#that structure will ALWAYS have people working within it that will do harm

[galatikid]

Mr. Beast partners with Amazon who is run by Jeff Mr. Moneybags Bezos to do a Squid Games Esq game show and everyone is baffled that it's a bad time for contestants.

I'm sorry that these people weren't encouraged to foster their critical thinking skills at a young age. I'm sorry they didn't have people around them to challenge them and their perceptions of the world.

Mr. Beast sucks and he's played the world for suckers. He's not a philanthropist, he loves money. He doesn't care about people, it's about the revenue. He got too big and the world being what it is he was able to limit test optics for a very long time. It shouldn't surprise anyone that his house of cards is crumbling, people should be disappointed that it didn't happen sooner. Viewers should be disappointed, and use this as a lesson for the future.

Always look closer, if something seems off question it. Confront it.

[drdemonprince]

ok fine cis men aren't the bad gender it's all men and we're all exactly like that anon who admitted to having abused women even if we don't know it. are you fucking happy now? is this the solidarity you want us to feel with cis men, that we're all just as mich rapists and murderers of women as they are? you have some fucking nerve to be throwing vague jabs while calling an admitted abuser "brave"

Normally I don't platform asks like these, but I'm moved by the genuineness of your emotional reaction here. I think you're hurting, and you've been hurt, and that the belief that abuse and violence are located within one gendered group (to which you don't belong) has felt like a way of organizing your world that has helped you make sense of things, and given you guidelines for how to act and whom to trust that have helped keep you safe. I think a lot of assault survivors feel that way when they're not cis men and their attackers were cis men.

As someone who has experienced a ton of sexual predation at the hands of cis women, cis men, and even other trans people, I don't feel the same way. There is no "bad gender" I can chalk up my abuse to. I find there are no easy means of categorizing entire people as abuser or as victim either -- I have known so, so many people who have occupied both roles depending upon the power they wielded and the social context of the moment. Hell, one cis lesbian that I knew who was infamous in her community for raping trans men would always tell her victims that her acts were those of "trauma recovery," of her "reclaiming" her power after men had stolen it away.

Even she, I don't think, is irredeemable or ontologically evil.

I'm an abolitionist. That's a core value through which a lot of my political action and beliefs flow. If you're not on board with the project of abolitionism, you'll find much to object to here, and most of your objections are things I will refuse to entertain, because I do not believe human beings are disposable no matter what they do, and I don't believe that anyone should have the authority to deem another human being as disposable.

An abolitionist politics is incompatible with the idea that some people or some groups are inherently bad. It's incompatible with the belief that abuse and violence comes from evil. It's a worldview that holds that people do harm because of social structures and networks of power that must be destroyed -- systems like the patriarchy, cissexism, anti-Blackness, ableism, capitalism, and more. And I think one of the ways that we conquer such oppressive systems is by raising the consciousness of all the people trapped under it -- so that we can topple it together. I want trans men and cis men alike to realize they have some skin in the game.

You don't have to associate with the men you don't want to associate with. If, because of repeated abuses at the hands of men, you can't ever trust them, well, those are your feelings, that's your life, that is your business. But when your personal feelings of safety are used as a justification for developing and promoting a worldview with transphobic, transmisogynistic implications, I'm gonna talk shit about that on my stupid little blog. And I'm gonna continue conducting my life in the way I feel I should.

And for me, that means forging common ground between trans men and cis men, and pushing both groups to take women's concerns seriously (especially trans women's concerns) and to stop centering themselves in feminist dialogue. There's a place for both trans men and cis men in the gender revolution, but we gotta do a lot of work on ourselves to stop getting in the way. It's work I'm emotionally equipped to do and find rewarding, and it's fine if you don't. There are lots of other people who need support that you can focus your energies on -- other survivors of abuse and assault that you perhaps find it easier to relate to. That's important work too, and I wish you well in doing it. Just make sure you're not excluding trans women in that work or I'll continue to be annoying about it on my stupid little blog.

[clearancecreedwatersurvival]

‘It’s different from the books’ sure it’s different but are you judging elements based on how they fit within the new transformative narrative that the show adaptation is presenting? Or are you purely judging each element based on how different it is from the books?

Does the new narrative that the show is telling have cohesive arcs and structure that work within its specific logic? Do the elements present, intentionally different or inspired or lifted directly from the books, work together to tell a story that shares most of the same overall themes and important story beats as the entire book series? Are they setting up the long term development of character arcs well?

Or are you just mad your favorite character isn’t just saying all their lines from the book directly and we need to have the ‘characters aren’t people regardless of our parasocial attachment to them, they’re storytelling tools that fill roles within a narrative conflict’ conversation again? Like, neither the author(s) nor the book characters themselves are gonna fuck you, just so we’re clear.

Mat having a weakness for helping and protecting children, Perrin being traumatized about using the axe as a weapon and worried about harming people he loves, Rand wanting to help men who can channel, everything about Egwene’s late stage character arc, Nynaeve’s innate potential and her constant early struggle with her unconsciously blocking that immense power away from herself have all been set up extremely well in the show, and all by making some pretty distinct changes from the books.

And every wot fan agrees that the books are not perfect in various ways, rearranging and tightening of the plot was always going to be necessary in an adaptation, let alone in one that is only allowed to span 8 seasons. But the main beats of the story are all there, and individual changes to characterization and the specific roles that characters play for certain bits of the narrative are not bad just because they’re different and I simply can’t take any criticism of the show that doesn’t account for that seriously.

Also like. Can we stop blaming the writers for stuff that is fully the producers’ fault. Season 1 episode 1 and episode 8 both got fucked over on rewrites and/or covid restrictions during filming, so the pacing and execution is kinda fucky there, but that’s not on the writing team. The rest of season one the pacing is better and better yet in season two, which honestly was kind of a banger start to finish.

The development in s2 of all the themes around channelers losing access to the power or autonomy over their channeling and the griefs of outliving your loved ones were explored so well, and all those ideas are very important for the rest of the plot from later in the books. And the choice to introduce all the forsaken sooner and develop them more than is present in the early books was brilliant, they’re incredibly effective and engaging villains and the show is utilizing them to full effect. Shit rules. I’m stoked for s3 for a lot of reasons but especially for more forsaken shenanigans.

When I want to reread the books I’ll reread the books. I’m doing that right now and having a great time. But I’m glad the show is different in a lot of ways and I like the way they’re reading the original text, including by changing the stuff that makes wot one of those book series you can’t really recommend without an asterisk because RJ’s grasp on feminism and queerness and gender theory was. Loose at best.

Idk man, just treat adaptations of books you love as really high budget fanfiction produced by a team of people who all care about the original text but are also of course gonna put their spin on it, and you might have a more enjoyable time watching them.

Howl’s Moving Castle by Miyazaki? Fanfiction.

NBC Hannibal? Gay Fanfiction.

The Wheel of Time on Prime? That’s right, it’s increasingly higher budget fantasy fanfiction with less gender essentialism, extra emphasis on all the milfy magical politics, and queer subtext made text, hell yeah.

[trans-axolotl]

so im going into therapy (or social work, more broadly) as a profession (in school rn). i know that not everyone in anti psych would support that, understandably, and im not under an illusion that therapy isnt tied to the whole system and process. but i want to bring a liberationist, anti-racist, pro-mad, and abolitionist ideology to help who i can

do you have any suggested resources or reading recommendations or idk any insight on how to inform the way i go about juggling anti psychiatry in a profession that is considered going hand in hand with it?

Hi anon.

I think there can be ways that people working in the psych system can leverage power and resources in a way where they're acting in solidarity with psych survivors and mad people, but in reality, this very rarely happens, even among professionals who identify as radical or as having lived experience.

Fundamentally, the psychiatric system is one that perpetuates structural violence, and in smaller and larger ways, anyone who works within the system to legitimize it contributes to and is complicit in that violence. So I think that for anyone who is planning to work within the system, you need to be upfront with yourself that there is harm occurring and that isn't something you can just ignore or act like that's something you're separate from. Even if you're not working inpatient or facilitating forced drugging of someone, there's still a lot of ways that therapists can be complicit in psychiatric violence.

One of the most obvious ways is through mandatory reporting. I believe that in order to be an ethical therapist you must break the law--mandatory reporting is a dangerous way that mad people are surveilled by the state, and therapists must work to interrupt that and prevent it. There are a lot of therapists out there already talking about practical ways to avoid mandatory reporting and how to be upfront with clients about it, and I can link some of that at the end of this post. I won't say it's always easy, but we have an obligation to each other to do everything we can to stop psych incarceration from happening.

I think there's a lot of ways that even outpatient, therapists are asked to enable other forms of psychiatric violence. Even if in your practice, you're really focusing on liberation, respecting autonomy, etc, there are ways that other psych professionals might try to get you to help them perpetuate different forms of harm. And because of your degree and licensure, there's this power imbalance between you and your client that means you do have the power to enable these kinds of harms. The degree next to your name means that you will always be believed over your client and that is a lot of power to hold. If you're working with a client with an eating disorder and their dietitian gives an ultimatum that they have to be hospitalized or they're refusing to provide care, what do you do? If your client's psychiatrist is refusing to answer questions or let them switch to other types of medications, what do you do? If your client is involved in a court case and you're getting subpoenaed for their medical records, what do you do? If your MSW program requires you to do one of your internships in an inpatient program, how do you prevent that from happening? There are a lot more examples I can think of, but these are just a few things I wanted to highlight for ways that therapy is still entangled in the larger system.

Another thing that feels important to me is to make the distinction between being a "good therapist" and helping people, because I don't think those things are the same. I see a lot of "radical" therapists get fixated on this idea that they need figure out ways to make the psych system run smoother, to improve access, to overall make the psych system better, and that this is the only way to help people. It's really important to be able to separate those ideas. For me, psych abolition is a project of building up our capacity to care for each other while destroying the systems that currently enact violence on us, and reformist ideas about expanding psychiatric systems, increasing funding, and legitimize psychiatric authority gets in the way of actually transforming care. I think in order to help people, you need to commit to being a "bad therapist" in the eyes of a capitalist healthcare system.

One recommendation I have is to read Franco Basaglia's writing and learn about his approach of the democratic psychiatry movement. As a psychiatrist, he saw his role as a way to disrupt the system and deinstitutionalize. He has this quote where he talks about how they weren't focused on eliminating problems, but rather on how deinstitutionalization would create more chaos and new problems--and how that created so much possibility for transformation. I think he's proof that there are certainly ways that psych professionals can act as accomplices who actually are in solidarity with psych survivors, but it's rare.

Last point I have is that although you gain something from professional training and licensure, there's also a lot you lose. MSW programs often don't actually teach you the skills you want to learn about how to actually support people--there's a lot you're going to have to learn from continuing education credits. From my friends who have gotten their MSW, I've heard a lot of complaints about how surface level a lot of information is, and also about how a lot of the way that information is taught reinforces hierarchal ideas and doesn't respect patient autonomy. I'll also say that gaining licensure oftentimes creates barriers for radical action--I've seen so many therapists who then become so attached to holding onto and not losing that licensure that they weigh it above mad people's lives. I've heard so many therapists say "Oh I can't speak up against restraint because I'll lose my job/I can't ignore mandatory reporting because I'll lose my license/etc etc etc." And I think that can be a really damaging mindset that harms your potential to actually help people. There are several therapists I know who are in the process of intentional de-licensure because of this, but regardless if you pursue that path or not, this is a mindset you need to be on guard against.

All that being said, I think there is a need for more abolitionist therapists who are able to help support our communities, both in terms of creating that space for individual support and on a collective level. There are ways that you can leverage your access to resources and the way you're seen as legitimate in the system to help advocate for people, get them support, and interfere with psych violence. I have a therapist comrade who keeps working in inpatient psychiatry specifically so that they can continue to sneak in banned materials to the ward, prevent illegal restraints, be involved in court proceedings as an advocate, connect people to mad liberation resources, let psych patients use their phone, document psychiatric abuse with the plan to fairly soon release that information as a whistleblower, and more that I'm not going to talk about publicly. They still grapple with the fact that they are currently perpetuating harm at the same time, but to them, it's worth it to be able to sabotage things in that way. And I think that there are ways that you can take the information you learn in your program that is actually useful and find ways to bring that directly to your communities, and that there is good you can. I just think you have to be very intentional and aware of what it takes to actually do that, rather than just staying complacent with the label of being a "radical therapist" without doing anything to make that true.

For resources--here's my psych abolition drive with a lot of different zines, books, workbooks on different psych abolition topics. I really would recommend reading Psychiatry Inside Out by Franco Basaglia as an example of successful psychiatric resistance.

I would also suggest checking out Mutual Aid/Self Social therapy--the people who created this project are trusted comrades of mine, have both gotten their MSW or LMFT, and they have a lot of helpful insight into how to navigate things like avoiding mandatory reporting, de-licensure, etc. They have a discord server and also have regular online MAST meetings to train people on what MAST is and how to set up a MAST collective.

Genuinely wishing you the best of luck through school and appreciate that you're actively thinking about these things.

[youshouldjustliveinmychurch]

Not to Merlin-post in the year of our Lord 2024, but I love Gwen as a character. She goes through too much honestly. She deserves such a good life and so much love. I want to see a spin off show about Gwen's reign as queen because that would be awesome.

FULFILLING THE GREAT PROPHECY

I was always frustrated because I felt like the "Arthur is going to be this great king and unite Albion" thing never came to pass or only kind of did sparingly BUT maybe it's that thing with prophecies where they come to pass in unexpected ways.

So maybe the great prosperity and uniting of Albion happens because of Gwen's peaceful, fair, and progressive reign, which technically happens because Arthur made the choice to marry when she was a commoner. She wouldn't have been on the throne otherwise. I'm calling it. I believe she would be a freaking great queen. With her empathy and intelligence and bravery? Hell yeah!

It's very likely that she had the guts to finally lift the ban on magic during her reign (and all that entails) which Arthur was never able to do because he had trouble /didn't have the chance to work through the negative feeling about magic that had been instilled in him by his father. Merlin was never able to push him to do so because he became too entrenched in supporting the current power structures because he was blinded by his love for and devotion to Arthur. Maybe they could have gotten there in time (there are hints of that), but instead the revelation is made inadvertently and the end of the show happens before they cross that boundary. That's one of the great tragedies of the show. It painfully demonstrates how power corrupts and people can be forced to try to work within a system that is actively harming them, especially when they love and believe in the people entrenched in that system.

Maybe Morgana had a twisted sixth sense about this too because she's peculiarly focused on Gwen being queen for a lot of reasons (SHE EVEN HAS VISIONS ABOUT IT).

Anyway, I'm sure someone has said this before.

Thoughts?

[nebrasska-alasska]

when you started making fics do you just kinda raw dogged it and go “whatever words will be typed came from my heart”? or is there a certain structure/script when leading up to key events? im really curious how your writing style works cuz its really good, not too fast nor too slow with situations and dialogue with really good imagery in between and the managing to convey a character’s feelings really well🥹

i wrote fanfics back in like 2021-2022 and i looked back on it to see how very simple it was since everything WAS lowkey just straightforward without any depth into it (if you get what i mean?) i do want to get back on writing someday because it was genuinely such a fun thing to do and it makes me passionate and i can definitely see in your works how passionate you are in yours as well💕truly you are an inspiration

It's a combination! Before I begin, or at least get too far into the story, I will make a comprehensive outline of the entire fic. Usually, it will just be a short list of things I need to hit in each chapter, but how I accomplish these things are kind of raw dogged. And the outline isn't always the greatest or most in depth, which can allow me freedom to kind of go crazy (though truthfully I prefer a pretty strict checklist). Here are two examples directly from my Tethered at the Wrist outline that kind of show the variety of how in-depth I go:

Chapter 10 [The Two Dance]: Sonic drags Shadow to the party. Have a scene where they dance. Gets kind of intimate, before they both realize what’s happening and that they’re in front of people.

Chapter 11 [The Two Have a Movie Night]: Starts with them having to water Shadow’s plants at his place (establishes that Sonic now knows where he lives). Later, movie night with Shadow. Sonic falls asleep and wakes up later, only to find that Shadow (who he had accidentally fallen asleep against) was no longer there. Goes out to Tails’ workshop to look for him, and seeing Shadow passed out on the workbench while Tails tampers with the cuffs, gets sad because he realizes that despite how close they’ve gotten, he still wants them separated. Sonic realizes that their whole friendship is currently focused on how they're forced to be together and that it isn’t real.

So yeah! I use these as a framework, and then play around within these constraints as I go along. In both of these examples, I added a lot more in the actual chapter than what is just in the outline. I try not to rush the pacing to fit everything into a chapter either, so if I need to, I'll split it up. No harm in doing that if it preserves the pacing of the story you're trying to tell!!!

But anyways!!! Please get back into writing!!! It is truly such a fun hobby, and the more you write, the more you'll find your pace, voice, and style!!! <3

[tinystepsforward]

im sure ur getting a lot of questions but i would like to say, thanks for posting about the Situation at hand, the context youve provided has been really insightful about the internal health/workings of tumblr. i am worried about the future though.. despite everything, i really dont want to see this website die.. in any case, i hope something good happens to you today

i don't want to see this website die either. it does worry me — i wouldn't have made the posts i did if i didn't care, if i hadn't spent six years doing my best at automattic and much longer than that growing up in open-source and on tumblr. (this is a new account, a couple of years old, but i've been around a while.)

the thing is, terfs (and nazis, and so on) are not a tumblr problem. the increasing legal burden on large websites to effectively moderate their sites in the face of increasingly strategic tos-compliant hate groups is not a tumblr problem. and the state of the tech industry over the last few years has made me very disheartened in general about where we're all supposed to go to keep in touch with each other — nothing out there is built and run both by people who have enough money to hire a policy team and a trust and safety team who will be treated well enough to design a less hateful platform from the ground up, and people who actually want to do that.

capitalism, as always, you know? moderating tumblr effectively would both require it not to be led by people like matt and to have the resources to cultivate a healthy, happy company where free speech without bigotry is at the fundamental heart of the product's design.

i don't think we'll get there! i think the structural problems with tumblr are structural problems with Big Tech, with venture capitalism, with capitalism as a whole, and so on, and cannot easily be fully fixed within that system even if matt suddenly decided to log off after fully empowering all staff to focus solely on harm reduction. i do however think that, as with twitter, people will make the best of what we've got, and contradictions and tensions between different groups will sharpen as they have offline, and we'll all be along for the ride.

maybe a boring old person thing to say but: i get a lot of fulfilment out of organising in person. i've been a prison abolitionist alongside a lot of other qtpoc comrades for nearly a decade now, and the good work we do helps me believe in a future we can thrive in. if that's available to you, doing good in some small way with people who believe in it is good for the soul and the world.

[beatrice-otter]

Genuine question for you, since iirc you're a pastor? Are there other ways to understand the Great Commission? I am not a Christian, but I am trying to be friendlier to Christians. My problem is: evangelism has deeply hurt my people through colonialism, forced conversions, and supercessionism. I cannot be neutral about this. On the other hand, I know it's a central Christian teaching and it's not so easy to just uproot things that are the word of God to their practitioners. I don't want outsiders forcing interpretations or suggestions on my people so in the spirit of interfaith understanding, is there a Christian way (or ways) of understanding it that doesn't force Christianity on the rest of us?

The Great Commission, as practiced, has done a lot of harm to a lot of people (understatement).

Short answer: no. Long answer: yes.

If your question is, "is there a way of interpreting that specific passage so that it doesn't mean Christians should try and convert people to Christianity," the answer is no. It's cut-and dried, and it's by itself--it's not a single verse in the middle of a longer passage of teaching that can be recontextualized. 'Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”' (Matthew 28:18-20). That's it. Boom. Done.

But there are two major factors in how it actually plays out that have HUGE impacts on everything about it.

The first is power. When Matthew was written, Christians were a persecuted minority. The idea of Christians being fed to lions and whatnot was largely a myth, the persecution was never as widespread nor as harsh as Christians remember it being, but it was still a thing. Christians had little or no social power in the larger community; a very large proportion of Christians were poor and/or women and/or enslaved. "Making disciples" could only happen when the prospective disciples voluntarily decided that following Jesus was the right thing to do because they could see the difference it made in the lives of Christians around them, or because Jesus' words touched something in their hearts. That is a very different thing from a colonial power coming in and imposing Christianity by force, and then trying to eradicate anything that doesn't fit within Christianity.

We get a lot of examples of how that worked in practice; the entire book of Acts is "what did making disciples look like in the early church." And what it looked like was ... tell people about Jesus, and if they don't want to hear, then don't bug them about it and move on. We also have Jesus' instructions to his disciples, when he sent them out to preach the first time: if people want to listen, great, stay and teach. If not, move on. (Note: at this point, their preaching would not be proselytizing Christianity, because Christianity didn't exist yet. Jesus was one of a fairly large number of traveling rabbis wandering about Judea teaching whoever would listen. The disciples were being sent as Jewish teachers into Jewish communities--this is before any of them believed that Jesus was the Messiah.)

In the 4th and 5th Centuries, Christianity became welded to the Roman Empire and became a tool of Imperial unification. Most Christians of the time seem to have thought it was a good thing because power! authority! wealth! and yet it warped a LOT of stuff about Christianity. Pacifism got jettisoned immediately, for example. There are a whole bunch of Jesus' teachings that are fine or beneficial when practiced by people with little or no social power that become toxic when they are the Official Position of the power structure. The Great Commission is one of those teachings. And now, of course, any thoughtful Christian has to reckon with that. Even as we lose our political and social power and hegemony (and I believe that's a good thing!), we've still got to reckon with the toxic and harmful ways we've used that power in the past.

Which brings us to the second mitigating factor, which is "what relative importance do you put on the Great Commission?"

That command is three verses long. Matthew has 1071 verses. The Great Commission is therefore only .2% of the Gospel of Matthew ... and it's not found in any of the other Gospels, or anywhere else in the Bible. There are 3,779 verses in the Gospels (the books directly about Jesus' time on Earth) and 7,957 verses in the New Testament as a whole (the specifically Christian books of the Bible). The Great Commission is mentioned once for three verses. Add in the Hebrew Bible (which Christians call the Old Testament), and the Christian Bible is 31,102 verses long.

And yeah, Jesus sent out disciples to preach ... but not to outsiders. And yeah, Acts is all about spreading the Gospel to new people, but the Gospel message is not "you need to learn this and pass it on like it's a pyramid scheme." Not to mention, Acts is very specifically clear that they are going out and spreading the Good News because the Spirit is calling them. Not just "Christians should go out and tell people" but "this specific person should go to this specific place and tell this specific person about Jesus." It's not about humans choosing to go out and conquer the world for Jesus, it's about following the call of the Holy Spirit. So if the Holy Spirit isn't calling you to proselytize ... shouldn't you be listening for what the Holy Spirit is actually calling you to do?

If you add in the book of Acts and count it as part of the Great Commission, that's 1,010 verses out of 31,102. We're up to 3% of the Bible, but still only 3%. Then we turn to the rest of the New Testament, and it's just not there. Paul spends a lot of time telling his churches what they should believe and how they should act. You know what he doesn't tell them? He does not tell them they should be going out and converting other people. Paul himself spends a lot of time making disciples, but he is not concerned with whether or not those disciples then go out and make other disciples. He has his ministry; theirs is to be the Body of Christ.

How much weight do we give to three verses out of 31k+? How much time and attention do those three verses require of Christians? When Christianity was the religion of the great imperial and colonialist powers, it was given a lot of weight because it provided a religious justification for imperialism and colonialism. But that's not an inherent reflection of how important it is in the Bible itself.

Most Christians in most times and places have not spent much time worrying about making disciples out of non-Christians. Even if you lived next door to non-Christians, it's not something the average Christian spent much time thinking about. It wasn't something theologians spent much time thinking about, and not something ministers spent much time preaching about, either. If God called you to be a missionary, great. If you were such a good example of Christianity that your neighbors saw your example and wanted to become like you, even better. But "making disciples" was not a major concern ... until you get to the massive wave of colonialism in the 19th Century. All of a sudden, it became this major thing. Every Christian was expected to participate in one way or another--missionary societies sprang up like weeds, dedicated to learning about missions to "heathens" and raising money for missionary work. The Great Commission came to the front and center of Christian teaching just as colonialism was coming to the front and center of European and American political concerns. This was not a coincidence.

Let's contrast that with another foundational commandment, shall we? The Great Commandment: 'Jesus replied, “The most important [commandment] is Israel, listen! Our God is the one Lord, and you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your being, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this, You will love your neighbor as yourself. No other commandment is greater than these.”' (Mark 12:29-31) Now, besides the fact that Jesus himself says that this is the greatest commandment, it's recorded in multiple Gospels (cf. Luke 10:27-28, Matthew 22:36-40). Also, Jesus is quoting! The "love the Lord your God" part comes from multiple places in the Hebrew Bible (most notably the Shema Yisrael, Deuteronomy 6:4-9). "Love your neighbor" comes from Leviticus 19:18 and is the driving theological point behind a lot of the Law and the Prophets (in the Hebrew Bible) and the Epistles (in the New Testament).

Moreover, the Great Commandment is the lead-in to one of the most important parables, the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37). And while it doesn't explicitly appear in the Gospel of John (which is a very different book than the other three Gospels), John has the Farewell Discourse. After the Last Supper (but before his arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane), the Gospel of John has a timeout where Jesus spends three whole chapters giving his disciples one last lecture and then praying for them. And while that lecture covers a lot of topics, one of the ones it keeps hammering home is love of God and love of neighbor.

The Great Commandment doesn't come out of nowhere, nor is it isolated. It is laced throughout all of Scripture. Multiple books of the New Testament are meditations on what it means to love God and love your neighbor.

The Great Commission, on the other hand ... is three verses.

When "loving your neighbor" and "make disciples" conflict, which one should we follow? I know which one I choose.

[hrizantemy]

Day 5 of ACOTAR Games: This or That

Perhaps, this is an easy one.

Who is more useless in the Night court?

Amren: Second-in-Command to High Lord

Morrigan: Third-in-Command to High Lord

You may recruit your tribe in your crusade if it pleases you. Your contenders: @achaotichuman @litnerdwrites @fenrysmoonbeamswife @gwandas @positivelyruined @yaralulu @umthisistheonlyusernamenottaken

And, @kataraavatara is on penalty.

You never fail to surprise me with such detailed essays on short notice, and they are always on point. Thank you!

This is an easy choice: Morrigan is far more useless than Amren in the Night Court.

While Amren may have her flaws and isn’t exactly likable, she has a clear purpose. She’s been alive for millennia and provides valuable knowledge about history, ancient texts, and magical artifacts. For example, Amren was instrumental in deciphering the Book of Breathings, which helped in the war against Hybern. Despite her lack of active participation in governing Velaris, her insights have proven essential when dealing with high-stakes situations.

In contrast, Morrigan’s role as the “Third-in-Command” and bridge between Hewn City and Velaris is more performative than practical. She despises the Hewn City, barely interacts with its people, and when she does, it’s often to antagonize or mock them. Her so-called duty to maintain relations seems to exist only when Rhysand forces her hand. Instead of acting as a true emissary to connect these two parts of the Night Court, Morrigan’s disdain creates more division. If she can’t even do the one job she’s supposedly responsible for, her utility within the court is highly questionable.

Morrigan’s trauma undoubtedly shapes who she is, and her history with Hewn City is a heavy burden. She endured horrific abuse at the hands of her father and was betrayed, which left her emotionally scarred. These experiences make it understandable that she would harbor hatred for Hewn City, the place that allowed her suffering. However, the issue lies in how she channels that hatred—not toward the individuals responsible for her pain, but toward the entire city, including the innocent women and children trapped there, many of whom are victims just like she was.

Instead of confronting her father directly or working to dismantle the toxic structures that allowed her abuse, Morrigan antagonizes the very people she could be helping. The women of Hewn City suffer under the same misogynistic and oppressive culture that harmed her, yet Morrigan shows them no compassion. She makes no effort to uplift them or offer them a way out. Instead, she treats the entire population as though they’re complicit in her abuse, despite the fact that many of them are victims themselves.

This approach perpetuates the cycle of suffering and ensures that the city remains a place of pain and oppression. Morrigan’s role as a bridge between Hewn City and Velaris gives her a unique opportunity to advocate for change, but her disdain and inaction only deepen the divide. Rather than using her power and position to help those who can’t escape, she distances herself from their struggles, almost as if punishing them for being reminders of her own trauma.

While her feelings are understandable, they’re also deeply flawed. Morrigan’s inability—or unwillingness—to separate the systems of oppression from the people trapped within them prevents her from being a true force for good. It’s a tragedy, really, because she could be a powerful ally to the women and children of Hewn City, working to ensure that no one else endures the horrors she faced. Instead, she leaves them to fend for themselves in a place she herself calls a den of abuse.

What makes Morrigan’s behavior toward Hewn City even worse is the proof that she is capable of compassion and of helping women who have endured abuse. She’s shown that she has the strength, resources, and heart to lift others out of their suffering—just not when it comes to the women and children of Hewn City.

Morrigan has been instrumental in creating safe spaces for abused women in other parts of the Night Court. The library beneath Velaris is a sanctuary for women who have suffered horrors, offering them shelter, purpose, and the time they need to heal. It’s an incredible initiative, and Morrigan’s role in it shows that she understands the importance of supporting victims rather than abandoning them to their circumstances. She also risked her own safety to save Feyre, who was trapped in an abusive situation with Tamlin. Morrigan recognized Feyre’s pain and extended her hand, offering her a way out. These acts of kindness and protection reveal that she knows how to help women who feel powerless—and that she can take meaningful action when she chooses to.

But that makes her behavior toward Hewn City even harder to stomach. Morrigan knows how to be an advocate for women. She knows how to step in and make a difference. She has the means and the influence to empower the oppressed, yet she completely ignores the suffering of the women and children in Hewn City. Instead of reaching out to them, she dismisses them as part of a culture she despises, as if their mere association with Hewn City taints them.

This selective compassion makes it clear that Morrigan’s issue isn’t her ability to help—it’s her unwillingness to see beyond her own pain. She could bring the same energy she dedicates to Velaris and Feyre to the women of Hewn City, creating safe spaces and fighting for their freedom. Instead, she distances herself, turning her back on those who need her most simply because their plight reminds her too much of her own trauma.

This isn’t me saying that Morrigan can’t have her trauma. She’s absolutely entitled to her pain and the scars it left behind. What happened to her was horrific, and it’s understandable that her past deeply influences her actions. However, when you are in a position of power, especially one that directly impacts the lives of others, you don’t have the luxury of letting your trauma dictate all your decisions. And yes, that’s unfair. It sucks. But it’s true.

Morrigan is the Third-in-Command of the Night Court. She holds a position of immense influence, one that gives her the ability—and the responsibility—to shape policies and help those who need it most. Her role as a bridge between Velaris and Hewn City isn’t ceremonial; it’s crucial. She’s in a unique position to advocate for the women and children suffering under the oppressive culture of Hewn City, to dismantle the systems of abuse that allowed her father’s cruelty to thrive. But instead, she lets her personal pain drive her choices, choosing to ignore or even antagonize an entire population because of what her father did to her.

It’s a harsh truth, but holding power means you don’t get to avoid the hard work of separating your personal feelings from your responsibilities. Morrigan’s trauma may explain her behavior, but it doesn’t excuse her decision to turn her back on the people of Hewn City. The women and children there didn’t hurt her; they’re victims of the same culture that harmed her. Yet Morrigan’s refusal to help them ensures their suffering continues, as if she’s punishing them for being reminders of her past.

Being in power means rising above personal grievances, no matter how justified they are, to serve the greater good. It’s not fair, and it doesn’t make her trauma any less valid, but fairness isn’t the point. The point is that her position comes with responsibilities she’s actively choosing not to fulfill. And when you choose not to help those who are suffering—when you decide some people aren’t worth saving because of your personal pain—that’s a failure of leadership, no matter how justified your feelings might be.

Overall, I blame Rhysand for this situation because he actively appointed Morrigan as the bridge between Hewn City and Velaris, fully aware of her trauma and the complicated history she has with that place. He put her in a position where her personal pain would inevitably clash with her responsibilities and, worse, doesn’t seem to expect her to actually do her job. It’s a failure of leadership on his part, and it creates a cycle of neglect and harm for the people of Hewn City.

Rhysand knows Morrigan’s history—he’s her closest friend and family. He knows how deeply she despises Hewn City, not just because of its culture but because it represents her most painful memories. And yet, he assigned her the role of liaison, a position that requires objectivity, diplomacy, and, most importantly, empathy for the people trapped in that oppressive environment. It’s a role that Morrigan is fundamentally unsuited for, and Rhysand should have recognized that. Instead, he placed her in charge and then gave her a free pass to neglect her duties because he never expects her to actually engage with the people of Hewn City in any meaningful way.

By not holding Morrigan accountable, Rhysand is complicit in perpetuating the suffering in Hewn City. He knows she hates the place and only visits when she’s forced to, usually to antagonize its citizens or make a statement. He knows she doesn’t advocate for the women and children there, doesn’t work to improve their lives, and doesn’t even try to dismantle the oppressive systems that harm them. And yet, he does nothing to address it. If Rhysand truly cared about the people of his court, he would have chosen someone better suited to the task—someone who could set aside personal grievances and focus on the bigger picture. Instead, he enables Morrigan’s inaction and, by extension, the continued suffering of Hewn City’s most vulnerable.

This is a recurring issue with Rhysand as a leader: he prioritizes the feelings and comfort of his inner circle over the well-being of the wider court. He lets Morrigan avoid her duties because he doesn’t want to push her, just as he lets other members of his circle get away with questionable behavior. But being a good High Lord means making difficult decisions, even if they upset your friends. In this case, that would mean acknowledging that Morrigan is not the right person for this role and finding someone who is.

Rhysand’s decision to put Morrigan in charge of Hewn City and then not hold her accountable for her failures speaks to a larger issue of negligence. He created a situation where both Morrigan and the people of Hewn City are set up to fail. And while Morrigan’s actions—or lack thereof—are her own, Rhysand bears ultimate responsibility for allowing this dynamic to continue unchecked. As High Lord, the buck stops with him, and in this case, he has failed both his court and his cousin by putting her in a role that only exacerbates her trauma and neglects the needs of his people.

Morrigan is fundamentally useless in her position as the Third-in-Command and the supposed bridge between Hewn City and Velaris. While we know that she travels to other courts and even to places beyond Prythian, which suggests she is at least somewhat fulfilling her duties as Rhysand’s emissary, the glaring issue is that she is neglecting the responsibilities within her own court. Her primary role is to foster diplomacy and maintain balance between Velaris and Hewn City, but she fails spectacularly in that regard, leaving an entire segment of the Night Court ignored and unsupported.

The fact that Morrigan can apparently perform her duties outside of the Night Court—acting as an emissary to other courts and dealing with foreign matters—only highlights how blatantly she is neglecting her own people. She’s willing to go to great lengths to maintain relationships with others but seems unwilling to put in the same effort for Hewn City, which falls squarely under her jurisdiction. The people of Hewn City aren’t just random citizens of Prythian; they are part of the Night Court, the very court Morrigan is sworn to serve.

What’s really funny, or rather, ironic, is how Morrigan wanted to join the Valkyries—the very group of women who are literally fighting for other women—when she’s shown so little interest in doing the same within her own court. The Valkyries are about empowering women, lifting them up, and fighting for justice, and yet Morrigan, who could be using her position of power to help the women and children of Hewn City, seems more focused on her own trauma and grievances than on extending any empathy or help to those who need it. The contrast between her desire to join the Valkyries and her actual behavior is striking.

Morrigan’s involvement with the Valkyries would, in theory, be a natural fit for someone who’s passionate about protecting and uplifting women. But her desire to be a part of them comes across as more of an idealized fantasy than a genuine commitment to the values they stand for. The Valkyries, at their core, are women who stand together, fighting to protect each other and create a better future for their kind. They represent a collective strength, and their work centers around supporting women who’ve been victims of oppression. But Morrigan’s actions—ignoring or antagonizing the women of Hewn City, failing to take responsibility for the systemic abuse within her own court—undermine the very essence of what the Valkyries stand for.

If Morrigan truly wanted to be a part of something that’s about standing for women, she would have started by using her influence to make a difference for the women of Hewn City. She has the power, the status, and the resources to be a strong ally to these women, but instead, she chooses to retreat into her own pain and neglect her responsibilities. If she were truly invested in the idea of women fighting for other women, she would be leading the charge to break the cycle of abuse in Hewn City, offering support and protection to the very people she claims to care about.

The irony isn’t lost: Morrigan wants to be a Valkyrie, but she’s failed to embody the core principles of what the Valkyries stand for. She has the power to do what they do—fight for women, protect them, give them a voice—and yet, she chooses not to. Instead, she turns her back on the very women who need her most. It’s as though she wants the image of being a protector, a warrior for women, but without doing the hard work of actually being one. The Valkyries are about building each other up, but Morrigan has yet to recognize that she needs to start within her own court, especially when she’s in a position to make the biggest impact.

I digress, but at the end of the day, this still comes back to Rhysand’s failure in putting Morrigan in a position of power. He knew her trauma, knew her history with Hewn City, and yet, he still placed her in a role where she was supposed to manage that very situation. The fact that she’s fundamentally incapable of doing the job doesn’t absolve her of responsibility, but Rhysand bears the brunt of the blame for this misstep. He’s the one who made the choice to place her in that position, knowing full well that her personal issues would interfere with her ability to serve the court and its people.

Morrigan is, undeniably, the most useless one in her position. While she may have power and status, she has consistently chosen to neglect the most vulnerable part of her own court. She may travel to other courts, ostensibly doing her job, but it’s clear that she’s neglecting her duties within the Night Court, especially when it comes to the people of Hewn City. The women and children suffering there are left to fend for themselves because Morrigan, despite being in a position to help them, either ignores them or actively antagonizes them. That’s the ultimate failure of leadership—she’s had every opportunity to make a difference, yet refuses to use her influence for the betterment of those in need.

Yes, Morrigan has trauma, and yes, that shapes her actions, but the reality is that trauma can’t be an excuse for neglecting an entire group of people who depend on her. If Rhysand had recognized her limitations, he should have never put her in that position. Instead, he allowed her to take up a role she was ill-suited for, and the result is the continued suffering of the very people she was supposed to protect. Rhysand’s inability to hold Morrigan accountable or to choose someone better equipped for the job is what makes this situation even worse.

Morrigan might be the one who is actively neglecting her duties, but Rhysand is the one who created the environment that allowed her to do so. That’s why, even though Morrigan’s actions are inexcusable, I’m still holding Rhysand accountable for making her the most useless person in her position. She shouldn’t have been put there in the first place.

[ranticore]

pelagic spiral villages

It's not the prettiest diagram and might be hard to follow. First off, the spiral is a region in the south of the western continent of Siren

the spiral region is not limited to the actual physical structure of the land, where the characteristic ridges and valleys of Siren crumple up into a twisted shape, but also extends south as far as the icecaps, with the ridges continuing their spiral but underwater (on the map above, the visible spiral is only what extends above water)

It comprises all of the pale blue water in this map area, bordered by the darker deeper water and what is known as the Ice Wall in the south.

The most densely settled areas are within the tallest ridges at the middle of the spiral, as these ridges form physical walls and barriers which prevent many of the dangers of the open sea from entering villages without having to traverse what is quite frankly a labyrinth of narrow valleys beforehand. But at the edges of the spiral, nearer to the ice wall, lies the pelagic village of !uamaa. This is where Huarva comes from and what's pictured at the top.

it is populated by phocids and some selkies underwater and Ice Wall shortwings above water (they are similar to penguins). It consists of a huge three-tiered underwater hall with an air pocket trapped by a tethered tent-like cap made of transparent material derived from sipho scales. The bottom tier is stocked with oxygenating plants (i can only assume they are VERY productive). The middle tier is submerged and where the in habitants enter the hall (through the round openings pictured). Shelf-like beds attached to the sturdy woven walls provide platforms where a phocid can sit with their body submerged but their head out of the water, which is the most comfortable position for them as they do like to have water supporting their weight as much as possible.

The hall was built over a hot water vent in the seafloor. The vent water is directed up through a stone s-duct, which leaves a flat surface above the water which is constantly heated. This is used as a cooking stone; there is a pot of perpetual stew always bubbling here and every villager is expected to contribute something to it every day in return for being allowed to take as much stew as they like.

The other buildings are these balloon type structures which are anchored both to the sea floor and to the floating pontoons above. The balloons do not have oxygen generating plants, but must be manually raised and lowered to the surface to trap more air every day. The colour palette is overall a strongly contrasting black and white (fun fact, pelagic people are hypersensitive to the colour red out of the water, to the point where it might cause headaches)

What's life like in the village? Huarva is often asked this but he cannot truly answer, because he was never a villager. Living out here is extremely tough and demanding, and experience is valued above all else. The eldest and most experienced person in the village is called the All-Bearer and their word is law. The All-Bearer is a matchmaker among villagers, pairing those who are thought to work harmoniously together in arranged partnerships, similar to marriage. Huarva's parents were not arranged; in fact they were strictly forbidden from reproducing because they did not work harmoniously together. They fought and argued and struck sparks off one another, but were inseparable. The All-Bearer gave no blessing for them to have a child.

^the All-Bearer.

In these cases it's not uncommon for the pregnant parent to find a matched pair and attempt to convince them to claim the child. That way nobody is harmed. But it didn't work out in time, on this occasion, so the child - Huarva - was born and immediately outcast from the village as a potential troublemaker. A pretty rough start all things considered. Huarva was an outsider, not a villager. they could hang around the place, beg, speak to people, but never be granted the elders' wisdom lest it be misused by a child of intrinsically bad character. They basically grew up homeless and uneducated in their village.

And this is a major handicap because of how dangerous this region is. Children are sorted into same-age 'generations' which go through a strict and standardised education before being unleashed as leviathan hunters. A couple years of that, and (assuming they survive), that generation moves on to the next-most dangerous job, replaced by the generation below them. And so on and so forth until what remains is the oldest generation, who are finally granted a safe and comfortable life in return for sharing all the wisdom gathered over the years working different professions. Few will remain by then.

The culture is cold. Repressed. Quiet. Fighting is an exile-worthy offense and disagreements are stifled. The All-Bearer makes every final decision and you cannot question them because you do not have the requisite experience to contradict anything they say. If you must be upset, do it where nobody can see, and never openly express discontent.

Huarva survived to adulthood by choosing to stick around the shallows on top of the underwater ridges. They tried many times to earn the All-Bearer's favour enough to earn a place in the village to no avail. Until the All-Bearer finally had enough of them and sent them away on a fetch quest doomed to fail, because Huarva did not have the education to know how to spot the warning signs of a flow of aerated water. Finding themself trapped under it, they panicked, never having learned any methods to slow their heart and extend their usable breath, and almost drowned. Sheer luck saved them; a leviathan-sized giant sipho flying for the surface caught them between its scale plates. It didn't notice its new passenger and ended up dragging Huarva almost the entire way across the dark and to the spire before they got free.

[littlemeanings]

I really do not blame students for using AI within a capitalist education system that prioritizes efficiency, productivity, and short term memorization of profitable skills over genuine critical engagement. some skills are obviously crucial (i.e., writing for building critical thinking) but can and are still being built with minor adjustments like proctoring. the research shows cheating rates have not changed and have remained high since AI has become available. with the students that do cheat, it's due to deeper systemic issues. many high school and college students are working multiple jobs, caretaking for family members, have health issues, etc. and they will use whatever is available to give themselves some relief.

I get complaining about AI in passing. like I love to hate on it. but most people aren't really offering real ways to protest it other than just telling individuals they are evil for using it... which in any other area of politics we would think flawed and inadequate (re veganism, eco friendly lifestyle changes, etc).

sooo many AI-critical takes are liberal/idealist/individualist and not materialist. once again, we see individuals blamed for the profit-maximizing decisions of corporations (who are the ones responsible for the most harmful aspects of Al). instead of viewing the problems of AI as a symptom of structural issues requiring collective action, they would rather frame it as a personal character flaw of workers and students. and this individualizing of political issues closes off potential for a deeper critique, coalition building, and more opportunities for action. it's a way to both feel superior to other people and subscribe to inaction.

AI does not defy the capitalist historical pattern of labor-saving technology creation, monopolization, dependency enforcement, and exploitation. new technology increases productivity/profit expectations. these increased productivity expectations translate into pedagogy that also expects increased productivity. medical schools actively encourage regular AI use because they know doctors will now be expected to be faster and see more patients because of it - despite the fact most AI tools are not accurate enough to trust for medical information. however, this does not matter in the real capitalist world. what matters is how many patients you can see and how much money you can make for the shareholders and insurance companies.

just like all new labor-saving technology, AI decreases the bargaining power of workers and heightens capitalist contradictions: if you cant stay competitive and keep up with the pace as a worker you risk your job and livelihood.

I am not advocating for doctors, students, and other workers to continue uncritically using AI, but to understand their part in the class war and act accordingly. under capitalism, all productivity gains from new technology will always go straight to the company owners, who would rather expect double/triple the productivity of workers rather than give the time saved back to workers or god forbid give the workers ownership over the new technology.

AI will not save us from capitalism - capitalism develops the productive forces for its replacement. we must radically organize and self-educate. activism isn't about being perfect but doing the best you can consistently without burning yourself out and this will look different for everyone.

[thewritingslut]

STORY — UNNAMED

TRIGGER WARNING — violence, school lockdown, mentions of discrimination.

AUTHORS NOTE — this is low-key buns, please give tips if having any!! first chapter

In a world of discrimination and hierarchy, I somehow managed to break into an industry that works against me.

Powers are common, yet some are not accepted. People are praised for certain qualities of their powers and degraded for others. Some people don’t have powers; they are punished for that by the system. Maybe the system of healthcare, or maybe they aren’t accepted because they aren’t seen as capable. Whatever it is, nothing was made to accept them.

Society isn’t pushing to be more accepting either; people often put themselves down to make it farther in high-paying industries they don’t structurally belong in. People with powers that are seen as villainous or scary, maybe odd or weird, tend to be shunned. They hide away their powers, tending to society’s norms set in place by people long before us.

I’m someone who has tended to society for as long as I can remember, my family too. Powers are hereditary, so if you're cursed with a ‘unique power,’ you are also cursing your kids, your bloodline. Cursing them to be bullied and rejected. Most of society has ‘plain’ powers, going about their lives, their powers being convenient in everyday life. Others have ones that put them on a ‘watch list’ being announced to everyone.

I’m one of those people, and so is my family. I got a mix of my mother's and father's powers, a mix that my little sister likes to call Cheshire, after the Cheshire Cat. I can make certain limbs disappear, disconnect them, split my voice, and make it seem like parts of me are still there even if I’m in a different place. Peers used to think it was interesting and cool; now it’s seen as creepy.

I’m on a watch list like the rest of my family because, according to the court of law, people like us are more than likely to become criminals. We’re seen as outlaws, and sometimes, I want to conform to that stereotype; I want to bring justice to people like me. My mother always said that would only make it worse, make people fear us more. I would be doing more harm than good.

So, I hid that feeling and continued to try and live normally. Although being on ‘the list’ makes it hard, my school knows it's on all my records. Since the moment my powers manifested was the moment it was put on all my lists. People also tend to ask, once I tell them, after being pressured, I get avoided. I watch others from a distance and keep to myself because of it.

—

“Eimi?” My teacher's voice rang out through the loud classroom. I slowly lifted my eyes from the assignment and put my gaze on her. A gentle smile graced her features, her head tilted slightly, making her glasses fall slightly off her nose bridge.

“Yes?” I inquired, my voice unsteady. Yet again, it never really was. I was sat in the front corner of the class, near her desk. My focus only on the assignment in front of me, tuning out my peers making noise around me. Ignoring the snide comments and remarks being made against me.

“You’re wanted in the front office.” She states softly, her tone gentle, just like her gaze. I slowly nod my head, and I stand up from my seat, walking out the door to head to the office. I bury my hands in the pockets of my hoodie, trying to ignore the cold atmosphere around me.

As I walk, I zone out, deep within my thoughts. Paying little attention to my surroundings, until I heard the voice over the intercom ring out throughout the hallways. I look up at the ceiling, listening, looking at the speaker posted above me.

“Lockdown, lockout, out of sight.” The intercom boomed out, and within seconds classrooms were locked, lights off, and I was stuck open and vulnerable in the hallway. I didn’t know where to go, or what to do. I stood, frozen in place. Until I heard footsteps from behind me.

I snapped my head back, quickly pressing myself up against the wall, being hidden by a locker poking out over me. I peeked my head out slightly, to see what could’ve made the footsteps. I’m met with the sight that it was put us in lockdown.

Unauthorized, and licensed ‘criminals’ using their powers in the school. I can see them using them on a classmate, one in my grade. I don’t know his name, but I know his face. The same face who threw food at me in the cafeteria, and destroyed what little reputation I had.

I debated watching, watching them put a possible end to his life. Yet, I do not feel that same burning sense of hatred towards him that I once did. I watch, my eyes tired but a bit wide as I do. My body seems to move on its own as if I’m trained to do so.

Throughout my technically illegal training sessions I put myself through, I’ve figured out I can use my powers to haze through someone's body to grab something, or to shock them for around thirty seconds. It leaves them with an uncomfortable cold feeling and nausea.

From what I can see, the assaulter is holding a weapon to the victim's chest. I can’t necessarily tell what it is though. Slowly, I take undetected steps, not because they're silent but, because they make small noises. I think I’m undetected because the assaulter is so focused.

In what feels like minutes, hours, maybe, I make it behind the assaulter. I haze my hands through the assaulter's body, taking the weapon with a strong tug. Catching both the people off guard, reacting to my instincts, I throw the weapon far away.

Taking my hands out of the assaulter's body, leaving them unharmed but left with an uncomfortable feeling. Although, the small moment of victory doesn’t seem to last long. I’m soon pressed up against a locker, being held up by my hoodie.

My feet off the ground, breath catching in my throat. I finally get a good look at the assaulted, a boy I recognize. One I’ve worked with a few times on assignments, someone also deemed a freak. He seems taken about by me defending his victim.

I look over at the victim, my eyes slightly narrowing at the sight. I guess I didn’t make it fast enough, he seems to be bleeding from the chest. I look at the assaulter, whose name is Inola. I give a grin, the rest of my body suddenly disappearing beside it.

I make it over to the victim, taking off my hoodie to wrap around the wound in a possible attempt to hold off major blood loss. The victim coughs up some blood, landing on my white tank top. My eyes widen slightly at the sight of it.

I look up at Inola, who’s loose at me with a disgusted, almost betrayed look. Although as we hold silent high contact he’s suddenly tackled by security. I watch in silence as yelling is heard around me, but it’s all overwhelming so I simply tune it out.

Soon, the victim was taken out of my arms, and police were around me, seemingly asked me questions yet I couldn't focus on them. I focus on Inola’s body being taken away in head cuffs, and how they’re rough with him. Giving him harsh words and threats. All I can do is stare.

WORD COUNT — 1,252

CHARACTER COUNT — 6,787

[between2mysteries]

as someone who has been in mostly long term relationships, and realizing only now the depth of my traumas and their role in what appears to be adhd/rocd/cptsd/anxious-preoccupied attachment/dpdr among depression and general anxiety etc lol, it’s difficult to recognize your emotional patterns / responses / trauma. especially when it lurks so invisibly and for so long roots into your nervous system and psyche. this is the person i have always been, not by choice, but emotional dysregulation, a lack of relational safety, and neglect mapped out for me how i handle conflict and yeah, shaped me in its image. and the same goes for everyone else. these are all patterned responses to a lack of safety.

i’m probably not articulating this well, but i guess what i’m trying to say is, there isn’t anyone i could be with who wouldn’t be touched by their self-history negatively to a varying capacity. some degree of mental illness typically interplays within most of our relationships and romantic ones are no exception. i think we can be quick to write people off esp now in the same way we can be too quick to stay in toxicity/abuse or within a dynamic of continuous unmet needs, which doesn’t come from a place of intended harm but becomes harm none the less.

i guess i measure the difference (which is fairly stark in my experience) with genuine actions taken toward change; to show up better and to love better. i could walk away from someone who up front cannot meet all of my emotional needs, but all of my emotional needs will never be fully met every single time by anyone regardless of what our conflicts are. i have to do the work to also meet my own needs, when other people can’t and same goes for friends and family so yeah: “self-care.”

but loving people show up for you more often than not, they might fail sometimes, and let you down at times, but the persistence in trying is where love originates.

loving better takes so much action and intentional practice and time and energy and awareness that it can be truly exhausting. i think most of us aren’t really given the right tools on how to love, and i don’t believe that a lot of isolation can necessarily give you those tools either, and i don’t mean being single is bad for long stretches of time, it’s not. you do need to take time for yourself and get comfortable with loneliness and being alone without relying on the dopamine hit of socializing every time you can’t sit with yourself. and or if romantic relationships as a structure are not desirable at all for you, that’s also okay.

but if the intention is to be in a romantic relationship with someone, then at some point you have to be inside of that dynamic. often, and i of course include myself in this, we mistake emotional control for emotional maturity. but healing isn’t just something that happens in solitude, it must eventually become relational. relationships are where your capacity to respond differently is tested. not in solitude where you can so easily guard yourself and no one else is there to hold you accountable.

at some point you have to decide if the person you’re with or pursuing is worth doing the work with.

there’s that quote somewhere about how you unconsciously don’t realize your inflexibility and emotional rigidity when you don’t live with other people or stay in isolation for so long. self-containment, at a point, can impair you to malleability, where you might be quicker to walk away and find yourself continuously coming up short of finding a lasting relationship because your expectations leave little to no room for someone to fuck up. and we all fuck up.

i know i’m not really saying anything new here, but loving requires sacrifice without losing yourself in the process which happens with deep self-trust. and that’s hard whether or not mental illness plays a role. sometimes i think our fear of love is attached to its spine, and it makes it hard to separate the two or to know from which place you are acting from. i also think most of us don’t even realize how terrified we are to love and be loved. when it moves beyond an idea, or analysis like i’m doing here and we are face to face with who we love and ourselves. and what that fear signals off in our bodies. i keep coming back to that final line of the glass essay—it was the body of us all, it walked out of the light.

might be way off but i always interpreted this to mean that walking out of the light (old light; all you’ve ever known; preconceived truths; traumas; moral failings; familiar pain) is walking into void. you don’t know what’s on the other side of that door—what safe love looks like when you’ve never experienced it before. so yeah, it’s an act of faith. it requires you to believe in something you have never seen but to walk into it anyway, not blindly naive, but prepared to be viciously confronted and challenged. and you will fail at times, and other people will fail you at times.

as someone who is really sensitive and has fallen into romanticization traps, it’s been difficult to realize i haven’t been loving anyone as well as i could.

i’ve never looked at myself this fully before and held myself accountable to my failings without severe self-blame and disgust, but i’m trying. that’s all i can do. and i would hope anyone who says that they love me would see that, and still hold out their hand.

[kirammn]

▍ DEFAULT VERSE.

moves away from season 2's insanity that was hextech. hextech had its potential and could've been fitted in a way that drives the primary narrative in the political and class struggle, but it was treated as a bandaid, as though it would resolve generations of oppression within the split cities.

i leave the specifics of the genocide attempt up to plotting, but whether it happens or not, my verse remains that the stressors between piltover and zaun do not fade away into the background. there was no magical shift in how the council members viewed zaunites, and vice versa. i do think the emphasis in humanity banding together to defeat a much larger problem had its purpose, as humanity ( in relative terms ) persists in the face of imminent threat, but every single issue that had existed prior, remains. the aftermath leaves behind a shaky foundation of the piltovians. caitlyn, whether she gives up her seat or not, makes her decision strategically. the old way of ruling would not suffice, and pragmatic, diplomatic manners of attempting to change the structure of their politics, were nothing effective in the face of a rigged system.

caitlyn stopped believing in the system she grew up on. she stopped buying into the lies and the propaganda and the delusions they fed themselves and her to believe what they do was righteous. she also did not find herself to be the person who was fit to be commander, nor in place to rule. so, she stepped down. but she studied the secrets of the ruling houses and its histories, its people. she turned to private investigation, primarily seeking to take cases that would have otherwise gone ignored. she plays the long game, firstly trying limit noxian rule and influence. then, removing long - time players in the council. she seeks to cut out the rot from within.

in short, caitlyn goes a bit rogue. she's clever about it, but it puts her at risk. she'd always wanted to prevent harm from befalling anyone but had learned that change could not come without its sacrifices and discomfort in acknowledging her part in a longtime cycle of oppression. for this, she does use the kiramman name to her benefit, knowing how the system works initially.

the piltover and zaun conflict is a major part of the games so it's not as easy as saying caitlyn solves the issue ( or that she would even be The One to fix it, quite frankly, she is only a pawn in the game ), but she does try.

general plot points i would fall back to include her investigation into jinx's disappearance, her implosion of high piltovian politics ( e.g. manipulating the council, blackmailing, replacing people every now and then, introducing education and policy changes, abolishing of the prison, re-training of enforcers, etc ), going after high threats in zaun, and overall just trying to delegate fundamental improvements.

sidenote: i don't diverge from caitlyn's actions in season 2. she started as a naive, sheltered girl seeking to highlight the atrocities of pitlovian oppression onto zaunites, biased toward her own involvement and lived privilege. it is wildly predictable that despite her desire to incite change, that she would allow grief and revenge to cloud her judgement. her transition into acting primarily on impulse, to falling out of place with her own actions, to immediately seeking to rectify it, is fitting to her character. she actively and continuously learns to combat her position of privilege and the biases that come with it. she says things that are ........... questionable, because she doesn't think about how they may be questionable until called out on it. caitlyn can be classist, it just is what it is idk what to tell you. she, again, grew up sheltered in a highest ranking name, and came about her evolvement on her own by trying to see beyond what she was shown. like, oh noooooo the spoiled rich girl acts like a .........spoiled rich girl. anyways

[nyarlathotep-thecrawlingchaos]

Below you will find the character profile for my One Piece OC (one of them, anyway. I have at least five, but I'll be working the most closely with this one for now).

So, here we go. Only been working on this shit for like...three days. Okay, technically over ten years since I used to write her ages ago when I was on fanfiction.net, but I've redone a lot of things.

I'm already in the process of working on a novel-length Mihawk x AFAB!OC fanfic, so here's the overly extensive character sheet for my OC because I always put way too much effort into character development.

The character history practically devolves into a mini fanfic itself around the middle by total accident, but whatever.

The fanfic(s) will toe the line between Live Action and Manga canon. We'll just call it AU and leave it at that.

Karimi Lionne

Associated fanfics: Hearing Problems (coming soon to an Unknowable Horror near you) and Any Way The Wind Blows (eventually, bear with me)

Age: 24

Occupation: Pirate; Mercenary

Abilities:

Kiku Kiku no Mi: A Paramecia type devil fruit that grants the user the ability to hear...well, everything, all the time. Within a certain range she, can hear the thoughts of people around her. The range varies with her focus; standard, it's anyone within a range of about fifty feet in any direction. She can close that circle down to either listen to one person's thoughts, or expand it to search a city or town for a particular person. Activated (which she hasn't yet), it allows the user the ability to plant thoughts in others' heads, and potentially control their thoughts.

She considers the ability more of a curse than a blessing since she has never managed to hone it quite well enough to shut it off entirely, and can often be found sitting at a dock or on a beach with her feet in the salt water, just to get some peace and quiet in her own head.

Blades: Karimi carries a pair of daggers with ornately carved ivory handles, the head of a lioness carved into the top of each hilt, in sheaths at either side of her belt. They belonged to her grandmother, who raised her from age four to age fourteen, and also taught her most of what she knows in combat. She also keeps a handful of throwing knives in a holster belted to her right calf, a couple inches below her knee.

Her fighting style relies primarily on agility, evasion, and accuracy rather than raw strength due to her relatively small stature of 5'2".

Haki: Not a master by any means at all. Learned from Red-Haired Shanks during her brief stint working with his crew, used largely to assist in suppressing her devil fruit abilities and making them more manageable. Not really proficient enough to use it for any other application.

Music: Karimi was taught to play guitar, fiddle, and piano by her grandmother, but she hasn't touched an instrument since her grandmother died, so she doesn't know how much of the ability she has retained. Karimi also learned several sea shanties from her, and often hums or quietly sings them to herself while out to sea.

Appearance:

Faceclaim: Jane Fonda c. 1960s, facial structure, skin and hair edited via Faceapp

Long, dark green hair, in wild curls that she can't do much of anything with except tie back in a bun or stuff under a hat. Sharp emerald green eyes. Fair-skinned with a handful of freckles.

The Resting Bitch Face is strong with this one.

Slender, petite, 5'2" tall.

Tends toward wearing long-sleeved shirts/dresses to cover the scars on her arms. Almost always wears her grandmother's hat, an old and tattered brown leather tricorne with a patch on the front left brim and a few more in the back.

Personality:

Confident, toeing the line of outright arrogance at times. Humor that ranges from dryly sarcastic to quite silly, depending on who she's around. Guarded. Brooding. Cynical. Empathetic. Gentle. Uses sarcasm as a coping mechanism. Not easily offended. Prominent issues with self-harm and PTSD.

Backstory (prior to beginning of fic)

Karimi has next to no knowledge of her origins. She knows her mother died shortly after giving birth to her, that she was born on her father's ship, and that she got her hands on a devil fruit the crew had found and ate it when she was three or four years old, not knowing what it was. Shortly thereafter she was taken to live with her grandmother on a remote island village called Conch Cove, somewhere on the Grand Line.

Her grandmother, Helena Lionne, had been a pirate captain shortly before Gol D. Roger came around and into his earlyyears of piracy, but Karimi didn't know much about her history. Helena was a powerful haki user, and was able to use the power to dampen Karimi's devil fruit abilities, largely for the sake of the girl's own comfort and sanity. Helena trained her to fight in order to defend herself in the event that she ever left the island, as well as survivalist training. She wasn't shy about telling Karimi that the world could be a dangerous place, particularly for a woman on her own, amd wanted to ensure that her granddaughter had everything she needed to safely make her way in the world.

Karimi found out more about her grandmother a week after her fourteenth birthday.

She discovered that her grandmother had been captain of the Siren Pirates. She discovered her grandmother possessed the abilities of the Mizu Mizu no Mi (logia type, water). She discovered that her bounty was in the billions...and still very much active.

The Marine Admiral who showed up to the island, Admiral Jackson "Volcano" Vesper, brought a large crew with him, with no intention of taking Helena alive. His moniker stemmed not only from his explosive temper, but also from his own devil fruit abilities—the predecessor to Fire Fist Ace, he possessed the power of the Mera Mera no Mi (logia type, fire). He also possessed an intense desire for revenge on the woman that had killed his father.

He didn't bother revealing how he managed to track her down—he simply went in guns blazing. The battle between him and Helena, between his crew and what remained of hers, waged for nearly two entire days, leaving several Marines and villagers dead and the town in total ruin. Karimi stayed hidden the entire time as her grandmother had asked her to, but with Helena's haki focused on defending herself and her allies, Karimi could hear everything with her devil fruit abilities.

She could hear the moment when Admiral Vesper's first mate got the drop on her grandmother, pinned her to the ground with the butt of his rifle, which he had coated in a layer of sea stone, instantly sapping her strength and her devil fruit powers.

Karimi could hear Vesper's thoughts, his intentions to humiliate her, kill her, and return to Marineford with her head.

And Karimi emerged from hiding and managed to toss a throwing a knife into the back of his leg.

She was captured almost immediately. Her physical resemblance to her grandmother in the woman's younger years was noted immediately by Vesper, and he knew in that instant that he had won.

And Karimi knew it too, with the man's bowie knife to her throat.

He agreed to let Karimi go in exchange for Helena's life, and Helena gave in without a second thought when she saw the bowie knife start to cut into her granddaughters neck.

He took the remainder of Helena's old crew as prisoners—the only four other villagers on the island left alive, but not before slitting Helena's throat and sawing her head from her neck with his bowie knife, while Karimi was held captive and forced to watch.

Then he and his men left her there on the remote island, in a ruined village with nothing but the corpses of friends and neighbors and the woman who raised her to keep her company.

She doesn't remember much of the following two weeks. She knows she was able to make a spear out of a throwing knife and a shovel handle to catch fish for food in the shallows around the island. That she had a fresh source of water in the form of a pond. She knows she was nearly through building a raft out of the rubble that was left of the town when another marine ship arrived at the island, captained this time by Vice Admiral Garp the Fist. She was understandably beyond wary of Marines, and she fought tooth and nail, kicking and screaming, when they took her back to their ship.

They took her throwing knives and her grandmother's daggers, and she was forced to stay in the brig because she made very clear that she would gladly gut any marine who came near her. She was still treated with kindness and provided full meals given her situation, and as she bided her time and got her strength back she formed a plan of escape.

She was able to use her devil fruit powers effectively in her escape—by listening around and finding the easiest target. This came in the form of a fifteen year old cadet who would check on her and talk to her during his downtime. He thought she was pretty and couldn't believe she had managed to keep herself alive for two and a half weeks after what she had been through, admired her sheer strength of will. It was incredibly easy to sweet-talk him into getting her weapons back to her, playing on his sympathies by telling him that they were all she had left of her grandmother.

She hid them once she had them, and did a little more sweet-talking...until he agreed to steal the keys and get her out of the cell. Once she was out, she wasted no time in knocking him out, stealing his uniform, stuffing her hair under the hat, and discreetly stealing enough rations to last herself a week and slipping away on a dinghy.

She had no idea where she was or how she was going to get anywhere, but she wasn't exactly of sound mind after the trauma she had endured. Her only thoughts at the time were that she wanted to put as much distance between herself and the Marines as possible.

She was picked up by a merchant vessel after a few days, and they took pity on her story and allowed her to remain on board the ship, assisting in cooking and cleaning in exchange for room and board and safe passage to their next stop. They were bound for Loguetown in the East Blue, and that suited her just fine.

Loguetown was a large city right outside the only passage onto the Grand Line, and it gave her plenty of options for work. She worked odd jobs that provided her with room and board, saving up money over the course of the following two years.

She was working in a tavern and staying at the attached inn when the Red-Hair pirates made port in Loguetown, and she knew she had her ticket back onto the seas, with only one goal in mind—to find her father, and tell him what had become of her grandmother.

Her memories of him were too vague for her to give any decent description, but she wasn't telling anyone her reasons anyway. She waited for her shift to end before approaching Shanks himself and asking, confidently, to join his crew.

That got a tremendous laugh out of the crew at large, but only a little bit of a chuckle from Shanks himself.

"And why would a little slip of a thing like yourself want sail around with a bunch of old men?"

"That's not really important." She sat down at the neighboring table at this. "But what I can provide your crew is."

"And what might that be, love?"

"I've trained with daggers and throwing knives since I was four years old. I also possess the abilities of the Kiku Kiku no Mi."

Yasopp, sitting between Shanks and his first mate Benn Beckman with bis feet propped up on the table, snorted at that, grinning. "So what, it improved your hearing?"

Karimi leveled her eyes with his. "Immensely," she daid. She gave a small smile...and began narrating his thoughts out loud. "'The hell is this girl's deal? Does she have any idea who she's even talking to right now? She can't even be much older than my—Wait. What the hell? What the hell is she—'" His feet slipped off the table, his mouth falling open as he registered what was happening. "'Holy shit, is she in my head? Is—'"

"Okay, you made your point, cut it out!" he half-shouted, staring at her in alarm.

No one was laughing anymore—and she knew she had their full attention now.

"That," Shanks said lightly, the amusement gone from his eyes and replaced with caution—but also intrigue, "is a very dangerous ability for someone as young as yourself to possess."

"I've had it since I was four. I've learned to manage it."

That was, of course, only half true—she could deal with it, yes, but she couldn't fully control it.

After a long, silent moment, in which members of his crew exchanged glances and Shanks quietly studied her, he leaned back in his chair, nodding to himself.

"Let's give you a real test," he said, leaning his arm over the back of his chair. "See how well you can put your abilities to use." Karimi lifted her eyebrows, waiting. "I want you to sneak into the Marine base here in Loguetown. Find where they keep the treasure and money they've confiscated from pirates and thieves they've arrested...and walk out with as much as you can carry." He lifted his bottle of rum from the table. "Undetected."

"Have you lost your goddamned mind?" Shanks glanced across the table at Benn when he spoke up.

"That's been gone for years, but go on."

Benn gave a growl of annoyance at his captain. "She's a kid. You're talking about sending a kid into a damned Marine base to steal from them. That's a suicide mission."

"The girl wants a chance to prove herself," he said simply, shrugging a shoulder. He looked back at her. "That's my offer, love. We're setting out no later than noon tomorrow. You bring your haul to the ship, you can come with us."

Karimi nodded, and stood from her chair. "Then I will see you all no later than noon tomorrow."

A few hours later, when the tavern closed for the night and the crew returned to the ship, they were met with the sight of Karimi, wearing a Marine uniform and sitting on a sizable burlap sack right in the middle of the deck. She stood from it and kicked it over, spilling gold bricks, jewels, and piles of Berry notes and coins across the deck.

Sneaking into the base had honestly been a piece of cake—she found a half-drunk Marine a couple years older than her at another tavern, did a little sweet-talking and got him back to her inn room. Suggested some rather kinky activities that would involve him stripping down and being tied to the bed and he jumped on it. Once he was securely tied, she gathered her few belongings, put on his uniform, put a do-not-disturb sign on the door, and slipped out the window.

It had taken longer to find and get into the rooms where they kept any seized contraband, but it had been as simple as keeping her head down and listening. Hiding and ducking down empty halls when she heard anyone drawing too close. The entire ordeal had taken just under three hours.

After a long stretch of silence, it was Benn Beckman that voiced what everyone was thinking.

"Holy shit."

Shanks grinned over at him. "Suicide mission, aye?"

She was officially welcomed aboard the ship at this, as promised, but there was some deal of commotion when she told them her name.

Particularly her surname.

She learned very quickly that both Shanks and his first mate were familiar with her father—and that Benn utterly despised him. To the point that he, however briefly, threatened to throw Karimi off the ship himself against his captain's will if necessary. The brief altercation ended in Benn storming off to the gun deck on his own, leaving Karimi wondering if she had made the right choice of crew.

Shanks was far more personable.

He told her about her father—Lyon D. Rollo.

He described her father as having been like "the annoying little brother he never wanted." Told her about their time spent as deckhands aboard the Oro Jackson. About his devil fruit abilities that had caused absolutely nothing but trouble for years because they were incredibly difficult to master without massive repercussions: the Kaze Kaze no Mi (logia type: wind).

Told her how they met Benn not long after Roger's execution after setting out on their own—Benn and his younger sister, Sedna, who he had looked after on his own since he was around sixteen and she was six, when their parents had been killed by raiding pirates.

Who Karimi's father had apparently fallen inmediately head over heels for. Said he refused to leave town without her, and did exactly as he set out to. Benn had refused to leave her side, and came with them despite his hatred of pirates at the time.

It was a year later that Shanks and her father had gone their separate ways. It had always been the plan, as they were both too stubborn to accept being anything but captains. Once they gathered enough of their own crew members and got their own ships, they parted as friends. Benn stayed with Shanks, and Sedna remained with Lyon.

It wasn't long after that they recieved word that Sedna had been killed during a firefight with the Marines.

"He never mentioned a child," said Shanks, shaking his head and looking at Karimi like he was looking at a ghost as he leaned forward against the railing around the bow. "I imagine he couldn't have been much older than seventeen." He shook his head a little, still in disbelief. "I don't think I need devil fruit abilities to know what you're doing here."

Karimi nodded shortly. "Do you know where—?"

"No, unfortunately."

No one knew where Lyon was—it had been five years since Shanks actually last saw him, and he and his entire crew seemed to have just vanished into thin air around a year ago, despite still holding active bounties.

Karimi didn't tell him anything else, not why she was looking for him—only that she was, and that she had no intention of remaining with the Red Hair crew for the long term. Just long enough to get a bit of money together and purchase her own ship, something small like a sloop that she could handle by herself.

She ended up sailing with the Red Hair Pirates for around two years, give or take few months. Shanks became something of a mentor to her over that period of time, taking time to train her in Busoshoku Haki, the same type of Haki that her grandmother had used to repress Karimi's Devil Fruit abilities, so Karimi could use it herself when she wished to. It wasn't fool-proof, but it at least helped lessen the mental load.

Once on her own, Karimi ultimately began working as a mercenary; taking on jobs with various pirate crews that required stealth or a subtle touch, avoiding Marines as much as possible, and attempting to gather any information she could about her father, but to no avail on the latter front—it really seemed like he and his crew had just vanished into thin air. His bounty was still active, along with those of his first mate and officers, but no one had heard hide nor hair of them in literaly years.

Nothing much changed for her until Karimi took a job from the Buggy Pirates a few years later, at twenty-four years old. Buggy was searching for a map of the Grand Line, and he needed someone to steal it for him, since he and his crew more or less stood out like sore thumbs and couldn't very discreetly sneak into the naval base in Shells Town where it was being kept. She was reluctant to accept—she usually avoided jobs that had anything at all to do with the Marines, but Buggy made an offer she couldn't refuse.

He claimed to have information about her father that he would gladly trade for the map.

She kept her ship anchored next to Buggy's overnight to set to preparing, planning to make way for Shells Town first thing the following morning...but news came down the grapevine that night that the map had been stolen during a break-in by another pirate crew into the Marine base.

In his rage that his plans were foiled after spending months gathering information, Buggy laid the blame on the hired hand—that she had left immediately, she could have beaten the other crew to the base and gotten the map first. He ultimately sunk her sloop, nearly with her on it before she managed to gather her most valuable items and get herself onto Buggy's ship, where he informed her she would be working for him until her debt at failing to get him the map was paid off—now she was going to have to steal it from the pirates that had taken it.

Karimi had little choice but to agree—being a devil fruit user, it would be far too risky for her to steal a dinghy and take her chances with thr open oceans.

They found the crew on a schooner and took them prisoner easily enough, given that there were only three of them. Karimi recognized one of them from a description Shanks had mentioned during her time with the Red Hair Pirates of the boy he had lost his arm to a sea monster saving (a story that she had honestly thought had to be an exaggeration), who claimed to be their captain and insisted he was going to be king of the pirates...while the other two claimed they weren't even a crew.

Whatever the case, Karimi knew they were her ticket out of servitude to the Buggy Pirates, and mutinied against them the second that the odds shifted in favor of Luffy, Zoro, and Nami.

Luffy was more than happy to welcome her aboard their tiny ship, especially on learning that she knew Shanks. She didn't tell them of her devil fruit abilities, still keeping them suppressed with Haki, a mistake she would regret in the next island they made port at due largely to their schooner springing a leak. They lucked out on landing in a town with a shipyard, but none of them really had a Berry to spare between them to actually purchase a new ship—the vast majority of the money that Karimi had saved herself had sunk to the bottom of the ocean with her own ship amd most of her worldly possessions.

On meeting and quickly befriending Usopp at the shipyard and learning the owner of the place was his "best friend," they had something of a plan, if a bit of a ridiculous one—Luffy was convinced that if he just talked to Kaya and explained their situation, she would just give him a ship and they could be off and on their way.

Both Karimi and Zoro recognized the butler Klahador, but couldn't quite put their finger on why. This was Karimi's mistake—she didn't think enough of it to release her haki and just listen in on his thoughts. It wasn't until everything later fell apart in Kaya's mansion that she did release her haki and quickly learn he was Captain Kuro, a cutthroat captain who had been believed dead for years, that he had been poisoning Kaya for years, and that he planned to murder Kaya and take over the estate himself that night.

She also learned while her abilities were active that Nami had every intention of stealing the Grand Line map and taking it to the pirate crew she was serving against her will. By this point Karimi had developed a soft spot for all three members of the Strawhat Crew (even if two of them still claimed not to be a crew), but she decided not to confront Nami about it—yet.

Kaya was more than happy to gift them a ship after they helped defeat Kuro and freed her from his suppression. She offered Karimi one as well, but she declined, stating that she would prefer to purchase one herself once she had the means to do so—but that she would happily return to Syrup Village and purchase one from Kaya's family's shipyard. In truth, she was honestly enjoying her time with the ragtag little crew, and wanted to stick around with them just a bit longer to see how far Luffy's ambitions could take them.

Usopp joined them at this point as the crew's sharpshooter. They were intercepted not far from Syrup Village by a Marine ship, and Karimi recognized Vice Admiral Garp almost immediately—as did Luffy, to her and the others' astonishment on finding our that Garp was his grandfather. Luffy was able to use his devil fruit abilities to deflect a cannonball thrown at their ship by Garp, and damage Garp's ship enough for them to slip away into a dense fog and lose their pursuers.

They happened by pure luck upon the restaurant ship Baratie, where our story begins in earnest, following Luffy's idiocy at trying to pass off a very expensive bill with an I.O.U. and getting stuck washing dishes in the kitchen to pay it off.

Relationships

Helena Lionne (OC): Grandmother, deceased. A powerful pirate captain in her heyday, Helena disappeared from the seas without a word one day and no one really knew where she had gone. Helena raised Karimi from age four to fourteen, when she was tragically murdered by a revenge-crazed marine admiral whose father Helena had killed years earlier when she was still pirating. Karimi looked up to her immensely and loved her to death, and thinking about her still hurts.

Lyon D. Rollo (OC): A active pirate captain on the grand line, though no one has heard hide nor hair of him or his crew (the Hurricane Pirates) in years. She's been trying to find him for the past ten years, to tell him what happened to her grandmother/his mother, since Karimi was the only witness left alive and no one else would be able to tell him exactly what happened. It doesn't help that she last saw him at four years old, and remembers next to nothing about him. He's actually the one who gave her the hat—he took it when he left home at thirteen to become a pirate himself, and left it with her when he took her to her grandmother. (A/N, if and when I ever get to working on Any Way The Wind Blows, it will be about his history.)

Red-Haired Shanks: Working with the Red-Hair pirates for two years led to her becoming fairly close with Shanks. He had known her father over two decades and became quite protective of her as a direct result, with her looking at him almost as a father figure as well as a mentor.

Benn Beckman: The first mate of Red-Haired Shanks, Karimi learned from Shanks that her mother had been Benn's younger sister, Sedna, and that Benn absolutely despised her father and blamed him for his younger sibling's untimely death. As a result, Benn spent a while both wary and untrusting of Karimi and treating her with indifference that bordered on hostility; but he eventually let it go, accepting that she was capable (and, in his own words, "a hell of a lot smarter than Lyon D. Dipshit"),

The Marines: Karimi positively despises Marines, with the sole exception of Garp since has come to recognize that she wouldn't be alive if not for him, though good luck getting her to admit it.

Luffy: For her short spell traveling with Luffy and his "crew," she bonded with Luffy pretty quickly, coming to see him like a goofy little brother. He absolutely reveled in hearing stories about her time on the ocean, especially any that involved her time on Shanks's crew. She's quick to scold him for his naivety and questionable decisions, but it's mostly out of care; his ambition is definitely infectious, and she wants to see him achieve everything he's set out to do.

Nami: As the only other girl on the Going Merry, Karimi did her best to get close to Nami, especially on learning about her tragic situation with the Arlong Pirates via her devil fruit abilities, but Nami makes herself intentionally distant.

Zoro: She butted heads a fair bit with Zoro, largely due to both of them being exceedingly sarcastic, but she doesn't hate him by any means. Quite the contrary, she admires his abilities as a fighter and passes time sparring with him on the deck. They're about evenly matched in fighting ability, as his style relies largely on strength and her own on evasion and agility.

Usopp: Usopp is always quick to pipe in with his own epic stories of his supposed adventures when Karimi mentions any of her own past ventures. Not unlike Luffy, she looks at him almost like a younger sibling, though honestly he annoys her a little more than Luffy.

[mbti-notes]

Anon wrote: Why is it always presented as extremely hazardous to diagnose yourself with mental disorders? What are the harms really? Say for example I am aware that my ‘diagnose’ is not a diagnose and just suspicion, is it really harmful to read about it giving that my intention is to get better? And why can’t people diagnose themselves? Don’t people know themselves better than anyone else?

For context, I’m 22, and INFP. And I do suspect I have (BPD) borderline personality disorder. I will try explain my reason/ intention for asking the question above next, and I’m also happy to receive any feedback or reflection questions on my ideas especially if they are type (infp) related since I always benefit from them.

I generally really hate relying on others for help, the more the issue becomes personal the more this becomes difficult. For example I do hate that I have to live on houses and drive cars made by someone else and that I have to put my trust in them, but I don’t find it as threatening as getting medical help for example. Besides the dentist, I’ve never seen a doctor ever since I became a legal adult, I put huge effort into caring for my health mainly for not needing to see a doctor as I could never trust someone to understand me. I train on my own I dye and cut my own hair by myself and I try to teach myself everything because I can’t trust anyone to understand me. Not because I’m uniquely unique but because I believe everyone is unique and it’s absurd to me how people trust others. I hate how knowledge is based on generalizations and I feel like the only way I can escape this is if I do my things by myself.

Despite this, I did seek mental health professionally. I am aware that sadly I have a non stable mental health and unlike physical health it’s more difficult for me to avoid it because most of the problems started really early in life. Since Ive been 18 I’ve tried with three specialist, a clinical psychiatrist, a therapist, and a psychologist. While they did some help, I was more stressed with them than without them, and our relationship itself was more bad than good, and very unstable. Not because they are bad but because of me, I just can’t explain myself properly, I choke when I do it. I hate when they tell me advice, I just can’t take it because of some voice inside me telling me “no one tell us what to do”. I also am sensitive and I get upset with things they do and with time I just hate them and can’t see them anymore. I also feel ‘reduced to a number/ case’ I feel like I’m not a human anymore. And the main issue is that work is temporary and I get to point zero once we stop sessions.

I knew about BPD less than a week ago and as much as I hate to accept that I have a disorder and label myself, I’ve never felt more seen in my life. If only I knew this information in the past few years I would’ve not fucked all my relationships the way I did. It hurts me that none of the specialist I saw mentioned it or at least properly talked with me about issues within its umbrella even as a general issue and not as a part of the disorders. Most of the talk I did with them was about relationships, I never in my life had a good relationship or even a deep friendship, not only they don’t exist, when they do for a short time they are insane. My specialists tell me things like I’m very ‘black&white thinker’, I’m avoidant and I need to train being close with people and that my resulting binge eating is a separate eating disorder, with not elaboration, which when I argued with them against it didn’t work. I don’t really know what to do with these advice that are random and non structured. I told one of them about one of my relationship that with my knowledge now is almost a fictional story that describes BPD, and she told me “oh you’re just an avoidant attached and not used to being intimate” and moved on. What hurts me is that this is not a one time thing it’s my only relationship pattern and she know it. It takes a lot to share these things and they don’t stop on them enough and I just can insist on something that already is difficult.

I’ve been reading about BPD and in just few days and with my awareness that I can’t diagnose myself, i feel better than I ever did. Everything makes so much sense I feel so understood that I almost think I can actually change now. I don’t think any specialist would diagnose me, because the previous ones didn’t, and because a lot of the symptoms are things I’m ashamed to share anyway. Also I’m afraid I will loose this validation I just had. It also cannot be treated medically so what’s the point of getting the professional diagnosis anyway.

So say I do want a diagnosis from a psychiatrist, from experience doctors can act superior, even my medical students friend would snap if I told her I searched something medical online and tell me that doctors hate nothing more than patients who look things online. The way she talks about patients in their practice is sometimes terrifying, they are just cases. Numbers. Not people. Individuals. and I don’t blame her or them it’s the system really of how you need the top grade to get to med school and therefore you are the smartest then overwork them till the point where it’s challenging to see humans as such. One of my friend’s psychiatrist told her if she will keep questioning his depression pills prescription she should not come to him anymore. I don’t want to generalize and there are just some cases but it’s common. And psychiatrists can be insensitive and impatient.

So how is this less harmful than me reading about a condition and trying to help myself with the love and patience that I don’t believe any professional can give me. I know that this is particularly part of my problem because I also don’t believe any human in this earth can give me love and patience, not because they don’t want to or can’t, but because of the unstable way I act.

I don’t want to sound bitter or te-grip-ish but I hate the system and the world and I wish to be on my own and be fulfilled by my love and care to myself only but sadly it’s not enough. I need love and assistance and friends and relationships and I want them too but I’m unable to neither get rid of this desire nor fulfill it. I love feelings and I live for the things and people I love but in relationships these feelings get dark and uncontrolled, almost controlling me and not being controlled by me which leaves me shocked as how the what I value the most is the cause of my suffering.

I’m sorry if this message is badly structured I wasn’t sure what to include and what to not. Many thanks. I also hope your health got better!

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I'm sorry to hear that you've had such a tough time getting the help you need. If you want to maximize the benefits you can get from professional help, there are some flaws in your thinking that need to be addressed.

(1) Self-Awareness: You may believe people know themselves best, but that is often NOT the case. People have no idea why they do half the things they do, and they often just invent a rationalization afterwards. The fact of the matter is human beings have great difficulty seeing themselves objectively, for a variety of reasons. I often mention that lack of objectivity is a major problem for all FPs when Fi and Te are too out of balance.

The degree to which you know yourself objectively and deeply can be captured by the complicated concept of self-awareness. An individual's level of self-awareness is largely dependent on their ego development (as explained in the Type Dev Guide). Ego development is essentially an empirical measure of self-awareness. Statistically, studies show that most adults hover around level three ego development or lower, therefore, the majority of people aren't very self-aware.

Your thought patterns are indicative of low/shallow self-awareness. People with low self-awareness are mainly preoccupied with ego defense, which makes them egocentric, basically unable to understand the world beyond their own experience. With the inner world being so small, the mind easily becomes an echo chamber. It is very difficult for information from the objective world to penetrate ego defenses and, as a result, the subjective world becomes increasingly filled with distorted, faulty, dark, or extreme beliefs that never get corrected. If left unchecked, one's perception becomes quite inaccurate, e.g.: seeing threats where there are none; misinterpreting people's intentions; misattributing cause and effect; not being able to tell the difference between belief and reality; etc. The more a person psychologically isolates from the world, as looping introverts are prone to doing, the worse the problem gets.

People with low self-awareness are primarily motivated by primitive negative emotions such as fear, shame, or anger. This means their way of thinking is emotionally immature, easily triggered and always reacting (reflexively) rather than responding (reasonably). Getting a better handle on one's feelings and emotions, i.e., improving one's emotional intelligence, is very important for increasing self-awareness. One must cultivate an open, objective, and nuanced approach to things, in order to make better judgments and decisions. For INFP, these qualities can be nurtured through Ne development.

Low self-awareness can produce negative effects in many areas of life. In relation to type development, low self-awareness makes it harder to learn how to use functions optimally. Low self-awareness often manifests through unhealthy function expression, e.g., Fi extremes + Si loop for INFP (you exhibit signs of both). Si loop leads to the self-concept becoming too narrow and rigid, i.e., your view of yourself is imbalanced and stubbornly fixed. The remedy to Si loop is to develop Ne and open yourself up to new ways of thinking, so that you can continually broaden and grow your perspective.

Unfortunately, people in tertiary loop are often unconsciously motivated to stay there, for a variety of possible reasons. In the case of chronic Fi-Si loop, pretty much everything "challenging" in the world is perceived as a threat against the self or an unreasonable restriction against self-expression. Thus, the mind closes up and blocks itself off from anything that might even slightly disturb one's stubbornly fixed identity, which eventually cuts off potential for growth -> stagnation. The more "hardened" identity becomes, the more brittle and easily it breaks under pressure, hence, the compulsion to protect it.

In terms of social development, when your mind is walled-off, your perception of the world is inaccurate, and you don't understand how to cope with things that make you afraid, ashamed, or angry, it is very difficult to maintain healthy relationships, isn't it?

(2) The Mental Healthcare System: You're running on the assumption that self-diagnosis is easy because you know yourself best, but I've called that into question above. However, even if you do know yourself best, you don't only need information about yourself to arrive at an accurate diagnosis, do you? You also need to have extensive knowledge of all known possible psychological disorders, including:

their cognitive-behavioral manifestations and symptoms

their etiology or underlying root causes

the history and application of diagnostic criteria

how to adjust for limitations/shortcomings of diagnostic criteria

the probability and potentiality of overlap patterns or comorbidity between certain disorders (which complicate diagnosis)

the ability to spot misdiagnosis effects/patterns

There is a reason why psychiatrists and psychologists have to spend over a decade of their life in school and training. It's a real slog because you need to hone a wide variety of skills. Even still, there is no way for one individual to learn everything there is to know about human psychology. People are forced to narrow their focus and specialize. If you suffered from migraines, would you go see a podiatrist and expect them to treat you properly? It would be similarly foolish to see a grief counselor for schizophrenia. Yet this sort of error happens all the time when people seek mental health help. Most people don't know the difference between psychiatrists and psychologists or who to see for what, let alone all the different kinds of therapies that are available out there.

In many ways, psychological problems are more difficult to handle than physical ones because: 1) they are almost always multifactorial; 2) symptoms can be mysterious or confusing to categorize; and most importantly, 3) the sources of psychological problems often lie deep within the mind, so deep that the person isn't even conscious of them. Unfortunately, due to the complicated, subjective, and hidden nature of psychological processes, getting to the bottom of a mental health problem often involves a lot of trial-and-error.

Add to this the fact that psychology is a relatively new domain in the history of human knowledge, so it hasn't had as much opportunity to develop as medicine. Add to this the fact that mental health services are underfunded everywhere, so there is a chronic shortage of researchers and specialists. Most areas of the world don't even have a mental healthcare system, so if you live in a country where a system exists, with its shortcomings, you're still one of the lucky ones. Even the best mental healthcare systems in the world are mostly a patchwork of services that can be difficult to navigate.

Nobody is saying that self-diagnosis never arrives at the right answer. Experts warn against it because misdiagnosis can lead you down the wrong path developmentally and lead you to seek out "solutions" that might ultimately turn out to be harmful or even traumatizing. Self-diagnosis can be especially dangerous for people with low self-awareness and poor critical thinking skills because, in the social media age, "doing your own research" easily leads people straight into an abyss of misinformation, where frauds and scammers prey upon fears/insecurities for profit. There is a reason why the self-help industry is worth billions of dollars yet doesn't produce great results for the populace.

It's always sad for me to see people fall through the cracks. It's understandable to be cynical about a system that has failed you one too many times. However, I think your expectations of the system are a bit out of touch with the realities of the system because you're focused mainly on personal anecdotes and not really taking the bigger picture into consideration. You've been through a winding and bumpy ride through the system for sure, but it sounds to me like you are actually getting closer to finding the help that is best suited for you. I would encourage you to not give up on the system just yet.

(3) Borderline Personality Disorder: I'm not in a position to diagnose mental disorders. The most I can say is that, with only a cursory glance, your thinking patterns and the problems you've encountered in life do seem to be consistent with BPD. While it is true that BPD is difficult to treat, it's not because there are no treatments available.

Unfortunately, the nature of BPD makes it very difficult to form healthy relationships. The therapist-client relationship is one of the most important factors that influences the outcome of treatment, so if you're unable to work well with the therapist, you won't get far. That being said, therapists are human, so the therapist-client relationship is like any other relationship in that it's not always easy to find a good match. Think about how many duds you have to swipe past in order to get to a good candidate on a dating app. Not everyone graduates as a top student, so every profession has its fair share of stars and duds, and it looks like you've encountered some duds, which is really bad luck.

You are absolutely right to leave any therapist who invalidates you or doesn't take you seriously. However, after hearing about the interactions you've had, I want to tell you that psychological change and growth are inevitably challenging, even painful at times (note the phrase "growing pains"). Think of it this way: In order to birth a better version of yourself, you have to let the outdated aspects of yourself die. To go through that "death" can be painful, especially when you've been holding on to your past self too tightly for too long. You have to gradually work up the strength to meet challenges if you truly want improvement. Setbacks, mistakes, and failures are also part and parcel of the growth process, so you have to learn to accept them more gracefully, rather than allow them to trigger a descent into unhealthy and extreme thinking patterns.

The best way to clear up unhealthy thinking patterns is to expose them to the sunlight, through relationships with others, and receive corrective feedback. Thus, it's important that you be more persistent in opening up and asserting your thoughts, feelings, needs, and wants in therapy. Express your opinions as they arise rather than stewing alone after the fact, especially when the opinions are about the therapist or therapy itself. This is an important step in being able to "work out the kinks" in any relationship.

A relationship, even a therapist-client relationship, cannot improve and meet your needs better until you learn how to be open and honest and handle conflict constructively. The therapist's office is a safer place to practice your relationship skills because you don't have to suffer as many real-world consequences, so take full advantage of the opportunity to trip and fall and learn how to pick yourself back up. If the therapist can't handle you "talking back" at them because they take it personally, then it's a clear sign they're unqualified for the job and it's better to know sooner rather than later, so that you can save time and find someone better.

If you strongly believe BPD is a possibility, that's fine, read some well-researched information about it. The danger of self-diagnosis comes in what you do next. Do you run off and try to heal yourself with questionable methods? Or do you use this new insight to target your search better, toward the right sort of professional? I hope you do the latter. You'll want to find someone who has lots of expertise/experience with personality disorders. If they themselves don't specialize in BPD specifically, they can probably refer you to someone who does.

As far as I know (and my knowledge might be dated), dialectical-behavior therapy is an effective treatment, so you can also look for therapists who specialize in DBT. The basic aim of DBT is to help people get a better handle on their emotional life and learn to draw healthier emotional boundaries - essential skills that are needed for healthier relationships. Even if you don't officially qualify as BPD, DBT is still likely to help you learn how to navigate relationships better.