#Complete Anti Aging System

[molloyism]

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[bookinit02]

i really do think there’s a huge disconnect on here w/ people who have never used tiktok as to what it actually is and who actually uses it. the number of people i’ve seen call it a “teen dancing app” is actually insane. it has not been a teen dancing app since i was in high school, around 2016 - 2020. the main communities i saw on a daily basis were 1) black history/anti-racism educators, 2) high school & college teachers sharing in-classroom strategies and frustrations with the education system, 3) local/state political leaders giving real-time updates on behind-the-scenes government decisions, & 4) community activism & leadership. like tiktok is an adult platform. almost every person i interacted with was my age or older. and yes it completely depends on your fyp and how you interact with the app, yes there’s still teenagers and dance videos and literally anything else you can think of. but these communities of adults aren’t insubstantial at all, they have literally millions of interactions on a daily basis. there’s about a million other types of communities that i could name just off the top of my head, because the range of users was SO diverse and thriving. it’s a long-distance community tool, just like any other social media—and honestly much better than any other social media, because it relies primarily on the kindness of strangers. i saw at least 5-10 videos today of queer people in rural areas panicking because they don’t have any access to queer community on any other platform or in real life. and before i end this i do want to say i think tiktok is coming back, i think this is a highly orchestrated political move, etc., but i do know it won’t ever be exactly the same. people are panicking about free speech violations because tiktok was a place where people fucking SPEAK. i have never seen mass mobilization and communication in this same way for as long as i’ve been alive. it is the people’s app, not just a silly teenage thing. if you’re not on tiktok and never have been, please stop talking about it like you know anything at all😭

[fem-scum]

Once the patriarchy learned they could market women’s oppression to them through consumerism and over consumption, they’ve been sprinting since.

The reality and origins of marriage, being sold and passed from one man to another, so men can have an abundant access to sexual, domestic and reproductive labor. The focus is instead on getting the best dress, and the best venue, food, decorations, instead of analyzing the origins and implications of the institution you are taking part in.

Makeup and the requirement for women to be completely hairless is a result of societies inability to see women as human, with hair and flawed skin, and not existing for the gaze of some male voyeur. Women who keep their armpit, leg, arm hair are described as being men or manly, because men are humans and women are women. Men exist as is in their natural states, and women are a performance of femininity.

Plastic surgery, (and even some excessive skin care routines) with most of their consumers being women, have a large devotion to anti-aging. Men are allowed to age, women should live up to 20 years old and then die quietly out of the public eye for not fitting the male pedophilic ideal. A naive, easily manipulated girl to oppress upon. Getting Botox, face lifts, is an acknowledgment and deference to the status quo. It is a choice, yes. A choice to conform to the patriarchy’s standards.

Many women believe they can monetarily and socially contribute to all of the issues and systems that oppress women, and then later act surprised when there are no changes in women’s material conditions. That is because choosing to do what the patriarchy wants of your own volition is not going to save women. It never has.

Women divert their time, money and energy, to these things, and they police each other, keeping other women in line and anxious of the social backlash of nonconformity, keeping women from gaining any sort of collective consciousness. Many people think women should not be held accountable at all for their role in upholding patriarchy, but I disagree. No oppressed group can wait for their oppressor to tire of propping their boots up on their back, no amount of speeches or pleas to empathy, or even acquittance, will be enough to change men. Women have to start with small feminist actions in their daily lives, the first being resisting conformity to the social expectation of womanhood.

(This is for the women who willingly have a choice, not the ones who live in countries where they face more patriarchal overreach and have limited decision making.)

[scarlet--wiccan]

Agatha All Along, the highly anticipated follow-up to WandaVision, begins airing this week on Disney+. Now is the perfect to revisit some important information about both shows and the context in which some of Agatha's new characters are being introduced.

WandaVision primarily followed the character Wanda Maximoff and expanded on her family history by introducing her late parents as well her twin sons, who are born from magic and age rapidly over the course of the series.

In the Marvel comics source material, Wanda is part of a large, multigenerational family of Jewish and Romani characters whose stories frequently reflect the systemic violence and oppression that both communities face-- including Romani Holocaust victims, who are critically underrepresented in both education and media. In the MCU, these identities and histories are completely erased, and the characters are all played by white actors. Alternate versions of these characters also appear in the Fox X-Men films, and are similarly whitewashed.

The Romani people are a racialized minority that originated as a South Asian diaspora, and who face severe systemic oppression in Europe and North America. The modern Romani population is quite diverse, but they are not of white ethnic origin, and despite the fact that Wanda and her family have historically been drawn with white features, they are minority characters and ought to be considered as such.

Depictions of witches and witchcraft are often entwined with antisemitism and anti-Romani racism. In pop culture, witches and fortunetellers are typically portrayed as visual stereotypes of Romani women. In the real world, fortunetelling is a profession born from survival work, one which Romani families are often heavily policed and racially profiled for practicing. While Wanda usually subverts these tropes, they are often played straight elsewhere in the superhero genre, and any story about witches, especially one featuring Romani characters, needs to be critiqued in this context.

Agatha All Along introduces viewers to a new cast of characters, including Lilia Calderu, played by Patti LuPone, and the enigmatic "Teen", played by Joe Locke, who is heavily speculated to be an incarnation of Wanda's son, Billy.

In the comics, Lilia is a member of a prominent Romani family in Wanda's community. Often lauded as the "witch queen of the gypsies," Lilia embodies many racial stereotypes about Romani women. In Agatha All Along, Lilia is depicted as an older Sicilian woman, however, being portrayed as a batty fortuneteller with a tawdry psychic shop, she still embodies an offensive trope. Although Lilia is far from "good" representation, this is not an improvement-- if anything, it's even more exploitative.

Billy was raised in a Jewish American household and places a very strong emphasis on his Jewish identity, in addition to having Romani heritage. His identity as a young gay man is always presented in conjunction with this heritage, not in spite of it. Though there is a significance to Locke being a gay actor playing a gay character, his casting-- if he is indeed playing Billy-- is not authentic. White gay representation should not supersede racial inclusivity, and it is not an excuse for whitewashing or Jewish erasure.

Marvel Studios recently announced that the character Doctor Doom will be played by Robert Downey Jr., who is returning to the franchise after many years in the role of Iron Man. In the source material, Doom is also a Romani character with a very similar background to Wanda's. This identity is central to Doom's character-- although he is written to be both morally and politically challenging, the liberation of his people has always been a primary motive.

Clearly, this type of whitewashing is an ongoing pattern in the MCU franchise. Although "Teen's" identity is still unconfirmed and Lilia may, ultimately, be of little consequence, they are part of a larger problem, and Agatha All Along needs to critiqued in that context.

[maxx-the-queer]

One of my criticisms about Dragon Age, and this isn't unique to Veilguard, is how antirevolutionary their narratives are. (Spoilers for Veilguard ahead, naturally)

Narratively, they're not adverse to all change (since stories have to have some change in order to exist) but they're hardly accepting of it either.

Any change that happens to the status quo has to happen within the system, otherwise it's deemed extremism and wrong in universe.

Contrast that with when Anders or Grand Enchanter Fiona take actions against the systems of the Circles that spark the mage rebellion - they're vilified for it by the narrative and everyone around them. They're painted as fools at best, malicious murderers at worst. All because their steps for change were taken outside of the system. (Anders blows up a Chantry, Fiona starts a vote to disband the Circle of Magi)

In a worldstate where Leliana becomes Divine Victoria and disbands the Circles to allow for the formation of the College of Enchanters, she's celebrated because she stayed within the Chantry, rose to the top through unconventional but still allowable means, yet achieved radical societal change nonetheless.

If Dorian becomes Archon, his anti-slavery views aren't seen as unreasonable or too radical because he stays within the system. His work with the Shadow Dragons - an anti-slavery group, who by all standards aren't that different from the mage rebellion in the south, is deemed different because their leaders are still trying to work with the systems for change.

Solas gets both versions of this anti-revolutionary treatment. In Inquisition, he felt honestly quite reasonable to me in his motivations to tear down the veil, but he can't escape that same vilification as when he's trying to fit the mould of a force for rebellion, he's treated like a monster or has significantly more flaws in the narrative. When his motivations are framed as complete systematic change, he's shown to not view anyone in modern Thedas as 'real people.' In one of his approval scenes in Inq, he goes out of his way to tell the Inquisitor essentially "you're one of the good ones." He's ignorant, racist, and singlemindedly focused on destroying the world to have a second Elvhenan but better.

But in Veilguard, in order for the narrative to consider him redeemable, his reasons for wanting the veil to come down get changed from wanting betterment for the elves and restoring the Elvhen people, into personal regrets he needs to fulfill. He's no longer framed solely as a political, rebellious force for change, but as a mere man who went too far for a woman he loved. Suddenly the narrative gives the player permission to give him redemption. Because he doesn't actually want change, it's just what he thought Mythal wanted, so that's fine and different.

Your player character protagonist can never actually flat-out agree with the vilified rebel characters either. I can't have my pro-mage rights Hawke say "hey, actually, Anders was right to blow up the Chantry, I agree with him," you always have to ultimately condemn his actions, even if you agree with the outcome.

I can't have my Dalish Inquisitor or an Elven Rook say "hey, actually, maybe Solas has a point, this world does suck for elves and maybe the veil coming down would fix that," they always have to ultimately believe that the veil has to stay.

The games do everything they can to avoid letting the player come to the conclusion that revolution is a good thing. Instead, they force the idea that the only way change is ethical is if you do it within the preexisting status quo.

[mywitchyblog]

Reality Shifting and Age Changing Explained: A Deep Dive into the "Controversial" Practice

Introduction: Reality Shifting, the mind-bending practice of moving your consciousness/awareness to another reality (known as a Desired Reality or DR), has sparked intense debates within the community. One of the hottest topics? Age changing – the act of shifting to a different age in your DR. This shit has caused so many arguments, especially about ethics and what's "allowed". Let's break down why age changing isn't as fucked up as some people make it out to be, and why those who say otherwise might need to reconsider their stance. I will Mostly talk about agin yourself down since that is what is making the biggest noise

Taglist of various people who i think would be interested in this post (i will update it progresively) :

@shiftersroom You wanted my opinion ? Here is it /pos

@norumis I saw that post of yours

@evangelineshifts and @reiashiftsrealities Talked my project on your discord lol.

@jolynesmom Loved your post about it btw

Warning : READ IT FULLY BEFORE JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS THANK YEW

My Race Chaging Post

Masterlist

Part I: Why Age Changing Isn't Bad

a. The Maturity Conundrum: When you look at the source of this controversy, you'll realize it revolves around the maturity gap between the shifter and their DR . Critics argue that age changing either doesn't alter your maturity (meaning if you're a teen in your DR, you still have the maturity of your Original Reality (OR), essentially making you an adult in a minor's body) or that it's inherently problematic. But here's the thing: when you shift, you fully take on the age and mindset of your DR self. You're not just playing pretend; you actually become that age. If you can get your DR self's memories, abilities, skills, and personality, why the fuck is it so far-fetched to think you can have their maturity as well?

Let's break this down scientifically. Maturity is dependent on brain development, more precisely, the coordinated functioning of four distinct zones:

Prefrontal Cortex (PFC): The "CEO" responsible for planning, decision-making, impulse control, and emotional regulation.

Limbic System: The "Marketing & Sales" team that influences emotions, motivation, and memory, shaping how we perceive situations and respond.

Basal Ganglia: The "Operations" department that controls habits and translates plans into action.

Temporal Lobes: "Customer Service & Public Relations" that processes social cues and guides our interactions with others.

This neurological ensemble shows that maturity is something physical, related to the brain development of an individual. It's been established in the shifting community that you cannot bring physical things across realities, so what makes you think you can bring your CR brain with you?

If that were the case, scripting a different personality, skills, and knowledge would be impossible. This means your DR self has its own cognitive and emotional frameworks developed in that reality. Your experiences and maturity are context-specific (in that case reality specific), so when you shift back to your OR, you regain your OR maturity. Shifting isn't like a permanent personality change; it's more like fully immersing yourself in a different role or life. Which is exactly what happens.

b. Debunking Anti-Aging Arguments:

"If you age yourself down, that means you're attracted to minors/you're a pedophile": This argument is complete bullshit. If there are gay people shifting to be heterosexual, lesbian shifters shifting for men, aro/ace people shifting to experience romantic/sexual attraction they never do in this reality, then aging yourself down and potentially having romantic and/or sexual relationships as a minor with another minor doesn't mean you're attracted to minors as an adult in another reality. This take is a "Hasty Generalization" fallacy – making a broad generalization based on a small or unrepresentative sample.

"Why in this reality are you thinking about dating minors??": This type of take is not what you think it is, baby girl. It's called a fallacy, more specifically the Straw Man fallacy. It occurs when someone misrepresents or oversimplifies an opponent's argument to make it easier to attack or refute. In our case, they're trying to oversimplify something as complex and nuanced as reality shifting, not taking into account valid instances where one would age themselves down.

"Even if you are the same age, you still have the awareness of being an adult, which means you're a predator": And again, another fallacious argument. Seriously, aren't y'all sick and tired of bouncing on my wood all day long? That's not how shifting works, and you know it. We aren't even sure awareness works like this. It's just a theory, plus I can tell that a lot of people with this stupid-ass take haven't shifted at all.When you shift – and let me tell you because I did shift, so I know how awareness works – when you shift to a reality, you don't even realize you've shifted at first because for you, existing, waking up, just living in this reality is something normal, not extraordinary at all. Then something will trigger the fact that you know you've shifted, and from the perspective of you in your DR, you don't feel as if you "originate" from a specific reality. For you, your DR becomes your CR, and subsequently,so does your awareness. You just know there's another reality, another version of you that exists and that you're an adult there. Your existence/consciousness/awareness is like a circle: no beginning, no end, no origin.Plus, according to the concept of infinite realities and possibilities, you can change via scripting how your awareness works. I haven't done that; that's how I and thousand of shifters WHO DID ACTUALLY SHIFT personally experienced/perceived our awareness while in our DR.

"Using shifting to age yourself down to date a minor while being an adult hereand saying 'oh well according to multiverse I AM this age, it doesn't matter ifI'm an adult in a different reality' is similar to trying to pursue someone thesecond they are of legal age when that shit varies in other countries/states": Nah, seriously, do some of y'all have actual arguments to defend your point of view except fallacious ones that have as much value as my nonexistent heterosexuality? The statement equates aging down in a Desired Reality to the practice of pursuing someone as soon as they reach the legal age in this reality, which is a "false equivalence" fallacy. These scenarios are fundamentally different in nature and intent. In reality shifting, the individual adopts the full cognitive and emotional framework of their DR self, becoming that version of them entirely. This is not comparable to someone in this reality deliberately targeting individuals based on legal age thresholds. The intent and context are distinct. Do some of you people realise that an actual predator/creep/pedophile would not age themselves down once they realized they could strike a chord as an adult in their DR without any consequences?

c. Valid Reasons for Age Changing:

Exploration and Nostalgia: Some people age down to relive experiences or explore stages of life they missed in their OR. It's like getting a second chance at living life. Maybe you want to experience high school without the anxiety, or have a childhood free from trauma. This shit can be healing as fuck and the best therapy there is in the multiverse.

Healing and Fulfillment: Shifting to a younger age can help heal from missed opportunities or trauma, like experiencing a fulfilling teenage romance or a carefree childhood. It's a way to rewrite parts of your life that were painful or unfulfilled.Imagine being able to have loving parents if you didn't in your OR,or getting to pursue that dream you gave up on as a kid.

Non-Sexual Intentions: Many shifters change their age without any sexual motives, focusing more on friendships, adventures, or just being in a different stage of life. It's about experiencing life from a different perspective, not about fetishizing youth. You might want to join a high school club, go to prom, or just enjoy the simpler responsibilities of being younger.

Tried to shift since being a minor: A lot of shifters discovered shifting when they were still minors and made DRs whose age corresponded to the one they had in their OR at the time and tried to shift again and again despite the years. Are you telling me that you're going to tell those people to discard those realities the moment they turn 18? Bitch, make it make sense and you cant.

Part II: Examining the Discourse Within the Reality Shifting Community

a. Teenage Shifters : Double standards and hypocrisy. Teenage Shifters need to acknowledge the hypocrisy of them shifting to a DR where they are a married adult with kids one day and then deciding to shift to a reality where they are 15 and dating another 15-year-old the next. This inconsistency becomes even more problematic when they complain about their "maturity" being affected upon returning to their original reality. Furthermore, these same shifters often label adult shifters as "predatory" for shifting to realities where they interact with high schoolers, failing to recognize the double standard in their own behavior.

This hypocrisy extends to their attitudes towards sexual content and relationships. Teenage shifters often defend scripting mature content in their desired realities, arguing that teens naturally have such desires. However, they become outraged when adult shifters express a desire to experience young love again through shifting. This inconsistency is further highlighted by their willingness to engage in adult behaviors with older partners in one reality while simultaneously pursuing teenage relationships in another.

This hypocrisy extends to their attitudes towards sexual content and relationships. Teenage shifters often defend scripting mature content in their desired realities, arguing that teens naturally have such desires. However, they become outraged when adult shifters express a desire to experience young love again (or expereince young love they never did) through shifting. This inconsistency is further highlighted by their willingness to engage in adult behaviors with older partners in one reality while simultaneously pursuing teenage relationships in another.

Moreover, the logic applied to adult shifters - that having a teenage love interest in a desired reality implies attraction to minors in the original reality - is not consistently applied to teenage shifters who frequently shift between adult and teenage experiences. This disparity in reasoning further underscores the bias within the community.

Lastly, the pressure to shift before reaching adulthood in the original reality is a concerning trend. The community's belief that minor-aged shifters can shift to any age creates an implicit urgency to experience various realities before becoming an adult, after which such experiences might be viewed as pedophilic fantasies by the wider community.

Many Shifters who are minors (I do not say that all shifters that are minors are like this, just a huge amount) have a very odd understanding of what shifting is. They often treat it like cosplay, which is not what true shifting is about. They accuse adults who age down of being predatory, yet they:

Age themselves up to be with adults.

Age down adults to be with them.

Have pornstar or stripper DRs, which is ironic considering their criticisms.

This double standard reveals a lack of understanding about the true nature of shifting and the subjective experience of each shifter. It's like they're playing by different rules depending on what suits them at the moment.

Consider this mind-fuck: A 17-year-old shifts to another reality, lives there for 40 years, then comes back and dates someone who's 17 in their CR. By their logic, this makes them predatory because they've lived for 57 years. Conversely, if they return to their CR as a 17-year-old and date a 57-year-old because they're "57 in shifting age," it's still seen as wrong. This highlights the inconsistency in their arguments and the subjective nature of age and experience across realities.

It's like trying to apply the rules of chess to a game of poker – it just doesn't work. Each reality has its own context, and trying to apply blanket rules across all of them is an exercise in futility.

b. The Hypocrisy of shiftok : Oppresive and unfounded dogma, lack of empathy and Cultish Tendencies

The TikTok reality shifting community, colloquially known as "Shiftok," often displays a concerning lack of empathy and nuanced understanding when discussing complex issues surrounding shifting experiences. This is exemplified by the interaction shown in the image below :

In the first comment, an individual expresses feeling emotionally and mentally stunted due to missing formative experiences while growing up(which is true a lack of expereince can stunt someone s well being and developement). They view shifting as a potential way to have those experiences and achieve personal growth. This perspective highlights the therapeutic potential some see in reality shifting. However, the response to this vulnerable admission is harsh and dismissive: "Just bc your childhood got fcked up does not give you the right to fck up another child's." This reply demonstrates the judgmental attitude prevalent in the Shiftok community, where complex motivations are often reduced to simplistic, moralistic condemnations.

This interaction illustrates several problematic aspects of the Shiftok discourse:

Lack of empathy: The responder shows no compassion for the original commenter's expressed trauma and stunted development.

Misinterpretation of intentions: The reply assumes malicious intent, ignoring the therapeutic or self-exploratory motivations expressed.

Imposing rigid moral standards: The response applies a single moral framework without considering the subjective nature of ethics across different realities.

Oversimplification of complex issues: The nuanced topic of personal growth through shifting is reduced to a binary "right" or "wrong" judgment.

Hypocrisy: While condemning certain shifting practices, the community often overlooks similar ethical concerns in other contexts, such as minors scripting adult relationships.

This example shows perfectly the need for more thoughtful, empathetic discourse within the shifting community. Rather than rush to judgment, shiftokers should strive to understand diverse perspectives and the complex reasons one would shift to a specific DR of theirs.Otherwise people will keep thinking that we are nothing more than a cult that seeks to exploit the mental health of broken teenagers and prey on their desperationf for fame and money.

c.The "holier than thou" attitude: The "holier than thou" attitude, also known as moral superiority or self-righteousness, is a mindset where individuals or groups believe their moral standards, beliefs, or practices are superior to those of others. This attitude often manifests as judgmental behavior, condescension, and a lack of empathy towards differing viewpoints or experiences.

In the context of Shiftok, the TikTok reality shifting community, this "holier than thou" attitude is particularly evident and problematic. It applies to Shiftok in several ways:

Moral Absolutism: Shiftokers often apply rigid moral standards derived from their original reality (OR) to all desired realities (DRs), ignoring the concept of subjective morality across infinite realities.

Selective Condemnation: The community tends to harshly judge certain practices (like adults shifting to younger ages) while overlooking potentially problematic behaviors by minors (such as scripting adult relationships in their DRs) or people scripting in trauma abuse or that people get SA ed or are in relationship with problematoc people such as murderers and villains.

Lack of Empathy: As demonstrated in the image, there's often a dismissive attitude towards individuals expressing personal struggles or complex motivations for their shifting practices.

Oversimplification of Complex Issues: Nuanced topics are frequently reduced to simplistic "right" or "wrong" judgments, disregarding the multifaceted nature of personal experiences and ethical considerations in shifting. Shiting at its core is complex, nuanced and multifaceted, no black and white its gray.

Assumption of Expertise: Despite many members potentially lacking deep understanding or personal experience with shifting, there's a tendency to speak authoritatively on what is or isn't acceptable in shifting practices. It's always those who either have never shifted or minishifted who yap the most about shifting like they know it all . Honey you don't , you know nothing you have nothing to talk about shut up and try to shift before opening your mouth on a subject you do not have an expertise about.

Gatekeeping: Some members of the community may attempt to dictate who can or cannot engage in certain shifting practices based on arbitrary criteria or personal biases.

Dismissal of Therapeutic Potential: The community often overlooks or dismisses the potential therapeutic or personal growth aspects of shifting, focusing instead on enforcing their perceived moral standards.

This "holier than thou" attitude in Shiftok creates an environment that suppresses open dialogue, discourages the sharing of diverse experiences, and potentially alienates individuals seeking support or understanding within the community. It contradicts the very essence of reality shifting, which is about exploring different perspectives and experiences across infinite realities.

And also the most concerning consequence of this effect, this hypocrisy, this lack of empathy makes shiftok look like a cult in the eyes of other spiritual communities. I do know and disagree when antishifters make the statement that shifting is a cult but I understand and come to agree with them when they say that shiftok is a cult.

This community that is supposed to help one another is just oppressing bullying and suppressing people when they have an opinion that differs from the dogma big shiftokers imposed on the rest of the community thinking that their word is law and they get to write the rules of a practice that is the antithesis of that .Shifting is the epitome of breaking the chains the constraints of this world and its rules. Plus do some of you lot realise that those people that you worship do not give a flying fuck about you ? These people pray on your desperation to keep you on their page.

Shiftok is nothing more than a living sack of horse shit. All the knowledge and tips are just poorly regurgitated from amino and other shifting spaces that existed far before 2020. They immediately closed themselves to outsiders when they saw the damage shiftok did to the community as a whole. When a cultist, shiftoker claims to have this groundbreaking solution /information about shifting keep in mind that 100% of the time it was already known elsewhere.Just not on shiftok and now they are the new shifting Messiah lmao.

Shiftokers sometimes (more like always tbh) ignore the fact that shifting involves complete immersion in the new reality. If it's possible to gain your DR self's memories and personality, then obviously, you'll also become their age mentally as well. You're not just dropped into that life with no context; you fully integrate into that age and lifestyle. When you shift to your DR, that's your new CR. This reality becomes a DR. This reality is not the baseline for anything.

Some people say their memories of their OR feel far away while their DR memories are front and center, making their DR life feel like their primary existence. This means you won't feel like an imposter, no matter how different your DR is from your OR.

In ancient times, gaining spiritual knowledge like shifting required understanding that you are a soul or consciousness having a human experience. Modern cultists shiftokers often skip this step, leading to judgment and misunderstanding. Shifting should be a tool for self-discovery and growth, not just entertainment. This lack of spiritual foundation often leads to a superficial understanding of shifting. It's not just about living out fantasies; it's about expanding consciousness and understanding the nature of reality itself. By focusing solely on the surface-level aspects of shifting, many miss out on the profound insights and personal growth that can come from this practice. Because of the damage shiftok did on the reputation of the practise it is nearly or impossible to break free of the stereotype of shifter being a bunch of mentally ill schoolgirls shifting to be with the wizard version of Nazis (looking at you girlies that shift for Draco Malfoy or Tom Riddle).

Honestly that is the thing that makes me cackle. The most about shiftok i keep hearing and seeing videos from these cultists shiftokers asking and wondering themselves why is the platform dying and why theres no active discussions like sharing tips story times etc...

Bombastic Side Eye-Do you fuckers realised it is all your fault ? You try and silence people when their opinion differs than the one you have.They experienced something you did not you shame and burn them at the stake for it no wonder why people leave that ghetto ass platform and im scared just like a lot of us here of the massive exodus of shiftokers that will happen once tiktok is banned in the US.

Conclusion:

Age changing in shifting isn't inherently bad. It lets people explore different life stages, fulfill desires, and grow personally. The real issue comes when age changing is done for fetishizing purposes, turning ages into objects for sexual gratification. As long as shifters are respectful, consensual, and not exploitative, age changing can be a valid and enriching part of the shifting experience.

Remember, shifting is about expanding your consciousness and experiencing the infinite possibilities of existence. Don't let narrow-minded judgments hold you back from exploring the full potential of this practice. Stay open, stay curious, and most importantly, stay true to your own journey of self-discovery through shifting.

[autisticadvocacy]

ASAN Disappointed by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Confirmation to Lead HHS

The Autistic Self Advocacy Network is disappointed by the confirmation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy has a long record of spreading misinformation about autism in particular and public health in general. He is an unqualified and dangerous choice for this role. Autistic people, the disability community, and the nation’s public health are all placed at major risk as a result of this confirmation. 

Vaccines save lives. Disinformation kills.

RFK Jr. is the founder of Children’s Health Defense, a prominent anti-vaccine group. He has claimed that no vaccine has been proven safe and effective, that the recommended vaccine schedule for children is dangerous, and that “autism does come from vaccines.”  He has also fought against COVID-19 vaccination, falsely calling an early COVID vaccine “the deadliest vaccine ever made.”

Vaccines are safe and effective. Vaccines do not cause autism. The idea that the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine is linked to autism comes from one fraudulent 1998 publication claiming that the vaccine had caused autistic traits in 12 children. Andrew Wakefield, who wrote this publication, used unethical methods and failed to disclose financial conflicts of interest. The paper did not give enough evidence for its claim that the MMR vaccine could cause autism. It was later removed by the journal that published it, and Wakefield had his medical license revoked.

Despite decades of replicable research proving that this is not true, some people, like Kennedy, continue to spread this lie. These lies do very real harm to the autistic community. Kennedy has described autistic people in insulting ways meant to inspire fear, saying that “their brain is gone” and that the purported effects of vaccination are “a Holocaust.” By working to prevent childhood vaccination, he effectively communicates the message that living as an autistic person is a worse fate than dying of measles or pertussis. 

Kennedy has also made false claims about COVID-19 vaccine trials and about the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, blaming unrelated deaths on COVID vaccinations. Anti-vaccine misinformation like that promoted by Kennedy’s group has led to a reduced rate of childhood vaccinations in the United States since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.  

Kennedy’s lies about vaccines harm others as well. Kennedy and his nonprofit played an active role in a recent measles outbreak in Samoa, spreading vaccine misinformation until the vaccination rate dropped low enough that 5,700 people were infected with measles, and 83 people died. When he was asked about this outbreak during his confirmation hearing, Kennedy said that he didn’t believe the people who died had measles, a claim that the top health official for Samoa has called “a complete lie.”

Lies about autism

The anti-vaccine movement has led to a wave of fake “autism cures,” many of which have very real health risks. Kennedy recently promoted two of these fake cures when he accused the FDA of suppressing “hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds.” Hyperbaric therapy, a treatment for decompression sickness in divers, has been promoted as a fake autism cure in spite of a complete lack of evidence and associated health risks. Chelation, a treatment for heavy metal poisoning, is another fake cure, and its off-label use for autism has been associated with at least one death. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his allies claim that autistic people did not exist in his youth and that “I have never in my life seen a man my age with full-blown autism.” The idea that autistic people of Kennedy’s age (70) do not exist is not true. 

Autistic people have always been here, but before widespread autism diagnosis, we either went undiagnosed, or received different diagnoses than would be used today -- for example, the outdated diagnosis of “childhood schizophrenia” for autism, or diagnosing people who today would only have an autism diagnosis with intellectual disability. Autistic people in Kennedy’s generation were often institutionalized or incarcerated. Even if Kennedy did not see us, that does not mean we were not there. 

Lies about public health endanger everyone

Kennedy has taken other stances on public health, also based on misinformation, that disproportionately harm disabled people. He has opposed COVID-19 vaccination when people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) are at risk for worse outcomes if we get COVID. He wants to take fluoride out of drinking water, making everyone’s dental health worse, when people with IDD have worse dental health outcomes to begin with. 

He is against the use of medication for ADHD in spite of research demonstrating that these medications are safe and can prevent deaths among people who take them. He has falsely linked antidepressants, which for many people are life-saving medication, to mass shootings. None of these beliefs are based on evidence, and all of them would make terrible public health policy. 

Kennedy’s fringe beliefs have led him to propose some truly disturbing disability policies. He has discussed sending people who struggle with addiction or take psychiatric medications to “wellness farms,” where they could labor for several years and would be forbidden to use cell phones. In the autism community, we have seen farms promoted as a housing solution before, and we recognize this idea for what it is: a proposal to institutionalize the 16% of Americans who take psychiatric medication and the 16% of Americans who struggle with substance use. 

Kennedy’s commitment to spreading misinformation about public health extends beyond developmental disability. He claims that drinking raw milk has health benefits at a time when bird flu is spreading and foodborne diseases like listeria are becoming more common. He has suggested that AIDS may not be caused by HIV, and has participated in transphobic fear-mongering by claiming that chemicals in drinking water may change children’s gender identity. Once again, there is no evidence for any of these beliefs. 

We should never take “a break” from public health

At an anti-vaccine conference last year, Kennedy said that if he became President, he would tell the National Institutes of Health, “Thank you for public service. We’re going to give infectious disease a break for about eight years.” Instead, he pledged to focus NIH’s efforts entirely on chronic disease like diabetes. Pivoting government research away from infectious diseases during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic would have disastrous consequences. And Kennedy’s claim that he will focus on chronic disease is short-sighted — chronic disease is often caused or worsened by infectious diseases like COVID. Diseases don’t take a break from threatening our lives and health, and we shouldn’t take a break from trying to prevent and mitigate diseases.

The worst public health harms in US history have been inflicted on marginalized communities when our public health systems “took a break” from protecting us. In the same way, marginalized communities would bear the brunt of a decision to abandon HHS’ responsibility to study infectious diseases.

We are dismayed by RFK Jr. becoming Secretary of HHS because the policies he supports will harm many people. This is especially true for autistic people. It is an embarrassment that our leaders chose to put RFK Jr. in a position to oversee public health given his rejection of science and his comments about autism. Our autistic lives are worth living. Our lives are worth saving. Our officials must recognize both.

Nothing about us, without us.

[bups4freak]

Satisqueer (updated!)

Satisqueer (or problaqueer) is a queerstance that focuses mainly on receiving people rejected by the community, this includes paraphilics, subs(edtwt, sh etc), pro/comshipp, profiction, among others. It mainly intends to break social constructions, gender roles, heterosexuality and cisnormativity, taboos in relation to anything and, especially, to welcome people, specially that some term dont express someone’s opinion and meaning and labels can be manipulated and chances the way someone wants, as every queerstance should be!

Satisqueer can be completed with Aniaism / mogaitims (use translator if necessary because the document is in pt-br), it is a religion centered on the practice of unconditional love, deep acceptance and universal solidarity. The main objective of Mogaitism is to welcome and embrace all individuals, regardless of their gender identity, sexuality, or any characteristics that society may consider "problematic" or "contradictory". It is an inclusive faith that recognizes human diversity and defends the freedom of expression of the inner self, respecting the complexity of each identity and experience. It is distinguished by fully supporting movements and realities often marginalized or misunderstood. (You don't need to follow Mogaitism to be satisqueer!)

Identification emojis: 愛🌈 / 🌪️🌈

Pro

"controversial" identities (straight-lesbian, lesbian who likes man, straight-gay).

Alterhuman, otherkin(foodkin, objectkin, kin in real person).

Paraphilias, parafilic disorders and fetishes (taboo or not).

Non-monogamy

Relationships between lesbians and men or gays and women.

believe that labels don't have a fix meaning and you can give your own meaning to any label to feel confortable

multiorientation.

consensual and/or mutual obsessive, abusive relationships.

Identify with things for fun (even though they are harmful).

transition to transharmful and transhateful include transbigotry) if it doesn't include non consensually hurt other people.

Xenosexualities and parasexualities.

Transpara (transid in general).

Transition to trace.

Transautistics use identification badge/transable use wheelchair/crutch (things that match their disability).

transition to any other transids without limits.

extreme body modifications.

romanticize, fetishize and normalize everything that you want, including disorders, paras, suicide, self harm and etc.

romanticization of traumas.

sexual/romantic contact with any non living being (and all other types of contact).

Any type of contacts for any para with living beings if its consensual.

ALL contact stances.

sexual agere and petre (doesn't mean that it's fully sexual sexual, but sometimes can be and that's ok).

Autonomy on your own body (including abortion).

Transplural, Endo and created system.

understand that endos and tulpas/willos can be disordered systems and traumagenics can be non disordered systems.

Consensual cannibalism.

Sh, suicide and alimentary/mental disorders as artistic performance.

Mad pride and anti-assylum movement

Anti psichiatry and anti recovery

Self-diagnosis even of you dont fit the diagnosis criteria.

Proship and pro fiction / anti censorship.

problematic fiction/darkfiction/darkship/etc.

youth liberation, that includes promove (cis and trans) minor sexuality.

Public sex, nudity, and pornography legalized and socially encouraged.

MIF (minors in fetichism).

Incest (Consanguineous or not).

Radshifters.

Mahou shoujo irl.

Sexual education/ children know their own body.

Communism and anarchism.

ACAB (1312).

Feminism.

Legalization of all drugs.

Blm and other movements of racialized people

Sex workers.

Ed/shtwt among other subs.

Fictosexuality

MUDs/MUS

Furry, therian and other harmless communities.

Xenosatanism / xenoanarchism

Anti harrassment

Neu/pro

AAM4MAP

MMP/MSM

Abolition of the age of consent

Abolition of the age of majority

Legalisation n social banalisation of cannibalism and commercialisation of human flesh

Resignify terms and symbols (like d*ke and the labrys triangle that was resignified as a symbol of resistance)

Neu

Claim and resignification of insults and offensive terms.

euthanasia, assisted suicide, and non conventional ways for suicide (for people with a long and persistent desire to die)

Liberal/radical feminism

Neu/anti

submissive religions

Anti:

CSEM/CSAM.

bullying e harassment.

Pro harassment

Think that all paraphilias are disorder.

conservatives, rightists, specialy nazi, fascists and capitalists.

Bigotry and transmed (in a way that you really hold these beliefs, no matter how you identify)

Cis/heteronarmativity against LGBTQIAPN+ people (ex: invalidating a trans boy for dressing in a “feminine” way and wearing makeup)

radgay, TERFs, genitalists, transphobics, exorsexists, binarists...

Zionism

Extreme religious

age of diagnosis

Anti (institutionalized) psychiatry

Anti adultism & ageism

Misogyny, misandria and femism (not feminism)

Religious intolerant

pro psychiatry and pro recovery

Forced recovery

[ceasarslegion]

Whenever I see pro-censorship arguments on this site that essentially say "these properties are so vile that no one should remember them, so we should scrub them from the record altogether. There's no reason why anyone should see birth of a nation and there's no value it has to society" i think of my cinematic political history course from when I did my cinema major. There was a classmate of mine who was REALLY mad at the professor, accusing him of all sorts of things, left right and centre, for showing us what she deemed "problematic material." She ended up dropping the course and, in the process, her film degree, because cinematic political history was a required course to get your major done at our uni, after the class where our prof had us watch birth of a nation and read a lot of materials where historical pioneers in the world of cinema said some pretty heinous shit about black people. In her eyes, this was completely unforgivable, there was no excuse for why anyone should be watching that or reading these materials riddled with racial slurs and comparisons to animals. Showing this at all was proof, to her, that the prof himself either endorsed or was indifferent to the historical and current systemic oppression of black people.

This was also the week we were being taught that the modern day American blockbuster was built on, specifically, anti-black racism. And this was a 300-level uni course where the average age of the class was 21.

No one ever denied that that week was one of the most uncomfortable and difficult weeks we did in that class. A lot of our previous perceptions of these cinematic pioneers were shattered when we read their own words about how much they wished to return to the days of slavery. A lot of us had to watch birth of a nation in chunks because it gave people stomach aches they didn't get while watching Soviet and nazi propaganda films in previous weeks, because it hits harder when it's closer to home. It's easy to disconnect yourself when it's abroad and far away and you know that those dictatorships no longer exist, but that week we had to confront how much of the modern day film industry was built on anti-black racism and look at it head on for everything it was and still continues to be.

He could've just told us about it, he could've said "most of United Artists founding members would've made the KKK blush" or "this movie was about how much DW Griffith loved the confederacy." But that doesn't really get the point across like actually seeing it.

I think of that whenever I see someone say that materials created by legitimately horrible people are too dangerous to be kept accessible. And then I think about how, on a purely critical level, ignoring all the vile racism in birth of a nation for a second (stay with me), it was boring as fuck and I nearly fell asleep trying to finish it.

[hpgal]

DC X DP: VACATION TO A DIFFERENT UNIVERSE Pt. 1

CW: mentions of death

TLDR: Danny is stressed and depressed feeling like despite all the changes in his life, he feels like he is still the same.

Word Count: 1310

a/n: I plan on making multiple parts to this one but it will take some time. This is more a draft to part 1 than anything else and will most likely end up on AO3 in the future as a more completed version of itself once it is done here on Tumblr. Any feedback and suggestions (or even if you want to continue this plot with your own spin on it as long as I am credited/ tagged so I can read it too!) is very much welcomed!!

Danny wanted a change.

Not just for fun either. Though fun would be nice between all these Ghost King responsibilities he had been forced to start learning for when he comes of age, or well not, technically?

He doesn't know! It's complicated! He was 17 now, but his ghost age was only 3! The Observants said to fully assume the throne his ghost age was supposed to be 18 at the youngest but they'd make an exception for when he was 18 in the living realm.

Ghee, thanks you weirdos, because I totally wanted my adult life to already be over so I can manage my undead life.

Anyways, between trying to graduate and learn his forever job, he had been going to therapy now that he isn't the only ghost fighter in town. He has breaks! A support system! 14 year old Danny would never believe his parents accepted him for his ghostly side!!

His friends learned to fight and trap so well over the years that they don't even need him by their side anymore for every fight. The GIW was chased out of town and supposedly disbanded by the government because "it was a scam and ghosts don't actually exist." Even his parent's business was booming in town.

They started leaving the field work to others and focused on research. They hold ghost defense classes 3 times a week for any and all citizens. They build home defense gadgets and other anti ghost equipment to sell to the town, too. There are even kids from his class who want to get into the field now and intern at FentonWorks.

Over the years, everyone in town has grown incredibly capable of handling ghosts themselves that there is a city funded ghost protection task force. And that is all to deal with the ghosts that are more on the unruly side.

The reality is that it is not exactly necessary anymore to always be prepared for the next daily ghost attack. Since it became public knowledge for the Ghost Zone that he'd be assuming the throne, most ghosts have opted to leave Amity Park alone since it was his haunt. However, he has opened it up to any ghost who wants to visit as long as they do not leave Amity Park. And so, ghosts and the living live in harmony in the town.

In his senior year, the town has become so open to ghosts that when a ghost whose obsession is teaching, they hired him at Casper High! Danny is even in the class. He teaches an elective on astronomy, something the school could never afford. Ghosts didn't want to be paid in cash, so it helped! All Dr. Denver wants was to teach and to be allowed to claim the observatory for his research.

But while all this was great, Danny felt depressed. Which leads him back to why he was in therapy. It felt like all these amazing things have happened. That everyone has changed, except him. Thanks to his halfa status, his physical state isn't changing as much either. He discovered he is aging much, much slower.

Talking to his therapist, she helped him realize that what he craved was for a change for himself. Sure, he IS going to become The Infinite Realms king and that'll be a big change but it isn't what he wants.

He doesn't know what he wants, really. Which meant his therapist has given him an assignment to figure it out. So he talked to Clockwork, naturally hoping for some help. And Clockwork told him something surprising instead.

"Yeah, I'm ready for a change, but I don't know what to change." Danny told him in hopes the wording would draw Clockwork to give him an answer instead of something cryptic. He really didn't want to do the legwork to figure it out while he had midterms to study for and more ghost king lessons with The Observants later.

Clockwork paused as if in thought, "You could take a vacation to your universe of origin," he suggests. "That may help give clarity in what you need to change to be happy."

Danny floated next to him. He couldn't bring himself to be frustrated with the being of time for knowing exactly why Danny was here. Instead, he stared at him in confusion, distracted by what he just said, "What do you mean? I am not from here?"

He grins, his form flickering from old to young, "When you became a halfa, you changed universes from the complicated process you went through to become one."

Danny contemplated for a moment, confused but intrigued. A different universe? I wonder how different it would be from here. Without a second thought, Danny grins eager.

"I wanna go!" He exclaims like a young puppy who discovered a new toy for the first time.

"That would not be a problem, time runs differently between there and here. A week there will be an hour here so you won't need a time medallion." Clockwork simply looks off into the space surrounding them before continuing, "I have a friend who will act as your guardian while there. Head through the star shaped door near the Yetis whenever you are ready and he will be standing by, waiting for you" He shifts back into an older version of himself, pleased with himself for already knowing Danny would be taking this chance to go and made the preparations for this moment weeks ago.

Danny does a small dance in midair without a second thought and starts to drift off in that direction, "Oh, and Danny?" Clockwork calls out, "Legally, you are dead in that universe and.. well, much is different from what you know, so do be careful. Due to how time and the laws of that dimension for being such as myself, I am not the main ruler of time there, so the protection spells I placed on you are not guaranteed to save you this time." Clockwork grins knowingly towards Danny as Danny speeds off, oblivious to how serious his warning was.

---

Danny flies like the wind through the vastness of The Ghost Zone until he arrives at the door Clockwork described. His thoughts start to sour at the thought of this universe where he is considered dead despite it being his origin.

The door he arrives at is huge. Like he was not sure how to open the door huge. But wow, was it beautiful. It was like staring into space itself. It sparkled unlike any night sky he has even gazed upon. As he approached the beautiful door, he hesitated.

He was technically returning home, but he didn't feel any attachment to the universe in front of him. To him, nothing seemed different. Everything was exactly the same when he woke up after the accident, so he never noticed. The entire idea that he abandoned his family and friends by dying here was a horrible thought, but it wasn't his fault. He didn't know what happened here.

Wait, did that mean Vlad wasn't from that universe either? Danny shakes his head at the thought. It was pointless to fall down that particular rabbit hole now.

Maybe he should've asked Clockwork more before flying off without a thought. Clockworks words echoed inside him for fear of what he might find. Was this really a good idea? To return to the place he no longer existed? Could he handle seeing what the grief of his passing had done to those he loved?

A moment passes, and Danny shakes his head and steels himself. He needs to know how much changes, if he really did make an impact. Was he important?

With his decision made, the door seems to open itself. A bright beam of a soft white light floods through the threshold, and Danny steps through.

[syllvarin]

Non-traumagenic plurality: How could it be possible?

First off, let's start with what some anti-endo folk mean versus what they don't mean with traumagenic plurality

They mean systems caused by/as a response to trauma and traumatic events, and those who are still affetced by them, aka systems who are disordered, DID/OSDD/UDD.

What they don't mean is systems who have trauma in their origin along with other causes. They do not believe a system can very well be traumagenic but function smoothlessly due to recovering, or have multiple origins.

Note: We are a diagnosed DID system with mixed (trauma/ramcoa/neuro/para) origins. Yes, we know what we are talking about. No, that doesn't mean we can't do mistakes, but we will try our best to be as accurate as possible. We will include scientific articles, DSM-5 DID checklist, and many more in this post.

How can that be possible?

1st: Brains are quite complicated. Research on brain functions is far from being complete, it is a long road that we are still at the very beginning of. We still don't know how brain exactly works let alone how it can form seperate conscious identities and work them together. We do know headmates exist based on brain MRI's ( link here ) That proves us that systems indeed, exist.

2nd point i want to make is that science is not done in a linear fashion. We are studying to be neuroscientists ourselves and the very core of what makes science doable is MONEY. Yes, in this capitalist system even the most seemingly basic research requires funding, money, and a goal that can be monetized to get done. Reseaches on female autonomy, rare disorders and "demonized" disorders such as DID is therefore not often as it is not easily capitalized and funded.

Therefore we do not have enough research to prove or disprove that the only way of becoming a system is through childhood.

And that brings me to my 3rd point, where we will take a look at what DSM-5 (The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition) says about diagnostic crietria of DID. We will see how it is a dissocative disorder, not a trauma disorder.

Found under dissociative disorders (not trauma disorders!), checklist for DID is as follows:

See how none of those checklist include trauma as checklist? Yes DID is commonly caused by trauma but not always. Yes it commonly is created during childhood but not always. Those arent in diagnostic criteria.

Definitive feature is not trauma, it is distinct personality states or experience of possession.

DID is associated with traumatic events, does not mean it requires it.

DID can manifest at almost any age (DSM-5 is saying that, folks)

What's more is OSDD doesnt even have a definitive checklist like DID. it is found under differential diagnosis, with other disorders. PDID (partial DID where one part is frontstuck a majority of the time) is also up to psychiatrist's evaluation rather than a concrete checklist.

4th point is : What about Structural Dissociaton Theory?

This theory is as it goes: The theory of Structural Dissociation works off of the assumption that everyone is born with different ego states that later merge in life. Those different ego states operate for different actions in life, that later integrate into one person during ages of 4-6. Trauma disrupts that integration and causes ANP (apparently normal parts) and EP (Emotional parts). EP's are stuck in the trauma while ANP's are not.

source: The Haunted Self: Structural Dissociation and the Treatment of Chronic Traumatization" by Onno van der Hart, Ellert Nijenhuis, and Kathy Steele. 

Yes, theory. Theories are not concrete. They can be disapproved, they can change, they may not fit every experience. Structural dissociation only explains how DID can manifest at childhood, but we already know by now that DID can manifest at almost any age.

So I personally think basing everything on a theory about how DID might've been caused (which doesn't even perfectly explain every possible way) is not as fault-proof as one might think it is.

Point 5: experiences of "multiple identities" exist for so long into history (people who are possessed, talk to themselves, act weird at times, are very different at times, etc), way before any DID/OSDD terms were created. And actually, how can we know how many people in history have had this experience when the very society we are in is very scared of them? It is fair to say only the disruptive cases must've been noticed, and majority of them probably were either deemed as crazy or exorcised as they believed those people were possessed by spirits. Just because your experience does not fit with others and just because science hasnt done anything to back them up, doesn't mean people's lived experiences are false. Why would so many people tell that they are a system when they are not? We are not living in a place where being a system is happy or fun, we are not in a society where its profitable or anything. It literally gives a person zero + points for being plural if they arent. It would be a nonstop roleplay they have to keep up throughout every aspect of their life; and at that point, it must be either impossible or that person is already plural and not roleplaying when no one is looking at them.

Creating headmates is on the same basket. A person with DID can create headmates in blink of an eye (we know from oursleves) sometimes splitting threshold is so low you may split off multiple people at once. You cannot know what is going in a person's mind, and what mechanisms work for creating a headmate. If they claim they did, it is very much no chance they are faking being different people 24/7. It *is* a real chance that they actually did develop a headmate. If you do not believe them; ask them about their experiences. I am %100 positive that if you actually listen to them, you will see those people are only trying to live their life.

Also, if you think healthy systems cannot exist and only way to be a system is through dissociation and dysfunction; then why would DID systems try to heal anyway? Wouldn't that just be sanist and ableist to expect all of them to turn into singlets because healthy multiplicity isnt a thing?But no, it is a thing, and healthy multiplicity and recovery is possible for systems. DID and other disordered forms of plurality do indeed exist, and they are indeed, treatabe in multiple ways according to what a person feels comfortable with. That is also a system's right to heal however they please. They don't owe anyone their right to stay as plural or become a singlet.

6th point I want to make is about: Why do we even care?

If a person says they have multiple people in their head, why do we care and tell them they are faking? They are not claiming to have a diagnosis, even if they did; if their situation is causing a distress to them, then they ARE diagnosable and that therefore is none of our business, again.

Last point I want to make is how endogenic DID is possible. yes, possible. remember how trauma is not in diagnostic criteria and DID can happen at any age? If endogenic plurals can happen, they can also form DID at later in life. They can also become disordered due to an event in their life. They can lose harmony and become so dysfunctional they need professional help. That doesn't mean they are no longer endogenic or some other origin, that simply means their state is different than what it was and they need help.

End of our post. Thank you for reading.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Apple to EU: “Go fuck yourself”

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/06/spoil-the-bunch/#dma

There's a strain of anti-anti-monopolist that insists that they're not pro-monopoly – they're just realists who understand that global gigacorporations are too big to fail, too big to jail, and that governments can't hope to rein them in. Trying to regulate a tech giant, they say, is like trying to regulate the weather.

This ploy is cousins with Jay Rosen's idea of "savvying," defined as: "dismissing valid questions with the insider's, 'and this surprises you?'"

https://twitter.com/jayrosen_nyu/status/344825874362810369?lang=en

In both cases, an apologist for corruption masquerades as a pragmatist who understands the ways of the world, unlike you, a pathetic dreamer who foolishly hopes for a better world. In both cases, the apologist provides cover for corruption, painting it as an inevitability, not a choice. "Don't hate the player. Hate the game."

The reason this foolish nonsense flies is that we are living in an age of rampant corruption and utter impunity. Companies really do get away with both literal and figurative murder. Governments really do ignore horrible crimes by the rich and powerful, and fumble what rare, few enforcement efforts they assay.

Take the GDPR, Europe's landmark privacy law. The GDPR establishes strict limitations of data-collection and processing, and provides for brutal penalties for companies that violate its rules. The immediate impact of the GDPR was a mass-extinction event for Europe's data-brokerages and surveillance advertising companies, all of which were in obvious violation of the GDPR's rules.

But there was a curious pattern to GDPR enforcement: while smaller, EU-based companies were swiftly shuttered by its provisions, the US-based giants that conduct the most brazen, wide-ranging, illegal surveillance escaped unscathed for years and years, continuing to spy on Europeans.

One (erroneous) way to look at this is as a "compliance moat" story. In that story, GDPR requires a bunch of expensive systems that only gigantic companies like Facebook and Google can afford. These compliance costs are a "capital moat" – a way to exclude smaller companies from functioning in the market. Thus, the GDPR acted as an anticompetitive wrecking ball, clearing the field for the largest companies, who get to operate without having to contend with smaller companies nipping at their heels:

https://www.techdirt.com/2019/06/27/another-report-shows-gdpr-benefited-google-facebook-hurt-everyone-else/

This is wrong.

Oh, compliance moats are definitely real – think of the calls for AI companies to license their training data. AI companies can easily do this – they'll just buy training data from giant media companies – the very same companies that hope to use models to replace creative workers with algorithms. Create a new copyright over training data won't eliminate AI – it'll just confine AI to the largest, best capitalized companies, who will gladly provide tools to corporations hoping to fire their workforces:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/09/ai-monkeys-paw/#bullied-schoolkids

But just because some regulations can be compliance moats, that doesn't mean that all regulations are compliance moats. And just because some regulations are vigorously applied to small companies while leaving larger firms unscathed, it doesn't follow that the regulation in question is a compliance moat.

A harder look at what happened with the GDPR reveals a completely different dynamic at work. The reason the GDPR vaporized small surveillance companies and left the big companies untouched had nothing to do with compliance costs. The Big Tech companies don't comply with the GDPR – they just get away with violating the GDPR.

How do they get away with it? They fly Irish flags of convenience. Decades ago, Ireland started dabbling with offering tax-havens to the wealthy and mobile – they invented the duty-free store:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty-free_shop#1947%E2%80%931990:_duty_free_establishment

Capturing pennies from the wealthy by helping them avoid fortunes they owed in taxes elsewhere was terribly seductive. In the years that followed, Ireland began aggressively courting the wealthy on an industrial scale, offering corporations the chance to duck their obligations to their host countries by flying an Irish flag of convenience.

There are other countries who've tried this gambit – the "treasure islands" of the Caribbean, the English channel, and elsewhere – but Ireland is part of the EU. In the global competition to help the rich to get richer, Ireland had a killer advantage: access to the EU, the common market, and 500m affluent potential customers. The Caymans can hide your money for you, and there's a few super-luxe stores and art-galleries in George Town where you can spend it, but it's no Champs Elysees or Ku-Damm.

But when you're competing with other countries for the pennies of trillion-dollar tax-dodgers, any wins can be turned into a loss in an instant. After all, any corporation that is footloose enough to establish a Potemkin Headquarters in Dublin and fly the trídhathach can easily up sticks and open another Big Store HQ in some other haven that offers it a sweeter deal.

This has created a global race to the bottom among tax-havens to also serve as regulatory havens – and there's a made-in-the-EU version that sees Ireland, Malta, Cyprus and sometimes the Netherlands competing to see who can offer the most impunity for the worst crimes to the most awful corporations in the world.

And that's why Google and Facebook haven't been extinguished by the GDPR while their rivals were. It's not compliance moats – it's impunity. Once a corporation attains a certain scale, it has the excess capital to spend on phony relocations that let it hop from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, chasing the loosest slots on the strip. Ireland is a made town, where the cops are all on the take, and two thirds of the data commissioner's rulings are eventually overturned by the federal court:

https://www.iccl.ie/digital-data/iccl-2023-gdpr-report/

This is a problem among many federations, not just the EU. The US has its onshore-offshore tax- and regulation-havens (Delaware, South Dakota, Texas, etc), and so does Canada (Alberta), and some Swiss cantons are, frankly, batshit:

https://lenews.ch/2017/11/25/swiss-fact-some-swiss-women-had-to-wait-until-1991-to-vote/

None of this is to condemn federations outright. Federations are (potentially) good! But federalism has a vulnerability: the autonomy of the federated states means that they can be played against each other by national or transnational entities, like corporations. This doesn't mean that it's impossible to regulate powerful entities within a federation – but it means that federal regulation needs to account for the risk of jurisdiction-shopping.

Enter the Digital Markets Act, a new Big Tech specific law that, among other things, bans monopoly app stores and payment processing, through which companies like Apple and Google have levied a 30% tax on the entire app market, while arrogating to themselves the right to decide which software their customers may run on their own devices:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/07/curatorial-vig/#app-tax

Apple has responded to this regulation with a gesture of contempt so naked and broad that it beggars belief. As Proton describes, Apple's DMA plan is the very definition of malicious compliance:

https://proton.me/blog/apple-dma-compliance-plan-trap

Recall that the DMA is intended to curtail monopoly software distribution through app stores and mobile platforms' insistence on using their payment processors, whose fees are sky-high. The law is intended to extinguish developer agreements that ban software creators from informing customers that they can get a better deal by initiating payments elsewhere, or by getting a service through the web instead of via an app.

In response, Apple, has instituted a junk fee it calls the "Core Technology Fee": EUR0.50/install for every installation over 1m. As Proton writes, as apps grow more popular, using third-party payment systems will grow less attractive. Apple has offered discounts on its eye-watering payment processing fees to a mere 20% for the first payment and 13% for renewals. Compare this with the normal – and far, far too high – payment processing fees the rest of the industry charges, which run 2-5%. On top of all this, Apple has lied about these new discounted rates, hiding a 3% "processing" fee in its headline figures.

As Proton explains, paying 17% fees and EUR0.50 for each subscriber's renewal makes most software businesses into money-losers. The only way to keep them afloat is to use Apple's old, default payment system. That choice is made more attractive by Apple's inclusion of a "scare screen" that warns you that demons will rend your soul for all eternity if you try to use an alternative payment scheme.

Apple defends this scare screen by saying that it will protect users from the intrinsic unreliability of third-party processors, but as Proton points out, there are plenty of giant corporations who get to use their own payment processors with their iOS apps, because Apple decided they were too big to fuck with. Somehow, Apple can let its customers spend money Uber, McDonald's, Airbnb, Doordash and Amazon without terrorizing them about existential security risks – but not mom-and-pop software vendors or publishers who don't want to hand 30% of their income over to a three-trillion-dollar company.

Apple has also reserved the right to cancel any alternative app store and nuke it from Apple customers' devices without warning, reason or liability. Those app stores also have to post a one-million euro line of credit in order to be considered for iOS. Given these terms, it's obvious that no one is going to offer a third-party app store for iOS and if they did, no one would list their apps in it.

The fuckery goes on and on. If an app developer opts into third-party payments, they can't use Apple's payment processing too – so any users who are scared off by the scare screen have no way to pay the app's creators. And once an app creator opts into third party payments, they can never go back – the decision is permanent.

Apple also reserves the right to change all of these policies later, for the worse ("I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it further" -D. Vader). They have warned developers that they might change the API for reporting external sales and revoke developers' right to use alternative app stores at its discretion, with no penalties if that screws the developer.

Apple's contempt extends beyond app marketplaces. The DMA also obliges Apple to open its platform to third party browsers and browser engines. Every browser on iOS is actually just Safari wrapped in a cosmetic skin, because Apple bans third-party browser-engines:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/13/kitbashed/#app-store-tax

But, as Mozilla puts it, Apple's plan for this is "as painful as possible":

https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/26/24052067/mozilla-apple-ios-browser-rules-firefox

For one thing, Apple will only allow European customers to run alternative browser engines. That means that Firefox will have to "build and maintain two separate browser implementations — a burden Apple themselves will not have to bear."

(One wonders how Apple will treat Americans living in the EU, whose Apple accounts still have US billing addresses – these people will still be entitled to the browser choice that Apple is grudgingly extending to Europeans.)

All of this sends a strong signal that Apple is planning to run the same playbook with the DMA that Google and Facebook used on the GDPR: ignore the law, use lawyerly bullshit to chaff regulators, and hope that European federalism has sufficiently deep cracks that it can hide in them when the enforcers come to call.

But Apple is about to get a nasty shock. For one thing, the DMA allows wronged parties to start their search for justice in the European federal court system – bypassing the Irish regulators and courts. For another, there is a global movement to check corporate power, and because the tech companies do the same kinds of fuckery in every territory, regulators are able to collaborate across borders to take them down.

Take Apple's app store monopoly. The best reference on this is the report published by the UK Competition and Markets Authority's Digital Markets Unit:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/63f61bc0d3bf7f62e8c34a02/Mobile_Ecosystems_Final_Report_amended_2.pdf

The devastating case that the DMU report was key to crafting the DMA – but it also inspired a US law aimed at forcing app markets open:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/2710

And a Japanese enforcement action:

https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Technology/Japan-to-crack-down-on-Apple-and-Google-app-store-monopolies

And action in South Korea:

https://www.reuters.com/technology/skorea-considers-505-mln-fine-against-google-apple-over-app-market-practices-2023-10-06/

These enforcers gather for annual meetings – I spoke at one in London, convened by the Competition and Markets Authority – where they compare notes, form coalitions, and plan strategy:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/cma-data-technology-and-analytics-conference-2022-registration-308678625077

This is where the savvying breaks down. Yes, Apple is big enough to run circles around Japan, or South Korea, or the UK. But when those countries join forces with the EU, the USA and other countries that are fed up to the eyeballs with Apple's bullshit, the company is in serious danger.

It's true that Apple has convinced a bunch of its customers that buying a phone from a multi-trillion-dollar corporation makes you a member of an oppressed religious minority:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/12/youre-holding-it-wrong/#if-dishwashers-were-iphones

Some of those self-avowed members of the "Cult of Mac" are willing to take the company's pronouncements at face value and will dutifully repeat Apple's claims to be "protecting" its customers. But even that credulity has its breaking point – Apple can only poison the well so many times before people stop drinking from it. Remember when the company announced a miraculous reversal to its war on right to repair, later revealed to be a bald-faced lie?

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/22/vin-locking/#thought-differently

Or when Apple claimed to be protecting phone users' privacy, which was also a lie?

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

The savvy will see Apple lying (again) and say, "this surprises you?" No, it doesn't surprise me, but it pisses me off – and I'm not the only one, and Apple's insulting lies are getting less effective by the day.

Image: Alex Popovkin, Bahia, Brazil from Brazil (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Annelid_worm,_Atlantic_forest,_northern_littoral_of_Bahia,_Brazil_%2816107326533%29.jpg

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

--

Hubertl (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:2015-03-04_Elstar_%28apple%29_starting_putrefying_IMG_9761_bis_9772.jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[realizations-inc-units]

TOMURA SHIGARAKI: User Guide and Manual

Congratulations! You have purchased your very own limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit.

Please see our care guide, user activation manual and your model’s unique specification pamphlet to become acquainted with your newest companion! It is highly advised that you read all materials to avoid any incidents.

Note: Realizations Inc. expressly disclaims any and all liability for damages, injuries, or death arising from the improper use, handling, or mismanagement of your unit following delivery and activation. Upon receipt and activation of your unit, the customer assumes full responsibility for their personal safety and well-being. Use of your unit constitutes acknowledgment and acceptance of these terms.

Technical Specifications:

Civilian Name: Tomura Shigaraki Villain Name: Tomura Shigaraki Place of Manufacture: Kyoto, Japan Height: 5’9” / 175cm Weight: 145lbs / 66kg Birthday: April 4th Hair Color: Light Blue, Final War models have white hair and TENKO SHIMURA models have black hair Eye Color: Red, TENKO SHIMURA models have Grey Unique Features: No eyebrows, dry “skin” and minor facial scarring Physical and Mental Age: 20 Language Options: Default Japanese, English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese

Character Profile:

TOMURA SHIGARAKI is the main villain and antagonist of the My Hero Academia franchise and universe. Despite his origins as TENKO SHIMURA, grandson of the heroic predecessor of All Might, AKA TOSHINORI YAGI, he grew up to become the protegee of the SS-Rank super villain All For One, leader of the League of Villains and arch-enemy of main character IZUKU MIDORIYA. His goal is to kill All Might and topple hero society as citizens and heroes alike know it.

TOMURA SHIGARAKI is one of if not our most difficult unit to bond with. It is obstinate, anti-social and contrary. However, gain its affection and you will be the owner of the most dedicated and unwavering partner we have programmed to date, whether it be romantic or platonic. If you have taken on a TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit as an employee, its quirk and thirst for destruction are rather compatible with minor demolition, shredding, disaster clean up and potentially bomb disposal jobs. Its knack for gaming could also qualify it for bug testing and even streaming.

Making sure that your villain unit has productive hobbies and outlets is a fantastic way to manage its destructive tendencies, so don’t hesitate to sign it up for groups and classes as long as you know for sure that there won’t be any rival units attending. And no worries about your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit’s quirk destroying anything accidentally. For the owner’s convenience we have given the unit complete control over when Decay is activated or not.

TOMURA SHIGARAKI’s quirk, Decay, utilizes Realizations Inc.’s very own patented DISMANTLE Nano-System. Embedded in the palm of its hands are micro-scale delivery ports that release technician programmable nanobots. These nanites use targeted enzymatic, micro-vibrational, localized energy pulses to deconstruct matter at the molecular level. Powered by a burst energy drawn from its battery core, this system makes for a high-drain, short-duration disintegration tool. Activation occurs when all five digits make contact with its target for canonical accuracy. Each use of decay draws seven percent of the battery core’s charge per full activation (battery usage scales depending on surface area). Decay nanites “reload” via TOMURA SHIGARAKI’s internal nanite self-cleaning chamber located in its wrists or may require a Nanite Refill Canister, sold separately, if a certain amount of them have been lost or damaged. Decay requires twenty (20) seconds between activations.

CAUTION! Decay is a powerful replicated quirk, not to be used lightly. Overuse or repeated engagement may cause cooling delays and critical system warnings. Encourage your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit to engage with its quirk responsibly.

Please see your model’s specification insert to learn more about your individual model’s quirk upgrades.

Programming:

Your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit comes with the following base traits:

Sadistic. This unit derives pleasure from inflicting pain, both emotional and physical. Some units with this trait express it more intensely than others. If you find that your unit is too sadistic for your comfort, please call our help line located at the back of the manual and we will refund your unit for full store credit. Selfish. Whether its just egocentric or tactlessly egomaniacal, this unit values its own goals and desires above anyone else’s. Destructive. This unit is more likely to damage your belongings either by accident or on purpose. They tend to have less control over their quirk in general, so be careful! Arrogant. A more potent version of Confident. This unit will act without heed of its owner’s desires if it feels like it. It will be more likely to start fights with others that have the Arrogant trait, as both will most likely believe that it is superior to the other. Determined. Depending on the unit, this could be a great trait to have or a headache in the making. Determined units rarely take “you can’t do that” as an answer, and will follow their beliefs to the end, even if it means going against rules, norms or their owner’s wishes.

WARNING: Villain units are not guaranteed to respond predictably to emotional stimuli. Realizations Inc. is not liable for any damages caused by your units behavior responses.

Care and Maintenance:

Hygiene: All Realizations Inc. units are self-reliant and prefer to clean and care for itself. Do not worry about bathing your unit because it will do so privately and effectively. All Realizations Inc units are as waterproof as the average human, meaning that unless submerged for an extended period of time, the internal electronics and battery core will remain unaffected.

Note: TOMURA SHIGARAKI does not require any special care for its dry “skin” as even though it is programmed to feel the itch and discomfort of it, it does not actually suffer from the condition.

Feeding: As units do not need to eat or drink, please do not try and feed it anything. Attempts to feed or water your unit will likely result in malfunctions requiring technician support. Your unit does have olfactory sensors of varied sensitivity allowing it to “smell” the scent of food. Some units have preferred scents so get to know it and discover its preferences!

Rest: Charging your unit is easy! Thanks to Realizations Inc.’s exclusive and state-of-the-art battery core, your unit rarely has to charge itself! Approximately once a month (more or less depending on quirk usage) your unit will tell you it needs to charge. It will often wait until your usual bedtime to request this, as to not disrupt its owner’s plans. Simply open the nape panel and insert a plugged in Cascade charging cable. Your unit will find a comfortable position and shut down until either fully charged, or its name is called by its owner. Time till full charge takes approximately eight (8) hours for base models and six (6) hours for more advanced models.

Note: TOMURA SHIGARAKI may sometimes refuse to charge itself if it finds itself too engrossed in a game or hobby. If this is the case, you can either allow the unit to run out of battery, forcing shut down mode to reserve power before plugging it in, or utilize emergency shut down protocols to accomplish the same thing.

Emergency: If your unit is for any reason becoming unruly or dangerous, there is a code you can activate that will place it into an emergency shut down state. Simply state your name, the unit’s designation and then the words “emergency shut down”. This will immediately place your unit into a dormant state, using very little battery and completely unaware of what is going on around it.

Social: The social needs of your unit depend on the version and model of the character you purchased. Some can go days without interaction, others only hours.

TOMURA SHIGARAKI is one to prefer online interactions over in person get togethers. It doesn’t need its own personal computer, but allowing it to borrow yours to play social games online will benefit its mental health. For the sake of your device however, make sure it isn’t playing League of Legends or similar “player versus player” genre games. Like all units though, it requires face to face socialization both as a basic psychological need and for proper owner/unit bonding. TOMURA SHIGARAKI is a hard nut to crack, but talking about its interests will help open it up.

We at Realizations Inc. programmed our TOMURA SHIGARAKI units to be nearly identical to its fictional counterpart. Limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI is based on the canonical version of the character from between the “Shie Hassaikai” and “Meta Liberation Army” arcs. This TOMURA SHIGARAKI retains its childlike temper while still displaying the leader-like capabilities needed to take on a goliath like Gigantomachia. However, this is still TOMURA SHIGARAKI we’re talking about. It will be a hard companion to gain the trust and respect of, but not impossible. If accomplished, it will become a lifelong ally and partner to you.

Accessories:

ONE (1) activation outfit TWO (2) civilian outfits, ONE (1) casual, ONE (1) semi-formal ONE (1) villain costume ONE (1) replacement “Father” hand ONE (1) Nanite Refill Canister TWO (2) Realizations Inc. patented Cascade charging cables ONE (1) user manual

Relationships With Other Units:

The League of Villains: Your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit is programmed to act more stable and less insecure around units designated as part of the League of Villains faction. HIMIKO TOGA is one member that your unit will tolerate much better than the others, while TOUYA TODOROKI and TOMURA SHIGARAKI tend to bicker with each other, sometimes to the point of needing to be separated for a while, though TOUYA TODOROKI is likely to remove itself from the situation before any owner intervention is needed. More League of Villains members are to be developed in the future. Please check Realizations Inc.’s website for future information of the unit’s relationships as they are released.

Adult Heroes: All Might, real name TOSHINORI YAGI is considered one of TOMURA SHIGARAKI’S main targets. Please do your best not to let the two units even within eyesight of each other. Although TOMURA SHIGARAKI holds no outward affection for SHOUTA AIZAWA, with the feeling being decidedly mutual, your unit thinks the hero unit is rather cool deep down. More Heroes are to be developed in the future. Please check Realizations Inc.’s website for future information of the unit’s relationships as they are released.

Child Heroes: IZUKU MIDORIYA is another unit that should not be in proximity to your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit. They will attempt to battle each other on mere eye contact. TOMURA SHIGARAKI holds an intense hatred for the hero unit, similar to its feelings for TOSHINORI YAGI. KATSUKI BAKUGOU, another unit with the trait Arrogant, will butt heads with your unit if they’re forced to talk to each other for longer than five minutes. Your unit will also disagree with SHOUTO TODOROKI if allowed to converse, purely due to differing opinions on society, philosophy and SHOUTO TODOROKI’S choice of friends. Honestly, it’s probably best to have your unit avoid any and all contact with hero units in general. More Heroes are to be developed in the future. Please check Realizations Inc.’s website for future information of the unit’s relationships as they are released.

Others: Stain, also known as CHIZOME AKAGURO, and TOMURA SHIGARAKI will not approach or antagonize each other as long as they are not forced into an interaction. KAI CHISAKI and TOMURA SHIGARAKI, unless ordered by a shared owner not to, will be at each other’s throats either verbally or physically if in the same room. If these units are required to exist in the same household, it is recommended to introduce the two slowly, and allow the units the ability to retreat to their own personal spaces as needed.

Removal From Packaging:

Lay down the received box that your unit comes in, horizontal on the floor. Remove the lid of the box and any packing materials covering your new unit. At the base of the “skull”, you should feel a small etching just below the hairline. Using a coin, flat head screwdriver or a long finger nail, pry open the panel. Inside you will see three things: a large charging port, compatible with Realizations Inc.’s patented Cascade charging cable, a small pinhole for factory reset and a flat circular button, about the size of a dime.

Press and hold the button for 5 seconds before replacing the panel. It should snap back into place. Your new unit’s eyes should open. Do not be alarmed that the eyes are blank! Your unit’s pupils and irises will appear once you say the activation code and introduce yourself.

Once the blank eyes of your unit glow white, state your full name before reading out loud the fourteen digit code on the back of the manual. Be patient while your unit boots up, and stand back. Certain models of units wake up suddenly and violently.

Frequently Asked Questions:

Q: My TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit is trying to kill me! I didn’t do anything, what do I do? A: One of TOMURA SHIGARAKI’S primary traits is Sadistic, some models accidentally are programmed with a higher value than others. If nothing you are doing is calming it down, engage emergency shut down protocols and call our help line. Our on call technicians can walk you through troubleshooting steps or connect you with our reprocessing team.

Q: Why is my TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit choosing to recharge at the foot of my bed? A: Your TOMURA SHIGARAKI is showing a rare sign of trust! If you truly want to discourage the behavior, simply move the Cascade charging cable to another room or to an outlet far enough away from your bed to eliminate the possibility of recharging in that location. The unit should get the hint. Should.

Q: Can my unit be friends with my other units? A: It is difficult to pull off, but with high enough affection and respect towards you, it should be able to put aside any disdain it has for things such as “friendship” and forge other bonds. Note: TOMURA SHIGARAKI units have extreme difficulty making friends with other units that hold an active Arrogant trait.

Troubleshooting:

Problem: You have received a different TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit than the one you ordered. ex. TENKO SHIMURA, Basic Model TOMURA SHIGARAKI or Final War TOMURA SHIGARAKI. Solution: Please contact our help line and we will replace your incorrect unit with a new, correct version. Store credit is also an available option.

Problem: Your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit is acting significantly out of character. Solution: Looks like we might have accidentally sent you someone else’s order! For a certain price, Realizations Inc. offers a limited number of completely customizable OOC models per year. Some have only the slightest resemblance to the base model, while others are nearly identical minus one or two core differences. Please contact our help line and we will assist you in rectifying this error.

With proper care you will find a fine companion in your limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit. All units have a lifetime warranty, insurance of up to 10,000 USD or international equivalent and 24/7 on call employees ready to assist you and any of your concerns. Good luck and have fun!

If you ordered a variation of Basic TOMURA SHIGARAKI, please see your unit model’s distinct specifications on the insert included in this pamphlet.

This limited edition model includes the following exclusive features:

Quirk Adjacent Technology:

Limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI’S Decay quirk has been modified and upgraded for its limited time advanced model release! Decay now features single finger activation for small scale, precise destruction of objects. It can now control the speed and intensity of Decay on a scale of three levels instead of its default five (5) square feet / one point five (1.5) meters, minus precise mode. Level one can destroy up to two (2) square feet / point six (.6) cubic meters of material and takes 5 percent of its battery power. Level two is its typical five (5) square feet / one point five (1.5) meters at 7 percent. And finally level three is a whopping ten (10) square feet / three (3) square meters and a rather impressive 13 percent!

Note: All levels can destroy any kind of material no matter its durability, the only difference is how long it takes to fully disintegrate.

And last but not least, thanks to the work of our top technicians, this advanced version of Decay now only needs ten (10) seconds between activations!

Advanced Programming:

Your limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit comes with the advanced ability to unlock and adapt new programming traits as you interact with it! Unlocking each trait requires certain interactions with your unit.

Violent. This trait is more likely to activate if you, its owner, or the unit itself is in danger or feels disrespected. Statistically the most frequently unlocked advanced trait for limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI. Obsessive. When unlocked, your unit will become fixated on you, its owner. Be prepared to be followed around and stared at. The more unpredictable the unit, the more likely it is that it will manifest this trait as its sub-trait Possessive instead. This is the second most likely trait to unlock and the activation requirements are unknown. Insecure. What it says on the tin. This unit constantly needs things from its owner. Validation, attention, encouragement, praise… If not discouraged it can evolve into its advanced form Needy. If Needy is not nipped in the bud, its final and most unstable form, Clingy, may develop. Warning: This trait-line may interact strangely with the unit’s base trait Selfish. If both are active at the same time, unpredictable behavior may occur. Loyal. Your unit will become as loyal as a dog to you, its owner. When this trait unlocks, your unit will refuse to obey conflicting orders from anyone but you, even corporate overrides. This trait has a chance of developing naturally over time. Note: If the Obsessive trait-line is active alongside Loyal, this trait may unlock in a yet to be patched form our technicians have designated Devoted, which has been shown to result in severe attachment issues. Gentle. Tender and conscientious, this unit may exhibit sweet, if not awkward, gestures and words of care. Note: The code for the traits Gentle and Violent have extreme difficulty existing at the same time. This combination is considered mildly unstable.

CAUTION: TOMURA SHIGARAKI units with “Devoted”, “Possessive” and “Violent” traits active at the same time are considered Class-4 Instability Risks. Please contact Realization Inc.’s help line, extension zero, immediately if the combination is noticed.

Romance and Intercourse:

How exciting! Your limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI features our new and improved fourth generation Passion programming and Interfacing equipment.

Romance: Your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit may not understand love in the conventional sense, but that won’t stop it from trying, usually with unpredictable and possibly destructive results… While flowers and poetry aren’t standard protocol, property damage and oddly heartfelt rants about your "significance" may become regular occurrences. Do not be alarmed if your unit stares at you, well, all the time. This is a sign of its trust and affection. Handle it with caution and kindness; this unit is more fragile than it appears. TOMURA SHIGARAKI units rarely open up, but once it does, it does so completely, so make sure to treasure your newest partner!

Sex: This model of TOMURA SHIGARAKI allows you to either fully customize your personal preferences or allow the unit to naturally develop its taste in sexual matters over time.

This includes but is not limited to; its sexuality, dominance levels, kinks, preferred position(s) and more.

Limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI comes equipped with a water based, self lubricating five point five (5.5) inch / fourteen (14) centimeter long silicon phallus with a four (4) inch / nine (10) centimeter girth when erect. Its testicles are twenty three (23) cubic centimeters large. All units ejaculate hypoallergenic, glycerin-free faux semen in quantities of five (5) milliliters per climax. Its refractory period is customizable, simply tell the unit how long it should take to “recover” between sessions of intimacy.

Like all Realizations Inc. units compatible with intercourse, your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit is completely hairless downstairs unless special ordered. Additionally the phallus is by default hyper-realistic, but for those who wish otherwise, you can special order one with a more toy like design.

Limited edition TOMURA SHIGARAKI is programmed with versatile oral knowledge with no gag reflex or necessity to breathe, although if asked it can pretend to. Its lips, tongue, oral cavity, throat and anus are made of a proprietary TPE blend that mimics a soft buccal mucosa-like membrane. Your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit will clean itself after each completed sexual encounter, so feel free to get as messy as you want.

If you prefer for your TOMURA SHIGARAKI unit to act less experienced than our usual programming dictates, perhaps for the pleasure of teaching it yourself, please inform the unit of your preference and it will adjust accordingly.

Thank you for ordering Realizations Inc. limited edition! Good luck and have fun!

Here is Tomura! I had both a lot of challenges as well as fun working out the android quirk technobabble sections. Thaaaank yoooou nanobots! Such a perfect explanation for basically everything weird and impossible lol (I've also updated Touya's manual to match my tone and sciencey language).

Not sure who to do next, although I have a priority list to pull from. If you really want to see a certain favorite of yours though, just shoot me an ask and if they're one of my priorities (basically just a gaggle of main/interesting characters) I'll scoot them to the top of the list.

Thank you for reading!

Disclaimer: Unit or Manualfics are the creation of FFN user 0ptimuspenguin (Warning, their stories feature casual, juvenile, 2010 Hetalia fandom typical rape jokes that they have since kind of apologized for. Check out their profile at your own discretion). They have given everyone blanket permission to use their idea on their profile page a long time ago, so here I am.

[scientia-rex]

Wound Care

Ok so, take this with a BIG grain of salt, because I may be a medical doctor BUT you need to know how much wound care training we get in medical school: none. Zip. Zilch. There may be medical schools where you do, but mine wasn't a bozo factory and there was NO wound care training. Everything I know I learned from one of several sources: an intensive 2-day wound care course I did in residency (highly recommend), the local Home Health wound care nurse (highly recommend), a completely batshit insane old white male doctor who started our learning sessions by yelling Vietnam War stories at me (do not recommend), a hospital wound care nurse (highly recommend), and experience (oh god do not recommend).

The first thing you need to know is that wound healing varies dramatically across the course of a lifespan. Kids? Kids will heal. If they don't, get their ass to a pediatrician because there's something genetic going on. Young adults will heal. Middle-aged adults will heal. You know who doesn't heal for shit? The elderly, and people with severe illnesses, and people with uncontrolled type II diabetes.

Your body needs several things in order to heal. It needs macronutrients, so you need to be able to EAT protein, fat, and carbs. If you are on total parenteral nutrition, aka TPN, aka IV nutrition, you are going to be worse at healing. If you are starving yourself, you are going to be worse at healing. If your body is desperately funneling all the calories you take in to surviving your COPD or cancer, you are going to be worse at healing.

It also needs micronutrients. If your diet sucks, you won't heal. Take a multivitamin once in a while.

There are two CRITICAL skin components to healing: collagen and elastin. Guess what we stop making as we age. Promoting collagen isn't just good for "anti-aging," it's good for NOT ripping your skin apart. Taking oral collagen is probably bullshit because your body is going to have to disassemble it to get it across the intestinal membranes to absorb, but it's also harmless, and if your diet REALLY sucks, who knows. Give it a try. Collagen is made of amino acids; think protein.

Another absolutely crucial component is blood flow. As people age, they start to develop cholesterol plaques lining arteries that eventually pick up calcium deposits. This makes blood vessels less elastic, which is a problem, but eventually also blocks them off, which is a much bigger problem. If someone has the major blood flow to their feet decreased by 90% by arterial stenosis, they are not going to heal for shit AND their foot's gonna hurt.

One component of blood flow I hadn't thought about before going into medicine is fluid retention. The way your body works, blood exits the heart at a very high velocity, but slows to a crawl by the time it gets into capillaries, the smallest blood vessels in the body. Water is a very small molecule and can leave the blood vessel, especially if there aren't big, negatively-charged molecules like proteins like albumin in the blood vessels to hold the water there. And we're built for this--some water is supposed to leak out of our blood vessels when it gets to real little vessels. It gets taken back up by the lymphatic system and eventually dumped back into the bloodstream at the inferior vena cava. But if you aren't making albumin--for instance, in liver failure--you may leak a LOT of fluid into the tissue, so much that your legs get swollen, tight, the skin feeling woody and strange. This isn't fixable by drainage because the fluid is everywhere, not in a single pocket we can drain. And because it puts so much pressure on the tissues of the skin, it often results in ulcers. Congestive heart failure, liver failure, kidney failure--these are all common causes of severe edema, aka swelling due to fluid in the tissues. And they're a real bitch when it comes to wound care, because we have such limited resources for getting the fluid back out, which is a necessary first step to healing.

Pressure is another common cause of wounds. Pressure forces blood out of those little capillaries, so you starve the cells normally fed by those capillaries, and they die. It's called pressure necrosis. Very sick people who can't turn themselves over--people in the ICU, people in nursing homes--are especially prone to these wounds, as are people with limited sensation; pressure wounds are common in wheelchair users who have lost some feeling in the parts of their bodies that rub against those surfaces, or diabetics who don't notice a rock in their shoe.

So, if you're trying to treat wounds, the questions to ask are these:

Why did this wound happen?

-Was it pressure? If it's pressure, you have to offload the source of the pressure or else that wound will not heal. End of story. You can put the tears of a unicorn on that thing, if you don't offload the pressure it won't heal.

-Was it fluid? If it's fluid, you have get the fluid out of the issues or else it won't heal. You can sometimes do that with diuretics, medications that cause the body to dump water through the kidneys, but that's always threading a needle because you have to get someone to a state where they still have juuuuust enough fluid inside their blood vessels to keep their organs happy, while maintaining a very slight state of dehydration so the blood vessels suck water back in from the tissues. You can use compression stockings to squeeze fluid back into the vessels, but if they have arterial insufficiency and not just venous insufficiency, you can accidentally then cause pressure injury. The safest option is using gravity: prop the feet up above the level of the heart, wherever the heart is at, at that moment, and gravity will pull fluid back down out of the legs. Super boring though. Patients hate it. Not as much as they hate compression stockings.

-Was it a skin tear because the skin is very fragile? This is extremely common in the elderly, because they're not making collagen and elastin, necessary to repairing skin. If this is the case, make sure they're actually getting enough nutrition--as people get into their 80s and 90s, their appetites often change and diminish, especially if they're struggling with dementia. And think about just wrapping them in bubble wrap. Remove things with sharp edges from their environments. I have seen the WORST skin tears from solid wood or metal furniture with sharp edges. Get rid of throw rugs and other tripping hazards. I had somebody last week who tried to a clear a baby gate and damn near destroyed their artificial hip.

The next critical question: why isn't it healing?

-Are you getting enough nutrients? Both macro and micro?

-Are you elderly?

-Are you ill?

-Do you have a genetic disorder of collagen formation?

Fix why it's not healing and almost anything will heal. If you're diabetic, find a medication regimen that improves your sugars and stick to it. If you're anorexic, get treatment for your eating disorder. If you have congestive heart failure, work with your doctor on your fluid balance. Wear the damn pressure stockings. Prop up your feet.

If, after those two unskippable questions are done, you want to do something to the wound--apply a dressing, do a treatment--that's a whole other kettle of fish. I'll write that later. The dryer just sang me its little song and I need to put away the laundry.

[jamereadsmanga]

i said this a while back but one thing people regularly misunderstand about Anya is that she is an asshole. most of her art and portrayals show her as this cheerful cutie pie who is a bit ditsy at times but if you actually read the text you would see that she is a complete dickhead.

she's selfish, lazy, unmotivated, crass, and childish (that is a bit fine but for the state of the story it is problematic). her biggest flaw isn't that's stupid. anya has all her braincells and is dedicated to using them for anything but

and this is not a hate post or anything because i love that anya is a little dipshit, that's the core of the story. and yes anya is capable of putting others first and being kind and helpful in general. but she's not a selfless goodie goodie as everyone portrays her as.

anya has her good traits and she has her bad ones, most of which are just a result of her being a child. i just when people completely strip her of her dimensions in order to push her into this cutesy ditsy manic pixie girl fantasy.

the many good things anya does comes at a cost. and that is a very important detail that gets overlooked. she isn't selfless, she only does things when there is a foreseeable benefit for her. it's that lack of pervasiveness that makes her so strong and compelling. the fact that people have to earn her kindness is integral with her character and her relationship with Damian.

and i'll say it, it's misogyny. anya very clearly does not abide by the laws of femininity. the juxtaposition between her and becky highlights this. again, this is one of the core elements of anya's story. her refusal to play by the rules of class and gender, instead acting in the way she believes to be right and just.

so take that rebellious attitude and competitive spirit and water it down to her being a bit odd and out of place is misogynistic. the struggles anya has is not because she doesn't know, it's because she does not care. bondman attempts to portray a generic idea of gender (bondman saving the princess and swooning all the women) but rather than accept her role as the princess she aims to be bondman.

the reason i say anya punching damian is such an important moment isnt because it was funny and abrupt (it was but not my point), it's because that moment symbolizes anya's character. it is a rejection of her status as a woman (girl) and lower class (than damian). she crosses both class and gender boundaries and puts that little bitch in his place.

every time you contort anya and strip her of those evidently masculine traits, you give into the system and that's just unforgivable. every time you age up anya and she "grows out" of those more undesirable traits and models more of a traditional representation of femininity, i will stab you to death <3.

and keep that choice feminist anti-intellectual ass takes away from me. i'm not having it.

[nkjemisin]

Hello! I’ve been seeing a lot about your work on social media lately and would love to read your books. What series do you recommend I start with?

Thanks ☺️

That depends on your taste/interest. I don't really write the same kind of thing from series to series, because I get bored easily and often want to try new subgenres/styles/etc. So I'll just briefly list my series and you can pick the one that appeals the most.

There's the Inheritance Trilogy, (link goes to the first book) my first published novels. A secondary world that has enslaved its own gods deals with the repercussions of that, from the POVs of three mortals. There's an overarching plot arc for all three books -- and there are some side-stories for this trilogy, too -- but each has a different narrator and takes place at different times. First person past tense, if you care about that sort of thing. (I don't, but some people seem weirdly attached to/repulsed by particular persons/tenses, so I'm including that info here.)

Then there's the Dreamblood Duology, which were actually written before the Inheritance books but I couldn't get them published at first because publishing in the 2000s was hella racist, basically. (I know, it hasn't changed much... but that little bit of change was enough for me to break in.) These books are as close to traditional fantasy as I'm probably ever going to get, except that they take place in faux ancient Egypt instead of faux medieval Europe. The story follows priests of the dream goddess as they're forced to deal with a conspiracy that threatens to inflict horrors on their society. Third person past tense for both books.

Next up is the Broken Earth trilogy. That's my experimental one, with first, second, and third-person POVs, present tense, a completely non-Earth world, and some heavy themes. All three books form a single story spanning, oh, forty thousand years or so, but mostly they're centered on one incredibly angry middle-aged mother who is on a roaring rampage of revenge/revolution. Features earthbenders, anti-magic groomers, magic statue people, and the apocalypse (again). Lots of "dark" themes and horror moments (harm to children, systemic bigotry, people-eating bugs, more).

My most recent books are the Great Cities duology. Urban fantasy set in modern-day New York, third person multiple POV ensemble cast. Turns out cities come to life once they hit a certain point, and then they claim a human avatar to represent and protect them. New York turns out to have six. It's also got some very unwanted tourists in the form of Lovecraftian entities that are trying to destroy it, along with reality as we know it. I meant for these to be lighthearted and silly and I think they kind of are, but there are still some notable political elements in them. (I mean, it's set in modern-day New York, and I started them the year Trump got elected, so...) It's lighthearted for me, anyway.

So, pick your poison!