#the system is just broken

[myreia]

I am not looking forward to calling the airline, but alas... I must call the airline. Sometime.

[royalarchivist]

Bad: I don’t think people understand the effect QSMP had on some of the streamers in terms of like… The real raw mental impact, so I’m gonna set the stage for you. [...] Imagine that you were given a friend to play Minecraft with — like your best friend — BUT if this person dies, if they die in the game, you never get to talk to them again. Can you imagine what that’s like?

Bad: If you did not live through the QSMP, if you did not live through that, it almost sounds like, crazy. But I don’t think people realize how much of a joyous experience the Eggs were. They were SO awesome! They were literally so awesome to just hang out with and spend time with.

Bad: I’m not saying I regret it. To this day, I loved the experience. I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. Even knowing how everything went, I would still do it all over again. [...] I would still do it all over again, because — even knowing like, all the trauma and suffering and stuff like that — because it was just… It was just that fun, it was just that fun.

Earlier today during his stream, Bad shared his experience and thoughts about the Eggs and the significant emotional (and traumatic) impact they had on him and his fellow QSMP members.

This clip a very edited-down version since his commentary was ~13 minutes long, so I highly recommend checking out Bad's VOD if you have the time. (Timestamp: 47:36 - 1:00:14)

[ Full Transcript ↓ ]

———

Bad: To be fair Chat, I really think the QSMP... I don't think anyone really can relate to it, Chat. It's something that's so... I've told people this before, like– but it's hard to understand. Right? Like...

Where was I? Sorry Chat, I'm losing my train of thought. Look, let me explain Chat– here's the dealio, ok? Here's the dealio, and this is what I mean when I say like, it's important to keep this in mind, Chat. Ok? It's important to keep this in mind:

I don’t think people understand the effect that the QSMP had on like, some of the streamers, in terms of like… The real raw mental impact, so I’m gonna set the stage for you. This is the analogy I’ve given to every person who I’ve like, shared this with. Imagine you meet somebody– [He hears a strange noise] What the fudge was that? Did you hear that?

Anyway– Chip! The story I was just relaying to Chat, Chip, was this: I was sharing this story with them, I said–  I was giving them an analogy. 

Imagine Chat, for example, imagine that you were… playing Minecraft, with like– you were given a friend to play Minecraft with, Chat, like your best friend, and [unintelligible] were like, “Hey, you get to play Minecraft with this person, right? BUT if this person dies – they’re currently your best friend, Chip – but if they die in the game, you never get to talk to them again. Ever again.” Can you imagine what that’s like, Chip?

I don’t think a lot of people understand like, what that does, right? I’m not gonna say that like, it creates this situation, Chip, that like, messes with your head, but it– Chip – but it totally, totally does, Chip. It messes with your head! It literally puts you in a position where you’re second-guessing and thinking about everything, Chip! You’re thinking about EVERYTHING Chip! Ok? And that’s the problem, Chip– is you turn into a paranoid monster because of it, Chip! Like, you don’t understand Chip– I was- I was so afraid of every dirt block, I used to carry a shovel with me Chip, and I would specifically right-click dirt blocks that looked suspicious because mines, Chip– mines could not be shoveled! Like, I was crazy, Chip! But here’s the problem, Chip: that craziness is still there. I’m genuinely like–

I remember thinking Chip, that I would one day– I was like, “I’m going to move past–” here, let’s go up here, Chip. I remember thinking one day Chip, I was like, “I’m gonna move past the underground base, one of these days. You know, one of these days, I feel like I’ll be able to grow and achieve the desire to build a base that doesn’t have to be underground.” But I don’t think it’s possible now Chip, because I think… I just don’t know. I feel like the paranoia– there’s still like, residual leftover trauma from that situation, Chip.

But here’s the problem Chip: I don’t think I don’t think– I don’t think people understand it. Like, I just really don’t. But I also don’t blame them Chip, ‘cuz I don’t think it’s possible to fully understand it if you haven’t lived through it. Like, if you did not live through the QSMP… I’m talking about the QSMP, I don’t- I don’t know if that was obvious– if you did not live through that, it almost sounds like, crazy. But I don’t think people realize how much of a joyous experience like, the Eggs were. Right? I don’t think people realize it. Like, they were SO awesome! They were literally so awesome to just hang out with and spend time with, Chip. So, it’s just one of those things that–

[He’s interrupted by a loud rumble of thunder above them]

Did lightning just strike here? Is it thunderstorming out…? But anyway, Chip. That’s the food for thought.

But that’s the problem– Like, every time it rains in Minecraft, I have to like, look at the sky, and I get this weird, like, second--hand vibe because of the trauma. The trauma, Chip! The trauma is real! But that’s the point– I’m not saying I regret it. I, to this day Chip, I loved the experience. I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. Even knowing how everything went, I would still do it all over again. 

[He falls down] Dangit, don’t come over here Chip, ‘cuz I’m coming back up! Ok.

I would still do it all over again, because — even knowing like, all the trauma and suffering  and stuff like that — because it was just… It was just that fun, Chip, it was just that fun. I really wi– I don’t think it’s ever gonna be possible, Chip, to give people that same energy, like that same experience. You know what I mean, Chip? I don’t think it’s ever gonna be possible again. Like, EVER.

Because… because like, one: I will say on one level Chip, I will say on one level, like– it’s sort of emotionally like… It’s emotionally devastating, and I think to actually go through that– and this is where like, if I ever do end up going to a– see a therapist, if I ever do end up going to see a therapist at any point, I’ll talk it over with them and be like, “Hey, what do you think about this?” Because I genuinely think on one level, like– it’s created this fear of forming attachments because of like, how things can go. You know what I mean? Like, the fear of getting attached to something and then potentially losing it. Like, it’s- it’s a genuine thing. I think people forget about that.

Like, at the end of the day, everything was RP, right? On the server. You know what I mean? Like, everything was RP, Chip. BUT at the same point, even though it was RP Chip, it was still like– there the reality of you were still playing like, with another person, and you were still getting that experience, and it felt like you were genuinely attached to someone and you didn’t want anything bad to happen to them. It was GENUINELY stressful, Chip.

But at the same point, I don’t regret it, and I don’t think it was a bad experience. I’m– 

Sometimes in life Chip, you go through stuff, and maybe you have a certain amount of like, things that like, can happen, that you’re like, “You know what, maybe this wasn’t a good thing that this happened,” but at the same point, you still aren’t necessarily upset about it, because… it’s like growing as a person, right? Here’s the thing Chip; even bad situations, Chip, can lead to an overall good outcome. Like–

Even if you’re going through something bad Chip, just because a bad thing happens doesn’t mean that only bad things have to come from that. That’s one of the things I tell people all the time, Chip, is that if you go through a bad situation, you can learn from it, and you can use your experience to help others. And you can be that– you can be, at the worst-case scenario, you can be someone for other people who are going through that same experience to lean on when they go through that.I think there’s a certain amount of comfort that comes from that; from knowing no matter how bad your situation is, you’re not the only person who’s experienced it. You know what I mean?

[sunderwight]

had a thought of what if Airplane had leaned a little more into the self-insert idea for Luo Binghe when he was still at the early stages of writing, with an end result that Luo Binghe actually Looks Like That because he basically looks like Airplane but with long flowing hair and a more idealized figure

SQQ going "why the fuck did you make his face so pretty???" and Airplane bullshitting about plausibility while trying really hard not to blush. twisting his fingers and scuffing his toe like jeez bro he's not that good-looking...

which of course sets SQQ off because how DARE!?! not 'that' good-looking?!?! just look at him! he's xianxia Helen of Troy with a face that launched a thousand harems! like okay sure with looks like that it does make sense that half the female population was willing to timeshare a marriage with him, but it's also totally unfair to SQQ, who has no recourse against those looks either! and who could? that is the most beautiful face ever!

Airplane's getting flustered. tries valiantly to make the case that objectively speaking Luo Binghe isn't that good-looking, it's just that SQQ is biased, but boy does that not go over well. SQQ has hitched the tattered remnants of his self-perception as a straight man onto the idea that Luo Binghe is just so devastatingly attractive anyone would want to hop into bed with him, and he is not letting go of it, so Airplane is just gonna get wrecked with inadvertent compliments

bonus if the Shang Qinghua look is actually the result of several illusions because when Airplane first transmigrated in, he got the same face too, and foresaw potential problems if the half-demon protagonist turned up looking like him. so he used illusions. he doesn't actually look all that different, in fact! the illusions just make it so that when people see him, they get a strong impression that he's unremarkable, so they don't really register what his face actually looks like and their brains fill in the assumption that he must just be kinda plain

oooh ooh double bonus if the system inserted a behind-the-scenes explanation for it too, which is that Shang Qinghua is actually unwittingly related to Su Xiyan!

and the whole thing comes to light post-epilogue when Shang Qinghua's illusions get stripped away by some monster-of-the-week, while everyone except Mobei Jun has a freak out about why do you look just like Luo Binghe?! (Mobei Jun isn't freaking out because he already figured out how to see past the illusions and just assumed everyone else wasn't mentioning it for some human cultural reason or something) and then Yue Qingyuan calmly explains that Luo Binghe's mom is Shang Qinghua's matrilineal cousin. Shang Qinghua's mother and Luo Binghe's human grandmother were half-sisters.

what? how does Yue Qingyuan know? you think that Cang Qiong doesn't check up on the candidates for the peak lord positions before handing off power, doesn't make sure there are no conflicts of interest or divided loyalties to other sects? what sorts of things do people imagine Qiong Ding's diplomats do? (I don't know either but, for the purpose of this scenario at least some of it is tracking down this stuff -- YQY handled most of it personally for his generation's ascension because he didn't want anyone else digging into his and Xiao Jiu's pasts) anyways, the connection could have been troublesome for its ties to Huan Hua Palace, but by the time it came to light Su Xiyan was deceased and there was no evidence that Shang Qinghua had ever even met her. so it wasn't deemed significant enough to matter, was just made note of and then mostly forgotten

so Shang Qinghua is like "oh THAT is why you kept bringing her up to me back then?!" because at the time he'd just been fully in "haha how would I know anything about the impending plot and the tragedies I am both partly responsible for and powerless to prevent haha that's so funny shixiong I KNOW NOTHING" mode, which luckily at the time was easily read as him just not wanting a dead cousin he never met to tank his chances of securing a promotion

SQQ is floored. he is having issues about this. Shang Qinghua is related to Binghe? Shang Qinghua looks exactly like him?! wait. Binghe has human family? still alive? like grandparents and stuff out there, who might want to meet him...?

Luo Binghe decides to step in at that point because he does not want to meet any more relatives! no more surprise relatives! no!

luckily this distracts Shen Qingqiu from thinking about all of the things he's said to Airplane about Binghe's looks for long enough for Shang Qinghua to flee the scene

[pseudowho]

It's the first day below freezing for our part of the UK, and so I welcome you to the delights of

Asking the husbando to warm the car up for me in the morning

Complaining to the husbando that I'm cold every 20 seconds

Putting my cold thighs on the husbando and making him shriek

Layers and layers and layers and layers and--

Complaining that I'm cold again

One cup of tea in a mug and two more ready to go in travel mugs

WOOHOO, BIG COATS!

@mrhaitch talking about not needing a 'big coat' yet

These stupid fucking gloves, that are super warm but were clearly made by someone who hasn't referenced actual adult hands

Love,

-- It's freezing 🥶 xxx

[sienna-the-doe]

HOLY FUCKLE A DOE REF FINALLY. Huge huge huge thanks to fenergizer.bsky.social for this amazing amazing gift??? gods I'm like in love with this. they did so fucking amazing drawing me.

[appri-dot]

I like to draw nutcracker yaoi for character reasons trust fencer(hurt fella) belongs to @ballcrusher74

[mmmelahii]

I adore how nuanced penumbra is in its discussions of morality and post apocalyptic capitalism and suffering and the human condition in a sea of infinite lives with their own need... And then you pan the camera slightly to the left and enter stage the tentative antagonist of the show "Dark Matters"

[pluralhottakes]

I don't see the issue in believing that your alters are multiple people or not, but saying that it's "anti recovery" to believe that they are is genuinely one of the most idiotic things i've heard. i don't see why it's a problem? i know so many systems who consider themselves multiple people, who are doing perfectly fine in healing, without needing to see themselves as just "multiple parts of one person". Alters can be so completely complex, they can be so different that you'd genuinely see them as completely different people, because they are different people to that system. This is coming from a plural who sees their parts more as just different parts of themself, by the way. Believing your alters are just multiple parts of one identity is completely fine, but claiming that it's "anti recovery" for others to believe that they're multiple people is one of the shittest things you could do. Just let people do what they want, there isn't anything wrong with that? I definitely see that systems can quite literally have what is basically multiple fully formed identities, fully formed people.

.

[wispurring-moss]

anyways—

mods r asleep quick post teeny huskerdust doodle— 👌✨

[cologona]

See in my eyes the greatest tragedy of DITF is that events were leading up to Bruce and Jason finally resolving this simmering issue between them, where Jason thought being Robin was what gave him a place next to Bruce, and Bruce was treating his, Dick, and Jason’s trauma as identical.

The thing that busts my balls about Robin Lives is that it has the broad strokes of what the hypothetical timeline where Jason lives should have.

Bruce realizes his mistake in uncritically projecting his own trauma and coping mechanisms onto his sons, growing from hyperactively empathetic into genuinely compassionate. Jason gets security (emotional security, which given that superhero comics are a story of symbols means it’s the most important kind) from the reassurance that he is loved regardless of his title as Robin and gets to really choose if he wants to be a vigilante or civilian. He gets to grow up.

That Jason doesn’t survive in the main timeline is a tragedy because instead of that emotional resolution and eventual growth we just get a teenager’s corpse and a father regressing into the worst possible version of himself.

But Robin Lives isn’t interested in any of that. It knows but it doesn’t care, because a lot of that great juicy stuff is just relegated to stray panels and background exposition.

Despite the narration being from the POV of Jason’s own therapist there’s very little description of what Jason’s actually going through at all. He gets like a few panels on one page max to voice his thoughts and the rest is what? A bunch of vague drivel about how he’s so broken and traumatized. More frequently the therapist narrator is talking about how beautifully and nobly Bruce suffers. Gimme a break!

As far as Robin Lives is concerned the most interesting thing Jason can do is be a wretch. As far as it’s concerned Jason is nothing, he’s a prop, he’s a moral landmass over which the forces of the two real main characters of this story fight.

I can’t express how much contempt I have for this story, with that ending which is clearly trying to make a Deep Statement about ~the cycle of violence~. Except if it was really invested in the point it was trying to make it’d take more interest in Jason himself as the principal subject. It would give a shit about how valuable the opportunity to heal is.

It would not have Jason get help and grow into his own as an adult, only to inexplicably become evil because what- he killed Joker so that means the moral disease transferred to him? See how stupid it sounds when I say it out loud. According to Robin Lives there’s just no hope once you’ve been Broken. You are doomed to become your abuser.

And that shallow symmetry this story forces the characters into, with Dick and Jason becoming the new Batman and Joker rubs salt into the wound. A dichotomy between those who are Good (like Bruce and Dick who respond to trauma by becoming even more pure) and those who are Weak (like Jason and -apparently- Joker, who go into hysterics and subsequently catch the disease of Evil). How OOC the characters felt should’ve been a warning to the writer that something was off, but alas!!!!

I’ll stop here now because I’m getting too heated to be coherent, but yeah I Dislike This Comic.

[silentsockfeet]

with the obvious addendum that act 3 isn’t out yet and we can’t form true opinions until the show’s officially done, i’m still really feeling like it could have maybe benefited from a third season. they’re hitting all the right plot points and those moments are full of really intense emotion, but everything in the middle feels so underwhelming in comparison and so much of it still feels rushed to me. idk

[nikkalick]

I have chronic back pain, have for a while. It’s not so bad now that I had surgery, but I lived with it for years. I tried to go to a doctor for it, but they just said to lose weight, so I learned to live with the pain until one morning I couldn’t get up from bed. Couldn’t move without feeling like electricity was running up and down my back, burning my spine and leg from the inside.

This had me back in front of a doctor who (thankfully) listened and then for an entire year my insurance jerked me around requiring that I try different methods to manage the pain before finally agreeing to cover surgery.

In that year leading up to surgery something inside me broke. I couldn’t do the most basic tasks. Having to learn how to move my body in just the right way so that I wouldn’t lock up trying to wipe my own ass is one of my least favorite memories. Next to it is a tie between falling at my sister’s wedding because my leg gave out and being in so much pain I couldn’t sleep for days on end. I couldn’t sit, couldn’t drive, couldn’t bend or twist or even lay down without feeling like my nerves were on fire.

Work accommodated but I felt useless. I couldn’t lift inventory anymore. Couldn’t do a key part of my job that I (oddly) enjoyed doing. Commuting the hour to school twice a week was excruciating, but it was my first year of grad school. I had to push through. My professors were kind, they accommodated so that I could be as comfortable as possible in class. But I felt like a distraction, a nuisance, a bother. It was so hard to focus on lectures and homework when 90% of the input my brain was receiving was that of pain.

I grit my teeth and bore it, my mental health hit a new all time low, and I broke down in front my my mother more times than I can count. And I did this for a year because insurance refused to cover surgery unless I proved to them I needed it. I had to jump through their hoops and play by their rules to get the procedure I needed and that my care team knew I needed. I lost feeling in my leg and foot because they made me wait.

I will forever be grateful for the doctors who listened, for the physical therapist who advocated for me, for my mom who surprisingly became my rock during the whole ordeal. But my insurance company? They can go fuck themselves.

My pain before that year was bad, but not excruciating. My pain now? It’s minimal. Sometimes I still lock up and I’ll likely never have all of the sensation return to my left foot, but I’ll take the constant pins and needles over that year of pain any day. That said, had it gone on much longer I genuinely don’t know if I’d be here typing this.

Anyways…I guess what I’m saying is IF he did it, I get it. I really really get it.

[reasonsforhope]

If you're wondering why I set up ko-fi membership stuff after I really resisted monetizing in any way for so long, btw... Honestly, it's because taxes and some big surprise vet bills this month kinda. decimated my savings. by a lot.

Normally I'm okay enough financially, but I'm in a really high cost of living area, and it's just been a really rough month in a lot of different ways.

So, if you're interested in supporting me or my work, whether it's with a membership or a one-time thing or whatever - and only if you can genuinely afford it - that would honestly be amazing and more helpful than I strictly like to admit

As an extra incentive, if this ko-fi thing goes well, I'll commit to actually answering asks and shit again lol

Either way <3 <3 to all of you

[bonefall]

Firestar getting treated to a character assassination after The Darkest Hour is my villain origin story tbh

You can see the EXACT moment where the brain worms go terminal when Tigerstar dies in front of him, and he starts going "oooga booga he was strong and noble and had good traits... well need him to fight all these evil foreigners..." Just ceremorphose already, this is #NotMyFirestar

[idontmindifuforgetme]

my gma told me that my mom used to wake up, eat breakfast, then study for 12 hours straight. every fuckin day. and my gpa would bring her food and tell her to take breaks bc of how immersed she was. she’s literally my role model forever

[rotisseries]

my favorite thing about mha has got to be how you can't tell if the writers are aware or not that the setting is in fact a corrupt police state