#who are mean to them but is in such extreme denial over it that she'd sooner deal psychic damage to a narrator than admit it herself

[s-aint-elmo]

digging out my eah content part 4: the kittycorner (ba-dum-tss)

ID: a set of sketchy digital drawings featuring kitty cheshire. the first five make a short comic. one: kitty earnestly slow-blinks; her catlike eyes are bigger and shinier when she opens them. two: a bemused lizzie hearts playing with her deck of cards asks, “...huh?” three: embarrassed, kitty blurts, “nothing. bye.” and disappears. four: lizzie waves after her, still confused as she replies, “oh--bye???” five: maddie hatter pops up behind lizzie, blushing and delighted, exclaiming, “oh my, kitty!”  six: kitty lounges on a tree branch, smiling mischievously, one paw-like hand raised near her face as she says, “y’know, like nya” with a cat-shaped speech bubble. off-screen, indicated by a wolf-shaped speech bubble, cerise replies in all-caps: “stop.” seven: a grinning bust of kitty in a less cartoony style winks at the camera. end ID.

[unstablerk800]

Pets to play with

Word count: 3,158

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: kidnapping, abuse, rape/non-con, orgasm control, denial, non-con drug use, edging

Summary: Nines is evil. That's it. That's the plot. You've been warned.

So when I posted about being ill and writing this, I mentioned I'd tag people who commented on it, and I always keep my word. 💙 I'll also tag those who gave a like to that post, because I'm not sure if they wanted to be tagged or they just... liked... that I'm writing? I couldn't tag two blogs because tumblr didn't find them. What a mystery. Anyway, story under the cut. (Ao3 version is here.)

@go-flow-bro

@a-patchofmoss

@pomeranianmasovian

@heretoboogie

Nines enjoyed having toys waiting for him after the long hours of work.

It wasn't like she could complain, or his little brother. After all, they were very well kept, at least in his opinion.

After the state powered up the new RK900 model, all 200,000 of them, they ran all over the country in a collected attack. Humans and androids had absolutely no chance against them.

The first that had been activated and met his predecessor though, had thought that he would enjoy some company in his lavish, vast home. And he did. Rescued little brother Connor from CyberLife, and even got him company in the form of a girl RK800 seemed to like.

A budding romance at the station between the deviant and the human. How quickly it escalated into something else.

They resisted first, of course. Talking about freedom and how keeping them there was a horrible act. They tried to persuade him, talk sense into him, to no avail. There were also threats and insults - all of those comments were emotionlessly but cruelly, punished. Nines could care less about their opinion; he'd found stimulating them at his leisure at the end of the day to be... relaxing.

She had been molded to perfection over the past few weeks. Denial - coupled with aphrodisiacs - could do wonders to a girl's spirits. He had a medical android safely remove the hood from her little bud to expose it even more to his fingers and tongue. Of course, she wasn't allowed to touch it without permission. She wasn't allowed to cum without permission. Every meal was full of drugs that kept her extremely horny, but her cunt was stuffed with a dildo and secured with a chastity belt only Nines could remove. Very clever device. That was one of his favourites. The other was the dildo itself that kept buzzing to bring her to the edge during the day but stopped as soon as it sensed she would cum. The chastity belt was made of metal, which constantly applied pressure to her exposed clit, but never enough pressure to throw her over the edge. During the night, her cunt was allowed to rest - after Nines used it as he saw fit -, but her ass got stuffed with a large sized butt plug instead.

This went on for days and days without an end until she broke down. One evening when Nines arrived home, she threw herself in front of him and begged, sobbing, to let her cum. He had successfully destroyed the last of her dignity and then he fucked her for hours, ripping orgasm after orgasm out of her body before he let her rest - but the sequence still continued. Nines showed no mercy. He put the toy inside her and locked the belt before he left for work. Sometimes, she could keep herself from begging, but he always knew when she would reach her limit, and he was always looking forward to that.

Connor didn't have the luxury of ever having a release. Being her only companion during the day, she stayed with him for long, long hours, talking to him, touching him, comforting him. He was permanently locked to a metal framed bed with handcuffs. They've tried to open them, but of course, Nines was clever. The handcuffs, just as the chastity belt, only responded to his touch. There was no escape, only endless torture.

They've been cut off from the world, their only means of entertainment were each other. In the beginning, she'd hug him and cry, he'd comfort her, wishing he could hold her gently to his chest. He didn't even mind anymore that he was bare naked. He didn't feel embarrassed about the cock ring locked tight around the base of his cock and balls. He noticed her state of arousal every time she visited him, knowing how frustrated she was, and he couldn't do anything about it.

Or so he thought.

"Pet", Nines sighed when she slightly jerked her legs closer to each other one morning when he was gently slipping the toy inside of her. She knew better than to openly resist, but she really wanted some extra friction. "You know better than this."

"I'm sorry Master", she said quickly, tears gathering in her eyes. "But please could you... could you..."

"Could I what?"

His icy eyes locked with hers and she was at a loss. She couldn't take it anymore.

"Please fuck me", face flushed, she gripped the sheets under herself.

Nines analyzed her, his LED whirring in amber for a few seconds before he laughed at her. He was mocking, teasing, humiliating her at every step.

"So desperate for my cock, are you?"

She whimpered as her fingers tentatively gripped his coat's white edges at his middle. Nines was superior in every aspect, it was no surprise they've been equipped with an incredible size. A seven inch monster. Two inches thick. When he first wanted to fuck her, it couldn't fit, so he impatiently shoved it inside of her with brutal force, and she came immediately before she passed out. He didn't really care, he said she'd get used to it, and he was right. She really did. She could take him without any problems now, and he still could enjoy her tightness around him.

"Yes Master", she whispered.

Nines's hand slapped down on her cunt. His hand was hard and cold, and she yelped but didn't move. He really trained her well. She kept her position even when she was punished.

"Ask me in a full sentence, pet", he ordered coolly, his LED blinking in blue.

Her face twisted in distaste, but just for a second before she braced herself for the inevitable.

"Please Master fuck me before you leave, I'm so needy, I need your hard cock inside of me, I need it now, please-"

Nines gripped her jaw and kept her head still. He actually smiled. It was insane how handsome he was, even if his icy blue eyes were calculating and piercing. He gently kissed her lips. Slow, sensual. Cruel.

"After you've sucked Connor's cock for an hour today, pet", he decided, moving his hands now to lock her in her chastity belt, "I'll show you a good time."

She sobbed softly as Nines got up from the bed and walked out, locking the one and only entrance of his home, leaving her with the toy buzzing buried in her wet warmth.

The breakfast waited for her on the kitchen counter as always. She ate it without feeling the taste; it had been so long since she could enjoy anything unrelated to sex. She knew her every move had been followed through the countless cameras by Nines; lying would be useless, he would know whether she did what he told her to do or not.

She visited Connor in the empty room. His sensory deprivation was even worse than hers. During the weekends, Nines was at home, and he didn't let her visit Connor. His room was completely empty, save for the bed. White walls, white floor, white ceiling, just the cameras in every corner above. He flinched when the door opened, relaxing only when he saw it was her.

"Good morning", he greeted her gently.

His mere voice could do wonders to her mood. Nines sounded cold and monotone, more machine-like, even if his voice resembled Connor's. Whenever he spoke, her stress levels were rising because no good could come out of anything he said. Like that morning, for instance. Even though Connor's tone calmed her nerves a bit, she quickly spiraled back to what Nines said, and she was biting her lower lip as she made a beeline to his bed to climb on it.

"What's wrong?" He asked softly, quietly. There had been so many things Nines could do to her, and he had no idea what he had come up with now. Connor was truly concerned. "Love, what did he do to you?"

Perhaps that was the worst. That they've been in this together, like this, slaves to a powerful machine, and Connor still showed affection in every way he could. Mostly with words, since he couldn't move. He wanted to do everything in his power to make her feel at least a little better. Nines could've taken his memories of the past to render him even more helpless, but he did not. And he remembered every second when he had made her smile or laugh with a comment or wink. He remembered all the times she blushed when he approached her at the station; he was oblivious to why it happened for a long time until he deviated.

And then, it was too late.

Perhaps if the RK900 wasn't activated after he'd succeeded with his mission, it all would've ended differently. He wasted countless hours wondering about different scenarios and what ifs; from letting Markus win or become a deviant himself. The latter happened either way. He knew it did. When they were captured and taken here and Nines touched her the first time, and she screamed for help, Connor's software couldn't handle it.

And Nines knew that. He took great joys in opening his door when he arrived home before he went back to her to dish out both pain and pleasure. Despite the fact that she was always on her best behavior, Nines enjoyed leaving welts on her body. Just as a reminder, just to make her more obedient.

Now, Connor had scanned her, but came up with nothing except the heightened arousal and abnormal stress levels. Both became the norm lately.

"Nothing", she said, sniffling, as she climbed up on the bed beside him. She stroked his cheek, and his eyes slid closed as he enjoyed her warmth and company. It had been so long again. Every night was a struggle. Every weekend was horror. He missed her terribly. "He did nothing."

"Then what did he say?" Connor murmured with furrowed brows but with still closed eyes, knowing something was up.

She leaned down to kiss him, and he reciprocated. It didn't feel like he was mimicking the kiss anymore; it was genuine and gentle, careful and loving, human like. Nines kissed her coldly, without emotion. Connor kissed her like there was no tomorrow, as if she was the sunrise on his horizon. The only thing worth existing for.

They were in no hurry now. Nobody would distract them, and they'd be able to muster some courage and power from the love they've felt for each other. Despite everything that happened in the past few weeks, he knew she still loved him. Connor often wondered why, but he never questioned it.

Kissing him always brought her comfort. She often wondered why Nines allowed her to feel thus, but she often came to the conclusion he wanted Connor and her to suffer. There couldn't be any other explanation. He basked in their helplessness, their uselessness, their inability to escape.

Her thumbs ever so gently rubbed his cheeks and Connor shifted up with her when she started to pull away, but the handcuffs held him down. She changed her mind and leaned down again, pecking his lips over and over, letting him rub his tongue against hers. He had detected the aphrodisiacs lingering on her tongue, but he said nothing of it, as they both knew by now that Nines manipulated the situation as he saw fit. He wanted her desperate, and through her, he wanted Connor to be desperate, too.

"I love you", she whispered softly in his mouth, and Connor rubbed his bare feet against the covers under him.

"I love you, too", he whispered back. "Now tell me... what does he want?"

She pulled away, sitting on her ankles carefully. Connor swallowed at the sight of her bare body. If the thought even crossed his mind that she'd be naked with him, he definitely did not think it'd happen the way it did.

His thoughts of her were so innocent back at the station. He had imagined her lips against his own whenever she looked shyly back up at him as he approached her. He toyed with the idea of gently touching her small hips, bringing her closer to his firm body when he finally built up the courage to kiss her. He would've been so gentle with her... he would've made sure she was alright, that she suffered no harm, he would've paid attention to the signs she was giving him and he would've stopped if he ever noticed that she felt uncomfortable.

They never had that. Nines captured them and made her his right here in this room he was imprisoned in. He'd never forgive himself for how that happened. She still had plenty of spirits left; she resisted, she fought back, she kicked and punched and bit and screamed - which, of course, made Nines angry. He had slapped her, bruised her body until she learned to stay down, under him where she belonged, made her cry and sore. And there was nothing he could do. He just had to watch and listen.

"It doesn't matter if it's bad for me", he tried to reassure her quietly. "I want it all to be easier for you. You can do whatever you need to do."

She was exhausted. He saw it in the circles under her eyes, he saw it in the way she looked back at him. She had no spark left. She was slipping into apathy and would've ended her misery herself if Nines gave her the smallest opportunity. Connor knew all that. He could taste it on her lips. In her kisses. In the way she looked back at him.

She moved her hand tentatively on his left inner thigh. She nibbled on her lower lip, on the verge of tears. Connor reassured her again, as soft and gentle as he could, and she leaned a little forward.

"Could you set a timer?" She asked, utterly defeated, "for an hour?"

Connor did not ask anything. He just nodded. And when he did, she leaned down, wrapping her pretty lips around his half hard cock. His body worked as any other body, it reacted to teasing, it reacted to her closeness, but he wouldn't finish. Reaching an orgasm was just as impossible as escaping this Hell he'd been thrown into with her, and Connor whimpered with need as he let his head fall back and closed his eyes.

"No, no, don't stop", he whispered when he felt her freeze. He didn't dare to look at her, he kept his eyes closed. His LED was blinking in gold. "Do what you need to do. I'll be fine. I promise."

She silently complied, working on his length until it was fully erect, pressing little kisses on the top of it before she wrapped her lips around the head and sucked, drawing desperate noises from the imprisoned android. It was unbelievable how close she could push him, and only a few minutes went down from the one hour.

She needed to pause several times; her lips got tired, her jaw had to relax, but whenever she hesitated, he urged her to continue. If this was the only way he could make her feel better, then so be it. He carefully adjusted the counter every time she stopped, making sure that Nines would get exactly what he wanted, ignoring all the error messages flashing in his vision from being edged over and over again. His thirium pump worked twice as hard as usual, his synthetic heart rate was dangerously high, and he honestly had his doubts he had been built for these sort of games for the long term.

He just wanted to finish… he just wanted, just once, so bad…

"It's ov-over-"

He panted when the counter hit zero, and he felt tears prickling his eyes. His LED had been crimson for the past fifteen minutes at least. He didn't even realise how tense his body was until she finally pulled away and up. Connor relaxed his legs and curled up toes, his cock twitching with the ring around it with a desperate attempt to cum. But it would never come.

"I'm so sorry", she whispered, and he just realised now she was crying. He looked up at her as he was trying to get his body to return to it's normal state. Her lips were swollen and red from working so hard, and so were her eyes as she had been crying for quite a while by now. "I didn't- I didn't want to make you feel so bad…"

"It wasn't bad", he shook his head a little. He shouldn't say this out loud because he knew Nines would use it to his advantage, but at the same time, he wanted her to know that she didn't do anything wrong. "I mean, you're doing this… flawlessly. Really. You're so amazing." He smiled up at her to make her feel a bit better. "You're never doing anything wrong. I'm glad you're here with me. Come on, let's rest."

She half smiled at him, then grabbed the blanket on his side and pulled it closer to both of them. She covered them both with it, then she snuggled to his chest to listen to the noises and whirring sounds his body was making as it worked. It didn't take her long to fall asleep, as the toy buried in her stopped vibrating altogether.

Most of the day passed by with her resting on his chest. When she woke up, they've spent the time in silence. There was nothing left to say anyway. Plans of escaping were out the window long ago, and other than doing whatever Nines told them to do, they just wanted each other's quiet company.

She almost fell back asleep when the door opened. Startled, her hand gripped the blanket on Connor's chest when she saw Nines. She knew what she begged for that morning, and she remembered what he'd promised if she did what he ordered her to.

But right now, she just wanted to stay there with Connor and never get up again.

"You're not even greeting me?" Nines's voice was cold as he approached the bed, and her pulse elevated already. "I think some punishment is in order, pet."

"I'm sorry, Master", she hurried to get up now, but it was too late.

Nines reached under the blanket, grabbed her ankle and pulled her to himself. She was crying already.

"Don't hurt her", Connor snapped, and Nines regarded him with a pitiful look.

"I'll be back to gag you", Nines arched a brow, "after I'm done with her."

Without furter ado, he started to walk out - with her ankle still in his hand, pulling her off the bed and through the room as she was sobbing for help before he shut the door.

[materialistvampire]

for the system hc ask game: 3 7 8 10 18 21 & 23 with kudan <3

Wow beloved mutual I wonder how you got the impression this is a thing I have thought about in depth?

Answers below the cut because this is long.

3. Do they have a collective system name? If so is there a meaning behind it?

I feel like that would probably be a point of contention for them, honestly. I think that's something Kudan would be adamantly against, because she's very concerned with public perception and she strikes me as the type to view that sort of thing as... For lack of a better word, kind of cringe-inducing. I think she'd prefer to be subtle about it in general. Yu seems like the type to come up with one, but to be honest I don't think she really cares much either way and wouldn't wanna fight Kudan over the matter.

7. Is there a particular topic they disagree on a lot? (Ie what to eat, what to wear, what music to listen to, ect)?

A lot of things. I think, as a system, they generally try to intentionally distinguish themselves as individuals from one another, because all of the headmates share in common the fact they're extremely willful people who would hate being seen as anything less than distinct people so, they tend to have very different preferences.

That being said, I think there's a certain mutual understanding between them because of this to let whoever is fronting basically do what they want as long as it's, not actively against the interests of the system. If they're doing something together they usually have to talk it through first.

8. What is their headspace like?

I think they have separate rooms, but no real "interim" space - they go between each other's if they wanna visit. I feel like Yu Ushizawa read a lot of fantasy novels as a child and internalized that heavily so she'd have a sort of like, dreamy castle type area. Kudan might have her own separate study room that's more Victorian inspired, has a lot of books, not actually super high tech despite what you might assume from her outward interests.

10. Do they have a collective gender or sexuality? Are there any alters who’s identities contradict this?

Staying closer to canon stuff? Yeah. I view Kudan as like, lesbians tbh who are IRL closeted about it due to familial pressure reasons, and I'd say that's true for Yu as well. Straying further into headcanon territory... I think while they may have other alters who wouldn't share that, since they're stealth about it, they wouldn't really discuss it openly unless explicitly asked. Think Yu having a male alter is well within the realm of possibility though.

18. Do they have any other disabilities?

Hilarious thing for you to ask me about the canonically disabled character.

Besides that, I feel like she's got some type of neurodivergence going on, but besides a fairly obvious case of C-PTSD, it's hard to say. I don't think any of them are the type to self-diagnose, as Kudan's scared about stigma and Yu dislikes the medical/psychiatric framework too much.

21. What are their protector(s) like? How do they protect the system?

*staring at the camera* Kudan social protector vibes. No I am not elaborating on that because I would be here all day but ANYWAYs it's real to me sorry.

23. Have they ever had a host change? What was that like for them?

I think Kudan probably became the primary host when they were around 12-13 after Yu went through All That. Kind of in my mind Kudan existed for sometime before that but after all of the trauma surrounding her Dad, Yu sort of, withdrew from the outside world and Kudan took over essentially in order to "fix" things for her, and then steadily over time became dominant to the point where she's in extreme denial.

(Side note: I think the name Kudan is something she comes to associate herself with later on, after being forced to confront all of the System Stuff, and also to put some distant between herself and Yu because she has... Issues)

Anyways yeah TLDR I am Insane about them and also Protector Kudan is so real to me sorry <3

[faelapis]

White Diamond analysis: post-SU future

i've spoken about why i like white diamond before, but i want to update it. i've made a mediocre little video ages ago (i think its called "white diamonds cognitive journey" but i don't wanna link it here because while i stand by a lot of the conclusions, i was very bad at youtube and cringe at my editing)... but that's somewhat outdated now. because SU the movie and SU future happened.

so i will summarize my old thoughts, and add new ones.

i will say that i don't think white's arc, whatever you feel about it, is meant to read as "complete." i think that's where a lot of fandom cognitive dissonance comes from. i think it's meant to read as a continuous, breathing thing that could change more now that steven is gone. i wanna thank future for that, both problematizing white's current mindset and giving her a jumping-off point - along with jasper and the other diamonds - to keep changing.

so. what do i mean by this?

in CYM, white falls apart. then the movie, and future, are extensions of the mindset she gains at the end of CYM. people complain about an "offscreen" redemption but i don't think that's true. what i will explore is how white submits herself to what steven wants because she doesn't trust herself or her own judgement anymore if she's not perfect. the movie and future are just natural extensions of that.

let's start at CYM.

by the end of it, white finally questions herself, to perhaps an extreme degree because she'd built herself up around the idea of having to be perfect. to her, perfect means being wise, correct, unquestionable. she's kept watch over gemkind, she's always looking from afar. how its played, its ambiguous as to whether she could Literally see everything pink did, or if she just put herself in denial that of course pink was alive, of course this was all one of her games.

but if its the former, if she can Literally see all of gemkind through her divine light, i think the reason she can't predict steven is that he's half-human. she can't see him as clearly. she knew he was human from the get go, calling pink "hiding" and "embedded in that human child", so perhaps part of her obsession was not being able to see.

anyway, what others say they feel isn't that important, she knows what they "really" need and feel. she can see them, better than they can. she's their creator, their goddess "mother", after all.

and if she can, in a meta sense, see everything, she is the opposite of steven and the audience - they are subjective, and they know that. "we" can only see from steven's pov. white is a challenge to that, someone who represents the standard tv drama where an omniscent audience gets to see everything. we don't, we are limited to steven. because the point is that no one can truly be objective.

but anyway - white styles herself as being objective. she's facts and logic, she doesn't care about feelings (tm). so yellow and blue's emotional pleas don't matter. what matters is if she can be logically proven wrong. if she SEES that steven isn't pink, then she is objectively wrong. that's something she can't handle. she can't justify it, so her worldview falls apart. she's not perfect.

the question then becomes how she responds to this. and the answer is, well, like someone whose world has fallen apart! someone who trusts her own judgement so little that she has to follow someone else. so she acts like most homeworld gems, at some point.

as we see at the end of CYM, and made more explicit in the movie and future... she starts following whatever steven wants. the era 3 diamond symbol is flipped on its head - steven is the "highest" diamond, and white sees herself as the "lowest."

i don't think white, personally, has reached a conclusion on how she feels about corrupted gems. i don't think she has anything but gut feelings - some base disgust (as drawn throughout CYM, there's a great shot about getting into the pool but looks conflicted, that i think someone in the crew described as her "hesitantly getting into a public pool", which can be read through several different lenses of prejudice.) , but also wanting to help because she feels bad enough about herself to do whatever someone else tells her is helpful.

and that someone else is steven. even if she herself is conflicted, she spends the end of CYM looking to him for approval. its only through his joy and acknowledgement of her that she allows herself to hesitantly, awkwardly smile. despite everything.

and then the movie shows this at its logical extreme. like white, yellow and blue are also following steven - they are almost obsessed with him. he's made things better, after all! he's a hero! he even guided them at their worst, the way white was supposed to do. he's surely worthy of worship as the superior diamond.

when steven understandably wants to leave, they beg for him to stay! they whine about how they've done everything he asked. they're clearly doing it for him. because of him. just let us worship adore you.

in a way, they are extremely childish. they're not really changed in the sense of a mature understanding of the world based on their own experiences and moral compass, but they know they are flawed. and they love and adore steven, so HE will tell them what to think. what to be. what to do.

we'll do it all. whatever you say. you know better than us!

then future happens.

our heroic, superior steven isnt the perfect golden child anymore. perhaps he never was. he's no longer able to hide it, at least, because now that the war is over, he's not able to focus on a life's purpose ("living up to rose quartz" first, "being a hero" later), so he is haunted by his PTSD. everything catches up to him. he even questions his own relationships - a lot of them having formed around him being that "good," helpful person. someone who needs to be needed. someone who doesn't know who he is when he isn't perfect.

are we really surprised he went to the diamonds, at his worst? of course he did. on some level, i think he hoped they could heal him... but failing that, maybe he would find a fellowship of flawed, broken people who had abused others high opinions of them. instead, he found them doing good things, being useful, being better than him, despite how he himself was still suffering. suffering because of them.

another huge reason steven was "set off" by white was by literally seeing himself in her body, right after shattering jasper and making a bunch of other mistakes. the fear of becoming like her, an ignorant or cruel person in an abusive chain. but the poison was already in him. and in trying to hurt white, he was literally hurting himself. trying to focus on destroying everything imperfect around you, you become incapable of accepting the imperfections within.

anyway. this is still about white!! i just wanted to "catch us up" on my interpretation of steven in future, and also lay some groundwork of the parallels between white and steven here. i think steven, in all of future, is a disharmonic, symbolic mix of white and pink.

anyway, now this messed up, openly broken steven has to meet the diamonds. and of course, when they fail to heal him, despite his pain being partially their fault, and seeing himself "as white", fearing being like her, deluded instead of a true hero... he doesn't take it well.

and that brings us back to white. while she's clearly scared in this scene, "i am my monster" clarifies that she doesn't hate him, and certainly doesn't blame him. she and the others still come to call, they still help him however they can. even if he doesn't love them (as spinel puts it, he never writes or calls), they still love him. he still helped them. he still made them better.

and i think that's a crucial bit of progress, because it shows them putting the pieces together. yes, steven isn't the perfect diamond they hoped would guide them, he isn't their holy "father" the way they tried to be authoritarian "mothers" to gemkind, but they don't turn on him for that reason. blue and yellow aren't disgusted with steven "turning pink" like white did. and white isn't even mad at him for trying to kill her. she knows why:

spinel: this is my fault!

white diamond spinel! don't be silly! everyone knows that all of this is because of me!

spinel: NO, it's because of ME! i tried to wipe his friends memories so he could die alone on a barren world!

white: but that was because you were angry with pink, and if pink hurt you, it was because i hurt her! like i hurt yellow, and blue, and steven, and everyone in the entire universe! *sobbing* this is all my fault!

and after that, of course, chad connie comes in and focuses their attention on the fact that yes, they did hurt him. but this pity party - this obsession with self-punishment - is just making it about themselves. like the way some parents respond to their children hurting with "where did i go wrong?!" instead of actually helping.

but what's crucial is that despite the diamonds following steven almost blindly, it wasn't completely blindly. they understand the concept of generational trauma: it wasn't just spinel, and it wasn't just pink. it was all of them. and white may in some ways be the "source", but connie still insists they all try to help anyway.

the diamonds are not fully "there yet" in terms of emotional development, but they did learn one thing - you can't abandon or destroy people because they are flawed. through steven, and through being there for each other, they have seen how even they, themselves, can help despite their own flaws... and so, they are forced to accept that part of steven too. that is something they're able to process and turn into practice by the end of future.

so then... steven leaves.

earlier, when he left homeworld, he told the diamonds the exact same thing he told jasper: don't follow me.

that can be interpreted literally, but also figuratively. with jasper, its explicitly about looking up to him: "find something better to do with your life." so that leaves them all - white diamond, yellow, blue, jasper... adrift. but now, with some morals and experiences to guide them. they're not children anymore, they can't rely on steven to tell them what to do. maybe they'll even have PTSD and existential crises of their own! we don't know, because we are bound to steven - someone who has decided that's not his business anymore. he has to heal himself, regardless of what everyone else does.

so the show prompts us to accept that no, we don't really know whether the diamonds (and jasper) will "fully" heal, what the world will look like to them in 10, 100, 1000 years. but it gives them all hope. it gives them a starting point, recognizing that their flaws are not the end of the world. jasper goes to little homeworld. the diamonds have each other. they just have to keep going without an authority to guide them... the same way all of gemkind must find a way to exist without the diamonds.

i'm not the first to say a lot of this. there’s been a lot of digital ink spilled to say the diamonds are only doing what steven wants, and that steven is "using" them... but that’s usually in the service of saying they're not “really” redeemed, end of story. because steven doesn’t like them, the show ITSELF must hate them and have no real desire to redeem them. it’s usually a reactionary stance to “defend” SU against “soft on crime” allegations lol.

but i don’t care about that kind of punitive bs, nor do i think that’s the shows intended message. they could’ve had steven actually shatter white, but it would’ve been at the cost of the societal goods of rehabilitation. this is a show where revenge and healing are contradictory - rehabilitation is necessary for true structural change (literal and figurative healing). people are flawed and they can change. they could’ve written revenge to be more important or equal, but no. steven doesn’t need to kill them, he needs therapy.

as i’ve hopefully shown, while the diamonds are far from perfect, they HAVE learned something. they accept steven despite his flaws, they’re well on their way to accepting the concept of flaws in general. they seem happy with their new powers to heal and find meaning in helping people. and in future, they continue to do good despite how steven never calls or visits. even humbling yourself and admitting you’re wrong is, i think, more than many of us could do.

[spookyclooky]

considering I will never shut up about this, and I see a lot of people ganging up on each other over this, I've decided I'm going to publicly share at least a few (if not all) of the slides from a powerpoint I made for my friends explaining why Stancy doesn't work and Steddie does

Keep in mind, this was not originally intended for general audiences but I've reached the end of my rope with this and I'm gonna show you some research I did (though I'm gonna exclude some of my slides cause they're introducing the characters for my friends who don't watch ST)

my first two slides, because some of this was jokes but I'm so actually fucking serious about this it's crazy

my summarization of both of their relationships (some of the Steddie one was jokes because they don't actually have a canon relationship obv)

and this is the summation of my analysis of both relationships (or what I think their relationship could be by analyzing the way they interact in Steve and Eddie's case). This doesn't even include the fact that Steve evidently wants a big family according to ST4, which Nancy straight up said is the last thing she wants. So, in being with Steve, she'd be trapped in her worst nightmare and would grow to eventually resent him. She even says this during that conversation:

Because she doesn't want kids! She expressed this early on the series when she's talking about her parents with Jonathan, telling him about how her dad was older and her mom married him for money. She didn't want to be like her parents, she still doesn't. She's trying her hardest to pave a path for herself in her journalism, by any means necessary. You think she can do that stuck in a house on the end of a cul-de-sac with someone she never truly loved in the first place?? NO!!! She says this to Jonathan in S1 E6, which just further proves my point

so hearing that, do you think she wants a cute little family with Steve, schlepping across the country with "six little nuggets" in tow? Absolutely the fuck not.

AND, for Steve, he straight up tells Robin that he doesn't love Nancy anymore. While he was on 'truth serum' from the russians. He doesn't even hesitate, and here's the scene if you wanna watch it again cause you don't believe me.

Even Murray, an outsider looking in, could see their relationship was not it

Like, do y'all not remember this?

Cause I do

this shows that even an outside party, who is JUST MEETING Nancy, can tell that she no longer loves Steve, and that's assuming she ever had feelings like that for him in the first place.

In S4, he SPECIFICALLY says, after the bit about crawling backwards, that he says when he gets a big enough thump on his head, he can change and move forward. He thanks her for helping him to 'crawl forward', which I kind of interpreted as a 'hey, thanks for showing me that the way I was acting before sucked, and you breaking up with me changed my life for the better', the breakup acting as his proverbial bump to the head in this particular case.

Speaking as someone who has been in an extremely unhealthy relationship in the past, I think that Steve is simply going through a denial stage at this point, his rose colored glasses coming back on to romanticize the good parts of his and Nancy's relationship instead of seeing the entirety of it. The good and the bad, even though from what we see as an audience, there's much more bad outweighing the good. Especially considering they weren't together for very long by the time the events of season 1 took place.

At the beginning of season 2, it seems like from Steve's perspective, the stuff involving the Upside Down (i.e, Barb's death, facing the demogorgon together, etc.), brought them closer together, but to Nancy, it made it easier for her to distance herself from Steve, for whatever reasons she personally may have found prominent at the time.

She at least acts like she's in denial at first about not being in love with Steve, but she lets that fall apart insanely quickly, considering she kisses/sleeps with Jonathan at Murray's a few hours after they talk about her love life/relationship with Steve where she says that she does in fact love him??

Delving into the mind of Nancy Wheeler is a complicated endeavor, the same could be said for Steve Harrington himself, but long story short, the idea that the Duffers could possibly be pushing them back together bothers me a lot because it'd be like Steve crawling backward all over again. It's like they don't know what to do with him unless he has some sort of love interest and it kind of shows. In S1 and S2, it was Nancy, in S3, it was Robin and now they're trying to come full circle which doesn't make any logical sense.

In all honesty, I think Nancy should just take a break from having a relationship all together, to finally let herself grieve Barb properly and Steve should have a partner that matches his emotional maturity that he's gained over the past seasons.

But that's all I'm gonna say, so thank you for coming to my TED talk and I hope you enjoyed <3

[into-control]

sorry into, this is going to be a rant, but I'm so heated and upset right now

everyone who takes TTB's side (aka that demonic monster of a straight woman) is just a bad person at this point.

one side literally has multiple detailed testimonies from different people, evidence including countless emails that she sent to them, that demon woman literally spoke on her blog about how she'd managed to find people's real life identities and also said multiple threatening things like "your identity is not a secret" to people who called her out, like those are her OWN WORDS, that she said on her ACTUAL BLOG herself, one of her minions also accidentally admitted in a k*ylor discord server that TTB had contacted someone's workplace, TTB herself slipped up and accidentally mentioned that she knew the identity of a person who anonymously spoke about her outing them, etc

like she has OUTED multiple people. one of those people literally has a physically abusive extremely homophobic father, and she could have gotten them seriously harmed or even killed

and despite the mountain of evidence against her, all TTB has to say is "lol no they're all lying, I'm not TTB btw, I'm sp*de riddles, TTB is innocent, they're all just jealous of her and probably homophobic, they're all liars, don't listen to them 😌"

and then she focuses on semantics and keeps saying "TTB never doxxed anyone" bc she's using the definition of posting private information on the internet, even though people often use doxxing as slang to mean revealing someone's online identity to people they know in real life. but notice how she never says "TTB never sent those emails" or "TTB never dug up people's identities", she avoids that and always just says "TTB never doxxed anyone"

and that's all it takes to get all of her minions and her followers to strongly take her side and dismiss all of the evidence against her and to attack the people who have spoken against her and call them liars

she is fucking EVIL, she could have got people kicked out of their homes or fired or even killed, she's a disgusting human being and if anyone here still supports her, I literally don't know what to say

also on top of the fact that she OUTED people just for disagreeing with her over K*YLOR, she also fucking kept calling jewish people rats and "lizards" and "the lizard crew" which is literally taken straight from antisemitic conspiracy theories (no surprises there), she called BLM "drama", she said that bipolar people are "mentally unstable" and "literally crazy" and that they shouldn't be able to work with children, she posted fucked up things about karlie faking a miscarriage, she spoke about the baby having "dirty bloodlines" and being "k*shner spawn"

she constantly uses "that person is mentally ill" as a way to dismiss the opinions of anyone who disagrees with her, she treats people with mental illnesses like they're dirt, she claims everyone who disagrees with her is homophobic EVEN THOUGH SHE'S STRAIGHT, she's complained more than once about being "attacked" for being straight and compared it to what LGBT people go through, she called black people who asked her not to be racist "toxic" and "negative" and "keyboard warriors" and then she told them they clearly didn't actually care about BLM and that taylor was doing more than they were, etc.

like she's genuinely fucking vile. people could have died. she was genuinely trying to ruin people's lives just because they disagreed with her k*ylor blog, and all of these people that she harassed and outed were LGBT themselves which is really fucked up given that she paints herself as an ally

I mean, are we even surprised given that she had threatened to out karlie multiple times on her blog? but I guess people thought all of those threats of her outing karlie were just jokes, and now they're in heavy denial about her actually outing people for real

genuinely, if anyone still supports her, then idek what to say, she's evil.

so many people in the gaylor fandom have deactivated their blogs in the last month or so, especially kids, because they're terrified of being outed by her like those other people were. and yet she claims she's an ally and that her blog is a safe space

you’re absolutely right anon. we have to stop letting straight women define what homophobia is because it allows them to participate in things they don’t think hurts us but does. i would even go as far as to say that we should stop letting them label themselves as allies (it should be a label that comes from one of us) because they let it get to their heads and they start thinking they’re an important figure to the lgbt community, which ttb obviously thinks because of how often she repeats how she’s an ally in response to members of the community criticizing her

the fact that she’s actually become so full of herself that she thinks she has the right to out people exemplifies that. and yeah maybe what she’s done isn’t *legally* considered doxxing but it doesn’t make it any less shitty. it’s just common decency within the lgbt community to not out another person. it doesn’t matter if somebody has made some of their info public. in my friend group only one of my friends is out to their parents but other than that we all know not to talk about our sexualities around our parents and other people we’re not out to. it’s just basic fucking decency.

she doesn’t understand our experiences in the slightest and you can tell in the way she reacts to certain things taylor (and by extension karlie) does. you shouldn’t be a gaylor because you’re anxiously waiting for taylor to come out. i used to not think ttb being a hallmark of the kaylor community as a straight person wasnt really a big deal but you can see how over time whatever bit of allyship she had in the first place has turned into a superiority complex.

and i can’t really speak too much on the antisemitism and racism as a non jewish and white person but in general you’re just supposed to listen to marginalized groups when they tell you not to do something

[kittyit]

let's start over with the eugenics discussion

this is what eugenics has looked like in america during the last 200 years

forced sterilization of black, latina and indigenous women against their will during other routine procedures, including birth procedures, and in many cases being straight up lied about it or only told after the fact.

forced sterilization of developmentally disabled women in health care. this is because of the extremely high rates of sexual abuse by male healthcare providers. the sterilization prevents pregnancy instead of stopping the constant rape.

birth control/sterilization being given coercively to impoverished women (many black, latina & indigenous) as a barrier/bargaining chip for necessary social services, such as help with food, housing, drug programs.

sterilization being denied to well-do-do white women (or middle and upper class women in general) because "what if you want kids" - contrast this with above

the deaths of black women (regardless of class) in hospital settings during birth because of the eugenic devaluing of their reproductive health (of course exacerbated by the anti-black racism that is ever present in america)

the intense democratic involvement in "benevolent" eugenics and denial of such

the pervasive idea that the reason climate change is happening/capitalism is choking us all to death is because of "overpopulation" - which means "poors breeding at a rapid rate" - instead of the intensely destructive forces of millionaires/billionairies and their companies

doctors overstating their knowledge & abusing their power in order to attempt control what kind of babies are born, including giving women who want children genetic tests that are not accurate to the degree they're presented as

doctors bullying women who want to give birth to their fetuses who test as having disabling conditions or women who want to give birth who are "too old" (which is especially crazy because older men's sperm is way more reliably linked with the outcomes that are trying to be prevented)

two things are necessary in the discussion of eugenics: recognizing eugenics as a patriarchal force that has shaped societal development and our personal development in far-reaching ways AND putting the moral responsibility on patriarchy and patriarchal medicine, NOT individual women.

the reason this recent  discussion started around the topic of "is aborting fetuses with disabling conditions eugenics" is only because there were women saying that it is not. it is! but you know what? that doesn't matter in the situation that is being focused on.

women MUST be able to exercise their RIGHT to bodily autonomy and abortion without caveat. it doesn't matter why. it doesn't matter if her reasons are racist (she doesn't want a mixed race baby), sexist (she doesn't want a girl), eugenic (she doesn't want a baby with a disability), if she'd rather party, if she just doesn't feel like it, if she's just in a bad mood, if she does it on a whim - any reason you can think of. it doesn't fucking matter! women's right to abortion is undeniable, absolute, no matter what her reasons are or who wants to deem them morally incorrect or find them upsetting.

eugenics and anti-blackness (which are hand in hand, linked inextricably) are as american as school shootings and privatized healthcare. criticism of the patriarchal structure of eugenics is essential to understanding america as it is and also the effects globally american eugenic thought have had. just because we started the discussion off on the wrong foot doesn't mean that it's not and it doesn't mean it's too late to recover it.