#thinking about all the people who have harmed me and how i Still feel so much love for all of them
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Alrighty y'all, grab a chair and get comfy whilst I yap about my son, my pride and joy, the greatest thing to ever happen to me, my D&D OC: Raymond Foxwood. He is a Wood Elf Druid with the Researcher background and a Neutral-Good alignment (Images at the very end).
I haven't figured out what his voice sounds like yet. I'm thinking he may kind of have an accent? But like it's barely there. I do have an idea for a possible Japanese voice claim: Souta from the movie Suzume.
His best friend? I guess it would be my friend's D&D character. Her name is Topaz and she is a Dragonborne. Not besties, but pretty close.
Ooooooo boy, I got a whole playlist my friend and I have been cooking up for this sad little fella. Here's a couple of them that I think describes him best:
-"The Moss" by Cosmo Sheldrake
-"Rom-Com Gone Wrong" by Matt Maltese
-"When She Loved Me" by Sarah McLachlan
-"Home" by Cavetown
-"Valentine" by Laufey
-"Love Like You" by Rebecca Sugar
He's like, dealing with a heavy breakup until "Valentine" when he meets his current partner :)
4. "I do Adore" by Mindy Gledhill
5. Nope! But I actually thought about it when I was first creating his character just to see how he would act with other dynamics.
6. A scientist. More specifically, an ecologist. He loves nature and learning about all there is to know about life and the world. He also likes finding ways to help others, so maybe even a pharmacologist?
8. Writing, researching, reading, gardening, and making little insect and animal models because he is a NERD™ /lh<3
9. He generally takes good care of his physical health. Although, his flaw is "Most people scream when they see a demon. I stop and take notes on its anatomy," soooo. "For science" he says. "It's for the greater good" he says.
10. Well he's trying his best. But sometimes anxiety just surprises you and all of the sudden you're spiraling and things seem much worse than they are and pfffft whaddya meeeeaaaan I'm sorta self projecting? But he is the kind of person who feels bad about asking for help and then sort of holds it all in.
11. Inspirations were taken Link from The Legend of Zelda series (mainly BOTW) and Howl from Howl's Moving Castle for his design. Everything else was based purely on my own self indulgences for a nerdy elf character (and the songs my friend keeps sending my for him).
12. Same response as question 2 :)
13. No not really, but he is fighting against an organization that keeps threatening and trying to burn down the library he works/lives in with the librarian: Amanita (Ama, Anita, or Nita for short). Amanita is the person who raised and took care of Raymond after his family died in a fire. A fire caused by the same organization who's trying to harm them now. This is his main reason for joining a campaign; to get stronger and protect his loved ones.
14. This one flippin poison dragon we fought. Or maybe that's just me because I really didn't want to let them leave alive. I don't think Raymond necessarily hates anyone.
15. That all honestly depends on how the rest this campaign will play out. My friend has told me that they all did die a couple times, and we almost died to the STINKIN DRAGON but that's not important right now. But L O R E wise, he'd probably still do his researcher stuff until he's really old. Then he'll write books and share his stories :)
16. If they were alive, then I could see him having a great relationship with his parents since they were also big nerds like him. His relationship with Amanita is also great, and he really wants to protect her since she has done so much for him.
17. YESSSSSS! He loves sharing his knowledge with others and would do such a great job teaching kids. Ohhhh this is such a good one, yes he would feel bad if he had to leave them.
18. He/Him :>
19. Biromantic Asexual. His love language in giving is Acts of Service, and Quality Time for both giving and receiving.
20. A longbow and rocks. He has a cantrip spell called "Magic Stone" which lets me make a ranged attack by throwing small pebbles or stones. I like to call this spell the "RAYMOND, STONE 'EM" spell because its funnnnyyyy.
21. hmmmmmmmmmm Actually, I'm not sure! I guess maybe "Nothing You Can Take From Me" from The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes.
22. Will generally go for the non-violent option (more of a lover), but if initiatives are rolling, he'll fight.
23. Extremely. He'll show up with a new tire to fix the flat one, and an extra one for any future situations.
24. Undecided
25. Not singing out loud, but he would definitely hum to himself! :)
26. Irises, forget-me-nots, and bluebells
27. Symbolism wise, a deer. 'Just because' wise, a rabbit, a fox, and a kitty cat :3
28. The Nerds™ (found at the end of this post:) ).
29. Cozy stuff, lo-fi, books, plants, leather notebooks, and an overall sort of cottage core mixed with academia aesthetic. (Mood Board made in Canva :>)
30. Accepts this as their new life(yippee!). They have now been adopted. Will try to find a way to bring up their interests in conversations.
Fuck it, OC brain rot won. Get ready for the Secret Ask List
1) Does your OC have a voice claim, if so who?
2) Who's your OCs best friend? How did they become best friends?
3) What song describes your OC?
4) What song describes your OC and their partner/love interest?
5) Do you ship your OC with a Canon character? If so who?
6) If your OC is in a fantasy setting, what profession would they be in the modern day?
7) Vice-Versa! If your OC is in the modern day, what fantasy class would they be? Would they be a different race?
8) What hobbies does your OC have? What do they do to unwind?
9) How does your OC handle their physical health? Do they take care of themselves?
10) How does your OC handle their mental health? Do they take care of themselves?
11) What was your inspiration for your OC?
12) Does your OC interact with other people's OC? If so, who's their best OC friend?
13) Does your OC have a rival? How did it start?
14) Who's a character your OC cannot stand! It's on sight when they see them!
15) Will your OC ever retire? Do you see them making it?
16) How's their relationship with their parents? Are they alive?
17) If your OC has kids, are they a good parent? Do they ever feel guilty if they have to leave them?
18) What are their pronouns? What would they like to be called?
19) What's their sexuality? What's their love language both giving and receiving?
20) If they fight, what's their weapon of choice?
21) What song best describes their relationship with their enemy?
22) Fight or Flight? Are they a lover or a fighter?
23) Is your OC reliable? Can I call them up at two in the morning if I have a flat tire?
24) Can they play any instruments? If so, what do they play?
25) Are they the kind of person who can't resist a good song? Can I catch your OC singing to themselves while they do the dishes?
26) What flower do you associate your OC with?
27) What's their spirit tamagotchi? Or an animal you associate them with?
28) What clique would they be in? (Draw them in the clothes of said group!)
29) Imagine a mood board for your OC! What's on it? (Make it if you want!)
30) My OC and your OC are friends. This isn't a question. I'm not asking. (How do they respond?)
#MY SON#MY BOY#OH HOW I LOVE HIM#HE MEANS EVERYTHING TO ME#YOU HAVE NO IDEA#*vigorously shaking op* THANK YOU FOR THIS#I don't have a favorite child#but if I did#it might be Raymond#yapping#talk tag#my ocs#original character#reblog#starshinedreamerpost
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2 new things I learned about Mormonism.
Thing the first…
Joseph Smith once held a sorta Mormon Comic-Con where he invited all of his followers and claimed he was going to perform miracles and talk to God and other nonsense. He set up a faith healing demonstration with an audience plant and they pretended to be suddenly stricken deaf and dumb.
Joseph was all, "By the power of Jesus, alakazam, you can now hear and speak again!"
Everyone clapped.
Joseph did not seem to have the foresight to realize other people might want to have their chronic maladies cured. So he was ready to wrap up his little magic show and move on.
But an old dude in the audience was all, "I've got this fucked up hand. Would you mind unfucking it for me?"
In his head, I'm sure Joseph thought, "Well, shit."
But he decided to give it a go. I mean, when I was young I would try to use force powers "just in case." Like, how do you know you don't have force powers if you never try to use them?
So he did his routine again on the fucked up hand and the old man stretched out his fingers for a second and Joseph probably thought "Oh shit, did that really work?" and then they curled back into their fucked up state. He tried his best to make an excuse and hoped that was the end of the faith healing portion of the show.
But then…
A man walks in carrying his little boy.
Who is super dead.
He's like, "Yeah, I was going to take him to a doctor, but everyone said you were coming and I should just wait. Would you mind un-deading my little boy real quick?"
In his head… "Fuck fuck fuckity fuck fuck..."
Out loud… "Jesus Christ and the almighty Father, restore life to this very dead child!"
And the boy opened his eyes and smiled and everyone clapped…
Would have been a great ending to this story.
But he was still quite dead.
Thing the second…
I knew that when Mormons turned 18 they went on a little mission. I always thought they picked a poverty stricken country somewhere and went to help the poor and build houses and give people food and medicine using the church's immense wealth and resources. That seems like it would humble a young person and give them a valuable life experience.
I suppose I just assumed that considering that's typically how Catholics do missionary work. They do a bunch of good deeds and when people are happy and grateful for their help, they pull out a Bible and start their sales pitch. I always had mixed feelings about this but I thought "at least they were helping people." (Not always the case. Sometimes missionaries do more harm than good. But that is the idea, at least.)
Mormons skip the helping people and just do the sales pitch.
They honestly believe converting them to Mormonism is more valuable than food, shelter, clothing, money.
Being a member should solve all of those things, right?
Well, that is essentially what these young mission kids are told.
And they don't just go to poor countries, they often go to rich areas in the US. One might go to the Congo and the other... Beverly Hills.
These 18 year olds are thrust into an unfamiliar place with a few weeks of language training and are tasked with getting people baptized. They have to pay for this "honor" and are judged by how many people they convert. They are often housed in sketchy places and in order to keep them from going rogue, they are attached to another 18 year old who must stay within sight and sound at all times.
Mormonism relies heavily on tattling to keep people following the rules. Seriously, I think the glue that holds all of it together is "snitches get riches." BYU even has an official snitching office where you can narc on someone for getting coffee.
The point is, no one is helped and these kids are essentially slaves for 2 years. They work 80 hour weeks with no pay just trying to get baptisms.
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In the law, there is a difference between being innocent and being not guilty. In the law, just because you are not guilty does not mean you are innocent. And I honestly can't think of a better way to describe Silco.
Silco is not an innocent man, but that does not mean he is a guilty man. I'll say that again: Silco is not an innocent man but that doesn't mean he's a guilty man. I believe Silco is a not guilty man and let me briefly explain why.
Silco has done bad things. Silco has done things some deem unforgivable and scornful. Silco has done things that have harmed people and have given many reason to hate him. But I don't think he is a guilty man. Because every action that Silco has ever committed has had a justified, logical, dare I say valid reason attached to it.
The narrative of arcane is interesting because it is a show that aims for "moral grayness" while also being a show that still commits to classic story structure. We're supposed to think of everyone as nuanced, quote "there are no innocents in arcane everyone does good and bad things"...but at the same time silco and ambessa bad vi and Caitlyn good. Blindly good. So good that we don't HAVE to examine their flaws that's not what the writers want and they also don't want us to examine the goods of Silco and ambessa.
Silco from the jump IS the antagonist IS the villain. With his menacing appearance, threatening dialogue, menacing behavior, etc etc. I'm currently fascinated with Silco's cold open flashback for E3 s1 because it is directly showing us that Silco is a Victim but it isn't framed like that and it doesn't feel like that at all when we watch it, even though that's exactly what it is. There's never a moment where we feel like Silco is a victim in the show, or even a moment where we as a whole are particularly meant to feel bad for him. Even in his death, the audience is more worried about Jinx than they are about Silco, who literally has blood dripping out of his mouth as he speaks his last words.
We're never supposed to see the "good" in Silco like how we're meant to see the "good" in Jinx, even though she's committed crimes on the same level as he has arguably. The only moments where our perception of him changes are those moments where he's with Jinx and he acts fatherly towards her.
But now that we have season two I want you to stop and genuinely ask yourself the following. Is Silco really wrong for wanting Vander dead? Is Silco really wrong for doing whatever it takes to achieve independence? Was Silco wrong to be cold and brutal? Silco did things that were wrong, but that doesn't mean he was wrong. In fact, I'm saying I think he wasn't wrong.
I watched this Silco video essay last year that was really enlightening and I want to share a quote that came out of that video essay.
"Terrorism is a poor man's war."
And man, ain't that the truth. Only people who have nothing else to resort to resort to terrorism and crime and all these other terrible things. Oftentimes I see people who genuinely hate silco. I must remind each and every one of you that Silco wouldn't have done the things he did had it not been for the council. Had the council done their jobs, supported the Undercity, ensured it was a livable place, then Silco would have never had any motive to do the things he did. Silco's misdeeds are an extension of the council's crimes. If the council did what they were supposed to do, Silco would have never gotten to power, let alone used it at the expense of others. Silco's actions are the result of Piltover's inaction. Everything could have been easily avoided had they just taken care of their own citizens or gave them independence THE FIRST TIME THEY ASKED FOR IT. Because THIS IS NOT THE FIRST TIME IT HAS BEEN ASKED FOR. THERE WAS A ZAUN LIBERATION MOVEMENT YEARS BEFORE ARCANE. And what was Piltover's response? They broke the movement apart by violence. They killed people left right and center. Silco had every right to react that way he did after everything Piltover has put him through.
And Vander? Vander, the man who betrayed his own brother for the world's shittiest reason and gave no valid apology? Vander, the coward who refused to fight for his people even when he saw the way piltover was impacting them, the man who gave up on independence the moment they received heavy losses? The fate Vander received was nothing short of justice. He deserved what he got, dare I say he deserved worse. Not only did he give up on the movement but he gave up on Silco. He drowned him in a river of toxic waste and cut his face so bad that Silco became unrecognizable. MIND YOU, when Silco reunited with him, he wanted to be his BROTHER again. Silco's plan wasn't to get rid of Vander, it was to join him again, for them to fight for freedom one last time. Vander knew what the consequences would be for denying Silco and he chose to deny him anyway.
Is this a silco defense post? Yeah, but not in the "Silco did nothing wrong" way. Silco did horrible things for solid reasons. Everything he did had purpose and reason behind it. Not only that but his actions yielded results that he wanted, results that no one else was able to achieve. And everyday I want you to remember that without Silco, Sevika would have never gotten that council seat.
#thank you and goodnight#this post was all over the place but i had to do it#mic does analysis#arcane#arcane season 2#arcane s2#arcane season two#silco arcane#arcane silco
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Adding to this because while I like Idia is my fav and I relate to him a LOT, Trey can pretty uncomfortable for me because it's like looking in a mirror.
To be honest, seeing people blame and mock Trey for not knowing how to handle a very difficult situation that most adults do not know how to handle hurts. I am not going to discuss it in depth, but to give my perspective from my past, when you are in a situation where you watch someone you care about be hurt by people who should be taking care of them and you cannot get them out because you are a child? It's HARD. The guilt you feel in that situation is CRUSHING. I was a child and I did not know what to do. So I tried to be helpful. I tried to soothe. I tried to do what I could to make the moments they were away from their situation happy ones. I didn't have it blow up in my face like 10-year-old Trey did, but I was a teenager and more aware of what could set a situation off. Even so, I knew I was disliked and I still preserved because even though I couldn't do much, I would not abandon them. Because really, those are your only options if adults around you can't or won't act: Be stuck watching someone suffer and all you can do is stay and watch and try to help in these inadequate ways that won't fix it OR you leave.
Back to the dream... Ortho points out the dreams WARP what you really want. Trey has a strong sense of compassion and empathy and that's what was holding him back from stopping Riddle and telling him, "Hey, how you are going about this? It's wrong". He was trying to protect both sides. Trey's been collared by Riddle before and he's most popular in the dorm, given he was voted to be the Vice by majority. He could've led a rebellion, except he wanted not only his dorm members safe: he wanted keep Riddle safe too. Look how fast the rest of dorm turned on Riddle when Ace punched him. They had a MOB MENTALITY.
His desire to keep everyone safe and happy twisted into not stopping the dream Heartslabyul students from basically harming themselves by overeating. Trey's motivation is simple, he wants people safe and happy, but Malleus's dream magic goes for the surface level and short-term fulfilment of the dream. Trey likes to bake and it makes people happy, so in his dream, he bakes a lot and he doesn't tell anyone to stop or to eat better or anything because it would break the "happy" part of "everyone is safe and happy". Looking at Cater, the other person who was trying to keep Riddle contained, Cater wanted to have every day feel like his birthday, but instead his dream made him the Housewarden.
And when I say Trey can be a pretty uncomfy mirror? I: hate being in leadership roles, think I'm pretty unremarkable, like to bake for others, get super uncomfortable with compliments, often try to act as a voice of reason when people around me are upset, am conflict avoidant, get nervous about setting boundaries with people who I know can be volatile, take on stuff I shouldn't to try and help, my get into situations I'd rather avoid because I wanna make sure my loved ones are safe... So, yeah. Trey is a super uncomfortable mirror at times because I see my weaknesses that I am still trying to fix.
This Trey discourse is getting ridiculous.
Tell me you don’t understand the dream without telling you don’t understand the dream. Tell me you don’t like Trey or understand his character without telling me you don’t like Trey or understand his character. For starters, the reason most of the fandom disliked Trey early on- book one. He didn’t stand up to Riddle’s mother or stop Riddle from being a tyrant.
Argument one: he was a child. A ten year old child whose parents were being screamed at for five hours straight (something of which BOTH Idia and Leona are horrified by, and those two had some strict upbringings themselves) while listening to eight year old Riddle wailing and sobbing for his mother to stop. That shit is traumatizing. Have you ever been screamed at unjustly as a kid? It’s terrifying. It haunts you. That kind of memory latches on and never lets go. Not without help.
Argument two: Trey is 18. He is a big brother. Not a parent. He didn’t raise his little siblings either, as his parents have a seemingly good relationship with each other and their children. He hasn’t seen Riddle in years, and while excited to see Riddle at the entrance ceremony he was quickly rebuffed by the now cold and steely Riddle who grew up under his abusive mother’s rule. He and Cater then worked with Riddle to dethrone their horrible then-dorm leader, and Trey was then sacrificed to the position of vice dorm leader because the entire dorm took a vote. Still, he did his best as vice dorm leader- not wanting to lose his head or watch their dorm mates stumble accidentally onto the execution block.
Trey, at the start, wasn’t particularly close to Riddle because Riddle wouldn’t let him be, and as someone who was traumatized by what happened when he WAS A CHILD likely struggled to speak up against Riddle’s harsher rules, and that most likely muddled together with Trey’s wish for Riddle to be happy. Going against Riddle would lead to conflict, and Riddle is short tempered as is. Trey likely believed that standing up to Riddle would make things worse instead of better.
He learns quickly from Adeuce later in book one how wrong he was, but that’s beside the point. The best Trey could do in the position HE DID NOT WANT was to give advice to his dorm mates and attempt to be Riddle’s voice of reason, acting as the peacemaker and struggling to keep any situation from escalating.
Something of note here, that I find particularly fascinating, is that it’s been stated by several characters that Riddle’s reign, though tyrannical, was nowhere near as bad as the last dorm leader- who was chaos incarnate. That plays a part in why Trey and Cater both were so willing to go along with Riddle’s iron ruling, even though both knew he was going about being dorm leader the wrong way.
There was no controlling or manipulating of Riddle- despite what Leona and Idia, who have ZERO CONNECTION AND INTERACTION with Trey and Cater prior to this dream, believed. There was no stopping Riddle, either. The best they could do was appease him and keep him calm.
Now, onto his dream.
We learn that Trey and his family “laugh” about what happened with Mrs. Rosebitch. This isn’t an, “oh they weren’t affected by what happened” situation, it’s an, “oh they were so badly affected by what happened that they can’t even talk about it properly because it’s so fucked up that they just laugh instead”. That’s called a trauma response. That trauma is so deeply rooted in Trey because he’s never learned to process it, that it’s there in his dream instead of being omitted.
Trey is also dreaming of a world in which Riddle has no stressful responsibilities. They’re at school, but his mother can’t reach him there, and Chen’ya- a childhood friend of Trey’s who was THERE when the Clover family got screamed at by Mrs. Rosebitch- is dorm leader instead. Riddle is not held down by what happened, and is seemingly “freed” from his mother’s cruel hand. Heartslabyul has become a safe space.
One built by Trey and Chen’ya, something they had unknowingly tried to do as children for Riddle (as they were unaware of the abuse, but had been a shining light for sweet baby Riddle who lived in the suffocating darkness) but failed- and paid severely for it.
Now, onto Fandom problem number two: the Round Bois.
I’m seeing people call Trey a “feeder” and are behaving harshly towards him because of it. But that literally couldn’t be farther from what’s happening. For example, let us take a look at his conversation with Vil (I brought my freaking receipts; this boy is my FAV of Heartslabyul) during Vil’s lab coat vignette.
We know Trey likes to bake.
He bakes for the Heartslabyul parties, and often gives Adeuce pastries to bring to Ramshackle to share with Yuu. But we learn in his New Years vignette that he bakes as a form of stress relief, too, to work his thoughts out and/or distract himself. It is a comfort to him. A safe space. And he knows whatever makes he will likely bring a smile to someone’s face. He enjoys baking, and he enjoys seeing people enjoy his sweets.
If someone is stressed, he encourages them to eat sweets- or cake with lots fruits, though that’s specific in this vignette because he just made a strawberry cake and was trying to find someone to give it to because it was one cake too many, lol, and Vil happened to be stressed out from something Rook said.
Trey isn’t being a “feeder” here or in his dream. He saw someone stressed and went, “Hey, I have a solution, why not try it? One slice won’t hurt and it’ll make you feel better/put you in a better mood.”
Baking is Trey’s solution, and a reliable source of comfort. He likes seeing how happy people are from the things he bakes, and he knows eating sweets can make other people happy. That’s why he goes out of his way to find someone to give the extra cake he accidentally made to- because it’ll put that person in a good mood and the cake will have a “good home” to go to.
Trey’s dream was basically giving Riddle and their other dorm mates a life where they could be happy and enjoy themselves without fear. A safe space. He could bake to his heart’s content in this massive kitchen his dream Heartslabyul provided, and everyone around him are happy and overall stress-free.
The reason they’re all ROUND BOIS???
It’s not because Trey was a “feeder” and fed them to that point, it’s because the dream-versions of his friends lacked self control and there was no one to stop them from eating sweet after sweet after sweet. They just happily ate whatever it was Trey baked, because he baked a lot- not to “feed” them, but because baking is something he greatly enjoys doing.
#twst#twisted wonderland#trey clover#twst jp#twst jp spoilers#twst spoilers#twst trey#riddle rosehearts#twst book 7#twst book 7 spoilers
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People are so weird about xenofiction
"Who cares if they die! They're animals! It's nature. Them getting killed isn't a big deal because animals die in nature all the time"
If I watch an animal documentary and an animal dies in it I'll still feel sad? I can acknowledge it's natural for anything to die and still feel bad. Hell I feel bad when PLANTS die or get hurt.
It's just so weird to me that some people genuinely want fictional animal children to die or get hurt and think it's normal because "they're animals"
Idc if they're animals, the characters are kids
There's a difference between going "lol this character sucks I hope he dies" and not being serious, and genuinely wanting these characters(whose biggest crimes are following their parents and Fade's a lil shit ig lol I love him) to be harmed because "they deserve it"
It just says a lot about a person imo
While I feel this situation is more 'these characters remind me of people I don't like personally so they should therefore die!' vs. folks being dismissive of animal life, this argument is certainly applicable to the amount of times we've heard 'who cares? It's realism/how nature works!' in response to how eh we feel about the lionesses in My Pride being chill with their cubs being slaughtered.
And it's like I mentioned in another ask: yes, these characters may be fictional animals but we've also had irl readers say they relate to them or they feel some kind of connection to them because they share very similar circumstances so when folks are saying they should die horribly or be rendered disabled as a punishment (which is also very yikes)... It can have an impact. It doesn't matter if they're animals or not. oof - RJ
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You ever just see a Mouthwashing take that makes you want to bang your head into a wall? I literally just saw someone claim Curly couldn't have been emotionally abused by Jimmy before the crash because he was in a higher position of power than Jimmy.
-Shrimp Anon
The mouthwashing fandom has shown me that people genuinely do believe that certain types of abuse are not as detrimental as other types especially when they deem those immune/resistant, ergo, believing one is objectively worse no matter how it affects the person nor the intersections of power, history and dynamics at play.
Get ready cause this is a yap session:
Cause like it's heavily implied that Curly and Jimmy's friendship was toxic and abusive, pointedly in the direction of how Jimmy uses Curly's belief/comfort in him. Curly wasn't forced to enable Jimmy but he was emotional and mentally on edge around him in almost every scene in some way. Mental and emotional abuse are not contingent on what positions you have at work. Yeah, he's Jimmy's boss but he was Jimmy's friend first and it's like getting into Psych discussion to talk about how social power tends to overshadow any perceived organizational power in the human mind. People are concerned about their jobs ofc but they tend to hang onto and put more value/investment into their personal relationships, hence why there tends to be laws and restrictions around mixing the two.
I always see the sentiments that "Curly is a grown ass man", "Curly is bigger than Jimmy", "Curly is Jimmy's boss", "He just needed a backbone" as criticisms of Curly and while I do agree that on the surface level all of these to be true and viable ways Curly could've taken more control of the situation, I often look at the parallels of Anya and Curly as victims of Jimmy pre/post crash.
The way Jimmy talks to Anya post crash is how he talked to Curly in the pre-crash segments. It's hard to pin-point mainly because we know he hates and wants nothing to do with Anya compared to his contrary but similarly handled obsessions with Curly. It's a weird sort of "honey-moon" effect of abuse Jimmy does in terms of emotional and mental victimization. He is always horrid to Anya, always talking down or questioning her abilities and thoughts in a situation, this of course includes the harassment and assault. However, he has a moment of attempted gentleness/conditioning when he question her about the mouthwash when she's contemplating drinking it at the table. The key difference is he has no personal investment in Jimmy outside wanting nothing to do with him, meaning there is no sort of romanticized version of him that he can condition her off of. He knows this, hence, why he always reverts to trying to make her to scared to oppose him.
This sort of give and take of "kindness" doesn't work on her because she knows he is just doing it to take more from her than whatever he could possibly give but it reflects even the "softer" scenes between him and Curly where he always rewords or rephrases Curly's sentiments and concerns to sound more shallow. He is feigning a deeper understanding by reworking Curly's emotions into something bad and needing to be hidden. Everything is laced with envy and resentment, an outburst just around the corner, I mean he even slams the table in the birthday party scene, a tactic in emotional manipulation to set the victim on edge and cloud their ability to respond. Even if Curly knows Jimmy won't get physical in that moment, the physical actions is intended to make him back down in the confrontation in case it does. This is something that is just not person specific. It ingrains itself into how you interact with the world and life and it shows in major and minor ways with Curly.
Post-crash, the abusive nature is more in tandem to the physical victimization Anya went through and the stripping of voice and autonomy we see take place. Like the parasite in HFIM, Jimmy speaks for Curly most of the time and puts words in his mouth, similarly to how he takes Anya's plans as his own. He very commonly, with the both of them mind you, supplements the worst aspects of himself into them; pettiness, selfishness, lack of understanding... And tries to cover himself with their best qualities; kindness, planning, initiative, etc...
These parallel are just to say that positional power has little to do with if a person can be abused and how it can even be flipped to further the abuse. There is no doubt that Curly could've picked up on Jimmy's envy of his position hence another reason he never confronted him as a Captain but as a friend as doing so would immediately put Jimmy in a space to be confrontational/combative.
I think the disdain some people have when they talk about the heavily implied if not implicitly stated emotional/mental abuse Curly experienced being Jimmy's friend is when treating it as an excuse to why he didn't do more. I can understand that completely because it is not an excuse to why he didn't do more but is a very real reason people in his position in these scenarios can experience whether in the context of a work or social environment. However, I also think the way people talk about it really does demonstrate a bigger problem when talking about abuse when somehow who is/was abused is either part of the issue or enabled it.
Harkening back to the sentiments about Curly's inaction regarding Jimmy, I think the exact phrases I used/have seen show how there is an inherent belief that it is easier to overpower the effects of emotional/mental abuse that go in tandem with the perception of Curly as someone who should be able to. There is not an age you suddenly stop being susceptible to abuse nor a set point or low where you realize how it has affected you. You don't suddenly know to stand up or put a face on to face your abuser nor admit that you inadvertently enabled them to subjugate someone else to the same treatment. Maybe it's my psych brain but their is this growing belief that direct action is somehow easy or always the best method with the game shows you instances where it is not always the case. In real life that rings true too. He should have done more, but it's not impossible to see why he struggled to find a way or didn't even if it makes us mad.
It's not easy to suddenly gain a "back-bone". You don't immediately want to resort to aggression, especially if it mirrors the type you were a victim to. You don't want to believe you allowed yourself to be treated this bad, let it get that bad or allowed something bad to happen to someone else. It is easy to be in denial, to retreat to your thoughts or make excuses to avoid the painful truth. It's frustrating but in a way we know is relatable. It why we both hate and love Curly for it. We know we'd be better, we think we'd be better, we like to think we wouldn't falter in the same ways but it's always easier to say that from the outside looking in. It's easy to see what he was doing wrong because we are seeing it, not him, but the game really does make you picture what you would do if this was your raw reality and it's why this debate about Curly seems so never ending/contradictory. We can all say what we'd do but bottom line is that's much different when you're in the moment with all the emotions and human feelings attached.
I personally think Mouthwashing tackles the themes of rape culture, enabling, toxic masculinity, types of abuse and patriarchy in ways that are meant to deconstruct the typical straightforward views we mostly have of these concepts and how little subtilities of them are just as, if not more, detrimental than the overt/obvious parts. The game deals with the idea of little details and bigger picture in a way to show that sometimes the bigger picture is not the issue but the little details that make it up. It's why I have a personal dislike of depictions of Jimmy as the typical horrible person who would of course do something like this because the game is about noticing the little warning signs, the foreshadowing and foresight.
It's why I dislike the typical discussion of "bro code" and "boys will be boys" for the game because the game makes a point to avoid the standard depictions of such. It is about the type of men who still enable despite not condoning, agreeing or even perpetuating harmful beliefs because they can't see the little details or the ways it seeps into their everyday. The severity is not obvious to them as it was not obvious to Curly, Swansea or even Daisuke the way it was to a woman like Anya. There are little details about Jimmy that should ring alarms but if you are too naive like Daisuke, too distant like Swansea or too conditioned like Curly, they are just off markers.
There is 100% more constructive/concise ways to say "Curly was a victim of Jimmy's abuse on an emotional and mental aspect that clouded his judgements and perceptions in the scenario" while also critiquing on the side of "Curly still had a responsibility to protect Anya as a crew mate and Captain that he failed to do due to biases and stigma's he failed to surpass" without the weird condemnation people give him about should've knowing better than to let himself be manipulated by a person he considered a close, if not family/best-friend and had his own reasons to trust initially. Also stop being weird about victims of abuse in general with this fandom, like sorry not everyone has a like social epiphany the moment someone's nasty to them. People are treating it like you immediately know when you are in a toxic relationship immediately or comprehend when a person is actively dangerous and either it's your fault for not knowing how to leave/cut them off or you deserve it. Like the hypocrisy of people believing how certain fans treat the story reflect their irl views but not their own is crazy.
End statement is: I honestly don't even know man, I've been writing this too long and just like no man on that ship was perfect or really helped Anya when it mattered and I feel like pitting them against each other in discussion on who did the least or most or how it was justified sucks cause in the end Anya always did the most and best thing for herself.
#i also think it is because mouthwashing is first and foremost a game about rape culture and the patriarchy especially in work spaces#regarding women and centering conversation around Curly a man rubs people wrong because it does overshadow that commentary#but it still mixes other topics into its initial theming and message on how abuse conditions you to accept certain things that are harmful#and how getting used to a culture/enviornment does not mean you are happy healthy or most importantly safe in it. I personally like to#explore those aspects where it mixes all the themes so we can discuss the ways you have to watch out for things because there is a differen#in the idea Curly enabled Jimmy just because they were bros and because he was an example of another man afraid to step out from what#is a still oppressive system that does try to punish those who act against it even if they fall in the category of those who would benefit#from it as Jimmy and PE 100% represent that sort of misogynistic system where men that would be “good” are altered until they follow line#in a way both on the personal and professional level as PE is the corporate lock out and Jimmy represents the social and its just the issue#that the discussion of it sounds like “in defense of men” when I am more so trying to discuss how it is much deeper than men being scared t#upset other men but complacency is rewarded by not becoming another person subjugated hence as all the moments Curly does try to do#something we can tie it back to how Jimmy reacts and a possible penality from PE where we now need to address the ways to combat those#two concepts so we dont get cases like Curly or Daisuke or Swansea where male avoidance of the issue is considered neutral or even good.#i think most of this boils down the perfect victim mentality to where if someone who underwent or is being abused is not a perfect example#or accpetible type than their abuse can not be considered a valid or substantial reason for effects on their behavior compounded with the#fact that Anya's abuse at the hands of Jimmy is a systematic issue that Curly is a part of even if unwillingly and was more physically#violating and topical cause sometimes i have to remind myself that all media is still critiqued through the lens of the culture it came out#in cause i do think about what if this game came out inlike 2014 like the conversations would be sooooooo different could you imagine it?#but back the before statement Curly isn't perfect but I feel like boiling it down if hes a good person or man is not the point of the game#but more so good people can still be part of the problem and the idea of condemning a person for one act creates a false sense of#rightouesness and justice that does not aid the victim and in fact aids the abusers in escaping blame for their mulitple behaviors as we se#how the men on the ship tend to blame Jimmy for just one act against them including himself while there is a plethora of things Anya is#concerned about with Jimmy#and its not that Curly just made one mistake with Jimmy but more so we consider his actions more damning because he didn't stop Jimmy#instead of focusing on the fact Jimmy did what he did regardless of Curly and the consequence because we already know he's bad n maladjuste#which is problem in the conversation where the individuals are blamed but the system and perputrator are overlooked in a sense of acceptiab#complacency as we know how they are and the lack of tangibility to personally affect them on a larger scale like I should just make a post#on like cutting out the face when it comes it confronting systems of oppression rather than tag talking but just ask me to clarify if#you want that like im jus trying to say we avoid talking about Jimmy and PE so much cause it is obvious what they do wrong that we make#the initial and inherent problem out to be one aspect someone in this case Curly does and the the constraints they use to force actions
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Endeavor is almost a perfect allegory for what the society in the mha universe does to people who can't be heroes or use their quirks in a way to benefit society, which is cast them aside or pass them over without over giving them a second glance until uh-oh! Suddenly they're worth being noticed because they're a threat.
He apologizes to his family, which is good! If you're a bad person and did terrible things, the first step in your own transformation and atonement should be to acknowledge what you've done and to apologize to those you've wronged. Great!
Thing is, Endeavor set off a chain reaction with his abusive, neglectful and downright irresponsible choices that it damaged everyone in his family for life.
I don't think someone who causes one of their own children to literally go up in flames, crying because they're finally getting attention from their father and family in the very end, ever deserves to be forgiven.
#mha#my hero academia#endevour#mha dabi#mha endeavor#im sure im gonna get some flack for this because for some reason lots of people think that he should be redeemed but no???#im sorry guys i like villain redemption arcs as much as the next person and i understand being confused over#why so many people forgive other villains vs endeavor#but theres something about being in a place of power and influence and using that to harm and neglect your family and having EVERYONE#EVERYONE IN THE WHOLE WORLD PRETTY MUCH JUST LOOK AWAY AND SAY OH ITS NOT MY FAMILY THATS HIS BUISNESS#BETTER NOT GET INVOLVED IT'LL SORT ITSELF OUT#that just doesnt sit right with me whatsoever#ive liked plenty of villains who do horrible things but i can still see their good side because they have their henchman or their own family#or that one person who they care for and will protect because thats their heart#im saying that even though endeavor FEELS BAD he really just didnt have a heart or care for anyone but himself until hmm#oh! after he became the number one hero#and after he got a scar that humbled him#theres a reddit post where the op talks about how people soften him and are willing to forgive him but i think thats coming from people who#very very thankfully no shade did jot have to deal with anyone like that irl in any way#OR people who are less into stories and allegories again no shade and take characters at a more surface level#its just another read on the character which of course is obviously fine but please please understand why people will never forgive him#mha spoilers#its like especially hard to not hate him when you find out that dabi had his mothers power all along#meaning he WAS that perfect child that endeavor had been looking for but he cast him aside too soon to even let that power bloom early on#god i hate Endeavor so much#love the way hes written story and character wise like he IS really well written#but fuck him all the same lol
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such is the tale of a ✨chronically online hypocrite✨
#(please forgive this old folk’s rambling for a hot min bc i need to get this off my chest somehow and in some way)#tl;dr: come and get into the hw idol series!!! we have ship discourse; more ship discourse; even more ship discourse#(yes ik people should be free to ship what they do b u t claiming a noncanon ship as canon and forcing it on everyone else is. not cool.)#yes yes friday’s mv was visually cute and ino.rin’s singing was peak b u t i feel like it has caused more harm than good in some way???#i cant b e l i e v e the jp hwtwt beef over friday’s mv is still going on mannnnnnnnn#no less than 3 separate people have made posts along the lines of#‘p l s stop using [official tags] to post about *[unnamed] non-official ships* p l s there’s a time and place for everything’#and n o n e of them even remotely run in the same circles yet they’re all banded together against a *certain* group lmfao never change hwtwt#lhy (esp yhy) shippers are always at the scene of the crime mannnnnnn#i cant see anything on their end of the naval battle (has every single lhy tag+account that i could think of blocked)#b u t it’s still really funny to witness on my twtdash against my will. i think i need to touch grass#‘kyhn isn’t canon either so why do you like it while being such a hater towards lhy—‘#great question!!!!!! it’s bc (disregarding the movie) they actually interact really well together~~~ like the honeypre event y k—#and also bc yukki treats hina really nicely all the time (even when she was being tsun and literally running from her feelings for him)#a n d hina loved him for who he truly was; even before his image change arc. and she also does her best to appeal to him and such~~~~~~~#but lhy. uh. they just bully hiyo 95% of the time and while they do look out for her bc they’re pals#they’re just pals. guys. and lxl have gone ‘uwu it must be u uwu’ to each other one too many times so shoehorning hiyo between them would.#be pretty weird ngl? esp since the ‘widely accepted’ portrayal of lhy as a trio is p much just hiyo x 2 dudes who dont even like each other#and. like. a branch of such portrayals usually seem to have aizo waft away from the ‘r/s triad’ to date mona instead which is. very weird.#some people just pick and choose aizo and mona interactions dont they. all they see is the umbrella scene and go ‘ah yes. canon’#they dont even read further to see how mona doesn’t even use the umbrella after aizo leaves (clear rejection)#a n d how aizo doesn’t even remember giving the umbrella to mona + mona’s entire existence in general after that#and that’s not even counting the grudge mona refuses to let go of even after what looks to be literal months#so for certain shippers to just casually shoo aizo out of the hiyoharem and into mona’s unwilling arms for the sake of yhy is. weird.#and like. shouldn’t he and yujiro have a say in this?? they’re more interested in each other than hiyo so just how are they being commonly#portrayed as hiyosimps in fanon? im so confused… like. wouldn’t they be equally obsessed with each other (as w/ hiyo) if they were a rstrio?#aaaaaa get this off my twtdash plsssssssss pls see this post twtapp pls let this affect your dumb algorithm im tired of the ship discourseee#as funny as the ‘lhy vs the world’ naval warfare is it’s getting. um. very annoying!!!! and now im missing nagisa more than ever s o b s#plsplsplsplsplsplsplsplspls influence the algorithm ragepost; ik big brother is 👀watching👀 so do your thing—#(pls feel free to duke it out with me too if y’all read this i need my birdsite algorithm to le a r n that i dont wanna see stuff like this)
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I don't know... horrible things happen all around the world and it's not a competition
Atrocities are committed against multiple groups in multiple parts of the world at the exact same moment, and none of them erase each other. They all matter, all the people in this world who are being brutalized matter. There shouldn't be any line you draw where one group doesn't actually matter as much as another
You're welcome to prioritize your energy towards helping one group or another, but what's not ok is invalidating or dismissing people who are actively being harmed
Same goes for trying to figure out which social group has things worst (and lets be honest, always using a US lens)
Like... maybe the important thing is to prop each other up and help everyone get on their own feet rather than trying to... pick fights about if physical disabilities or mental illness are less respected (I'm trying to pick a more absurd example but sadly I've seen exactly that argument happen before). Maybe it doesn't really matter and what matters is helping who we can when we can
I'm tired of it, I'm just fucking tired of it. Support people, champion them when the world is just brutalizing them, but you don't need to throw a single other person under the bus to do that
Which seems to be an absolutely impossible lesson for people to learn
#I won't say anything else on this; but I will say that to me one of the groups that it feels like is most forgotten is Syrians#including by me if I'm honest#I don't know what's currently happening in Syria... but... my understanding is it still hasn't really gotten better#assad is still brutalizing people last I had heard#so rather than saying anything else I'd prefer to simply focus on some people it feels like were forgotten back during Obama#and... and have remained forgotten#and I'm sorry I can't do more to help with the suffering in the world#but... you notice what I'm not having to do here?#I'm not having to throw a single other person under the bus#I'm able to just focus on how much I wish for Syrians to be ok (which is a hollow gesture on my part in many ways I think)#and I can keep all the focus on Syrians rather than throwing anyone else under the bus or doing any whataboutism#and that's literally all I'm asking of you fucking people#don't downplay human misery to try and make your thing seem more important#they're both fucking important... they're all important#there's so much suffering I can't even keep up with it#there's so much of it that I can only name without knowing the details; Congo; I believe Sudan is still suffering; Haiti#I don't know how things are in Ethiopia right now... I can't keep track#and none of these situations and the horrible things they're dealing with; things I haven't even been able to follow#none of it detracts from and of the issues I am following more closely#I don't need to compare them and say 'well it's not as bad'; because... bad is bad and any is too much#and nothing I say here will do a damn thing; no one'll hear and even if they did they'd ignore it or get pissed#that's what my evidence shows me about how people behave#but suffering isn't a competition; the correct amount is zero#and... perhaps I'd have more tolerance if I hadn't watched how you behave with stuff#...the worst part is the person I adore who... man... I wish I could just get them to really think through their words#they mean well; they're coming from a place of love; but I just haven't been able to paint the picture for them of the harm#and I'm flawed; I don't have all the answers; I could be wrong here#but... can you at least see why I feel that maybe we shouldn't pit misery against each other#that the people suffering have more in common with each other than opposed and... maybe westerners aren't fucking helping#eh... too fucking drained thinking about this; end of tags
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Full disclosure, I don't necessarily think it's an equivalency people should make, but I can definitely think of some reasons people do. Some are more surface-level; others are more on a socio-political level. And there will always be some folks that are just plain ignorant and/or angry. People draw and project from their own experiences, for better or worse.
I also want to say I'm not bashing Catholicism. I'm just pointing out historical and structural aspects that might make the Jedi "read as Catholic" to some people.
Anyway, here's my 2 cents as a history buff who is a non-Catholic Christian with a lot of Catholic family:
The religious orders most Westerns are acquainted with are Catholic ones. Like the Jedi, they tend to heavily value contemplation and focus on the spirit rather than material goods, etc.
Catholic priests (and monks and nuns) take a vow of celibacy and do not marry. It isn't the same as a vow against attachments, but you can see where people might make similarities depending on how they interpret what the Jedi mean.
The audience's main understanding of the Jedi's rules and customs are through Anakin, a deeply unstable and unreliable narrator. He emphasizes the negative, and that probably resonates with a lot of people who feel hurt by religion. And many of those people are ex-Catholics.
Although they are often sent on missions in tough conditions, the Temple is arguably a gorgeous place of refuge, separate in many ways from the outside world. They have priceless religious artifacts and ample resources...but we know other places in the galaxy, or even on Coruscant, are suffering. Similarly, the Catholic Church has historically had a lot of centralized wealth, which some are critical of.
The Jedi have outsized political power. As a religious order, there is no reason for them to get involved in so many political disputes. Likewise, the Catholic Church has historically held tremendous political influence -- see the Renaissance Papacy and all the ways it intertwined with wars, democracy, kingdoms, and more.
Raising children: It's never really stated how most younglings come to the Temple, but the mere fact that they are there harkens to images of religious orphanages and schools. Some legitimately helped those with no other options to meet their basic needs, but there was also an entire network of religious boarding schools (many of them Catholic) in the Americas designed to harm Indigenous children. (U of British Columbia has a decent intro to that history.) It is understandably a sensitive subject for many.
The Jedi Council is a centralized power structure that appears to not include much member input. No individual Jedi has voting power. Similarly, power is famously centralized in the Catholic Church, which is in stark contrast to many protestant denominations that have representative or direct democracies. Frankly, as someone in a church where parishioners have a lot of input, the Jedi Council's unilateral decision-making was very off-putting to me.
Catholicism is global. There are 100% other religious sects that share some of the above traits, but the reach of the Catholic Church is vast and ancient. Things like missions and inquisitions and ties to royalty early were pretty effective ways of spreading across the world. In online spaces where people come from all over and yet the West still dominates in many ways, lots of Star Wars fans have a shared knowledge of history and culture left behind by the church. We learn about it in history class. We talk about it in social justice circles. We see it in when people get married or buried in movies and when politicians speak and when the Pope performs Christmas Eve Mass on TV while we stay up late eating cookies.
what the fuck is it about the jedi that makes them like the Catholic Church. Truly I will give a thousand dollars to anyone who can give me an answer that isn’t full of racist aphobic fanon bullshit
#the jedi#jedi council#catholicism#tw religion#history#fanon vs canon vs reality#sorry i got way too into this#long post
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I don’t know, me personally, I just think two adults playing pretend & pretending being gross together with full open communication & consent between them is harmless, but maybe that’s just me.
#this is very much a vague post if there ever was one & I’m absolutely vagueing#again; pay attention to the wording & reread if you need to#I think adults playing pretend on its own is harmless as long as everyone involved consents to it#idk how much more simply I can put this tbh but had to unfollow someone over saying certain kinks are harmful#like wow okay if they knew my other blog they’d be saying I’m an absolute freak probably tbh#always seems to be younger folks who have the unhealthy takes about kink but in this case i cant say nothing yknow?#idk this person & they're going through some stuff so i can't really say anything without it sounding tone policing plus parasocial#but just because bad people like a kink doesn't make a kink bad; trauma too doesn't make a kink bad; uncomfortable maybe but not harmful#just like in general yknow? its only as harmful as you make it between yourself & others. Everyone has to communicate or the whole thing#will fall apart. In this case there was absolutely some communication issues which lead to trauma but also just seeing someone agree that#a kink I like is harmful is like idk made me super uncomfortable even if the person is traumatized & going through it still just yeesh#idk seeing someone you follow for a while be like 'yeah this kink you like is bad' when by itself its actually harmless just leaves a#bad taste in your mouth if that makes sense. it just really rubbed me the wrong way so mmm 😕#I hope that person gets all the help & support they need; I'm just uncomfy with the rhetoric of 'certain kink bad' when its just like not#you're traumatized actually is what's going on & that person who hurt you was into said kinks so now in your brain those r bad#absolutely fair way to feel; but adults playing pretend with these specific ones is absolutely not inherently harmful#& pushing that kind of mindset is also coincidentally something right wingers especially want right now & commonly so yeah no#I just bleh it makes me feel gross when other people say stuff akin to that like oh that's like SWERF rhetoric even if unintentional jeez 😓#mine#op
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Thinking about. That one post about art. And how it's never good enough. Since you're the one that made it. And how. It might relate to how I view myself?
#Sel talks#Like. Do I like the idea of a masculine body because I think it will make me less me?#I keep thinking about a line from “in stars and time” talking about. How maybe they changed because it was easier than learning to love#Himself as he was.#Keep thinking about something my therapist said last session. About how he would hope there's more restriction around accessing trans#Health-care than there is about getting a medical Marijuana card#And even if it comes from a place of good intent; is still a harmful idea?#I keep forgetting how much importance cis people put on transitioning. And it's just. Not? For me?#My body is just another form of expression for me to form and play with. And I feel like it might be hard to try and get someone who's#Not thought a lot about gender to understand.#I don't really want to lable it as “transitioning” either. My isat brainrot is wanting me to call it “Changing”; bit I'm not sure if that's#Quite accurate either. Like. We don't have a word for playing with different styles of clothes? Why do I need one for messing w other types#Of presentation?#Sigh...#I'm soooo tempted to just go on t and not do anything else. No name change. No sex change. And not tell anyone.#Why do I need to take into consideration how much my decision weighs on other people?#I feel like I've gotten too many reminders that “tomorrow's not promised” or “How we spend our days is how we spend our lives”#“Don't live wondering” or whatever that old lesbian slogan was. “We're all going to die so who cares if it's a waste”? Some will wood song#I'm listening to. I just.#Why am I waiting for the perfect opertunity to transition? Or change or whatever.#I've always considered my want to masculinise as me taking “be the change you want to see” either too far or too literally#I want to see men in dresses!! And if no one else around here is going to do it I guess that falls on me!#Why must I follow everyone else's path to t?? I want to make my own!#Grrr barkbark#I feel so underequiped to change the world; why must I do it?? Can't it just change for me??
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My interpretation was that merging with the reflection actually didn't add anything to the vampires, but erased a part of them--like a tole.
I get that this doesn't fit with how the series presents the reflections as sentient beings, but hear me out:
Mirrors often serve as metaphors for self-awareness and empathy. We tend to be kinder to people we 'see ourselves' in. We 'hold a mirror up to' people when we want them to recognise their own mistakes. Mirrors can be used to represent truth and reality beyond what a character wants to see/what they think is best for themselves.
If we continue with the idea that mirrors represent self-awareness and empathy, losing your reflection would mean giving up those feelings. People who are incapable of feeling empathy (and there are a variety of conditions that cause this--I'm trying not to draw any direct parallels, given I'm talking about a work of fiction) tend to also struggle with guilt and remorse, unless the situation directly harms them. They also generally don't feel shame or embarrassment, as those emotions require you to care what others think of you, which is arguably an empathetic response (again, being very general here).
It's my headcanon, then, that merging with their reflection eliminates a vampire's capacity for emotional empathy. This would be beneficial for the survival of their race, as their primary method of feeding requires hurting/killing other members of their species (vampires are human, after all) in a very intimate way, which would be extremely traumatic for the average person. In addition, the amount of war, death and suffering anyone who lives for centuries would be forced to witness would quickly become unbearable.
We see evidence of this over the course of the show.
Ingrid shows guilt and empathy in season 1, particularly in 'Slaytime TV', where she admits to tricking her father because she doesn't like how upset it made Vlad, and 'countdown', when she saves the Branaughs. There's a lot less of those moments in later seasons. She sacrifices an entire netball team in an attempt to slay her brother, is onboard with executing her father until she finds out he actually loves her, and doesn't seem to feel anything when anyone she's bitten gets dusted. While she seemed to care about the Branaughs prior to her transformation, the implication is that she didn't contact them for the three years following season 2, despite still being in the Stokely Castle.
Boris didn't have much character development beyond being an anxious person and afraid of the transformation. The most apparent change is in his confidence, which could be the result of no longer caring what others think of him. Research has found a strong link between high empathy and anxiety.
Finally, let's look at how Vlad changes after the merge. He's more confident, but that could be put down to him no longer caring if he hurts someone else's feelings. He shows little remorse for dusting people, unless it turns out he was wrong about his reasons (more about his own sense of morality than any actual care for the person), and doesn't hesitate when doing so. In season 5, when he finds out his entire family would be punished if the council learnt about Sally, he genuinely doesn't seem to understand why his father would value their unlives over Vlad's curiosity. He tries to rationalise his selfishness, but he does genuinely seem to struggle to understand his father's very valid concerns.
The sadism we see in Sweet Sixteen and Bad Vlad may be side-effects of bloodlust. In these episodes, both Ingrid and Vlad are coming into their full powers, which are most likely fuelled by blood, so they would be starving. Vlad had already existed for months without feeding his powers, so the added bloodlust that came with increasing them would have been overwhelming. The sadism created by bloodlust would also be a survival mechanism to keep the more moralistic new vampires, like Vlad and Boris, from starving themselves.
I know this doesn't entirely fit with the canon, but I found myself overthinking the concept of the transformation and what it actually does, so this has been knocking around my head for a while.
some part of vlad, even if it was only little has always been a bit evil
ok, so this post is me rambling about vlad and the fact that even though he seems directly opposite to his dad and sister in the way that he doesn't drink blood and wants nothing but peace, a tiny bit of him isn't like that
obviously the best episode we can look to is "bad vlad" when he goes full evil from his reflections possessing him
in my opinion, their reflection isn't a diffrent being entirely. in some capacity,it is part the vampire looking into it. even for the least evil of characters, it focuses in on that tiny shred of darkness in them, and magnifies it. for those already evil, like ingrid or the count, this is fine, because its barely a change. but for Boris and vlad we see that it creates a massive difference. Boris goes crazy with power and vlad almost kills the count,ingrid and erin for a second.
Then, in the episodes following, we see him do stuff he wouldn't have done before and vlad gets to lashout at people (and rightly so 90% of the time) now you could use that as a way to prove that, no a fraction of vlad wasn't evil, he was just dealing with the merging of him and his reflections. but as I said, the reflection is showing who that tiny part of vlad could be.the only thing is,now that little part he kept locked away is getting to come out more through his actions and words and everything.
and then, he bites erin.
while it was in order to save her, he was pretty resigned to doing it until ingrid persuaded him against it.and we know (again from bad vlad) that he tried to bite erin twice. that might just be because he was hungry and she happened to be a breather, but (we're kinda getting into headcannons now) I think that after that or maybe even before, he has wanted to bite her. he mentioned he gets bad cravings sometime at the start of season 3 and erin was the only breather other than renfeild in the house. so there is a possibility of him wanting to bite her before then.
i might be clutching at straws a little with this but I don't care. I do not think that vladnis in no way at all a lille bit on the evil side
#young dracula#vladimir dracula#young dracula lore#young dracula headcanon#young dracula vlad#young dracula ingrid#ingrid dracula#young dracula fandom
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blah blah blah blah blah
#i have real thoughts rn i am just so overwhelmed with feeling that this is all that can come out#tldr: i wish i could just spend my time traveling and treating women how they Deserve to be treated (well. loved)#thinking about how many people i see who are so deeply sad#thinking about how many ppl ive had a positive impact on even if we ended on terrible terms#thinking about how many more people i could help if i just had the resources ....#thinking about how fucked the psychiatric industry is and how so many therapists suck#thinking about how i actually love being the mommy therapist friend a lot of the time and my limits surrounding that really just come from-#-the fact i Dont have the resources to do this for everyone bc i also have to manage other things in life and work and such#thinking about how if i could i would actually do free emotional labor like. all the time.#thinking about how much it sucks i cant do this#thinking about how much i want to hold every sad girl i see on my dash and let them cry into my arms until they cant anymore#thinking about how much i love my friends#thinking about how much I love...... everyone i meet#not in the like Romantic way but in the “oh hello. you crossed my path. i love you. i love you. i love you. thank you for being alive” way#thinking about all the people who have harmed me and how i Still feel so much love for all of them#thinking of the strangers who have been both rude and kind to me and how much i think of them. how deeply i hope they're still alive.#it..... hurts to love this much ngl#but pushing it down feels worse and im full of this feeling of tender frustration????? because of it#i love that i have so many people who allow me to love them and love me in return#i want to reach through the screen and kiss every follower and mutual and person i follow on the forehead and tell them I love them#i wish i could express more love for people w/o them falling In love with me or being weirded out thinking im In Love w/ them....#i wish i could express better that its not that im aromantic but that i just have so much love at my baseline that its hard for me to-#-Fall in love unless we constantly are talking and communicating and like. working to that together without sounding like a jerk or like im+#+a saint. im not a saint. im not. i just love you. ):#ANYWAY sorry for all those feelings if i didnt get them out i was gonna explode#that also definitely wasnt really a tldr
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idk how to start this so this post is ab individual action, trying to motivate positive change in the world, etc etc
a lot of growing up in the US for me makes things feel more scary than they are. like it’s actually not that difficult to go out of your way to get a bottle of water or iced cup of water from some random drive through if you think you should do it. either fast food conglomerate or local actually, it’ll usually be cheaper than 5 dollars to get drinkable water. i try to have 5-10 dollars i can justify spending on water, and asking for change, because sometimes when i’m out driving i need to go grab water.
i do not do this for me as much as i try to do it specifically when i see someone who’s most likely homeless on a street corner. i’m sure one day i might do this and they might not be there when i come back, but what have i lost really? a bit of time and a bit of money that would’ve meant more to them, that i can hold onto until i see them next.
the pressure that a lot of people feel when they think “what can i do” comes from this grand narrative that the average citizen can singlehandedly fix the housing crisis. rich people? maybe. nonprofits? not in a day, not all one person still. what can i do is a question i ask a lot. what can i do, not just because it feels bad to move along like nothings wrong with the world, but what can i do that will do anything. what can i do that makes even the smallest change.
i feel like it took me too long to figure out a personal method to what i consider individual action. it’s taking time to get to my own financial stability to be able to do more. but for now it’s as simple as water and cash. not water and food, but water and cash.
individual action means a lot in small steps, go get a bottle of water bare minimum and the price of a meal if you can and then just give it to them. if it wasn’t such a miserably hot place where i live i would keep a pack of water in my car, which i still want to do for the sake of having immediate access to water to give someone who might need it- hot or cold sometimes won’t matter. but when it’s hot out, get cold water, if it’s cold out, a warm tea will hydrate more than coffee will as long as it’s not super caffeinated.
#very genuinely i’ve always felt paralyzed by the idea i cannot doing anything to help and on the grand scale i kind of can’t#i can’t give someone a house to stay in where i could take care of the space enough to get someone back on their own feet#but i can give someone water and some money for whatever they need#one day i’ll be able to do more but for now. water bottles and cash.#what i want to say here is everyone knows bare necessities and everyone knows ways to get them#i also have an opinion that you should sit with and hold the harsh feeling of seeing the world fall apart and help people survive anyway#idfk man#i’ve met some extremely fucking jaded people in my time at college who seem to have no way to piece together that they can do SOMETHING#one of my classmates once complained about feeling bad about not doing anything for a guy on a corner and i recognized who#because i’d seen him too and done nothing at least 5 times before one day on the way home i gave him all the cash i had on me#she’d said she’d do more if she wasn’t so scared and anxious of being hurt. i don’t see how he could even look harmful or dangerous#he blessed me and offered a hug and asked me to have a good day and said thank you and i still can’t see why she was scared of him#at the same time i hadn’t done anything until i saw myself in someone else and thought it looked nasty. looked uncaring.#i saw him again today and gave him a water bottle and all the cash i had on me. i told him the weather seemed hot#he agreed with me and he took the bottle of water#i think i interrupted him opening it to hand him the rest#he got up and he blessed me again#offered a hug and more thank you’s and it’s so simple but i felt us both human in that moment. talking about the weather in a brief exchange#wishing each other well as we go different ways#he wouldn’t stop thanking me and wishing me well#i told him it was the smallest thing i think anyone could do and i still walked away hollow wishing to have done more somehow#to suddenly own an apartment complex nearby for him and anyone he knew that needed it too#not a rigid shelter but a place to make home#blah blah blah talking too much about a deed done because i get emotional about humanity#tauto talks
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The worst thing about suffering is that it still hurts when the danger is over but no one cares about it anymore because it shouldn't hurt. No one will ever say "I'm sorry that happened to you" especially when they barely say "I'm sorry that's happening."
#Okay to tb btw all the personal stuff is in the tags#Like. Not eating for a week because you couldn't get groceries hurts#and people will say 'oof sorry that's happening' but then#after you're able to get food no one will ever say 'I'm sorry that happened' even though you think about it and hurt from it constantly.#No one will ever say ':( that must have been so hard' because you're fine now right???? No psychological damage there?????#This example is stupid but I do think about it every time I feel hungry. I told people I wasn't able to get groceries#and there was no food in my house. And they said. Oof.#Instead of idk Oh God Are You Okay ??#No one cares when you've been abused your entire life and behave the way you do out of genuine terror because your brain is fucked forever#They don't say 'I'm sorry that happened it must have been really scary to turn you into Such An Asshole. I pity you like a dog :('#Speaking of man everyone loves fucked up abused terrified dogs and wants to be the one who makes them open up#And shows them that people can be good and kind and that touch doesn't have to hurt#But everyone is scared of fucked up abused terrified people#Humans are capable of harm even more than dogs and fear is understandable but.#Can you please call me good boy and shush me and tell me nothing's going to hurt me and let me curl up on your lap#And not hit me if I get scared and start to growl and feed me good and take me on walks and play with me#Even though I'm not very fun to play with and I'm still learning what's fun and what's mean and what's a toy and what's a hand#Plleeeaaase don't be jealous of a dog that doesn't eat good don't say 'tch he's so thin what am I doing wrong'#I want to eat good and grow and gain fat and be warm and be comfortable I don't want this#Don't say 'if abused dogs don't eat good then I don't deserve to either' no no no no eat good so you can take care of us both#Please please please I learned so many tricks to make people happy and call me smart but I don't actually know how to do anything I'm#Literally like such a stupid dog it takes me like one day of no one paying attention to me for me to become un-housebroken#I make a lot of mistakes even though I know better or I really should know better#And sometimes do things wrong on purpose to get attention either yelling or showing me how to do it right#But most of the time I genuinely don't know how to do stuff because I was never taught or I was taught and#My previous owners said 'this is how it is. It is this way because it is and it is forever. The answer is Because.'#'now quit asking repetitive questions before I pop you'#If I do something Because and not know the reason why I'm doing it that's not learning that's acting#Especially habits taught specifically to hurt me and not being allowed to question it or know why I'm being hurt#Oh my god I acted out so much when I was younger and all my friends were so disgusted and hurt by me and yelled at me every day
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