#lots of experiences of people comparing themselves to me and being mean to themself...

[deoidesign]

One of my first digital pieces (2010) versus one of my recent ones (2024)

We all start somewhere!

[homestuckreplay]

A point came up in discussion with my friends about how Homestuck treats the notion of sex (as in, a supposed biological basis for gender as rooted in sexual reproduction) that arguably the first stage in the comic's future progressive dissolution of that notion is John "fathering" himself and the other kids (guardians included) via the means of ectobiology, rather than the usual human means of reproduction - something I think becomes deliciously ironic given later transgender readings of their character, if presumably not an intended reading at this time. Do you have any thoughts on this?

this is a SUPER interesting read that I’m going to be thinking about a lot – I honestly wish I had more thoughts, so I might add to this later if anything else comes to me, but here’s what I have so far!

I think ectobiology is inherently queer, as there’s no reason why a kid made that way would need two parents of different sexes. any couple could have a biological kid by mixing their slime, and a baby could also have three or four bio parents at once. as you say, the person performing the ectobiology doesn’t have to be one of the bio parents, analogous to something like surrogacy in our world. so ectobiology levels the playing field for what reproduction and parenthood can be, without privileging ‘cis man + cis woman conceiving a child via sex’ as the gold standard that all other methods are compared to.

In our world, it’s AFAB people who do the work of pregnancy and childbirth, which causes society to see parenthood as gendered. mothers are perceived as primary caregivers, as more inherently nurturing than fathers, as finding it easier to bond with their children, etc., even though these things aren’t always true in practice. ectobiology happens in external lab equipment, so people of any sex have equal capability of doing the work of creating a child. this breaks down the distinction between motherhood and fatherhood, making it harder for society to see them as separate roles.

In sexual reproduction, kids are assigned a sex at birth and usually raised differently because of that, with expectations for their gender and personality. societally, sex is privileged over gender – it’s seen as either the source of gender (for cis people) or something we’re transgressing (trans and nonbinary people). ectobiology doesn’t work like that, because it encodes personality traits as well as genetics. Bro loves puppets, so when he’s cloned in baby form, the first thing he does is find a puppet to curl up with, because that’s hard coded into him instead of being an interest he developed across his life. it’s possible that John has inherited ‘male genetic phenotype’ from Grandpa and ‘female gender identity’ from Nanna, and if so, ectobiology holds those things as equally important instead of one preceding the other. so being trans isn’t a deviation from the norm, it’s an equally valid and likely experience to being cis.

In our world, someone parenting themself happens when their guardians’ parenting is incomplete, so kids (or adults!) have to teach themselves about things their guardians missed. cis kids are more likely to get sex education and information about puberty from a guardian (often one of the same sex). trans and queer people usually have to do that research ourselves. so John being their own parent (ie creating themself) represents how John’s dad taught them about male gender roles + cis male puberty, but John will later have to teach themself about what it means to be trans + how transitioning works. biologically and socially, John is both the cause and effect of their own identity. that’s kind of beautiful, right?

[postmoderntongues]

A Jt Leroy Rant

As a comprehensive book Ive come to prefer "Sarah" but I also think "babydoll" and "coal" are her best pieces if you dont count THIDAAT as a novel and instead recognize the stories in it as individual works bound by a theme and ordered somewhat chronologically

Harolds End grew on me as i matured but when I read it as a teenager I didn't fully understand it enough to appreciate it, how much something as small and incapable of reciprocating love as a snail becomes to this boy who in reality doesn't have anybody but the fellow unfortunates he keeps company with for attention and the men who want to use his body. By expecting nothing from him the snail IS able to show love for him. But as a teenager as much as I loved the art it wasn't as edgy or high octane as the other two pieces i had to grow into an emotional comprehension of it as a study in loneliness

"Meteors" is also a special piece to me because I feel like we get to see a rare desperate, vulnerable Sarah failing to cope that her sexuality, the only worth she shees herself to have but believes she has it infinitely and unconditionally, has been rejected and really painting the first casual interaction we see her attempt to have with a mentally stable adult who isnt an addict or pimp or part of the underworld themself and seeing how shes reached this stage where without realizing shes become so far gone that stable normal adults find her off-putting and dont want to interact with let alone sexually/romantically involve themselves with her and Jeremiah's unwavering dedication to doing anything to prove HIS love to her and the sense of defeat when that love isn't good enough for her and she gives him a head injury trying to attract the meteor man and then abandons him when the tactic fails as if to her he and his devotion were just a means to an end and I wonder what part having his love always treated as inferior and secondary to love from a man damaged his ability to grow up with the sense that he was a worthy/suitable/lovable man or would ever grow up into something "worthy" of the love he craved but instead was used as a disposable tool in an attempt to secure by his mother potentially influanced the character's development of gender dysphoria, nt just the validation and love he received from Sarah as a girl but the rejection he constantly faced by her in favor of other males giving him the message that the love he had to offer as a male was insignificant compared to the love of "real" men.

I also think (and i could totally be reaching) that there's a suggestion of Sarah being Autistic/Neurodivergent in Meteors with her inability to successfully transmit or receive social signals. Savanah's portrayal of JT always gave me autistic vibes too, I have a very similar dysregulated volume and stutter when i read out loud and a lot of the body language she appropriates in her fidgeting and body language and use of eye contact (even with the glasses she often speaks to people pointing her head not toward them) are something that as an autistic person id clock another person in a bar as probably autistic by. I know verbal autism wasnt super recognized at the time but do you think to some degree her performance mimicked autistic traits without knowing the word for what she was acting out was autism? Or was she herself autistic and it just came through in her performance? because Sarah in so many ways reminds me of so many polysubstance addicted religiously traumatized hypersexual girls aging out of their playboy years who are also on the spectrum including myself to some degree. Also I can't praise "Coal" enough for being such a starkly accurate of not just a psychotic episode but of the public's response to not wanting to deal with the inconvenience of involving themself in a compassionate way and just letting it escalate until it becomes a problem for the cops to deal with as somebody who experiences psychotic episodes myself. Sarah really blows my mind in how she manages to be so fragile and vulnerable and you want to rescue her almost even while shes doing objectively evil things with a boldness that as the reader you are left wondering if she even has the neurological capacity for empathy and to recognize Jeremiah as an autonomous sentient being instead of a burdensome belonging, like her actions are so despicable but instead of leaving the reader hating her they raise the question of her mental capacity to even realize that what shes doing is wrong and shes causing harm to a person who can feel the pain of that harm, that maybe she rejects his love like she disregards his pain not because shes not open to it but because she's lacking something cognitive that is required to see that love or pain are things Jeremiah is capable of experiencing as if shes living in a delusion where shes the only real person which is a major factor of NPD (another diagnosis of mine but a sort of post traumatic psychosis where u dont manually recognize other humans and autonomous and sentient and existing when ur not perceiving them and have the delusion that you are the only "real" person and therefor any person u harm doesnt matter past the consequences u face for it because since theyre not "real" like you they are capable of preforming the act of things like love or pain for you to observe but dont actually FEEL it like you wuld in their shoes bc they arent actually sentient)

I also think A Sissy Spacek type would have been more suited to the role than Asia, Asia was very stiff and offered no vulnerability that we see from the character in the book her portrayal was very harsh and villainous when in the book Sarah is clouded by trauma and substance abuse and desire for male validation and mentally ill and trying the best i think shes capable of trying but fucking up, asias portrayal of the character was very in control and malicious. She was also too magazine hot, she didnt give "debilitatingly mentally ill long term polysubstance abuser" visually she gave "pin up" not "shoulder of the road shopping bag bottle collecting lady" like she becomes in the book. i also think Asia was too old for the role, she looked obviously 30 when part of sarah's entire problem is shes an 18 year old mentally ill addict with no support at first shes just a child herself trying to have fun and have her son, just a little girl who thinks she can have her cake and eat it too who deteriorates into a person who does genuinely evil things partially out of having never learned better or been set a better example, Asia looked on the old side to even be a club stripper at all at like a real world truck stop and was just like clearly feeling herself way too hard and it tainted her performance

But also both Girl Boy Girl and her rape of Jimmy Bennet have soured me toward her so i suppose im more inclined to be looking for flaws in her performance. I also think its disgusting and predatory that, like Dennis Cooper, she was under the assumption that JT was a traumatized sexually abused teenager and she not only proposed engaging him in sex even though part of his character was established to include that he was compulsively unable to deny sexual advances due to his sexual trauma but tried to use sex and feigned affection to get him to sign over the book rights so she could make her movie. While Im a "separate the art from the artist" person and am still a fan of the technical craft aspect and transgressive reaches in Cooper's writing knowing his inappropriate interactions with "jt" who he believed to be a minor a lot of his work feels less transgressive and more smutty/goonerish like hes not trying to make a point about the complexity of sexuality hes just writing fucked up sex scenes and getting off to them and its insane nerve to be the outed offending pedophile in the situation and then act like the victim and go after Laura for (not being a real abused child that he was sexually exploiting? Sexually exploiting a child is in his eyes more acceptable than getting a little out of bounds with a pen name?) I did think "the sluts" was an interesting literary response to the situation but if he felt hoodwinked he could have cut professional ties and moved on to some new target, the entitlement and lack of accountability in going after her made me lose most of my respect for him as much as like I said I do enjoy his technical craft and find his works interesting reads. Again how are you going to be exposed as an active offending pedophile and then play victim because you didnt get to actually abuse a real traumatized child? Male audacity astounds me.

[waffle-sorter]

So.

For somewhat more than two years now, I've been seeking out stories of fictional trans people. (I don't know why only the fictional ones - my best guess is that it has to do with how people build stories compared with how they assemble memories or other people's accounts.) I started in AO3's "trans character" tag, and have since branched out to original stories, both professionally published and freely uploaded to various sites.

Now, granted, I don't read everything - in particular, anything marked as smut is going to have to do a lot of persuading to get me to click - but I have noticed some trends. The vast majority of these stories seem to more or less fall into one of the following categories, the first being far more common:

The character has always known they were trans; or at the very least, by the time the story begins, they have already figured out that there's something gender-related about themself that they don't like. These stories usually focus on the character either coming out, or seeking to have various restrictions relaxed while trying to not come out; either way, most of the conflict is about navigating the community's reactions and options.

The character is in their mid-teens to mid-twenties, and suddenly finds out that they're trans, usually by being either magically transformed into a girl or compelled to dress as one. The type-1 plot often occurs, but generally as a b-plot; usually the main arc is more internal, as the character tries to grapple with questions about what their situation means and what they want to do about it.

(These are not exclusive categories; I can think of two off the top of my head where, after an adult realization, the character remembers some moment of clarity from their childhood.)

Now, I don't know the actual statistics, but from what I've heard only a minority of trans people realize in early childhood. And certainly people who figure themselves out as full adults are not unheard-of. And yet... I can't think of a single story I've found that matches more than one or two particulars of my experience. For example, I can only come up with two where a character took more than a week or so to come up with a "new" name to go by. And I'm fairly sure "Unknown Number" is the only one I've seen that involves a (very different) slow, introspective realization before any other significant transition steps.

[candy-cloud-system]

Guess who’s back speaking their shit ! This guyyyyyy ! . Allow me to write a long ass paragraph explaining everything about why I am NOT going to take back what I said.

First off. Comparing anything I said in that paragraph to racism is wild. Not ONCE did I mention race, and it was a completely irrelevant and honestly just false comparison. Hating someone for being downright ableist is SO much different than being racist. And I can guarantee you, I will never hate anyone for their skin color or race. That is something they are born with, and cannot change. And the diversity of human beings is single handedly the most beautiful thing to me.

Now. A more accurate comparison, if you will, would be saying something along the lines of this: imagine you broke your leg because of someone else’s actions, and it causes you a lot of discomfort, pain, and changes the way you have to function. Often you get frustrated with things you’re unable to do the same as someone without a broken leg, or even get super angry at the person who was the cause of your broken leg, sometimes finding yourself daydreaming about how much better your current state would be if you hadn’t been around them or left the situation sooner. Now imagine the next day you see someone else with a cast on their leg, and you think “oh! Someone who may have a similar experience and understand my struggles!” Just for them to tell you their leg was never broken before and they simply “wanted” to have a broken leg.

Imagine the pure frustration that would give. All the thoughts of everything and all the pain and regret and rage you face daily now being mimicked by someone who woke up and decided to claim they had it simply because they wanted to. THATS what it’s like seeing an endo.

I will say this now. Plural means the exact same thing as a system. There is NO difference. There is no such thing as “systems have trauma, but if they say they’re just plural then they aren’t claiming to have a disorder!” Because that’s bullshit.

Endos cause a lot of harm to our communities, even if they aren’t aware. The misuse of terms and stealing of terms from cultural practices, invading our spaces sometimes with purpose to harm us, convincing actual systems their repressed trauma or even remembered trauma doesn’t exist or wasn’t bad, and wide spread misinformation highly effects people like me who have to live with the actual disorder.

I’ve seen a lot of systems (myself included) who are uncomfortable calling themselves plural. Although it is a correct, and sometimes more used in medical settings term for systems; the association of the word with endos who think slamming another label on themself justifies blatant ableism has made that term unbearably difficult to use on ourselves. I’ve seen the same with the words headmates, host, fictives, and other system terms.

“Tulpa Systems” are stealing a cultural term, AND misusing it at that. Tulpamancy is a term from Tibetan Buddhism. Original concepts of it found in the Buddhist Niramāņakāya, and later came into traditions of Mysticism. It is NOT when a 14 year old on tiktok decides they want a serious mental health condition and “creates an alter” for themself. Tulpas are part of a culture. And are spiritual practices.

Invading spaces that aren’t made for you can be very harmful. Even if unintentional or seemingly “harmless” those spaces are MADE for certain people. Those certain people need places they feel comfortable being themselves with other people like them. That’s very important. Something I’ll compare it to is this; I get very uncomfortable when an abled body person gets in the school elevator with me. The elevators at my school are made specifically for disabled individuals and those who cannot walk up stairs. It with the exception of escorts, when someone who is perfectly able bodied gets on, it creates a tension for me. They’re invading a space made for me and people like me, simply because they wanted to. I feel it’s unfair to me, because I’m not able to fit in comfortably in their spaces, I cannot walk up stairs with ease, yet they can, the elevator is a space where I can feel comfortable and capable with the abilities I have, and I feel very uncomfortable when that’s invaded by others. And it’s the same with system spaces. I’ve ranted to my friends countless times about how I never feel comfortable in the online system community. My spaces get invaded constantly by people who think they have a right to steal what should be a safe space for trauma survivors. I have grown accustomed to the reality that I will never have a space online that I will be completely safe from ableism in this community do to endos. Even in real life I have faced people in the eyes who faked my disorder just because they thought it was cool. They faked and copied my real struggles, lied about experiences and made me miserable. And I feel like i don’t even have to speak about the endos who come into spaces to harm us. We can all tell that’s fucked up.

CDDs are a trauma response. And something it does, and it’s whole point, is to hide your trauma. A lot of people with CDDs will not remember what happened. It’s what makes it so tricky to cope with and heal from. I’ve had a very close friend of mine ignore their plurality and not take steps to heal due to them being convinced they didn’t have trauma or wasn’t enough trauma and they were an endo. That is so incredibly harmful. I cannot stress that enough. Telling people they can have a CDD without trauma, even putting that option of being plural without trauma is SO harmful. Because young people who may realize they have a CDD and not be educated on them will brush it off as being an endo, spread that misinformation, and most dangerously; not be able to take the proper steps to heal. Lucky for me, I understood that it was a trauma related disorder, so I was able to get into therapy, get on medication to help myself combat my depression, and find coping skills that were healthy for me to work on growing and coping with my CDD and other disorders. Convincing someone their CDD isn’t serious, or that it’s not trauma related takes that away from them. It takes away the realization of the need to heal, it takes away the chance for them to cope with serious trauma. And it can even worsen it. People with trauma who categorize themself as endo or are categorized by others as endo may be even more effected, feeling like trauma is now a competition or that they aren’t enough to have a CDD that they may actually be struggling with and wanting help for. I hope you understand how harmful that is.

The spread of misinformation is WILD. One of the first things usually brought to me by my friends at school who don’t know much about DID is usually some misinformation they saw from an endo. And of course I don’t mind educating them properly at all, but it honestly hurts me a bit to see some of the crazy things I’ve seen them believe because of how much misinformation people spread on the internet about this disorder.

CDDs aren’t fun, they aren’t quirky. They’re serious trauma stemmed disorders formed to help someone survive. It’s not “having silly characters I like in my head”. It’s NEEDING them to keep you alive and as stable as possible when in horrible conditions whenever you are in the most vulnerable stage of your life.

Blah blah. Internet rant. Blah blah. I can already feel the comments calling me a loser and telling me to blow up or something 💀 like ima lowkey be mean for a sec but do y’all ever shut up? Learn to literally educate yourself instead of believing a 13 year old who wants the entire cast of Hazbin Hotel in their head cus they think it’s quirky (no shade to actual systems with hazbin alters)

Get ur ableist asses outta here fr 💀💀💀💀😭😭😭 making my life hell

Tw: syscourse ,

Endos DNI with this post.

Hot take; I shouldn’t have to be terrified to read / like posts. I should have to read the tags to make sure it’s not posted by an endo trying to infiltrate our spaces. I shouldn’t have to fear that the thing I’m gonna read is going to send me into a spiral because it’s gonna be some stupid ass shit about how “traumagenic systems are losers” or whatever the other stuff endos say about us is.

WE SHOULD NOT HAVE TO HAVE AN ALTER WHO SITS OVER MY SHOULDER EVERY TIME I OPEN THIS APP THAT CAN PULL ME AWAY INCASE SOMETHING GETS BAD.

THAT SHOULD NOT BE A THING I, A TRAUMATIZED SYSTEM, SHOULD HAVE TO DEAL WITH WHEN LOOKING FOR COMFORT OR SILLY CONTENT TO CHEER ME UP REGARDING THE TRAUMA FORMED DISORDER THAT WILL FOREVER MAKE MY LIFE DIFFICULT.

“Endos don’t hurt anyone🥺🥺🥺”

yes they fucking do.

- Sharkbite

[thechangeling]

In honor of disability pride month I wanted to discuss something.

Conversations about the way some people in this fandom infantalize Ty are good because it is a problem. However, allistic people aren't the ones to decide what is and isn't infantilizing for an autistic person.

In fact you could argue that only the person themselves can make that decision is themself, but Ty is a fictional character being written by an allistic woman, so that becomes complicated. BUT it is still unfair of people to essentially be acting like Ty is just like everyone else and we should just be treating him like any other character.

I don't love this because it is a very colorblind way of looking at things, it's like the people who say "why are we bringing up Alastair's race?" Because...it's relevant. Ty is disabled. That literally means that there are some things that he just can't do, or do as well as allistics can.

For example, my mom makes all of my doctors appointments and I'm 22. She goes in there with me because I've given her permission to speak for me because I can't. Because I know I will forget to ask things or zone out and not hear anything the doctor says. Also talking to people is hard.

When autistic people like myself and Rory talk about how Ty probably didn't process what was happening or Kit's confession because we process emotions and outside information in general MUCH slower, we are not trying to say "oh poor baby Ty didn't understand what was going on uwu." We are pulling directly from our experiences with THE SAME DISABILITY and providing explanations. I have stuff from ten years ago that I'm still trying to process and sort through

You don't need to do mental gymnastics to try and provide nt reasons for why shit went down the way it did (even though you could because losing your twin is reason enough to be not handling shit well) because the autistic explanations already exist. And providing those explanations doesn't mean we're making excuses or saying that Ty didn't do anything wrong.

I see a lot of allistics who try and rationalize autistic behavior in a way that makes sense to them by comparing it to something they would do or trying to filter it through their lense of what makes sense, but sometimes you can't do that. Sometimes we will do things for reasons that don't seem rational to you or make sense to you and you gotta just accept that. You won't always understand everyones perspective but thay doesnt mean you can't sympathize and show compassion.

Tldr: An autistic person providing an explanation for another autistic person's behavior and citing symptoms and traits is not infantilizing them.

[soupbabe]

omg hi i just realized i would also like a chubby s/o with rohan as well please (i am not sure if he would be considered part of the duwang gang or not!) please and thank you! the s/o can be gender neutral or whatever you’re most comfortable with!

Figure Drawing (Rohan Kishibe x Chubby/Plus size! Reader)

Rohan asks Y/N to model for him

Warning(?): Light insecurities, but nothing major ! If this kind of thing makes you uncomfortable please feel free to not read! <3

The bell jingled in greeting as you entered the cafe. You scanned the area, looking for the manga artist you called your boyfriend. Today he asked you to meet up here, only saying that he just wanted to chat and nothing else. Of course you were nervous on what that could mean; you've been dating Rohan Kishibe for about a month now and it's possible that he could've been bored of you already.

Rohan found you first and called you over. "Ah Y/N, glad you could meet with me darling" he gave you a quick kiss that never failed to make your cheeks heat up. "Hey Rohan. What did you want to talk to me about?" You asked, preparing for the worst to come. You liked Rohan a lot, so if he really did want to break up, you needed all of the mental prep you could get. "Oh yes, about that. Later this week I want you to model for me. As an artist it's my duty to capture diversity in my work. Drawing the same old body type gets repetitive and boring fast. Plus, I don't need people thinking I'm a one trick pony."

Oh that's a lot to take in.

It's not that you were ashamed of your body. You were bigger than most people and you taught yourself that it wasn't something to feel bad about. No one tried to make you feel bad about it. And if anyone did give you unwarranted comments, you would simply brush them off. You figured that they were just insecure themselves and hated seeing a fat person be confident in themself for once. This kind of attitude was actually what attracted Rohan to you in the first place.

Soon enough the day came. You stood at his doorstep with a mix of nervousness and excitement. You knocked on the door and soon enough, the man who's been plaguing your thoughts ever since he pitched the idea welcomes you into his home. "Welcome Y/N, I hope you're doing well." He looked at you with a smile.

"Rohan, are you sure about this? I haven't had any experience doing any model work." Rohan rolled his eyes "Of course I want you to do this. I wouldn't be asking you to do such an important job if I didn't think you were perfect for it." You thought about it and you decided to agree. You trust the artist enough and who knows, it could be a fun experience.

~

He led you into his office, blinds closed and a changing divider in the corner of the room. It was facing away from his desk. "Okay darling, I'm going to need you to undress over in the corner. Nothing drastic, it's harder to capture the natural human form if they're covered in clothing."

Of course you knew this, it was a detail he mentioned when you two were talking at the cafe, but you didn't really think too much about it. Although you don't tend to wear baggy or oversized clothes, he hasn't seen everything. He hasn't seen every stretch mark, cellulite, etc decorating your plush body. It feels different when you're in your underwear compared to actual clothes, no matter how they fit or how much it reveals. You guess it's just how intimate the situation is, despite you two not doing anything too exciting.

You stepped out in front of the divider in your undergarments, an unusual shyness coming over you. Rohan glanced at you and his face turned pink. He was breathless in the best way possible, you were truly perfect to him. "You look amazing, Y/N." He took your chubby hand in his slightly boney one and led you to an area where he wanted you to stay at. "Now remember, if you start feeling uncomfortable tell me. I have no issue ending the session if you don't want to continue." "Of course." You smiled, feeling more confident as he looked at you with a lovestruck expression only you could see.

All throughout the afternoon he asked you to do multiple poses, ranging from a simple front, side, and back view of your body to action based poses. He allowed you to take as many breaks as you wanted and he praised you constantly for being a great model.

It was surprisingly a fun afternoon, you too were able to be closer than you were in your relationship and teasing Rohan for staring at you for longer than he should was a highlight of your day. Maybe you should ask to be his model more often.

[writerofshit]

(I mentioned briefly a story of how the Stream Team met. This is that story.)

Somewhere in Los Santos, in the late night hours of a Tuesday, a convenience store is robbed. So is one several blocks southeast. And one roughly in the middle of them both. After all, what's more convenient than 24 hour chili dogs on every other street corner?

Cash. Cash is more convenient. So are guns. Hollering, waving one to get the other. Most important, back alleys that twist and turn, snaking away from increasingly distant sirens. Three individuals find themselves running through these alleys, a couple grand each weighing their pockets down.

It's through serendipity and convenience that their paths cross.

The man from the farthest store arrives first. He's done this a few more times than he'd like to admit, so he'd had a plan. Of sorts. Cut through the park, take a few sidewalks like an upstanding citizen, under the bridge and find a fire escape to utilize from there. There aren't any that reach the ground, of course, because he's smart but not quite enough.

And so this is why Trevor is standing in an dark alley, contemplating whether or not the dumpster will give him enough height to reach the ladder, when the man from the middle store appears. He's around Trevor's height, but would probably win in a fight between them, if he were so inclined. He doesn't seem to be, though. He seems shaken, like he's not quite sure how he ended up in this alley. He's holding a gun almost gingerly, as if it might bite him.

Trevor pulls his own gun.

'dont you fuckin' try anything!'

This does not go over well with Matt. He takes a step back, and then seems to remember that he also has a gun so maybe this is even footing. He holds it aloft, finger nowhere near the trigger.

'same, asshole!'

At this moment the robber from the first store arrives, also, of course, with a gun. And a mask. And an entire purple and orange neon fucking suit, actually, topped with a white cowboy hat. It gives them a few extra inches of height they are distinctly lacking, comparatively. Somewhere in the back of his head, Trevor acknowledges that this newcomer could probably kick his and the other gunman's asses. It is not a pleasant thought.

'oh, what the fuck!?'

Jeremy sounds more annoyed and less scared than one would think, considering they've run into an alley only to find two men with guns. Two men who quickly turn those guns on them.

'who the fuck are you?'

The question surprises them all, including Matt, even though he's the one who asked. As it turns out, people have a tendency to say the first thing that comes to mind when in a stressful situation. Such as, having robbed a convenience store for the very first time and immediately finding himself face to face with other apparent robbers. It would get to anyone, probably.

'i don't want any trouble, but i've already robbed someone tonight and i don't give a shit about felony murder!'

Two lies and a truth, is what Trevor has chosen to play, for some reason. In reality, one does not rob a convenience store at gun point if one is intent on staying out of trouble. And he does, in fact, care very deeply about felony murder. Felony murder is the precise reason he'd shot a bag of Doritos and not a clerk. In his defense, the clerk had initially rolled her eyes at him, asked what exactly he thought he'd get out of this. He'd found this question rude.

The truth, of course, is that he did rob a convenience store. That did happen. No take backs.

'so did i!'

Matt and Jeremy speak so in unison it's almost scary. If they didn't know any better, they'd think the two of them had always known each other.

Trevor's gun wavers between them, unsure which is the bigger threat. The guy who clearly has zero experience with guns, or the weirdo who seems to have far too much? It's a toss up, really. So his aim pinballs back and forth, but his finger does not curl around the trigger. He's serious about that felony murder thing.

The air seems to shift, suddenly, and the sound of sirens is now growing closer. This evidently also annoys Jeremy, and they throw a glance over their shoulder to the direction they'd come from. Red and blue lights flicker past.

'shit. ok. we're all robbers, i guess, and we're all fucked if we keep standing here. who's got a plan?'

Jeremy's eyes are staring impatiently at Trevor. Eyes being the only part of their face Trevor can see. And their hands, a plastic bag in one and a gun in the other.

Trigger finger is an apt name.

He glances at Matt, still wild eyed and glancing back and forth. No, Matt probably does not have a plan. He sort of gives the impression that he's never had a plan ever, actually. That perhaps he'd simply woken up here and decided to wing it. So Trevor makes an offer.

'fire escape?'

There's another moment of tense silence. Well, minus the sirens. And oh, helicopters. Even better. Jeremy shrugs.

'good a plan as any.'

And then they're off, brushing past Trevor and hoisting themself up onto the dumpster. He knew it could work. Trevor blinks and Jeremy has caught the ladder, is quickly working their way up. Shit, how does five foot something manage to get that high on a good day, much less in this situation and with a bag and gun in hand?

Matt's gun clatters to the ground, and honestly, that's probably for the best. He's climbing onto the dumpster now, and he mutters something about not signing up for this shit. Trevor reminds him that he apparently robbed someone, so yeah, he kind of did.

Before Trevor climbs up, he shoves his gun into his jacket pocket. Smart? Probably not. Convenient? More so than climbing with a gun in his hand. He follows Matt up the ladder, wondering what happened to his plan. Yeah, the ladder had been involved. Two other people, however, were not.

Above them, glass shatters.

'warning, maybe!?'

'oops. careful, there's glass.'

Jeremy's voice is no longer directly above them. Instead, it comes from one story up and a little to the left. So they've broken into an apartment. Sure, add breaking and entering to the list of charges, that sounds great. But Matt and Trevor follow, because there's not really another option.

Inside the apartment, Jeremy's mask is gone. The suit is quickly disappearing as well, revealing a rather boring outfit of a white tank top and...sweatpants? The true mystery lies in where the cowboy hat has gone to, because that's a hard item to miss.

'do we really have time for this? don't you think someone might, oh, i don't know, wake up and call the cops?'

Trevor doesn't mean to hiss, it's just that he's sure there's more pressing matters to attend to than an outfit change. Continuing to flee, perhaps.

'nobody's gonna wake up.'

They don't even have the wherewithal to lower their voice. It registers to Trevor that Jeremy's bag and gun are missing as well. Had they dropped them on the way up? It was certainly possible. Trevor thinks he would have noticed a gun flying past his head, but there's a lot going on.

'can we maybe not kill anyone? he brought up a good point with that felony murder thing.'

It's the most words Matt has strung together since he'd shown up. It's damn near a whisper, but at least it's progress.

'i'm not- god, can you two shut up? i gotta make a phone call.'

Jeremy yanks the door open, hand carefully wrapped in the fabric of their shirt. For a moment, Trevor thinks they're leaving and steps forward to follow Jeremy. Instead, Jeremy turns and heads toward the kitchen, pulling open a drawer and digging inside it briefly. They come back with a cell phone.

Something dawns on Trevor.

'is this- do you live here? did you break your own window?'

Jeremy doesn't answer. They put the phone to their ear.

'you're gonna wanna hide whatever you've got. and try not to look like you just climbed in through a window.'

And then-

'hello? yes, hi, i'd like to report a break in, i think? i was hearing a bunch of sirens and then i don't know what happened but some guy just broke my window? he ran through and i just- my friends and i are really scared and we didn't know what to do- yes, we're ok, he's gone, but we- you'll send someone? ok, thank you. the address? oh, uh, it's the del perro heights building, apartment 7. should i shut the door? no, don't touch anything. ok- guys, don't touch anything, she said someone's on their way to check on us! thank you so much- no, i think we'll be fine. thank you.'

It's a marvelous performance. Jeremy genuinely sounds like some poor flustered victim of a crime. Trevor would applaud if he thought Jeremy would appreciate it. Almost immediately, their voice is back to normal.

'check things out my ass. they're gonna show up, ask which way he went and never call me again. feel real fuckin safe.'

Jeremy settles themself onto the couch, choosing the spot closest to the door. Matt, who has apparently gotten over his initial terror, wanders into the kitchen. Searching for something to distract himself, if Trevor had to guess. Trevor is still standing in the middle of the living room, dumbfounded. How did a simple robbery become hanging out with other robbers, waiting for cops to show up?

'i'm jeremy, by the way. they won't ask, but y'know. just in case.'

They're flipping channels on the tv, seeming to arbitrarily skip almost a dozen programs. Finally, they settle on one and stand. Trevor recognizes it as an old Disney movie, and desperately wants to ask why the fuck Jeremy has put this on.

'uh, hi. i'm trevor. why are we watching Mulan?'

'matt. oh hell yeah, i love this movie!'

He sounds remarkably cheerful, considering the circumstances. How Trevor had seemingly switched places with Anxious McGee is beyond him. He needs to get it together. He pulls his gun from his pocket and takes it to the kitchen, sticking it in the drawer Jeremy had taken the phone from. There are several other phones of varying price point. He steps back to the living room just in time.

'that's why.'

They don't elaborate. Apparently Trevor is meant to just figure this out on his own, which ordinarily he might be able to do. After the course of events of this particular evening? Not a chance.

But he can't ask, because now there's a cop in the doorway and he's staring at Trevor and that will never be a good thing. Trevor stares back. He has no clue what he's meant to say. Hello? Welcome? He went that way?

'oh thank god! we've been so terrified, we didn't know if he'd come back or what he'd do.'

Naturally, Jeremy has taken lead on this. They're a phenomenal actor, Trevor has to admit.

'did you see which direction he went?'

'toward the stairs, i think. we've all been rooted to the spot, you know, it's so scary-'

Matt freezes in the doorway of the kitchen. He's just out of the view from the front door.

'right, well. you boys did the right thing by calling. can you give me a description of the man?'

The corner of Jeremy's mouth quirks.

'gosh, it all just happened so fast. taller than me, probably, but shorter than you, wouldn't you say, trey?'

Trevor nods, because he's not quite sure what else to do.

'alright, thank you. someone will be in touch with you for an official statement. in the meantime, if you remember anything else don't hesitate to call.'

He's holding a card out to Trevor, of all people. He takes it carefully, like if he does it wrong somehow the guy will know and arrest them all. The card is simply the number for a tip line.

As suddenly as he'd arrived, the cop is gone and they're all breathing sighs of relief. Jeremy closes the door.

'you guys can stay for Mulan, if you want.'

So they do.

Trevor asks about why Mulan again, and Jeremy explains that they assume most people have seen it, could answer any questions about it if they came up. Perhaps, if LSPD officers were less incompetent, they would have. Although if that were the case, they wouldn't be LSPD officers at all.

Matt asks about the window, and Jeremy says yes, they did break their own window. Of course they'd had an actual plan when they'd entered the alley. They were always going to end up exactly here, give or take the extras. Asking for a plan was simply a test, determining the merit in bring them along. They'd passed.

Jeremy asks if they want to stay for Mulan II, which is apparently up next. They do.

Somewhere in Los Santos, in the early morning hours of a Wednesday, three convenience stores are recovering from three separate robberies. Right in the middle of them all, their respective robbers are sitting on a couch together, watching a straight to video children's film.

It is the beginning of something far greater than any of them can imagine.

[aroclawthornes]

Blooming Brilliant, an Aroace Willow Park Manifesto

[id: a gif of a heart locket opening. One half of the locket displays a picture of Willow Park from The Owl House, winking and making peace signs with her fingers. Blue and yellow stars surround her. The other half reads "willow park my beloved." /end id.]

Greetings! It’s me, User Aroclawthornes, and instead of working on all the time-sensitive homework I have I sat down and wrote an essay explaining why I think Willow Park OwlHouse could plausibly be read as aroace, and why it would be a thematically enriching interpretation. I’ve never written anything like this before, so it’s oddly formal, a little pretentious, and contains a lot of qualifying language, but I'm confident that it gets my point across. I’m not intending to speak over other interpretations of Willow or assert that it's the only true way to read her, but it's a headcanon I find interesting, and I think there’s a lot of evidence to back it up, between certain elements that Willow’s arc employs to some good old overanalysed symbolism. If you're aspec, I hope this is validating; if you're not, I hope it's interesting; if you don't care, scrolling past it is quick, free, and easy.

Some disclaimers on terminology: I’m speaking from an aroace perspective, and so when I say “aspec coding” I’m generally referring to both orientations as a catch-all - a lot of the coding surrounding Willow could go either way. I’m also going to be talking about commonly accepted “aspec” narratives, but I’m aware of the limitations of this insofar as my experiences are only a single facet of the diverse range of aspec people in this world, so anyone who wants to add or argue anything - respectfully - is encouraged to.

Analysis below the cut!

The Thing About Plants

I’m not going to pretend that an association with plants is historically indicative of aspec coding, because, frankly, there haven’t been enough aspec characters to establish it as a convention, and it’s also a fairly wide-reaching branch of symbolism. However, I am going to propose that lighthearted comparisons between asexual people and plants (however misguided on functions of plant reproduction they are) are fairly common elements of budding ace teenage humour, as are related quips about photosynthesis.

[id: a screenshot of Willow from "I Was A Teenage Abomination", depicting her sitting on the ground while casting a spell over a small, pink flower. /end id.]

I’m also not going to claim that the colour green Belongs To Aromantics, and therefore that All Plants Are Belong To Us, but in tandem with everything else I’m about to cover, the connection between Willow and plants seems like a fairly plausible nudge to a relatively common element of aspec humour.

“Half-a-witch” Willow and the Late Bloomer Experience

[id: a screenshot of Willow with glowing green eyes, from "I Was A Teenage Abomination", depicting her summoning a mess of thorned vines. /end id]

Willow is literally nicknamed “half-a-witch”, in reference to her supposedly incomplete state - this is a sentiment eerily reminiscent of the pressure to find one’s “other half”, which affects aspec - especially aromantic - people particularly profoundly. She’s considered a late bloomer, someone who hasn’t reached the societal milestones of growth at the expected age, and who is derided and considered immature as a result of this perceived failure. However, we quickly discover that Willow is, in fact, an exceptionally competent and powerful witch - taken out of the restricting frame of the Abominations track, she’s able to grow into her own, “complete” person, therefore proving that she was never really lacking in anything in the first place. Like real-life aroace people, she was perceived as limited and immature based on the expectations and judgements of other people, but Willow was never deficient in anything, least of all herself.

[id: a screenshot of Willow and Luz from "I Was A Teenage Abomination". They are holding hands - the former is laughing with her eyes closed, and the latter is grinning, while covered in abomination goop. /end id]

As far as symbolism goes...the track Willow is initially put in literally requires her to conjure up another humanoid entity, with the expectation that she will therefore prove herself to be a whole and mature person. Only with this ability, she’s told, will she be successful and happy as an adult. The shapelessness of her attempts at conjuring an abomination reinforces this connection in my mind - if I may reference this quote from Ducktales 2017‘s (absolutely stellar) A Nightmare On Killmotor Hill, in which the protagonists explore their own subconscious fears via. the dream realm, for a second:

“I think that’s supposed to be my romantic interest, but I’m too threatened by the concept, so it never takes shape.”

A lot of young aroace people find themselves in situations where they attempt to convince themself of their interest in someone in an attempt to be “normal,” or end up lying in response to family members or friends’ questions about crushes. While Willow’s abominations, first and foremost, represent the expectations from her school, classmates, and family to be a successful, “complete” witch with a profitable future, I think that with an aroace interpretation of Willow they could also very easily be read as representing some latent insecurities over a lack of attraction, or pressure to find a significant other.

(I’m not condemning Willow’s dads, by the way - they seem like perfectly lovely fellas, and I’m confident that they were doing what they thought was best for her. They’re certainly very quick to drop everything to assure her future in Escaping Expulsion, so obviously they care about their daughter very much.)

Greens, Blues, and Yellows: Colour-Coding Willow Park

A while back, I made this post comparing Willow’s palette to the aromantic and aroace flags:

[id: a screenshot of a post depicting the aromantic and aromantic asexual flags, colour-picked from images of Willow in her Hexside uniform and casual dress respectively - these are overlaid on top of the flags. The caption reads "observations on willow park". /end id.]

The grey-and-green aromantic flag has long been the accepted mainstream symbol of aromanticism, and, as the above post - and many others - demonstrate, Willow’s palette reflects it near-perfectly. This could easily be a coincidence, owing to the palette of the standard Hexside Plant Track uniform, as well as her hair and eye colours - which are obviously supposed to be reflective of her plant-related abilities. However, given how fond of employing hidden meanings The Owl House has shown itself to be, I don’t think it’s far-fetched to claim that there’s at least a chance that her palette was constructed with the flag in mind.

The latter is...a bit more problematic for me, although it’s fun to joke about. The blue-and-yellow aroace flag was only created in December 2018, relatively late into The Owl House’s initial production, and it’s still relatively obscure, although on the rise in popularity as the accepted aroace flag (I only recently started using it myself), so I don’t know if Willow’s casual wear is enough to verify the presence of any deliberate subtext. I think it’s a fun coincidence, however, and (as was pointed out in this post) it’s cool that these blue and yellow stars surrounding Willow occur in the same frame as Luz’s bisexual decor:

[id: a photograph of Luz, Gus, and Willow, all surrounding a disgruntled-looking Principal Bump. Luz has flowers in the colours of the bisexual flag decorating her hair, while Willow is surrounded by bright blue and yellow stars. /end id.]

also seen above: powerful bi/aspec solidarity

Conclusion:

Do I genuinely believe that Willow is being deliberately written this way? If you’d asked me, say, two months ago, I’d have said probably not - as far as queer representation in kids’ cartoons has come, it has a ways to go, and focusing on transgender characters seems like a more obvious (and equally invaluable) route to go down. I can name maybe five explicitly aspec characters off the top of my head, two of whom have been written as alloromantic and/or sexual in adaptations or continuations of the source material (I have...some grievances with 2005 Doctor Who). But the emergence of Raine, an explicitly nonbinary character on Disney Channel, has given me a little spark of hope, and so, even if it’s never confirmed, it’s comforting to be able to see a character with such strong elements of aspec coding and think to myself, just maybe, that there might be some intent behind it.

I also...really want to see interesting things done with Willow. We’re halfway through Season 2, and despite some promising setup for her arc in the Season 1 finale, she’s sort of been left by the wayside lately in favour of developing the more “plot-relevant” characters, such as Luz, Amity, Eda, and Hunter. Frankly, I think it’s a disservice to her Season 1 development, despite how much I adore all the characters I just listed - beyond any personal motivation, the prospect that Willow could be aroace adds a lot of sorely-sought depth to her, and, as detailed, a lot of this has already been set up in her earlier episodes. I just...I think it’d be neat. Rarely do you get a kids’ show so brazenly queer in its themes as Owl House, and aspec people deserve to be included in that.

Willow would also be great aroace representation because, well - those five or so aspec characters I mentioned being aware of are all white or “raceless” (...also written as white, basically), and so an aspec Asian character would be a really lovely step forward in this area. Additionally, all the characters I referred to are also conventionally skinny, and Willow is not only fat, but written in a way that doesn’t treat this feature as a caricature. People who are more knowledgeable on these topics than I are absolutely free to make additions, as is anyone who feels like I’ve left certain details out.

tl;dr: Willow’s association with plants could be read as a cool nod to aspec humour, her “late bloomer” narrative is eerily reminiscent of some common aspec experiences, her palette speaks for itself, and it’d be really cool if we could diversify the so-far fairly bland sphere of aspec representation.

I’m going to conclude this by linking Rose by The Oh Hellos, because they’re my favourite band, they share The Owl House’s initials, and I also think it’s a good Willow song. Peace out.

[grimmradiance]

Close to Me: How the Hollow Knight's Fighting Style Reflects Their Trauma (and the Radiance's as well)

So I've been trying to actually beat the Radiance, which means I've been fighting the Hollow Knight. A lot, as a matter of fact, since I'm beans at this game sometimes. I've also been thinking about @lost-kinn's meta about how fighting styles are how Vessels, especially the Little Knight, communicate.

In trying to apply this to the Hollow Knight, I've been coming to some very interesting conclusions, especially taken in context of...Everything Else in the lore, and Everything Else implicated in this by the psychology of it.

There's a lot to cover here, and it tracks through a LOT of different places, including trauma psychology, the relationship between chronic stress and lifespan health, and shape symbolism. Two warnings first:

One: this essay is gonna get heavy. It includes fine-grained discussion of the Hollow Knight's trauma, including discussions of the real-life machanics of psychological abuse, as well as the Extremely Concerning Implications of them harming themself during their boss fight. please read with caution and when you're in a safe emotional place to do so.

Two: This post is not a place for justifying the Pale King. If you read this essay in its entirety and still want to do that, please make your own post; my relationship to the Hollow Knight themself is deeply rooted in my own experiences, so in the context of this discussion I can't promise I won't take it personally.

With that out of the way, let's talk trauma and fighting styles:

We know that the Hollow Knight is trained to be a paragon of fighting skill, through the Pure Vessel fight, and this gives us a fantastic way to compare what they were like before they were made Government Assigned Radiance Jail, and after. Or, in other words, we're given the perfect opportunity to see what the Radiance is doing (i.e. context effects), and what Hollow is (i.e. what we can conclude is reliably consistent as a part of them). Listed here, for reference:

Hollow's attacks:

Three slashes

A dash slash

A Radiant Shade Soul, which launches a volley of Infection blobs in arcs

A Radiant Desolate Dive, which produces pillars of entwined Void and Light at random intervals

The Infection bursting out of them in random arcs, covering a significant amount of the aerial space of the arena

The Radiance ragdolling their body around trying to hit the Knight

Contact damage from them stabbing themself and falling over atop you

The Pure Vessel's attacks:

Three slashes

A dash slash

A Pure Shade Soul, which launches a volley of nails in straight lines

A Pure Desolate Dive, which produces nails at specific intervals

A Pure Focus, which causes circular explosions across most of the aerial space in the arena

Lashing out with a Void Arm (word choice intentional)

I've highlighted attacks from each battle that are different, since those are our points of interest here. In addition, both the Pure Vessel and Hollow are exceedingly fond of teleport-spamming in a way that is usually reserved for a specific group of bosses.

Another very important distinction between these two fights: the Pure Vessel doesn't scream. Well, they certainly try to, but no sound comes out. No voice to cry suffering, after all. All of these points have a lot to go into, so let's address them one at a time.

All That Remains: Theoretical Background On The Significance Of Constants

Making comparisons across time is important specifically because humans (and human-like bugs) change. Most personality traits aren't set in stone--they exist as an interaction of someone's internal tendencies, their experiences, and their environment. Speaking of those last two points, not all experiences and environments are created equally. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs for short) are known to have lifelong implications for a child's health, both physically and mentally. These are events that are so stressful or stressful for so long that they exceed a child's ability to cope and become toxic stress (yes, that's the term in the literature, because it actively damages your organs). They compound, as well--the stress of one ACE makes it harder for a child to cope with another, especially if they overlap.

Some examples of ACEs? Being exposed to physical danger or the threat of physical danger, deprivation of normal social relationships with peers of a similar age, being forcibly seperated from family members, witnessing a loved one being hurt or killed, chronic illness in oneself or a family member, neglect of a child's emotional needs....

Poor fucking Holly. It's a miracle they didn't disintegrate under the pressure. The only other option is that they bent and adapted under that much stress--in other words, most of their personality has been forcibly reshaped by what they've gone through. Anyone who has up-close experience with parentification or complex child abuse already knows: this was by design. I'm not saying the intent was to traumatize the Pure Vessel past several points of no return, but the intent definitely was to reshape their personality for the purpose of being The Vessel. We only see them (the Pure Vessel) in battle after this process is mostly or entirely complete, but we do see them a few times beforehand. I'd like to draw attention to the Path of Pain cutscene right now.

I've seen people talking about the look the Vessel and the King share as a sign that TPK really does love his child. That might be true, but it's definitely not relevant when it comes to how abuse works. This is, in fact, exactly how the cycle of abuse uses affection as a tool. Long periods of abuse or neglect, smoothed over by small periods of affection that placate the survivor? That's textbook love bombing, the kind that forms stubborn trauma bonds and facilitates unhealthy dependency. Forgive me for not giving the Higher Being of knowledge and prescience the benefit of the doubt on that one. (/s)

Team Cherry knows about the importance of parallels and dissonance. There's a reason the music in the second phase of the Hollow Knight fight plays in the Path of Pain. There's a reason it cuts out the moment the battle with the Kingsmoulds is over, instead of at the room transition. There's a reason it doesn't cut out in the Black Egg. Actually, there's two potential reasons, which could also coexist: either little Hollow trusts the Pale King to keep them safe, even after the borderline torture that they were just subjected to, or big Hollow is so hypervigilant that they're in full functioning-through-trauma mode even while they're at death's door.

If you don't see how much the Pale King scarred his child at this point, I'm not sure we were playing the same game.

Walking the Straight Line: How the Pale King's Teachings Show In the Pure Vessel

The Pale King loves order and control. Everything about the White Palace and every decision we see him make implies this. Everything is spotless white walls and well-maintained gardens; the only signs of disorder are hidden away, either in his workshop or in The Pit™. This also reflects in the Pure Vessel's title--pure as in holy, but also pure as in without flaw. Considering the Nailsmith's emotional state after completing the Pure Nail, TPK's fate with his Perfect Controlled Kingdom, and the Godmaster ending as a whole, attaining perfection is not a good thing in any sense.

We know the Hollow Knight isn't perfect--that's the whole catalyst for the plot. But considering their upbringing and their fighting style as the Pure Vessel, their imperfections absolutely kill them emotionally. I'll spare the lecture on how perfectionism affects neurodivergent kids even more severely than neurotypical kids, if only to keep this post to a reasonable length (look up "twice-exceptional children" if you'd like to know the theory I'm glossing over in more depth). But, in essence, the deck is doubly stacked against them--they have a higher goal to reach, and far more obsctacles in their path, including their own emotional scars.

I've already discussed how Hollow isn't meant for this kind of stress in a physical sense in other posts. They're not prepared for it emotionally, either--the Pale King wants perfection, and they can't even stand up straight (every spoonie in the audience already knows how exhausting people's obsession with Standing Up Straight is). There's another page on their stack of emotional baggage, even BEFORE you consider that the Pure Vessel knows their perfection is what bought them a ticket out of the Abyss.

Bringing Teleportation To A Sword Fight: Where The Pure Vessel Reveals Their Fears

How else are they going to cope with that need for perfection, that need to prove themselves worthy of the reason their life was spared, by being flawless in any way they can? Being a mechanical, flawless fighter puts so much pressure on them, both literally (repetitive strain injuries fucking HURT) and figuratively--if you're predictable, the only sure way to win is to mop the floor with your opponents before they figure you out. Hell, that's the way most people play their first run of Hollow Knight, by throwing themselves at the bosses over and over until they figure out the patterns. That strategy is inherently going to fail against an opponent that's, say, an immortal higher being.

There's no way that the Vessel didn't figure this out, and yet none of their TPV specific attacks are positioned randomly--the nails are always evenly spaced, and the Focus explosions are always in a specific height region of the screen. That's clinging to survival strategies even when they become maladaptive in its purest form.

Another dip into psychological theory: let's talk about disorganized attachment. Attachment styles describe how someone's relationships to their main caregiver(s) influence their understanding on relationships in general. Disorganized attachment is a result of an upbringing of inherently unstable parent-child relationships, where there's no way of a child predicting whether an adult is going to be delighted to see them, ambivalent, upset, or otherwise. If my parent woke up some days saying "all right my child, time for the Infinite Buzzsaws Obstacle Course," I'd be the same way. In adulthood this manifests as an inability to form a stable sense of self-concept as well as concepts of others. Mission accomplished, TPK, there's no will to break if you broke it yourself.

This is where the fighting styles as communication comes in--Hollow needs to keep Ghost at a distance to fight, but also wants to be closer to their sibling (the only being who has a chance of understanding what they've been through), BUT also has a trauma-rooted fear of attaching to people, as their experiences with attachment are inherently unpredictable and dangerous. Hence, both the teleportation that doesn't seem to match their fighting style any more reliably than "aim at the thing attacking you" and the second attack unique to the Pure Vessel--they're quite literally lashing out in pain to push people away. There's a reason that attack is so reminiscent of the Thorns of Agony.

Of note is that Holly does seem to teleport like the bugs of the Soul Sanctum do (favoring the edges of a screen, rather than going wherever like Dream Warriors do), which makes sense--they're the most obvious answer to the question "how did they learn how to teleport, anyways?" However, Sanctum bugs have abilities designed to capitalize on this, like homing spells and slashes from above. I can only assume this means that someone saw Holly's proficiency with the nail and assumed it translated to other forms of combat, and didn't feel the need to give them at least a bit of a primer on how to make the best use of it. There's another tally for the Hollow Knight as an autism metaphor.

Trauma Bonds: How the Radiance Speaks Through Hollow

Now, we're back to the Black Egg, and two people stuck in the same sinking ship. The thing that makes this hurt so badly is that Holly and the Radiance are at complete cross purposes here, and yet they both want the same thing:

They both want out, no matter the cost. For the Radiance, this means forsaking the pacifistic nature of the moths and nuking Ghost personally.

For Hollow, this means forsaking the way they were raised and everything that was bludgeoned into their personality: the only way out is to fail, give up control, and trust that Ghost will do what needs to be done.

Imagine how much pain they're in to actually go for it. Going against a literal lifetime of conditioning is something that takes the average person years to even consider, let alone go through with. It's a form of learned helplessness--if you try to break free and fall, again and again, it actively discourages further attempts. Breaking through learned helplessness is an interesting process, because it generally involves re-establishing a sense of control by recalling previous events where the person was able to change their situation.

Which, as far as we know of, are nothing but traumatic memories for Hollow. It's very unlikely that they'd break through it on their own, but we know they have by the time we see the second phase of their fight. This is them at their most desperate: the same music as the Path of Pain, the way they let, or can't stop, the Radiance throw their body around, the way they actively try to let the Radiance out by stabbing themself.

You'd think that giving up and learned helplessness are inherently compatible, but when giving up both goes against your core personality, and involves your active participation, they're in direct opposition. So either Holly was able to process all their trauma by themself (which I doubt, judging by how much effort the player has to go through to even see Ghost's and Hollow's traumatic memories), or someone gave them a nudge or three in that direction.

Considering that there's been someone living in Holly's head who has a vested interest in them Not Doing Their Duty, I think we know who. And the thing is, I think we watch Hollow have this breakthrough during their battle. Imagine for the first time in decades, at least, you can move. You're in pain from being in the same position, probably hallucinating from sensory deprivation, with an infection sucking at what strength your body has left. And there's this little creature who looks ready to fight you, who seems to have let you go for that exact purpose.

And you look down, and both you and the Radiance recognize them from a place rooted deeper than consciousness, in the murky depths of trauma. You see the other Vessel who just as easily could have been you, and who looks so much stronger for not being you, for being an imperfect, willful creature. And the Radiance sees history threatening to repeat itself, another one of the Wyrm's cursed children seeking to lock her away once more.

What else do you do when you're triggered? You scream, and you go on instinct, and you retreat into your head. Those first blows, with the epic music? That's the Vessel the Pale King forged, the fighting machine that will endure unimaginable stress because it knows no other way. What snaps you back out of dissociation? Usually, either the passage of the triggering stimulus, or an even more relevant stimulus (severe pain from getting beaten up by a nail, for example).

The tragedy is this: we know this isn't a triumph. I think most of us went into that fight the first time, knowing we'd be putting the Hollow Knight out of their misery. The music turns tragic, Hollow screams, and then we see the Radiance and Hollow themself break through: the Radiance trying to fight Ghost directly with the resources she has, and Hollow trying to help her along.

For what it's worth, Hollow even had the right idea, when it came to letting themself rest while helping Ghost stop the madness their father started--they were just digging for the Radiance in the wrong place. The dynamic between the Radiance and the Hollow Knight is something I could write on for pages and pages, but this has gone on for long enough. Tune in next time, where I'll presumably talk about this same topic but in reverse with regards to the Radiance.

[alys-gay-parade]

To be fair, the kink at pride discourse doesn’t actually ruin pride for anyone, because the people who engage in it have never been to an actual pride event, and people at pride are going to continue unapologetically being themselves regardless if Twitter tenderqueers and conservative republicans are teeming up to call them creeps online.

You have a point, but also I feel like this Is a discussion that warrants attention among the communities that Do actually go to pride Regularly. And a lot of people, esp minors, thinking about going to their first pride event might be put off of a potentially life altering and uplifting experience upon Seeing discourse this hostile in their online spaces.

Pride is supposed to be about supporting and uplifting future generations of queer people, which means the minors who are exploring their identities. The fact that I saw a shitty 30-something telling a concerned but uneducated minor to Kill Themself for Showing Concerns for their community was the tipping point for me. The amount of purists saying stupid bullshit doesn't compare to the harm telling a Child to Kill Themself can do.

Kink belongs at pride. So do queer minors. We need to make sure we marry these two factions in a safe and respectful manner. Everybody's concerns are Valid, and we Have to come to a middle ground in order for the community to be stronger as a whole.

[felikatze]

Just wanted to say thank you so much for all the brainworms you have been giving me and my friends for the past few hours about Ayin and all the analyses you've been doing about him.

I have been losing my mind in the middle of the night thinking about all the things you've said, turning it over like crazy and trying to compare it with the gameplay I've had of Lobotomy Corporation and Library of Ruina.

Please do more analysis and share more of your ideas! Please? Please, with cherry on top? Please, I beg of you?

Especially if you have in-depth ideas of analyses for the Sephirah and how it relates to both their own characters and Ayin and Angela.

I thank you greatly in advance!

the implication that i've infected an entire friend group with my brainworms is power that will 100% go to my head i feel amazing. what else is analysis posting except trying to inflict people with the same thoughts bouncing around your skull on repeat

i DO have shit on the sephirah but mostly netzach, because i love netzach, and i in fact found my discord ramble about him (and chesed)

i dont have things on how they relate to A and Angela specifically because I mainly kept thinking abt Reverbaration Ensemble parallels... i have so many thoughs abt Netzach and Bremen.

(but if you want me to talk about, say, a specific core supression, or floor realization... i have a lot of thoughts on floor realizations.)

First off I am so sorry that you seem to think I'm smart because that means i have the perfect opportunity to inflict you with this

okay now we can get to the serious stuff

[transcript:

containment breach:

quick ramble abt lor again but i love the ensemble receptions so much. i'm at chesed's rn, and i know he's been chill the entire game, but him just refusing to comment on jae-hoon's tragedy seems, out of context, a dick move, but also is so important for chesed to do? he recognizes that another's suffering is not related to him, that he can't do anything about it, and that this is fine. The closest i'd describe chesed in lobcorp would be "activist burnout." Due to betraying the lab from garion's pressure, chesed was so consumed by guilt, he just blamed himself for everything and became more callous because it's already his fault, right? There's nothing he can do. But in lor, he knows what his responsibilities are, and allows himself joy where he can find it. I love the ensemble receptions bcuz they are just examplary of each patron libriarian's growth and i iqbfjc (sobs)

GOD this sure is a paragraph

also have to salute netzach for carrying his scene all by himself as the musicians of bremen just (animal noises) :pray:

ykno being online i realize that i'm not quiet at all i am a complete and utter chatterbox /end]

[transcript:

containment breach:

thinking abt netzach's scene where he doesn't talk to bremen, because he can't, but recognizes this who has not only lost themself in their own art but also their own suffering

i just i love netzach so much his entire character arc is abt learning to live with depression and learning to want to live again

so he becomes unable to understand, really, why someone would sacrifice themselves for their own art

when he started out just, similar yet different from bremen, completely submerged in his own misery

musicians of bremen reminds me i still have bremen bon bons at home i should eat those. they r tasty /end]

i wanna specifically dig into this scene more because i love that scene, a lot.

Art as we get to know it in the City is irrevocably tied to violence. Puppets are made of human bodies, music is played on bones and sinews. To the artists of the City, to create art is to make someone suffer. Rewatching Netzach's story bits, Roland describes it as doing nothing but seeking stimulation and being provocative.

Furthermore, there is a direct comparison between art and alcohol. To paraphrase more, the Pianist must've been one hell of a stimulant, like getting hit by a strong booze. A performance some are still hungover from.

Netzach's main struggle was addiction because of depression, and his growing appreciation for art is a continuation of that arc. He says himself that art and alcohol are linked.

However, alcohol is a step down from hard drugs. Netzach hasn't quit, but just that step down shows he learned moderation, which makes me very proud of him.

Moderation is what the other.. let's just call them artists, lack. I said in the screencaps above, initially, Netzach was lost in his own suffering, and the musicians of bremen are lost in their art. And if art is seen as equal to suffering, that just means Netzach and Bremen are more similar than expected. (Especially considering what we see of the musicians previously; they’re always trying to chase the same high they experienced listening to the Pianist by any means necessary. The addiction parallels are not suprising.)

I rewatched most of Netzach's lor scenes, and what rlly gets me is that in his first one, he seems almost the exact same as in lobcorp. He doesn't want to work, he got dragged into this against his will, he feels as if his accomplishments are futile.

But! He eventually invites Roland for drinks. He's not drinking to forget alone anymore, he's doing it as social activity. Furthermore, the more time he spends as Patron Librarian of Arts, the more he grows to appreciate art. Art is tied to suffering, still, but it is an expression of suffering. It does not produce any. Or should not, in any case. He sure wishes it wouldn’t.

So we arrive at his Ensemble Reception. This one makes a rather interesting comparison: art as the pursuit of the light. Let me elaborate.

To quote, “Honestly, I wanna tell people to stop doing the kind of art that requires ‘em to immolate themselves and others. Although, on the other hand... I can kinda see where they’re coming from. Art narrows your vision, after all.

You stop caring about the things around you. That’s how most artists seem to act, I think. And so, you indulge in the craft, not realizing that you’re throwing yourself and your surroundings into the fire you started.”

I pose this: Netzach speaks of his experience as Giovanni. Giovanni was a researcher who, when push came to shove, willingly sacrificed himself to advance the project, in hopes of seeing the light, seeing Carmen, again.

Though he dislikes Bremen’s actions, he does not judge them for it, because he recognized that it would be hypocritical. Even so, what shows that he’s grown is that he.. doesn’t want to see people harm themselves anymore. The focus here isn’t if Bremen hurt other people, which they have, but how much of themselves they’ve given up for their performance. He condemns the act, and not the people.

“If I can see that light once more... If I have to muster up the courage to reach it, I’ll gladly do it. It’s easier said than done, though; you need a lot of fearlessness for it.

And I guess you saw the same kind of light I was so desperate to see, yeah? Even if yours was a twisted creature... [...] Though, I don’t think I can tell you off like the others. At least I can see the reason behind it.”

He even explicitly mentions the light. The funny thing is, both Giovanni and Bremen tried to reach the Seed of Light, and Carmen. It’s tragically hilarious that we know Carmen is the voice the Distortions hear.

Hell, the more I think about it, the more you can just compare the Ensemble as a whole to the Outskirts Lab crew, down to Angelica’s puppet body and Carmen’s desecrated corpse.

“And I know pretty well that we have no right to devilishly pick apart each other’s way of art. I’m not very proud of mine, really...”

Netzach just.. gets it. I can’t remember atm, but I don’t think the other Patron Librarians really draw parallels like that. I’m seeing all the parallels now and I can’t unsee them ever. Bro.

His “art,” his way of protecting the light, is still violent. But he sees that perhaps it didn’t have to be, or rather shouldn’t be. I fucking love Netzach so much. His arc just means a lot to me personally, and I’d wager a lot of people who’ve struggled with mental illness would agree.

I’m not gonna get into Netzach’s floor realization here because this post is already long enough, but like, look at the specific flashback of Angela shown in Netzach’s story bits and contrast it to his arc of learning to want to live, and. Yeah.

[creacherkeeper]

hi!!! I saw you mention being a rare autistic extrovert, I think I might be also???

I enjoy interacting with strangers at a low level (crowds are overwhelming) such as short conversations with random people at the grocery store. Also longer conversations about interesting topics and connections with amicable coworkers. I have an innate desire to connect with most people. I also end up making a lot of eye contact accidentally because I’m looking at faces a lot and trying to discern if I know someone. I may not read social cues or body language I’m not attuned to and I have to consciously think about lots of cues and I constantly make my partner cringe (autistic and more introverted) when I break unspoken social rules. I turn my head a lot at noises and kinda catch myself staring at people who look interesting.

i also think i try to interact a lot with people who aren’t interested in interacting with me, and maybe my enthusiasm is offputting?

I mentioned to my friend that eye contact isnt uncomfortable and they stared really intensely at me and I shuddered, so I guess I do have issues with eye contact but it’s not painful or anything? I find myself unmasking a bit and looking away from people when I talk to them and it helps me concentrate on conversation.

It gives me relief that I’m not the only autistic person who doesn’t feel all that introverted. Eye contact and desire for social connection make me feel all impostery even though I meet the criteria pretty well.

Is this similar to your experience, and have you met other extroverted autistics?

hi!! yeah it sounds like you are pretty extroverted, but also some of what you said sounds sensory seeking too? looking at noises, reading expressions, staring at people, eye contact - all of those things can be sensory as well as social, so it seems like you have an overlap there

i like spending a lot of time with people and find myself very drawn to social interactions, whether its new internet friends or coworkers or talking to people for my job (like, i currently work as a social worker who does one on one sessions with clients, the vast majority of the time i feel better after sessions than i did before them). i definitely get very tired and brain funky if i dont have a lot of interaction. i have a lot of friends and still worry that im bugging them too much because i just like talking to them constantly

i definitely get what you mean with the imposter syndrome. but its important to remember that all autistic people are different and the autism "spectrum" covers a wide variety of traits. some autistic people have no problem socially or with eye contact and thats fine! it doesnt make them less autistic! and even two autistic people who have issues with social interaction can look entirely different

im probably the most extroverted autistic i know, but i definitely know autistics who are extremely charismatic and do very well for themselves socially. over the years as ive learned more about myself and others, ive grown a LOT in this area and now find it rather easy to engage with most people, have few problems communicating, and have been told that i am charming and generally well liked. but it was a PROCESS to get here because i used to be something of a fucking mess lmao. i think the key thing was that a lot of my skills in this area were LEARNED WITH GREAT INTENTION and i think thats where the difference is between me and an NT who just has these things come naturally. and i think another thing was just learning self confidence and self acceptance, like ive found that people tend to be drawn to someone whos confident and who can laugh at themself but doesnt really mind if they come across a little weird or unusual, compared to someone whos very self conscious or anxious about how they appear to others. like not being ashamed of your little oddities can go a long way!!!

[everythingthemoontouches]

Hii I love your blog. What do you think about pluto conjunct ascent and Lilith and Chiron in the 1st house. Pluto in 12th house and sag rising, aqua moon, Aries sun

Hey there!

Thank you so much ❤️ and can I just say that your username kinda makes me hungry and its really late where I'm at so the croissants are gonna have to wait another day..

🎯Speaking of your placements, have you ever tried archery? 🎯

There's some super heavy bow and arrow symbolism in your ascendant. (Sag and chiron both feature arrows)

Please keep in mind that some of this may not apply. So if something doesn't quite match your lived experience, don't try to force it to fit.

Chiron in the first house is a super annoying placement to have.

And yet, these people can go on to be some of the biggest social reformers. Could second guess their skills or own wisdom a fair bit?

Change is always PERSONAL.

Chiron being the wounded healer archetype strives to be the adult they needed when they were growing up ❤️😭 I have so much love for people with this placement.

I feel like they could grow up with a lot of insecurities regarding their looks or sense of identity. Yet, because they've been through it themself, they are more likely to be able to help other people with self love.

The friend that hates seeing people trash talk themselves.

Lilith and chiron being in the same house, they can be quite sensitive about perceived threats or insults and can go into a bit of a ' attacking is the best defense' 😉😈🛡️ mode of action.

Lilith and Pluto aspects to ascendant are strikingly sexy and I'm lowkey getting tired of saying this now 😴😂🔥 just know that y'all are naturally hot okay?

Trigger warning

I feel like the sexual attention could be potentially dangerous due to Pluto being placed in the 12th house. Whether you like it or not death, rebirth / starting over could have played a big role in your life. I'm not trying to scare anyone reading this, but if astrology helps you figure things out, or save someone from a potential mishap, I believe it's my job to point out potential redflags.

Could have repressed memories? It's okay to let some of these things lie in the subconscious unless you're 100% ready to deal with them?

Sag rising comes off really generous and kind. Could be a little too generous to the point where people you've just met are thinking,' what do you wnat from me? Are you just naturally just that kind? 'the house and sign of your Jupiter could show who you're always bailing out of trouble.

Sagittarius denotes skill. In Tarot it's represented by the 8 of pentacles which is the card of skill building. It represents doing things over and over untill you're completely satisfied. For a long time it was believed that its was humanely impossible to run a mile in 8 minutes. But once that record was broken, people actually established new records fairly often. That's your skill as a Sagittarius rising. You can learn a d teach others to do things extremely skillfully and also, in a way set a new standard for doing things.

You could be the friend who people go to when they need a shoulder to cry on. Jupiter is nothing if not generous.

Could be a tendency to either be friend zoned or be hurt because someone else didn't like that you only see them as a friend.

Pluto in the 12th : do you know a lot of random prison facts? People could feel naked around you. Like all their subconscious fears are written on their face around you.

Pluto in the 12th is an extremely spiritual placement. Umm, have you ever been in therapy? If not, perhaps you're someone who likes to research about the human psyche. And I'm not talking about, what does your favorite color mean kinda pop psychology. You're probably comparing Freud, Jung and Nietschze. Or someone even more obscure that even some professional spiritualists may not know of.

Do you watch documentaries about prisons / fortresses / dungeons?

Do people feel attacked around you? With Pluto being so close to your ascendant, you could unintentionally mention subtle cues you pick up on. And this may not always be the polite thing to do?

♒Aqua moon : do you take a nap when your feelings / stress gets overwhelming?

♒🌙Could be really smart at learning or setting up things. If this is in your third house, you're probably really good at learning languages or could even be the one who comes up with words that your friends end up adding to their lingo.

♈Aries Sun: was your mom an athlete? Your parents (mom/ stay at home parent) could have had a really quick temper and needed things to be DONE THEIR WAY. They could have kinda been the cebtre if attention at home.

♈They may have been firm with you but could also be really protective. I know an astrologer with an Aries mum and she was talking about how even though her mom may ha e never agreed much with her, but she also her fiercest ally outside the house. And that she gets a lot of confidence from her mom. A learned habit. Since this is also your sun sign, it could be your dad who displays Aries like traits. (I believe it was Hannah's Elsewhere)

5th house sun :

your hobbies were probably encouraged. You may also have been a particularly gifted child. Aries in the fifth could have give you a competitive streak on the playground. You may feel like you have to be the best at your hobbies. Perhaps you were the star athlete? Or your dad could be an avid sports fan. could have had a really happy childhood. May be closer to your father than you are to your mum. Pisces 4th house folks could sometimes feel like mom was kinda distant. Or she may have been extremely emotionally in tune. It's usually one or the other. Water signs at their best are extremely emotionally intelligent and sensitive to other people's needs.

Could be lucky/ blessed at games of chance. Please dont spend all your savings on a lottery ticket just because I said so.

If / when you have kids they're probably gonna be quite energetic and have leader like traits. Your firstborn may also resemble your father a lot in looks / behaviour. I also feel like you would either have a boy or your child would ha e a really confident, masculine energy to them. They're not one to sit around and watch things happen. The 5th house also represents your inner child, so you could have been someone who liked starting things and was quite energetic.

Could enjoy watching movies about the government. Makes for a good leader or someone in administrative services.

In conclusion : I feel like you come across fierce, smart, quick witted and passionate about things, someone with a range of interests and somehow you're good at all of them,even if YOU think you could do better, take the day off Chiron) . Could be a tad bit sensitive when it comes to your ego but are usually quite fun to be around since your big three are fire and air signs.

I could also see you as a community leader.

[wtwo-archive]

i'm about to ramble about some dumb bullshit nobody cares about but truly... hilbert/hilda and nate/rosa play the same role in gen 5 that red and ethan/kris/lyra did in their games respectively.

in other words, pokemon black and white are the red and blue of gen 5, and pokemon black 2 and white 2 are the gold, silver and crystal.

the gsc/hgss protagonists basically do almost the same things as red and experience almost the same things he did. they receive pokedexes from professor oak, they have a rival that's an asshole, they encounter team rocket along the way. they collect all 8 gym badges for their region. they take team rocket down. they become the new champion. and then they travel to another region (something red didn't do in his games) and collect those gym badges as well.

and then after the player ends up at the top of mt silver, face to face with red. the former champion. the kid who took down team rocket. the ultimate trainer. and with only the exchange of two eyes meeting, they fight.

the biggest difference here is that you never see the bw hero in black and white 2. you hear mentions of them, of course, from people like bianca, cheren, n, team plasma members and their mom, but you never get to see them for themself. their story is plain and simple—they were the hero that saved unova two years before plasma decided to strike again. they might have been champion, too, at some point, but that's more ambiguous. nate/rosa follow almost exactly the same path hilbert/hilda did on their journey, they just start in a different place and go through different obstacles. they both get a pokédex from juniper (technically bianca for the bw2 heroes), collect 8 gym badges, run into team plasma and n, and then they confront ghetsis at the climax of the main story and take team plasma down.

the parallels you can draw from these two different yet similar storylines don't just limit themselves to the player's journey. in hgss, blue says this to the player:

and, honestly? looking at ethan and lyra's designs, i can see it!

in bw2, a lot of people compare nate/rosa to the bw protag. most of them don't mean it like, physically, and more in how strong and determined they are, but how can you look at these designs and not think that someone could mistake them for older versions of hilbert and hilda?

one big difference between the bw and the bw2 protags is that the dragon they get is different. depending on the version, hilbert/hilda will get reshiram (black) or zekrom (white), while nate/rosa will get the dragon that n had in the postgame (zekrom for black 2, reshiram for white 2). this doesn't really add to the parallels, but i think it's fun how they can be seen as foils in that regard.

the rivals for red and the johto protagonists are very similar. as in they're both assholes who at first only want to get stronger, but then after getting beat repeatedly by the player they realize that they can't just rely on being strong. blue's change is evident from the three-year time gap between kanto's events and johto's events, while silver's spans from the main game to the postgame and some of pokemon masters (which is in a weird limbo of canon but I Think It Counts Because It's Important To Me). cheren is the blue to the bw protag's red, while hugh can be seen as the silver to the bw2 protag's ethan/kris/lyra. cheren and blue both have a huge final goal of becoming stronger and being the champion, while silver and hugh are extremely fixated on becoming stronger to crush their regions respective evil teams.

blue and cheren both become gym leaders in the next games they appear in and reference their journey/red or the bw protag a lot. blue talks about red beating him with a bitter fondness like they've known each other their entire lives, while cheren talks about his journey with hilbert/hilda and bianca on occasion and says that it changed him a lot and he's grateful for it and how it made him grow.

silver and hugh both want to take down the evil teams in their games for personal reasons. silver sees them as weak and bitterly resents them because his father, giovanni, was the leader of team rocket before abandoning his son after blue and red beat him, with red also taking down team rocket himself. team plasma stole the purrloin hugh's sister was gifted by their grandfather five years before bw2's events, and is desperate to try and take them down and save it. both of these goals cause them to get really bad tunnel vision, where silver loses it after lance defeats him and berates silver for not caring about his pokemon beyond their strength, and hugh doesn't know what to do with the stolen purrloin, now a liepard, glowering at him with hatred and no memory of who he is. the main differences between them are that hugh isn't as mean as silver can be and doesn't get physical with the player, as he and the player are childhood friends. he can still be harsh to some people though, mainly the ex members of team plasma.

the last parallel i'll draw between these games is the one between red's mother in gsc/hgss and hilbert/hilda's mom in bw2.

in the johto games, when the player visits her, red's mom says this:

"Hi! Red's been away. He hasn't called either, so I have no idea where he is or what he's been doing. They say no news is good news, but I do worry about him."

and in bw2, hilbert/hilda's mom says this:

"No news is good news they say. Being happy about something like that is a little difficult though. Being a parent is tough."

there are a lot of different ways you can compare these games, but these are by far the most important details that i felt had to be shared. if you got this far, thank you for reading this post!

[positivlyfocused]

Mind-Blowing Sex Comes Easily By Being Positively Focused 😄

Sex is fun. Sex is more fun when you love yourself. Being Positively Focused creates self-love that knows no bounds. There, sex, even solo-sex, leaves knees weak, and libido highly satisfied.

My best sex ever happens when I’m by myself. Although I’m not by myself. My Broader Perspective is with me loving me as I love myself. When I have sex with myself, my entire personal trinity is there too. So it’s really an orgy 😂. An orgy of ecstasy.

The last time I had sex with myself, it left me weak for hours. The passion, the joy, the LOVE was so abundant…sex with others just can’t compare.

It seems weird that our society considers self-pleasure sinful or weird or even secondary to giving one's self to another. Often times we giver ourselves in casual situations, as if giving ourselves means little. I used to think sex wasn't sex if it happened alone. That's "masturbation"...a very unsexy word if you ask me. Where's the romance in "masturbation"?

^^"Masturbation": society says: "Don't touch that!". They're wrong! Touch it! (Photo by Charles Deluvio on Unsplash)

In my experience, joy of sex is off the charts when performed solo. That’s because through being Positively Focused, I’ve come to love my self.

My self-love knows no bounds. Why wouldn’t I be at the top of my list of people I want to have sex with? What’s more, knowing what I know, with weak-in-the-knees solo-sexual experiences part of my life now, why would I share myself with someone I hardly know, someone who likely is no where near as connected to themself as I am to me?

The tyranny of no connection

I get how desperation leads people to fucking almost anyone. So many people have no real connection with another. It's rarer still that a person has a deep, real connection with themselves. Desperate to find connection, they look for it through the penis or vagina or other body parts of another, rather than finding the only source of unconditional, unbridled and ecstatic connection: with themselves.

It's no surprise when sex amounts to "getting one's rocks off", or it gets stale after having sex with the same person over and over. Even someone you really (think you) love.

I’ve been there. I’ve done that.

And there I usually felt post-orgasm dissatisfaction. The more causal the experience, the more unsatisfying it was after the fact. It was fun during. But the aftermath...well, it was emotional aftermath.

Now I know better.

^^Casual sex with no connection gives momentary pleasure, but connection is better. Especially self-connection. (Photo by We-Vibe WOW Tech on Unsplash)

Fully accepting me and feeling good

Loving me means knowing me and accepting me. That means knowing and accepting what I like. I enjoy what I enjoy and the more I do it, and accept that I’m doing it and enjoying it, the more joy I get from it.

So many stories out there say what feels good is bad.

It’s the opposite people!

What’s good is good. What’s good leads you to more good. Follow that good-trail and before you know it, you’re in bliss…in bed, by yourself, yes, but also out in the world. Here’s the fringe bennie: when you’re chronically in bliss, you can’t help but meet blissful people. All those assholes? They can’t find you!

Why else do we have positive feelings for?

^^A client describes how being blissful causes old beliefs creating old realities to pale in comparison.

It’s deliciously mind-blowing

Accepting me happened over many years. Being Positively Focused helped a lot. I’m glad I’m here, loving myself in bed and while moving through my day. Nothing compares to that. No one else’s attention matters more to me than attention I pay to myself.

And in that selfishness, I discover doing things I want to do, having things I want to have and being happy…all come easily. Joyful ecstasy of the Charmed Life. It’s available to everyone. And it will make anyone weak in the knees.