocho: you're gonna be saving a buck by not buying weed Fhujeth: I think a session for physical therapy will cost me half a month's supply of weed Chocho: just go every 2 weeks Fhujeth: When I went they wanted me to go 2 or three times a week (I forget how many times but it was like 15 sessions) for some very specific things (sessions were 45 minutes and were workout, massage, stretch, and decompression, and TENS). I'll see if there is anything the state! I think right now my best option will have to be the way most americans manage pain... XD our ridiculously heavy duty pain killers that kill us slowly and surely.

[This log was nearing the end of us talking. She literally asked me how I was JUST to talk about how much pain SHE was in, then say she's not willing to pay for care.]

Chocho: but he gets bad bad pain Fhujeth: Ah! Ok! I have back pain! I wish had healthcare! I'll look into things more. I was thinking of getting one of those inversion tables! Chocho: heat pad might help too Fhujeth: I use heat, ice, and a mini-tens unit! (also those are great for cramp pain!) Fhujeth: Oh I remember what helped too is that stinky rub Chocho: i think if it's that bad, your pain, you should try these things out, if only a couple of times... like the massage treatment Chocho: it may well super help Fhujeth: I did twice! Fhujeth: err, I did physical therapy twice Chocho: ah well there you go Fhujeth: like 40 sessions! It helped but I went a lot. Chocho: i don't really have any other ideas Fhujeth: It's ok! Chocho: dried cranberries Fhujeth: What do those do :O Chocho: some kind of pain relief, i'm not sure

Fhujeth: I am in. So. much. Pain right now. I'm wanted to stay at the computer and still play sm but I think I'm gonna have to lay down and try to work on my back at the same time. What else do I need to do for Choromatsu and the meds :3

Fhujeth: i am so much pain i can't hardly walk Chocho: maybe you should rest.... Fhujeth: I'm gonna when the game comes try to lay on the floor with my legs up and try to get my spine to at least not hurt... gonna try to get some other work sorted first Chocho: ok! Fhujeth: Sorry for whining I'm kinda scared it's never been this bad and it wont stop Chocho: it's all right Chocho: i hjust hope you can get some relief Fhujeth: I have some vicadin it just recently expired i think...

Chocho: i looked up slipped disc treatment Chocho: "It can take about one to three months to recover from a slipped disc. Treatment usually involves a combination of physiotherapy, such as massage and exercise, and medication to relieve the pain. Surgery to release the compressed nerve and remove part of the disc may be considered in severe cases, or if the pain doesn't settle down over time. In many cases, a slipped disc will eventually shrink back away from the nerve and the pain will ease as the disc stops pressing on the affected nerve. Sometimes the slipped disc will stay pressing on the nerve, but the pain goes away because the brain learns to "turn down the volume" on the pain messages coming from the nerve. " Fhujeth: Yeah ;.; Chocho: i still recommend massages Chocho: once every 2 weeks Chocho: if you're in that much pain, surely it's worth a try? Fhujeth: I have a thing I am going to start to use for massages and start with it... I think mine isn't a slipped disc though it's the next step above that (unless it's the same name) Fhujeth: But massage would def help Fhujeth: I wonder if there is a place here that can do it not as a "spa" Chocho: it would be worth looking into if you're going to not be spending that $ on weed... use it on something else to help the pain Chocho: i would Fhujeth: Yeah I know! Trust me, I know. ;.; I tried doing some other stuff like laying the way you're supposed to but it felt like uhh how to word it..... Fhujeth: I was more sore when I got up

What stood out to me in this one was just how willing Chocho still was to help Fhujeth out with her pain despite everything that Fhujeth had put her through up until now. But it’s being mentioned so much it’s difficult to know how bad the pain really is.

Chocho: good Fhujeth: Ugh I am trying to massage the area and the pain got like 50 times worse Fhujeth: I think Chocho: i think it may well be a case of worse before better Fhujeth: it might wear off Chocho: cos you're shocking the system Fhujeth: Yeah. shocking the system? Chocho: yeah, as in it's not what your back is expecting Chocho: kind of like ice stings before it numbs Fhujeth: I hope! I feel kinda tense now x.x;

[These all lead up to the "day" where I was finally done with the topic always being about how much pain Fhujeth was in and me not being all too sure how much of it was true and how much was attention seeking... turns out the time I was finally done was the worst time to be done.]

[The pain stuff, whether is was a headache, a migraine, rashes, aches after working in the garden, her back or anything else... basically started, at the latest, around April when she was in Japan (condering that we first started talking at the very end of February that year). From that point, talk about pain came up all the time, it was draining and the pain just "escalated" all the time. And it continued right up to when I said I wanted out (Which was the end of November the same year).]

The logs here are just from the utox app and Chocho says these are not all the mentions of pain from Fhujeth.

This is where we got onto talking about the ignored artwork...

[I actually shared the artwork first, then commented about the Tabimatsu event. Her back didn't "escalate" until I mentioned "let's ignore it" about the art (which to be honest, she ignored my art a fair few times before then) which I had been actually drawing out some of our roleplay we had been doing, which I had been doing to try and distract her from the apparent pain. By this point, she had been complaining about "bad pain" so much (crying wolf, basically) that I... have to say, I no longer believed the severity. Here's the chatlog. With that in mind, you can see I'm tired of this same situation over and over, it just happened to be the worst time to make a comment. Either that or she escalated it BECAUSE I made a comment? I don't know, I can't be sure, I was only on the other side of the screen. After a while she went silent, so when I decided to go watch TV with my boyfriend, I left the note saying I was. It was blunt because I was annoyed, which I assume came across as heartless to people she showed. Sadly, timestamps weren't kept, so that context is lost.

Apparently the people who she showed at least partial logs to, she didn't mention that I was drawing the pictures to entertain her and help distract her, nor that I asked if she took pain meds and if they would help. Basically the only part she kept of mine was "thanks for ignoring my pic", I was told. So THIS is the "edited chatlogs" I mentioned. Editing means conveniently dropping details from the conversation too, being that because you've only shown snippits or because you've dropped lines entirely...]

Chocho: *PIC WAS HERE* Chocho: i never managed to get school uniform choromatsu from the event before it ends Chocho: there's no way i can get enough coins for another spin before the event goes, which sucks Fhujeth: I'm sorry >< Chocho: it's okay i guess what can i do? let's ignore it [<- note, this was me hinting about the ignored artwork] Fhujeth: uhhhhh my back is Fhujeth: very bad Fhujeth: atm Fhujeth: i am home alone Chocho: thanks for ignoring my pic can you get any painkillers or do ones like ibuprofen or paracetamol not work? Fhujeth: this is emergency Chocho: or do you have any of that one that worked the other day? Fhujeth: your pic is good I like it Fhujeth: sorry I am panicing Chocho: mmhmm [<- note, this is a response to “your pic is good I like it”, not that she is panicking] Fhujeth i can't move Chocho: have you got any of the one you used the other day Fhujeth: i can't move Chocho: the one that let you sleep well Fhujeth: like my back is that much pain i can't move Fhujeth: i am like leaning ovef in my chait Fhujeth: your picture, I like it! I am really sorry I can't focus right now. I don't mean to ignore it I'm freaking out and in a lot of pain and I can't do anything Chocho: i don't have any advice left Fhujeth: there is no advice Fhujeth: i am stuck here and scared Fhujeth: and hurting Fhujeth: till my mom gets back Fhujeth: i'ma try to fb her Fhujeth: she coming home Fhujeth: im trying t figur out how to get to the floor Chocho: im going to go watch tv

This is the conversation that happened a day before the chatlog that Fhujeth gave me as evidence that Chocho didn’t care about her pain while only being interested in the fact that Fhujeth ignored an artwork. After all of the previous “I am in pain!” claims how was Chocho supposed to know that THIS one was a dire emergency? Anyone who is told about someone else’s pain that many times is going to be desensitized to it and it becomes very difficult to tell what is bad and what is REALLY bad. Because Chocho wasn’t convinced that it was apparently an emergency, Fhujeth accuses Chocho of abuse.

Fhujeth claimed that the question about painkillers was insulting:

I might've forgotten when I worded the story but I rectified that. That was something that to me was more an insult than a concern because if I am in pain OF COURSE I am going to take pain meds.

Chocho gave me these...

Fhujeth: it's just she wants me to clean always at the worst time so I try to get it done in the am Chocho: That's a good idea.. u_u Fhujeth: There, now if I have to do anything it'll be powerwash Fhujeth: which I might do in a few minutes Fhujeth: because also if this pain gets worse I'll be unable to clean at all! Chocho: Hmm.. =( Have you been taking painkillers or..? Fhujeth: I will in a bit if it gets worse it's ok right now :3 Fhujeth: roombas are great (robot vaccuums) ahh Chocho: Okay! ;w; Just don't suffer too much, all right? <3 Hahaha, I bet! XD Fhujeth: oh I wont :3

Fhujeth: ahh my head hurts Chocho: How come? D= Fhujeth: not sure o_o Chocho: Headache? Fhujeth: Yeah ;.; Chocho: Can you take painkillers? D= Fhujeth: Yeah I may... brb gonna do the dishes Chocho: OK

Fhujeth: whch pattern Fhujeth: For kara? Chocho: Yeah! => Chocho: See if it's possible to shrink down Chocho: I doubt it cos it has small parts. XD Chocho: It might not even be worth trying... Fhujeth: I have a badddd migraine Chocho: Did you take painkillers? =< Fhujeth: Yeah not working x.x Chocho: Did you take paracetamol AND ibuprofen together?

Fhujeth: it's ok! also happy birthday again Chocho: Thank-you! ;w; Fhujeth: x3 no problem, I wish my head didn't hurt so bad. Chocho: Did you take ibuprofen AND paracetamol? =< You didn't answer Fhujeth: what is paracetamol? Chocho: It's a painkiller.. =o Chocho: One of the most common... Chocho: You can take it with ibuprofen as long as the ibuprofen you took doesn't have it in it. => Chocho: And it acts like a double whammy because it attacks pain in a different way Fhujeth: Ahhh, no I don't have that Chocho: Might be worth checking your painkillers to make sure they don't have it in already, then getting some if they don't! =o Fhujeth: it's hard to get that stuff here. Chocho: Is Japan really stingy with painkillers or something> Chocho: *? Fhujeth: well you can only get them in a pharmacy Chocho: Cos paracetamol is... the standard painkiller Fhujeth: I will sleep soon Chocho: Okay! ;w; Sounds like a good idea since you're in so much pain! Fhujeth: Yeah... I wanted to finish the bag but I will when I wake up. Chocho: Good idea.. =< Chocho: Don't suffer, you know? Fhujeth: Yeah x.x I am suffering at this point Chocho: You should try to rest! =< Chocho: Especially with a migraine Fhujeth: Yeah, I will sleep now!!!! Goodnight :3

Fhujeth: Back.. are you feeling betteR? Chocho: Yeah, you? Fhujeth: Nope x.x Chocho: Still in pain? Fhujeth: Yeah. ;.; Chocho: Did you take any painkillers? =) Chocho: *=( Chocho: Heh, shouldn't be smiling at that Fhujeth: it's ok XD You seemed pretty pissed at me when I left so... about to! Chocho: I was pissed at the world Fhujeth: I am used to people taking their frustrations out on me XD;; So I sorta knew you were upset about many things but I felt like I was in firing range. Did you wanna post that thing? Chocho: Ohhh no, I might have ranted about things to you but I don't go about ATTACKING my friends

[Any time she was in pain, I suggested/asked about painkillers and usually she hadn't even bothered to take them... so... painkillers were the first thing I always asked about every time.]

So hang on... every other time painkillers were brought up it was Chocho being helpful and it was appreciated... but this one time where ignored artwork also happened to be involved is was hugely insulting? I don’t get it.

And something else I’d like to mention. I’ve never seen Fhujeth mention pain before. There are endless instances of it in the logs from Chocho, but past Chocho saying goodbye to Fhujeth...?? Maybe it’s only ever in private conversations... but just a thought.

Part of Fhujeth’s conversation with me:

Ah, to add, yeah. So that event happened, I didn't log into the chat we used (utox) the next day so that night they IMd me talking just about 'Oh I guess Totty has big balls now" or something cause the yokai set came out... :S and I was like, "Wait are you for real you're not gonna ask how I am after that?"

Chocho gave more logs:

11/22/2016 chochomatsu just gotta say choromatsu is very amused that todomatsu is a tanuki and what that implies totally-totty Yeah. chochomatsu i'll leave you be

totally-totty And. The "icing on the cake" was instead of you sending me something saying, "are you ok? i know you were in a lot of pain yesterday." You had to tell me about Tanuki Balls. I think you're a great person and I like to RP and interact and chat with you but I think you think I don't care about you. chochomatsu tanuki balls? totally-totty Isn't that what your first message to me implied? chochomatsu not really besides the fact that that was trying to start conversation i wasn't even thinking about tanuki balls totally-totty What were you implying in your first message? chochomatsu tanuki's are portrayed/commonly seen as fat that's all are they supposed to have big balls too? totally-totty Yeah.

[The continuation of the "chatlog evidence" that Fhujeth cropped out, revealing that I wasn't actually talking about tanuki balls at all, but actually that tanukis are portrayed as fat, something she kept pushing on Choromatsu (and earlier, when I was working on Domatsu, Karamatsu) that is now Todomatsu instead. Even though I flat out explained myself there and then, I guess she thought that messaging her about tanuki balls was more offensive and better to use as "evidence", so she cropped the rest out.... also, one of the lines in her chatlog is out of order. Here's the true order;]

FHU'S 'EVIDENCE' ORDER;

chochomatsu i don't want to talk about this any more we are getting nowhere i don't think i am wrong for having emotions or feelings, but i obviously am, so i'm sorry i will leave it at that

totally-totty I understand where you're coming from, we are both at fault here or it was a misunderstanding. It was a bad situation where we both felt ignored by the timing of events and you expected me to do something that I didn't do.

chochomatsu here's what you want: i was completely 100% wrong, bad, nasty, horrible and i am sorry

totally-totty I think we're both at fault.

TRUE ORDER;

chochomatsu i don't want to talk about this any more we are getting nowhere i don't think i am wrong for having emotions or feelings, but i obviously am, so i'm sorry i will leave it at that here's what you want: i was completely 100% wrong, bad, nasty, horrible and i am sorry

totally-totty I understand where you're coming from, we are both at fault here or it was a misunderstanding. It was a bad situation where we both felt ignored by the timing of events and you expected me to do something that I didn't do.

totally-totty I think we're both at fault.

So... edited chatlogs? It’s a minor edit but it significantly changes the flow of the conversation in Fhujeth’s favor when read in the order Fhujeth showed it.

Additionally...

Fhujeth: I am back now! I have to try to clean my side of the house that is what I was doing the other day when we were talking when pain got me ;.; now it's all messy again and I am terrified so if I say that I am in very bad pain again it's probably the same as yesterday! I'll try not to "cry wolf" with pain that is tolerable from now on to help clear things up! Fhujeth: the day before^ Chocho: take it easy, ok?

[Fhujeth even admitted she had been crying wolf about her back pain before the fight after the event.]

[I found out later from others that Fhujeth chased all my potential friends away by spreading tiny nasty rumours about me to people who were other ask blogs in the fandom, in an attempt to keep them away from me. Telling them things like I was SO controlling and had a huge ego/bad attitude. I had no idea this was going on, but apparently she started super early into our friendship (the domatsu days, before chocho existed).]

[I found, after I had broken away from Fhujeth that I realised that she had really... muddied my mind. The way she was so quick to aggression or even a full out argument (which I really did not want) made me just nod along and agree with her nasty comments and tactics in order to defend myself from potential fallout and I felt disgusting about that after I broke away and my mind was cleared. I rarely stood up for my beliefs and morals whilst talking to her. I mean, sometimes I did? But usually I didn't. I dunno if maybe the people who talk to her now are doing that very same thing now themselves. She just had this toxic atmosphere that infects you. After I walked away I found that my mood was instantly more positive, even though she was trying her very best to destroy me publicly and privately. The absolute hell she put me and my name through after I left was actually less stressful than the frustration and pressure I had to deal with daily whilst we were talking, especially near the end.]

[Fhujeth would fight about /anything/. I'm pretty sure she enjoyed arguments (which I really, really do not) and liked to spur drama. So I would try and avoid that at all costs, not calling them out on their poor behaviour or bad morals because I didn't want to argue about things, ever. And the fights took forever, they lasted sometimes hours I think because you just can't be right against her. Even when the argument was as stupid as "what the right way to play DDR is". I could never win because she would never reconsider her opinion/point/stance. Basically the only way out of the argument was bowing down and saying "you're right, I'm wrong, you win". But of course, the response to that is always negative (and insulted) because she wants the argument to continue I suppose. And of course, if you're angry, the way you pitch "LET'S END THIS" is always going to be angry. I'm actually quite hard to anger and yet she managed repeatedly. Possibly more times in a single year than anybody on their own has managed to do (besides maybe my brother if we count my entire life). I can't believe just how many times I say I'm frustrated or angry or peeved or upset in these chatlogs looking back... it doesn't sound like me... <=/;;; Cos I'm not usually angry or peeved or upset... tired maybe... XD;;]

Fhujeth claimed to me that she was the one that tried to get away from Chocho.

That she sent me after I had chosen to stop signing in to get away from her.

Chocho gave me a small chatlog with her point of view...

Fhujeth: You having a good day today? Chocho: Yeaaah, enough. You? Fhujeth: Eh, was ok, Jussy did something minor but irritating to me Chocho: Really? =S What did she do? Fhujeth: she messaged me on two seperate accounts of mine within 5 minutes of each other saying Hi on one and "boop" on the other at 5am XD Chocho: Ugghhh... you might wanna tell her that it was 5am and you didn't appreciate it... Chocho: She probably doesn't think time zones Fhujeth: it was more so the... probably... 5 minutes within each other. I can get after a few hrs or osmething if it is important but just to say hi...... within 5 minutes is.... strange Fhujeth: Cus I know I messaged you twice the same day on different accounts but it was after a fight.... and it was over the span of a day. :S Fhujeth: But this was like 3 minutes or less even.. and not even to say anything.... important...

[By the last month of talking to Fhujeth, I have to be honest, I wanted out. But I could tell that if I told her "that's enough, I'm leaving" that she would... well, do exactly what she did. There were a couple of times after fights where I'd say something like "Is this the end?", hoping they'd say "Yeah, let's part ways" so that I wouldn't have to make the run for it and the parting would hopefully be mutual and peaceful, but every time, they wanted the friendship to continue. (As an interesting point, now I'm looking back at these chatlogs, basically every fight/argument had a "So what do you want to do then? We always fight anymore, should we still be friends??" from her in it. This was from quite early on though, so it looks like a threat, rather than a resoution.) The fallout I could sense scared me into not leaving, but I was completely done/spent emotionally otherwise. If I had just not signed into Tox ever again, I would be leaving behind all my friends on there and she would just come find me on tumblr anyway as always... but after "the back event", I found out about all of the horrible stuff she had been doing in regards to me even from months back, the whole talking about me behind my back and villainising me to others. So I decided that was it, wrote her a message about giving the "closure" that she wanted, that she had told me at the start of the friendship (if I wanted to leave I had to give closure, not just disappear). I didn't block Fhujeth so she could have her say and I got nothing but abuse back which I didn't respond to until she blocked me. I have not said a thing to her since. She even sent some horrible, abusive e-mails in the coming months after, knowing I'd see them. Also, it's probably worth mentioning that she sent my boyfriend of many years a direct malicious e-mail, trying to turn him against me.

She says that she was trying to get away from me for ages, but it was the other way around. I was terrified to leave, I even said so to one of my friends, because I could just tell from the atmosphere that if I left, no matter how I did it, she would follow me or try to destroy me. Which is exactly what she did.]

This is a chatlog of Chocho talking to one of her other friends (name censored for protection):

chochomatsu <name>, I'm scared... if I try to cut ties is she going to try and destroy me? It's pretty much the biggest reason why I've let myself be pushed around by her for so long.... this has been going on for months... chochomatsu I can't do it any more... chochomatsu If she's willing to ruin my reputation over a tiny scuffle/misunderstanding... because that's basically what that was a few days ago. Hurt feelings, not even a fight

And this... is the very last thing Chocho said to Fhujeth. The parting message:

11/26/2016 chochomatsu Hey. I can't do this any more.... I found out what you did regarding Monday/Tuesday. I'm not willing to put up with this any longer. It was fun while it lasted and I can't say I didn't have some good times with you, but enough is enough. This is the closure you asked for... thanks for being my friend.... I hope things go well for you from here on out. Goodbye! totally-totty You mean you hurt me so bad? It was fun when it lasted... What do you wanna do with what is owed? Just be even? totally-totty I think it hurt me that you did not get that you hurt me... And then guilt tripped me... Tried to put the blame on me. totally-totty So yeah. It was great while it lasted. Sans the times youd misunderstand me and I would put up with it. totally-totty But i am not all to blame here. If you cannot see what you did wrong. I feel so sad for you. I only retailiate when i have had enough. totally-totty What did you find out exactly? Just for reference. totally-totty That I told people you abused me tooons of times? That when I have had right to be paranoid and scared you told me not to hold it against you but when ai hurt you youve held it against me ever since. totally-totty Ill miss talking to you. But i wont miss the anxiety and stress of feeling like i was walking on eggshells to make sure i said things properly. totally-totty I wont miss you interpreting everything as either aggressive or ignored either. You have hurt me more than you actually know or probably grasp and all you cared was that I ignored your drawing. "If i was in pain id have done this" ya well im not you And id try to apologize but itd always go to a false ear. totally-totty So I leave you with this. I know it sucks to have epilepsy and other physical ailments but please... You have NHS. For your future... Please seek some psychiatric help. You are lucky enough that you get access to it. Utilize it. Also learn how to take a critique.

...wow. After everything I now know this is just... incredible. Fhujeth is insinuating that everything is Chocho’s fault here. That Chocho guilt tripped her(?), hurt her, misunderstood her... and that everything they ever spoke about in their friendship sparked anxiety and stress. And that final attack on Chocho’s physical illness is just flat out despicable. There is NO excuse for that. (Note: Chocho has given me full permission to include this information in this post)

Perhaps, given everything here, it is Fhujeth that needs to seek psychiatric help.

Past this point, Chocho claims to have not spoken to Fhujeth at all hoping that Fhujeth would eventually move on and not cause further drama over the broken friendship. Fhujeth didn’t do that (as I can back up). Emails were sent to Chocho from Fhujeth for months after the final goodbye...

"Have fun, I guess. You really hurt me. You have no idea how much you hurt me. You're a heartless person. I should've known when I first met you. I have no idea what your issue is..."

And...

“And I can NEVER forgive you for the shit you pulled on Jussy you desperate little fuck."

What... seriously?? Fhujeth was the one bugging Jussy for commissions and insulting her behind her back. If Fhujeth is referring to the two aliases thing... jesus fucking christ get over it! People have aliases, big deal! There is some SERIOUS spite here for reasons I can’t fathom. That Chocho managed to get away from her maybe? If you’ve read to this point you’ve seen the level of manipulation aimed at Chocho from Fhujeth.

And, quite importantly I think, it’s clear that Chocho was the one that wanted to get away, not the other way round. An abuser does not try to get away from their target, that’s what the abused does. The abuser is the one that takes chase once their target has got away.

Among other emails sent to Chocho from Fhujeth, there was also one apparently sent to Chocho’s boyfriend in an attempt to get him to turn against Chocho and reveal information to Fhujeth (this I couldn’t believe until I saw it, it’s a SERIOUSLY disgusting move). I wasn’t shown the entire email but I asked if I could see so Chocho asked her boyfriend to hand over some parts... (name changed to Chocho for privacy - real name was used)

Chocho did some really terrible things to me in the past and I can't say I haven't retaliated but even after I've tried to apologize she has kept it up. I just want peace. I have been trying to move on and it has been literally impossible, even with the blacklisting software and blocking.

I'm not here to criticize her or get mad at her, I just want to ask if you can check on her and what she is doing with ask blogging. I know she has stolen an idea from me now, and this I have records of. I think she is running multiple blogs under different aliases too. If anything I am actually more so worried for her mental health than anything else.

It's not my place to start anything. I just want you to look at what she is doing. Please, I urge you to keep this between you and me. I wouldn't be contacting a complete stranger if I wasn't getting desperate.

I think at this point she is running around four different tumblr "identities" and trying to play them off as if they are entirely different people despite it is very clearly in her art style that it is her.

Yes, really. Fhujeth actively tried to get Chocho’s boyfriend to reveal information to her behind Chocho’s back because she was paranoid about what Chocho was “doing with ask blogging”. Now I can’t speak for anyone else but I find this utterly despicable. Not to mention the continued attacks on Chocho’s state of mental wellbeing.

Extras...

[I had so, so many fights with Fhujeth because she'd take something the wrong way or she'd be rude/disgusting or she'd pick a fight.... and every fight lasted FOREVER and I was SO DONE with fighting. My 2 best internet friends for up to 10 years? I have probably had 1 argument with each in those years. And it didn't last and cleared up quick. My best friend in person that I have known since I was about 8 years old? I have had 1 fight with them EVER and it was because of another person. My other best in person friend I have never had a fight with ever. I had another best online friend who I had known since we were 12, she slowly drifted away over time due to changing interests and I think we lost touch when we were about 24 or older by the time that happened... we had 1 fight in the history of us being friends and that was when we were what... 15? Prime time for teenage friend arguments. In general I think it's natural to have at least ONE fight with your best friends that you know for years. But the sheer amount of fighting Fhujeth started between us in less than a year was just incredible...]

While looking for the chatlogs shown in this post, Chocho found a lot of these fights with Fhujeth... but because the post is already very long I have put these in a separate draft here:

https://totty-chan.tumblr.com/private/172180653683/tumblr_p62b4pvIRS1w7dwde

There are also other subjects of interest in this post although they weren’t strictly related to Fhujeth’s claims of abuse from Chocho that she discussed with me. There are also some logs and comments that extend upon the subjects covered in this post, but again, this post has grown into a monster already

tfl;dr

I (Sammy) have had my fair share of bad experiences with Fhujeth over the past year. I have known about the drama between her and Chocho but not any of the details until now. I approached Fhujeth about it asking for proof because I didn’t like the fact she was STILL going around accusing Chocho of being her “abuser” and I didn’t know why. After listening to Fhujeth’s argument and considering her evidence, I went to Chocho to ask her for her side. Up until now Chocho has been very unwilling to talk about anything to do with Fhujeth because it was a very hurtful topic for her. But when I told Chocho that Fhujeth is still claiming that she is the abused, Chocho decided to break silence and... well.. tell me everything. If you’ve read the post, I’d like you to make you own decision on all of this, BUT, in my opinion Chocho is the one that was abused. And in a big way, for a very long time. Manipulation, gaslighting, fear, uncertainty... you name it, Fhujeth tried it. And when Chocho finally decided enough was enough, Fhujeth took chase and terrorized Chocho privately and publicly for months after the friendship was broken up.

tl;dr of the tfl;dr

Fhujeth’s a manipulative, despicable piece of shit who thought she could frame Chocho for her own disgusting behavior.

Considering my personal experiences with Fhujeth and those that I have discussed with others in the past, this article expert-reviewed by a licensed professional counselor describes this situation to near-perfection. I am of the opinion that Fhujeth is living with Antisocial Personality Disorder, or ASPD.

https://www.wikihow.com/Spot-a-Sociopath

Please read if you can and consider your relationship with Fhujeth and if any of this is relevant to you.

Take care of yourselves.

Chocho, I really hope Fhujeth finally leaves you alone. After seeing the proof you have given me I now believe you have been framed for abuse you didn’t commit and I can honestly say you don’t deserve any of the hell you have been dealt for the last year and a half...

[brakken]

Finished Before the Storm Episode 2, thoughts below.

Hmmm.

Hmmmmmm.

I have to applaud Deck Nine for their commitment. Their effort to make this game a valuable addition to LiS is noticed and appreciated. This could easily have turned out as shallow fan-pandering, but they’re clearly wanting the game to be something the fans of the original can connect with beyond that.

I’m just... hmm. I’m just not sure it’s quite hitting the mark yet.

When it was announced to be split into three episodes, and that Chloe would be 16 years old, I speculated that each episode would be set a year apart - leaving us with a 19-year-old Chloe, soon to be reunited with Max.

I don’t know if this would have been my preference, as I’m not too keen on when prequels lead right into the original - but I am feeling that making the episodes daily like the first game is causing some clunky, rushed stuff in the narrative. Rachel and Chloe met only a day ago and they’re already preparing to run away together. On its own this wouldn’t be too much of a problem, but when we know they’ll be stuck in Arcadia Bay for another three years - it seems oddly early to be writing in this plot point. We’ll see. The final episode could stick the landing. This is my main hangup at the moment, though.

I hope they chill with their callforwards. I’d been predicting there would be nods to ‘hella’ and Frank’s beans since they’re sort of the big memes in the fandom. The reveal of her car was a nice surprise, but the one that took it too far for me was her hat. I get they are just cute little easter eggs (the hat discovery seems to be optional) - but they get a bit on my nerves when they’re too blatant or excessive. It’s an epidemic in prequels to turn inconsequential details into these crucial tentpoles of the character’s past, erasing years of implied history in the process. The junkyard was originally just Chloe and Rachel’s hideaway (w/ added importance in the later episodes). It is now additionally where Chloe got her car, where she got her hat, where she came up with her nickname for David, and where her dad’s car-wreck was taken, making Arcadia Bay feel suddenly much smaller and emptier. I’m expecting we’ll see her get at least a strip of blue in her hair by game’s end - and I’m totally there for that. But I think I’ll be a little disheartened if they force in any more 'this is how she got this’ stuff.

-spoilers ahead-

The scene with Drew, Mikey and Damon left me a bit torn on whether I liked or disliked its similarities to LiS ep. 4, wherein we sneak into a dorm room, get caught, and witness someone get beaten up on the floor. I think I liked this scene better (those closeups on the tabletop figures were v good), but it’s sort of weird to set those events up in a similar fashion when there aren’t really any meaningful parallels between the characters involved.

One of the things that bugged me about the original game was the text messages being used too obviously as ‘consequence reminders’. I’m appreciating that while that is still present in BtS, it’s coming across more naturally. The texts from Steph and Drew after Mikey's injury felt like the characters had genuine reasons for writing what they did.

On the flipside - recall how I said that I liked that the Backtalk feature was optional? Well, yeah... we were forced to do one in this episode. That wasn’t... fun. 

Also I flubbed it, haha.

I really enjoyed the Tempest segment even though I felt the game railroaded me into it somewhat. They seem a little confused whether they want to focus on the fire or the storm as their primary metaphor. Very crafty of them to pick a scene that mentions both and also has underlying symbolism for our main characters. And heck was I surprised to see Sean Prescott - makes me appreciate that Deck Nine isn’t trying to tiptoe around continuity.

I think I’m happy with how they’re portraying Rachel so far. The original game was always emphasising how much she meant to Chloe, but kept fairly vague on how much Rachel reciprocated. And so far she feels appropriately intoxicating but potentially damaging, without villainising her beyond repair. It helps a lot that her story thread is kept in constant attention. I found this was fumbled a little with Chloe in the first game - in LiS ep.2 her abrasiveness took too much of a spotlight away from her vulnerability and it was harder to sympathise with her. This happens occasionally with Rachel, but not to the same degree thusfar. And the implications in the latest dream of William make it seem to be intentional to some extent. 

But, that doesn’t make it any easier to make decisions... 

... I’m doing my best to get into this younger Chloe’s head, and it hurts to go down roads that I know are damaging to her later on. In the previous episode, I was worried my choices might have locked out of a romance with Rachel. By the time I got to the opportunity in this one, I wasn’t even sure if I wanted it! Yet I still chose the kiss, because it felt in line with where poor-young-awkward Chloe is at. 

I think I miss Max.

Also, we got snow. Snow...! (I mean, I suspect it could have been ash from the fire but nonetheless I appreciate its vague nature and what it’s alluding to.) I don’t know how far they’re planning to elaborate on this but by gum am I happy for it. It’s really cathartic to have these lore hints after the weight put on Max and her powers in the first game. It hasn’t confirmed or debunked anything, but just connecting Rachel more to the storm is what I need.

I think I’ve been subconsciously avoiding speculation since it got me in hot water in the original game, but it’s been kind of nice not guessing the plot direction. The mom reveal took me by surprise. Kind of a tropey moment, but interested to see how it plays out anyway.

The previous episode to a degree managed to capture both the grander narrative aspects and the calmer, quiet moments of the original game. This episode hasn’t fully delivered on that and feels a bit lacking by comparison, while not out-and-out bad in its own right. Also, kinda waiting for them to do something with Eliot - so far he’s pretty much been a BtS-equivalent of Warren, which is equal parts odd and amusing to me.

Fave moments from this episode:

-Graffiti in the bathroom. Fun opening.

-Trying to climb onto the boat in the junkyard. For some reason this made me really laugh.

-Listening to the argument outside Drew’s room. Good tension.

-BS-ing through the Tempest performance. Fun to play, interesting to witness. Dorky Chloe is best Chloe.

-The kiss. I felt guilty about choosing it, but it was a pretty good kiss.

It was oddly tricky to get my thoughts down for this one. Probably from having only played through it once - the details are a bit harder to grasp. We’ll see how it goes with episode 3 once it’s out. Golly, this is the first time I’ve ever had to wait for the release of an episode, haha. 

If you read this far, thanks as always! Here is a Chloe.

[swshadowcouncil]

What’s In A Name? Cases For And Against “Rey” Skywalker

Written by needsmoresprinkles.

Originally posted on the Star Wars Shadow Council weblog.

It’s no secret that Rey’s name has been the subject of fierce debate over the past few years—is she Rey Skywalker? Rey Kenobi? Rey Palpatine-Calrissian-Sleazebaggano? Instead of wading into that particular topic, however, I’d like to address a different part of the mystery surrounding Rey’s moniker. Namely, is her name really Rey after all?

We already know that Rey was separated from her family at a very young age; so young, in fact, that she has virtually no memories of her life before Jakku. And, given that she seemingly has no memory of her last name either (or else is really bad at putting two and two together), it’s reasonable to wonder whether or not Rey has forgotten or changed her original name since the time she and her family were separated.

Full disclosure: since I do have to SOMEHOW limit the scope of this article, I’m basing my analysis on the evidence-based assumption that Rey is Luke Skywalker’s daughter. You can read some good cases for it here, here, and even here, in this imgur album. If this is indeed true, how could the daughter of the galaxy’s most famous Jedi forget so thoroughly who she is and where she came from? On the flip side, if Rey can remember her first name, why can’t she remember anything else about her origins, including her family name? Or does Rey actually know more than she lets on?

Buckle in, boys and girls, because it’s time for me to have an argument with myself on the internet. I present to you, the evidence for and against Rey Skywalker.

EVIDENCE FOR “REY” SKYWALKER

EXHIBIT A: It’s really hard to forget your own name

This one’s kind of a gimme. By the age of 4 or 5 (when Rey, as far as we know, was separated from her family), virtually all children know their own name. In order for Rey to forget her “real” name and start going by “Rey,” she would have to suffer an event that almost entirely wiped her memory prior to the events of her separation. The fact that we don’t know for sure how much Rey actually remembers, however, makes this point difficult to refute completely. Canon materials have been inconsistent and vague about how clearly Rey remembers losing her family, and the interrogation scene between Rey and Kylo indicates that there may be “walls” put up in Rey’s mind that prevent others—and maybe herself—from seeing her memories clearly. If Rey is in fact a false name, there must have been a seriously memory-altering event in Rey’s past that resulted in her losing sight of her true identity so thoroughly.

EXHIBIT B: Who would have named her?

An odd point, but an interesting one. If Rey did forget her own name, and presumably grew up parentless, who would have given her the name Rey? Some have argued that Rey got her name from Dosmit Raeh, the pilot whose helmet she wears in the opening scenes of TFA, but this was (somewhat) debunked by Pablo Hidalgo, who tweeted that “Raeh” was an in-joke from someone on the production team, whose children had initials beginning with “R” and “H,” and that the “ae” was an Aurebesh substitution for an ampersand. It’s possible that the writers were inspired by this to change Rey’s name midway through production (which they did, but more on that later), but it’s a stretch to think such a small detail would spark such a major change. So, unless we find out Unkar Plutt turned out to be a more devoted father figure than we imagined, it’s likely that Rey began introducing herself as Rey of her own accord. And given that most 5-year-old girls given the opportunity to name themselves would go with something more akin to “Baby T-Rex Ballerina” than “Rey,” this seems good evidence in favor of Rey going by her real name.

EXHIBIT C: Why would Rey be using a deliberate pseudonym?

Some have suggested that not only does Rey know more about her identity than she’s letting on, but that she is in fact deliberately hiding who she really is from those around her. Her odd comment to BB-8 about having a “classified” identity seems to hint at this, although it could also be a lighthearted joke poking fun at a cute robot acting like a member of MI6. But—again, assuming she is Rey Skywalker—her surprised reaction to hearing about Luke, a man who shares her last name, pretty clearly indicates there are parts of her identity she genuinely doesn’t know about. If Rey is using a pseudonym, it’s either because she’s someone other than Luke’s daughter and this whole argument is made irrelevant (again, refer back to the above links to see why I think this isn’t the case), or because she somehow knows she needs to keep her true identity a secret but doesn’t fully know why.

(Bonus: Obi-Wan calls her “Rey”)

If there’s one person who’s in the business of “knowing everything about the protagonist, up to and including things the protagonist doesn’t know about themselves,” it’s Obi Wan Kenobi. So in Rey’s force vision, when we hear that clever little cut of Alec Guinness calling out “Rey?” we’re dealing with a guy who usually knows who and what he’s talking about. Since this is pretty minor evidence, I’m not going to give it its own exhibit heading, but it’s worth considering nonetheless.

EVIDENCE FOR “SOMEONE ELSE” SKYWALKER

EXHIBIT A: Han’s Reaction

This is my personal biggest indicator that “Rey” might not be our protagonist’s real name. Let’s assume that, however busy he was gallivanting around the galaxy, Han was at least tuned-in enough to know that his brother-in-law/best friend had a daughter at some point, and would have probably remembered her name. So when he comes across a desert-dwelling, backseat-driving, scrappy mechanic kid with no family who was born right around the time his niece was, you would think his reaction would be slightly more intense than this:

There are a million different ways you can analyze Harrison Ford’s delivery here (and unfortunately, the scene isn’t on YouTube, so you can’t hear the vocal inflections he uses), but he certainly doesn’t stop dead in his tracks the way he might if he found out this grown-up version of his preschool-age niece just happened to have the exact same name as her. All we can observe is that Han hesitates and avoids eye contact while asking Rey her name, softens and smiles slightly when he hears it, but then immediately continues with what he was previously saying. Whether his reaction is then one of dismissal (“Well, guess I was wrong.”) or poignant happiness (“So that’s what the little scamp goes by now, huh?”), it certainly doesn’t read as someone who just discovered the biggest “coincidence” of his life.

EXHIBIT B: Rey’s name changed mid-production

Those of us who followed TFA hype from the beginning know that Rey’s original name was “Kira” (or “Keera,” depending on who you ask), which was then changed to “Rey” when the crew was already filming in Abu Dhabi. So why would JJ suddenly feel strongly enough to change his protagonist’s name midway through filming? Simple answer: he liked “Rey” better. Alternate answer: Rey’s real name is (or, rather, was) Kira, and the TFA team decided that it would be easier from a storytelling perspective if she went by a different name than her birth name while on Jakku. Based on deleted lines from the novelizations of The Force Awakens, such as Kylo’s “It is you!” and the mysterious male voice in Rey’s vision saying “I’ll come back, sweetheart, I promise,” there’s some evidence Rey’s identity was originally far more obvious than it ended up being in the final film. So if the production team did indeed make the choice to play things closer to the vest partway through production, they may have given Rey a pseudonym to prevent scenes like Han and Rey’s introduction from giving away too much. And, although I am loath to go into etymology territory here, “Kira” is derived from a Sanskrit wordmeaning “beam of light,” or “ray of light.” So there is some evidence that the name “Rey” wasn’t picked at random just because it sounds cool, given that it shares a meaning with the character’s previous name. Now that the infamous Han Solo spinoff has a female lead named Kyra (thought to be pronounced KEE-rah), it seems unlikely that this particular name will be revealed to be Rey’s real one. But the connection between Rey’s original old and new names gives us an indication that there was some method to the madness of renaming her so comparatively late in the production process.

EXHIBIT C: ¿Por que no los dos?

If I were a betting woman, my money might be on this option. Although Luke is most closely associated with Tatooine, and Leia with Alderaan, their longest-running family lineage stems from the planet of Naboo. And if there’s one thing we know, it’s that the Naboo people LOVE names that end in “-ey” sounds. So much so that when you list some of them by name—Saché, Sabé, Dormé, Cordé, Rabé, Eirtaé, Padmé–it sounds like a deleted verse from RuPaul’s 1993 classic, “Supermodel.” So is it really so inconceivable that Luke and Mama Skywalker decided to name their daughter something befitting her Naboo roots (or even just a pretty name featuring the syllable “-ré” or “-rey”)? In this sense, maybe Rey both is and isn’t our heroine’s real first name. If she was, say, Freya, Aurelia, or Reyna Skywalker (just to use a few earthling names and spare myself the embarrassment of trying to invent Naboo-sounding ones), her going by “Rey” would explain Han’s reaction—this was, indeed, likely his niece, but she went by a nickname that gave him just enough doubt to keep him from being entirely stunned by the revelation. This is also a great way to show that Rey’s developed her own identity, allowing her to keep the name she’s been using for ¾ of her life (and, more cynically, the name she’s been marketed as by Disney, Hasbro, et al), while also explaining why neither Han nor Leia, at any point, went “Holy shit, her name is Rey? Like, Luke’s Rey?” like any normal person would.

CONCLUSION

Look, at this point, we’re less than a month out from the movie, and this article will either be tossed aside or get me hailed as some sort of Star Wars psychic (but will, in either case, be mostly irrelevant). So I can only speak for myself when I say that I think Rey will, ultimately, be the name that our protagonist goes by for the remainder of the trilogy. But I think there is a very good chance it is not her real and/or full name. If we are, in fact, dealing with the long-lost daughter of Luke Skywalker, we already know there’s a long and bumpy road to finding out all the secrets of who she is and how she got in her current situation, and her name being part of that unraveling mystery wouldn’t surprise me in the least. So, if you want to take my word for it, I’d say go ahead and get that custom-embroidered “I Love Rey, My Fictional Psychic Samurai Girlfriend” leather jacket you’ve been longing for. That’s relatable, right? Everybody wants one of those.

[misscrawfords]

Also, I also prefer that Rey isn't the daughter/grandaughter of someone of the OT but she will probably be. Making her a Solo is too unrealistic, she will probably be a Skywalker and it will probably make little sense.

Rey Solo is a terrible idea that I see no possibility of happening. So Leia had a second child who would be exactly Rey’s age, abandoned her on a desert planet, met a highly force sensitive young woman years later who had been abandoned on that same planet and at no point thought, “MAYBE IT IS MY LONG LOST DAUGHTER” and neither did Han? I mean, wow. Then Rey connects to Han as to a father figure, which is beautiful because she doesn’t know her father and he has lost his son and is actually more symbolically moving precisely because he ISN’T her biological father, and then he dies in front of her? What a missed opportunity for the franchise to milk that further by having Rey reunite with her father and then immediately lose him! Which didn’t happen. Rey Solo makes zero sense.

I agree with you that Rey Skywalker would be a very disappointing move, but I disagree in that I don’t think it will happen.

Many people have written really good metas on why Rey Skywalker is a) bad and b) not going to happen, and I’m not going to try to compete, but in brief:

- Luke had a one-night stand/relationship and either never knew she was pregnant or abandoned the girl/his daughter? Luke, who was entirely driven by a desire to live up to his father and then, when he knew who his father was, to save him? Does this sound even vaguely in character? True, we don’t know the circumstances of Rey’s birth and abandonment but this would all boil down to Luke being dangerously ignorant of his actions and consequences or being an abandoning douchebag and neither ring true.

- Absolutely no foreshadowing between Han, Leia, Chewie, the droids that possibly Rey might be related to them. No half finished line, no anxious glance. It’s a big universe, lots of possibilities for other force sensitive children. If the only people who can use the force in the entire universe are Skywalker, it’s, uh, going to get incestuous for real at some point one way or another.

- The Skywalker gene pool and legacy are absolutely being carried forward in the sequel trilogy by Kylo Ren. Rey isn’t and couldn’t be ‘the’ Skywalker. That place is already taken. Darth Vader’s legacy is being explored already. Why rehash Luke’s story of “omg I’m related to this legendary family and I never knew how am I going to deal with it” when you have the far more interesting stories of a) “I know exactly what my legacy is and what it’s costing my family and this is how chronically messed up it is through the generations like a Greek tragedy” for Kylo and b) a nobody gifted with extraordinary powers which would parallel Anakin in the Prequels and contrast with Kylo, who is too burdened by his family’s past. Rey otoh is a blank slate. That’s interesting. Repeating Luke’s story isn’t. (The counter argument to that is that TFA paralleled ANH quite a bit and if TLJ is lazily written perhaps it will parallel ESB too much in this way too.)

- Various people involved in the film have made comments that suggest that Rey is not related to anyone in TFA and that she is all about finding new family bonds not relying on blood ties. And tbh considering how terribly family bonds work in this universe, this would be a clever parallel and statement in which to conclude the three trilogies - with found families and disparate people finding strength and companionship and love with each other, even without blood ties. Of course Daisy Ridley and the rest may be lying about this to make the reveal a surprise. But there have been sufficient such statements to make it seem unlikely.

- Reveal the surprise? There is literally NOTHING surprising about Rey being a Skywalker. It is a rehash of ESB and plenty of people expect it because they don’t want to see Kylo Ren as the Skywalker of the new generation and they see Luke being a mysterious Jedi and Rey being an abandoned child with Jedi powers and they assume a connection. Luke saying, “I am your father” would be the biggest, yawning anticlimax of a generation. Honestly, it would probably make a cinema audience laugh/grown because how else could you react? I believe TLJ will parallel ESB in various ways and probably that will involve a shocking revelation about a character or some event or discovery that will shift the way we see a character and their relationships, but it’s not going to be the exact same one as in ESB. TFA did not copy the characters of the OT and so it cannot realistically copy their relationships. I suspect the “shocking twist” will revolve around Kylo showing a conscience and Rey being tempted to the dark side, though that’s been pushed so blatantly in the adverts that there is probably a further twist.

- Make Rey a Skywalker and what on earth do you do with the romantic/sexual literary coding between her and Kylo? Modern Americans consider cousins as incestuous so it’s unlikely the film would actually go there… The kind of “treacherous bond” they apparently have, the hints of feelings, the admiration under the hate, the recognition of a kindred spirit, having seen each other in dreams… this is not a familial bond being described! Compare with the much lighter and sweeter awareness of each other that Luke and Leia had. This is not the same category of thing at all! And, to play devil’s advocate, if were meant to assume Kylo and Rey are related because of their shared awareness/past/dreams/force bond/whatever and we look to Luke and Leia… they’re twins. They had a bond with each other and with their father. Does the bond stretch further? Leia has a bond with her son. But if Kylo and Rey have this bond (a bond which is VERY differently described as to how it manifests itself and operates to how Leia senses Kylo and Luke and Vader sensed them both), then why doesn’t Leia sense Rey as her aunt? Absolutely nothing in TFA. Of course that could develop further but if it does later, then it creates a plot hole. And really, a bond between twins and parent and child is a really cool and engaging concept. But people have loads of cousins. It’s really not an exciting relationship on any level. Like, why would it be a thing? Why? I just don’t understand.

There’s more that could be said but it’s after midnight and I need to sleep!

I mean, all of this is idle speculation and people of course argue the opposite with equal levels of speculation and interest and obviously I think I'm right and they think they're right so it's really a pointless discussion (that's a hint to anyone who might want to try and use this post as a way of debunking all my arguments - I won't change my preference so make your own post please and thank you). The film might well do everything that I think would be lazy storytelling because Hollywood films are very often disappointing... and yes, I would very likely be disappointed!

[chesskilled]

█ ▌ VERSE ! ┊♞┊  SURVIVOR OF THE KILLING GAME SEMESTER.

GENERAL DISCLAIMER that this contains spoilers for the entirety of NDRV/3, particularly regarding Chapter 5 and 6. By no means am I saying this is the ‘canon’ alternative either, however, it is canon on my blog for this particular verse, and all events listed I’ll try and go into as much detail as I’m able to properly fit this into NDRV/3′s canon timeline. This will be separated into three parts under a cut: chapter five, chapter six, and the aftermath. 

CHAPTER FIVE ! ┊♞┊VOYAGE WITHOUT PASSION OR PURPOSE

For the most part, the beginning of this chapter is exactly the same as it is in canon. The current-surviving cast witnesses what they believe to be the ‘truth’ of the outside world, Ouma claims to be the mastermind behind it all, Kaito is locked inside the Exisal hangar, all that good stuff. As it stands, most of Ouma’s plan is still in motion and going exactly how he wants it to.

Where things start to shift, though, is after Maki’s ambush in the middle of Kaito’s and Ouma’s fight. After Maki shoots the two arrows she has: one into Ouma’s back, and the other in Kaito’s arm. Ouma still steals the antidote after she flees and returns, tricking her into thinking he drank it, and he still tries to convince Kaito of the consequences if he doesn’t; however weak they both were, instead of succeeding though, this failed. There’s a stubbornness they both have, and even in dire circumstances they didn’t have the time to argue for long. (Note: Even after the original trial, Kaito notes that Ouma’s way of convincing him was “... probably just another one of his lies... I bet he just said all that to try and make me feel sorry for him and get me to cooperate with his plan...” A large amount of the survivors agree with this statement, at first.)

In this situation, Ouma really only had three options.

He drinks it and only Kaito dies. (And Maki, after the trial.)

He forces Kaito to drink it--though unlikely--because unless there’s an agreement a fight might ensue (again) and they might LOSE the antidote. 

He breaks the bottle, therefore losing the antidote and Maki commits a double murder instead.

More or less, Ouma is in the same position as he was in the chapter prior: sacrifice a few to save the rest. In this sort of situation, I’m running off the concept that although Ouma was hit first with the poison, Kaito’s already-weakened immune system due to the implemented virus only worsened the poison’s effects, and he ended up dying first. Ouma’s decision then is limited only to 1 and 3, and he doesn’t have the time to think.

So, he drinks the antidote. There’s not much choice, now. Given the situation, there’s only more work for him to do, and more to piece together. Ouma was right, in his initial thought: the mastermind now saw him as a threat after his trick, and fooled Maki into ‘killing’ him, in order to ‘eliminate’ said threat.

All that happens afterwards is him manipulating the crime scene, a way to make the case harder than it needed to be, similar to Togami in DR1. It wasn’t meant with ill intent, no. And it wasn’t meant just for ‘fun’. He was right--with all evidence in order, it’d be obvious who the killer was. In a way, letting things play out that way would purposely be playing into the mastermind’s hands. 

He disposes of his scarf and shirt near a few of the arrows, and struggles to move Kaito’s body as well. It’s difficult, and takes an unnerving amount of time given his injured back (potentially too, his spine--breaks in between are frequent as he struggles not to collapse himself) The press trick still comes into play, though instead of his own body, it is in fact Kaito’s own that is crushed underneath it. Blood stains the staircase and the control panel, but for the remaining time frame, he steals an Exisal to hide in until “the time is right.”

The trial, too, is rather consistent--but he doesn’t need a script. He’s essentially a no-show, but continues to mimic Kaito alongside voicing his own opinions and thoughts in the meantime inside the Exisal. His confusion with ‘Remnants of Despair’ and the ‘Hope vs Despair’ argument is still genuine, and he still plays along--only revealing himself at the height of the trial, purposely making himself a strong suspect.

As weak and as miserable he feels (due to not only breaking DICE’s motto not once, but twice now, one after the other), he continues to play up the ‘mastermind’ act, as well as providing a ‘witness testimony’ towards the events. While he certainly swings the trial in his direction for a while, it is at this point where he pushes the blame back onto the true, regrettable culprit: Maki.

There is undoubtedly a bit of debate that comes from this: all from accusing Ouma of lying to Maki’s own (likely) emotional response, either way, at the end of it all, she is revealed as the culprit, and consequently is sent to be executed after her own recount of the crime.

After her execution, though, Ouma doesn’t make a show or try to make himself out to be more of a ‘villain’. In a way, that’s almost more suspicious of a reaction, but I digress. 

I already stated prior that he is not in the best state of mind after these events, but it’s only after this trial where it shows. For once, he doesn’t feel the need to lie outright--of course he still does, if asked something a bit too personal--but his usual ‘mask’ is anywhere but present. 

He’s quieter, almost maintaining a dead-eyed expression; weary and angry and depressed all at once. They’re emotions he doesn’t want to deal with, yet doesn’t have the energy to suppress. So he does nothing at all.

Despite all circumstances following, the only request he makes is being helped to his room--at most, all he wants is to rest, albeit he doesn’t get that wish granted for long before chapter six begins.

CHAPTER SIX ! ┊♞┊GOODBYE DANGANRONPA

As soon as Chapter 6 begins, they’re set in ‘deadly life’.  Rest isn’t a wish easily granted, given the constant explosions outside as Kiibo is deadset on destroying the school and those within it--be it as means of ‘saving/sparing’ them. It’s a malfunction at it’s finest point, but there’s not much that can be done--especially not so given Saihara’s request for a final investigation + trial. Ouma doesn’t get involved until one of the surviving cast wakes him--in a sense, he’s given up, but at the same time he does understand there’s still work to be done. It’s just not something he has the energy to deal with at the time.

It’s with some hesitance he agrees to let them investigate his room as well; the mess that it is. He doesn’t lie, here, there’s no reason to. Anything left confusing or vague he provides insight to, handing over more important pieces of evidence: the Monokumarzpads, files, drafts of certain inventions (he briefly explains his alliance with Iruma, too, though he seems hesitant to admit it given the circumstances)

The only thing he seems wary of handing over is his own motive video--that which reveals the truth of his lies--he’s not a ‘supreme leader’ of some ‘evil secret society’. More or less, he’s just a kid. A kid with his friends trying to have fun, through pranks and theft and other ‘petty crimes’; and although he wants to do anything but, the true message--their motto--is something that he understands is important to debunking any claims of ‘despair’ and his supposed associations. 

The only person he shows his motive video to is Saihara--what Saihara does after the fact is none of his concern: he either succeeds and reveals the mastermind, or he gets them all killed. Ouma, himself, trusts Saihara: he knows what he’s capable of and he knows that despite everyone’s continued reliance on him, he’s capable of finding the truth. He’s surpassed the initial role he had in the beginning of the game by a long-shot--Ouma fondly remembers watching and admiring that progress (and falling in love in the process.) If they die, that would’ve only been the best solution.

After this, he makes the choice to try and be of some help in the investigation--as much as he understands the necessity, this is also an opportunity to explore more, to prove his theories right. Every theory, every question he had yet to find an answer for--now was the time and the place to piece the final pieces of the puzzle together, to solve the mystery that was ‘DANGANRON/PA’.

He refuses to answer the riddle to Amami’s lab, and he refuses to explain the contents of his own. He’ll acknowledge that whatever it is is important, but he passes it off as being disinterested in both outside of how ‘interesting’ both labs are, and feigning curiosity for the obvious evidence. (After all--he was the one who wrote down the codes to Amami’s lab to begin with, he was already aware, to some extent, of the truth.)

By the time they reach the room where the remembering lights are made, and where the Mastermind has been hiding, he’s angry. Beyond so. As much pride as he has in being correct in theorizing that their memories were fake, it’s just as frustrating. Who were their true selves? For what purpose did changing their memories serve?

It doesn’t take long to come to the conclusion it’s for the purpose of the ‘broadcast’. Even without evidence to prove it aside from Monokuma’s persistence on following the rules, that room gives him more reason to believe that they’re just players in a sadistic little game. For someone, anyone, potentially everyone to be watch and be amused by. He hates it. He hates those who watch it. He hates the Mastermind for even implementing the concept to begin with. He is anger; he is rage; and yet he’s silent.

His anger isn’t shown predominantly until the trial itself---not until the actual reveal. Of who is the mastermind, of the audience, of the proxy. He feels used, and in a sense...he’s not far off. Where others find hopelessness, feel despair, he finds nothing more than resentment and indignation. Ouma is one of the only ones who refuses to succumb to despair, one of the only ones who fights it instead. Ironically, at first, he’s in agreement with the one he fought the most: Kiibo. They can’t give up, not now, not after all of this!

At some point in the trial though, he realizes the mistake that’d be made in siding with ‘hope’, siding with the audience, and here is where his original ‘personality’ comes back into place: instead he starts vouching for despair. It’s a trick, of course, Saihara had mentioned abstaining from either option, although many still seemed to side for despair thanks to Shirogane. 

He tries to trick the remaining survivors, the audience that he knows has their eyes on them. Breaking out those sprites in an elaborate act to push the others to agreeing with Saihara. He figures, given his reputation, the moment he starts siding with whatever the others agree with, the others will feel inclined to go the opposite route. He’s hated, after all.

Of course, he abstains from voting himself. As angry as he is (and at some point, he does make that known--venting his own frustrations publicly to counter Shirogane’s taunts, and briefly taking the ‘lead’ role in the trial, presenting options that were yet to be brought up) Any taunt that remains truth--including, but not limited to Ouma’s feelings for Saihara--are things he’ll acknowledge later. Even if he did/does get worked up, there’s no need to acknowledge the remarks until after the trial is over. Until they win.

And he’ll admit, he was surprised at the end result: he expected Kiibo, after he lost his ‘self’ to the audience, to vote for ‘hope’. He did expect them to fail; he had no faith in the audience or their decisions given the revealed ‘past’. In no way was he prepared for the alternative: the fact they won, the fact that in a sense, even though Kiibo was going to destroy the school, they had survived.

And that makes the aftermath ever more bittersweet.

AFTERMATH ! ┊♞┊MORE THAN FICTION

He’s just as shocked as the rest of the remaining cast that he survived. Buried underneath rubble, somehow protected from the blasts that ultimately destroyed Gifted Inmates Academy. Shocked and confused, seeing real daylight--a brief glimpse of their true reality is...relieving. Not once did he ever expect to get this far; not once did he expect to survive. He had speculated he’d be a victim at some point, surely--never a survivor. That was never a role he was fit to play, a void he was meant to fill.

It feels powerful, and powerless all at once. At the same time--there’s something that pushes him forward; to prove he was more than just a character in a game he never intended to survive.

Saihara’s right--even in the ‘fictional’ world, they were still real, their feelings were still real.  “The outside world wanted this lie to become the truth.”

Their talents, their ‘characters’, had crossed the border from fiction to nonfiction, for falsities to reality. In this reality, he still was the SHSL Supreme Leader. Saihara was still the SHSL Detective, Yumeno the SHSL Magician. They were real--and if not, they had the ability to make these ‘selves’ a reality, and discover the truth for their own.

That, is exactly what Ouma does, in a way. He still keeps a fond memory of DICE, and, in this particular scene, his emotions and reactions and similar to those found in his prison mode ending: particularly with Saihara, of who he wishes will ‘stay by his side’. To an extent, this offer extends to Yumeno, as well.

At the end of it all, Ouma, along with the rest, pursue their talents, and in the process they strengthen their bonds and challenge the truth versus the lie in the reality they’re now brought to live in.