#like... no... this isn't healthy... I will not stop....

[naamahdarling]

Cranking your hog with children in the house also upsets these people, btw.

The idea of pleasure as addictive is so fucking toxic. Wanking isn't bad.

It can be a compulsive and destructive behavior, that isn't disputed, compulsive behaviors are disorders, and compulsive behaviors are certainly present in some but not all cases of various addictions, but there are major components of addiction (diminishing returns in the pleasure center of the brain -- the brain does not seem to exhibit this wrt masturbation -- physical dependence, risk to health and life) that are never present in these people. Treating it like an addiction does not work and in fact causes people harm. Calling it an addiction is inaccurate and irresponsible. It may seem like splitting a hair, but it isn't. It's very important.

Studies have shown a very common element in the distress associated with "sex/porn addiction" is religiosity and shame. Not just being someone who masturbates. It seems like the culture of shame and repression is the toxic factor here.

"Food noise" is...hmm. I have very low dopamine, and so I think about food A Whole Fucking Lot, or I did until I got my dose of ADHD meds raised and it stopped. Which was nice, I won't lie. So I've experienced what people would probably label as "food noise". But I'm skeptical of its validity as a problem on the scale people are now talking about it being, because even if we grant that thinking about food all the time to the point that it becomes genuinely upsetting is a thing, we have such a dysfunctional and unrealistic cultural relationship with food that I don't trust ANY mainstream discussion or medical discussion about how we eat not to be deeply, deeply unhealthy.

It's the same with sex negativity, which is having a revival even among left-leaning people. You cannot have a rational and healthy discussion about sex OR food in a social climate that deems sexuality as gross and inherently damaging and food as a vice and fatness as a massive character flaw. I'm absolutely not going to be able to meaningfully discuss "porn addiction" or "sex addiction" with people who have a really fucked-up relationship to the idea of other people's sexual habits. I also don't trust people whose knowledge of psychology, sexual psychology, and addiction comes primarily from the internet. I don't trust much of what psychology says about it, either! If you don't think people should get their sex ed from porn, you also should not think that people should get their information about sex and addiction from talk shows and wellness sites, social media, Facebook, Reddit, etc.. There is a large and growing body of evidence that calling this "addiction" is inaccurate and inappropriate and leads to crap outcomes in treatment, which people exhibiting compulsive behavior do need help with.

Fuck it. I don't trust ANY talk about things we culturally consider nasty, indulgent, immoral, immoderate, etc. People just can't fucking cope with the idea that human beings should be allowed to do pleasurable things that aren't causing them distress or negatively impacting anyone else. Someone being bothered by the idea of a coworker's UNCONFIRMED daily masturbation -- during what is likely the only breathing room he gets away from kids and an insufferable-sounding wife that judges him so hard she'll bring it up to strangers -- does not count as being negatively impacted.

I think people should be left the fuck alone and allowed to do what they want with their bodies.

This is not an addiction

[mensahbots]

so much to love about these moments

a lovely depiction of romantic obsession as usual. i like that they were so explicit about it, not just the pain it causes gurathin, but also the element of unintentional entitlement that often accompanies infatuation. and i strongly feel gurathin would never say any of that out loud. the idea of openly expressing this desire, especially in mensah's presence, would likely be horrifying and devastating to him

relatedly, the dialogue in the lead-in to where i started the gifset was incredible. his view of the rest of the team, how he deeply cares about them yet does not view them as equals (he has a rather high view of himself, all things considered). but mensah? to him, his equal. his better.

murderbot line delivery, acting, and the impression we have of its discomfort (including with its own actions/the breach of gurathin's privacy) i think are also really excellent. i really liked the murderbot emotions in this episode in general

the team's reactions are really well-acted and shot. i love their discomfort and the sense of awareness they all seem to have about the situation. most of all i love pin-lee's expressions and response. i think there is some personal discomfort there, but i also wonder if they want to protect mensah or gurathin or both. i feel like tv pin-lee is pretty emotionally intelligent and compassionate about gurathin's situation, and obviously (if you've seen my other posts) i interpret them as pining pretty intensely for mensah themselves. so that makes their behavior in this scene that much more interesting for me

poor mensah... her discomfort and imo pain are so palpable. the acting is really beautiful. i think she deeply cares for gurathin and likely knows how he feels, but the idea that it has shaped his perception of her to this degree i can imagine is very painful, almost dehumanizing (to be the limerent object of someone you platonically love). and i feel like these are feelings that we don't get to see depicted in media a lot, so i really appreciated seeing that

and then moving to the post-mbot leaving bits... my god, this little moment was incredible. she's so much at her limit emotionally/stress-wise. and it's clear ratthi's behavior really frustrates her & has been frustrating her

but imo, she has likely been feeling complicatedly about how he treats pin-lee, too. she's the leader and seems to closely observe her team and try to soothe them in meaningful ways (i think best illustrated by how she interacts with pin-lee in episode 7), and i can't imagine she hasn't noticed things like him touching pin-lee while pin-lee looks visibly uncomfortable. i think there's a part of her, maybe subconsciously, which thinks, ratthi, pin-lee isn't your pet either

but the way the line is delivered, too... she is feeling things. maybe a repressed part of her is feeling, gurathin, i am not your pet

but the way the line is delivered, two (three?)... obviously, secunit is not their pet, full stop. she feels so strongly about that. seeing them speak/treat it like it belongs to them, like it's a prop, etc, is distressing for her and pushes her to this emotional extreme. and i think that's what's at the forefront of her mind, but it's possible the rest (the underlying emotions and frustrations and fears related to the interpersonal tensions she's witnessed and is involved in herself) might contribute to how strongly she feels they are wronging murderbot by regarding it like that. she is empathizing with it and likely feeling frustration she didn't intervene sooner and some kind of personal hurt (maybe including a sense of moral failure) that people are treating murderbot poorly

and speaking of, i think tv mensah has issues with boundaries (this is not to say that she totally lacks boundaries or behaves inappropriately, just that boundaries are not easy for her and she is not interpersonally perfectly healthy). we see she is somewhat people pleasing and has porous boundaries with gurathin. his actor has described it as a sort of codependent dynamic, which i think seems appropriate based on some of their early-season interactions. i think we can see the flipside of this in her interpersonal behavior with murderbot (the oversharing and seeming to need it to set explicit boundaries). i can imagine her boundary issues extends to her leadership style, especially given how some characters try to strongarm her and she often allows them to at least try. for example, pin-lee repeatedly shouts at her in the early episodes and mensah never explicitly expresses discomfort or sets boundaries about being treated that way (in front of the whole team, to boot!). so imo, she wasn't able to put her foot down about ratthi treated/spoke about murderbot earlier in the season, and now she feels strained/pushed to the point that she can. she needed to

their stunned reactions are so great. because they aren't completely shocked or horrified, but it's still clearly out of character for mensah. they know this matters to her, and they know she's been pushed to her limit. really incredible

and i really like knowing tv ratthi will definitely try to be/do better. his interiority in this episode was really cool to consider. i think there is a lot implied about the inside of his head

this episode makes the show's handling of gurathin and ratthi's interpersonal behavior (from a meta/writing level) work a lot better for me. i wasn't loving how it was framed, but this episode made it a lot more... i guess understandable. i found their behavior a bit triggering/activating (i have pretty bad ptsd. irl i get triggered being unexpectedly touched by men or having men raise their voices near me... it's an issue i'm working through but definitely colors how i take in live action media) so i am glad that there was some emotional payoff/meaningful interpersonal implications, and i assume there may be more

the juxtaposition of these scenes and the fact that they happen so close together i think is so fascinating and cool from a writing perspective

and i so love tv mensah. it is so great to see all these new elements going on around the character and to see her have such emotional depth. her emotional state in this episode is so complicated and well-executed

[plaidos]

Bold of you to assume the stalkers have friends

i mean i can only assume this is the case right? nobody to stop them :/ like if i were harassing this one minority i had arbitrarily decided needs to apologise for an out of context post i saw six months ago, like NON-STOP making new blogs to talk about this one specific thing because they can't find anything else, i think even if my friends didn't care that this was obviously a shitty way to behave, they would still say "Roxie this isn't a healthy thing for you to focus or fixate on for this long. you have to let it go. this is an unreasonable way to spend your time. this can't be making you happy". stuff like this really makes you appreciate your loves ones

[onsideramen]

Ughhh parkour civilization what the fucking helllll why'd you give me ANOTHER man to love and adore and draw a thousand times over.... come on... I don't need three of them... two was already too many....

(Sketches under cut)

Even got me drawing in class again like... what the fuck man... what the fuck...

^ HEAR ME OUT THE CROWN IS MELDED INTO HIS SKIN. Maybe don't hear me out actually

I might like him a little bit

[chanelle-lize]

I used to have a really hard time bringing up the fact that I graduated from high school a year late without feeling the need to explain why and insisting that it wasn't my fault while simultaneously kicking myself for how much I sounded like I was just making excuses for something I should take responsibility for.

Then I watched Dimension 20's "The Seven" and suddenly I could simply say that I was a super senior.

The first time I heard the phrase "super senior" was in reference to Antiope Jones, a Black girl who had been held back a year after getting kidnapped and imprisoned by members of a fundamentalist cult, and like, girl, same.

So, since then, instead of anxiously spinning out any time I tried to tell a personal high school anecdote, I could just say I was a super senior, and then my brain would auto complete that statement with "like Antiope Jones" and I'd feel good about myself because Antiope Jones Is That Bitch.

That's what the problem had been the whole time. I wasn't worried about how other people would perceive me; I had been struggling with how I perceived myself.

Thanks, Aabria.

[introspectivememories]

please put your reasonings in the tags!!!! esp if you pick the last one

[necrotic-nephilim]

If you want to be bothered. Maybe this for dick and Bruce???

i ALWAYS want to be bothered these are always the highlight of my day tbh you're a delight for letting me just yap <3

Dick. For the canon isn't real square I am Specifically talking about the Tom Taylor Nightwing run. Usually I ignore bad runs but given this one is ongoing (though about to end THANK GOD and get replaced by Dan Watters who i have high hopes for since i adored his Sword of Azrael (2022) run but i digress) so I counted it. Especially since it's so debated if that run is bad or not, for some reason. I'm a 90s Nightwing truther. I love Dick so dearly and tbh recently I've been more enamored with him the more I read his Discowing era, I didn't used to be as big of a Dick stan as I am these days.

Bruce. Honestly where do you even start with Bruce. I want to fist fight him and also patch him up. He got me into comics and superheroes as a whole but I roll my eyes whenever he shows up in a story. He's a bastard and usually not a good father but also complex and should be dissected under a magnifying glass. I love him dearly. He's also just the worst. I think that's why I love him. I'm always a fan of unabashedly Complicated Asshole Bruce who's generally not always the best person, particularly not to the Batfamily and that being the driving force of his relationships with them, especially in shipping.

And for bonus points, Tim. Because know above all else, I'm a Tim Drake kinnie /deg. He's been my number one for a decade and I've yet to uproot him from my brain. He's literally the Worst half the time and I love him for it. And the canon isn't real refers to Tim Drake: Robin because... that sure was a comic. And that's about all I can say about it. Pre-Flashpoint Tim I miss you so dearly. I think it's fun that I want to put him in a blender and drink the juice but also want Nothing Ever to happen to him.

[silverwings920]

i just reread the nel arc again, now that it's officially over, and slursagi really elevates his game here, but my favorite crazy off-the-wall slursagi moment (besides all the clown lines) has to be him telling kaiser, "kneel to me, you shitty clown."

Entirely.

Unprompted.

remember: when kaiser told the bllkers to get on their knees, he said it in german, and before any of them got the mikage translators; isagi never understood what he was saying.

so... unless he specifically wasted his precious analyzing time in the viewing room to rewatch this moment (which, dgmw, that's a hilarious mental image: like, imagine isagi, off-the-field btw, muttering furiously to himself 'what did he say back there? what did he fucking say? it was an insult. i just know it. i gotta figure out what it was just so that i can throw it back in his face later on on the pitch to traumatize him and pretend that it was just an in-the-heat-of-the-moment thing i said during a match.' if that was the case, i'd love isagi so much more because, like, you gotta respect the dedication to the bit 🤣🤣🤣) that was just slursagi having the most insane sixth sense for insults ever.)

and right after we got kaiser's backstory, too… (literally the same f-ing chapter)

[makises]

words can not express how much i fucking hate tiktok

[ailithnight]

What layer of anxiety is it that makes me hate making myself food when everyone else has already eaten? And more importantly, how do I make it stop?

[orchideae]

A little unpopular opinion on something I've seen happen more commonly throughout November/December and wanted to address quickly for my own blog: Please never hesitate to reblog anything from me. You see me reblogging a sentence starter list that you like? Go for it and reblog it from me directly without any pressure on you whatsoever to send anything into me before doing so. You like a GIF-set or musing that I reblogged? Nab it from me, it'll brighten my day to see that we share an interest in something. I like to see interaction between me and anyone who follows me. I like to see that little activity notification light up.

Honestly, it simply reminds me that we're all part of a community, and more specifically, a fandom that consists of characters and nations that we all came to love and then share that amongst ourselves. And honestly, seeing a reblog happen shortly after me but it's from the source, creates (in my opinion) an odd sense of chosen disconnect between people that can feel awkward, it's as if we're walking on eggshells as to not rub each other the wrong way. But what's wrong about going 'Hey, I see what you reblogged, I like it too!', it even gives you potential common ground to start a conversation. We're a community, and I don't know about you, but I like seeing people interact with each other beyond merely threads and notes. It's the little things that matter, after all.

[katyspersonal]

These are my personal thoughts on stuff that has been bothering me for almost a decade now. I kind of went from "It would be more merciful to do an abortion because my child would live in horrid if not dangerous conditions and be taken away for their own sake" to "Maybe they'd conclude that they love living even if they were dealt a losing hand and had only adversity. Even if they DO get taken away from a person financially incapable of caring for them and live as orphan. What if they will be happy to exist anyway? I can't make this decision for them. This is something person can only decide themselves and it is called "suicide", (but I'd still do everything I can to not allow that)".

I know I speak as though it is 100% guaranteed I'd be a single mother, and it is true. I can only possibly get pregnant..... against my will, to put it this way. And yet I am always scared that this "fate" will find me anyway. I am pretty sure fixations on potential threats is some type of paranoia. I've just riched the conclusion that I do not have enough ambitions and life itself to refuse being bound to someone. I just go to work, play videogames and obsess over my interests. Why I believed I'd seek abortion at all cost is because I could not care for a child when I am myself like a child. In every sense of this word but physical. But, again, if it became THAT bad, someone else would, then. I've just been thinking about the whole concept of not letting someone to exist "for their own sake" and I think I grew out of it? Sort of? Because losing misery means losing happy moments too, and someone might see them worthy to suffer for, no matter how rare they are. I can't just assume someone else will be as depressed about existing as me. Everyone is different.

The dumb part? I've came to this conclusion upon overanalyzing fucking Soulsborne videogames. I wish it was a joke, but I just have this neurodivergency that keeps me in permanent disconnect from "real" things and "real" people, and only through prism of special interests and characters things 'click' to me. It is like I am deaf, and fiction is my hearing aid. I still think it is so fucking funny that years of religion-based guilttripping, all these fake inspirational stories of struggling single mothers TV is filled with and having optimism hammered into my head by other mothers didn't change my mind on how having a baby is possibly the MOST cruel thing I could do all things considered. But then like, Melina yapped some sweet nonsense about not deciding for others that they'd rather not exist than suffer, and it sort of have been slowly growing ever since.

I also questioned whether this stuff got hard-coded into these games, but I don't think so? Miyazaki definitely loves motherhood but that's literally it. He just poured love for archetype into some characterizations, nothing more. It is more about how existence itself and its meaning is explored here. And how it clicked with what's been bothering me, because I am always scared that I am not safe from... that. Nobody with a working womb is, but I am fixated on this fear, as if this is doomed to happen. But the most dreadful part of it is kind of.. dissolving? Nothing could convince me I am strong and capable and not as stupid and helpless, no power in the world. But something could convince me someone would still love to live even with the trauma of having a mother so shit they had to be saved from her incompetence and helplessness

[hadesknockedupintheunderworld]

My hot take is that some of you who live vicariously through fictional familial relationships yearn for "a healthy loving family" the same way a lonely person yearns for the perfect boyfriend/girlfriend/partner who will sweep them off their feet and dote on them and love them always and only focus on them and take care of them and protect them and provide for them and give them a fairytale wedding

And it shows

[lettucedloophole]

lov and peace on planat earth... ✌️

[liamket]

i shouldn't be thinking the worst cuz of some pain damn is not like it would kill me right?

[justalittlebluetiefling]

Now that I can finally do cossack squats without my knees giving out, I'm trying to decide on my next goal and I think it's going to be lifting my feet off the ground while doing an L-sit.