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"Kicked for [Being Idle]" - My Thoughts on The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (2023)

That's the message I received once I was booted from my first match in this game since 2023. A game that requires victims to hide from family members. A game with a game mode called "Rush Week" wherein a timer for police arrival can be activated and then waited out to survive. A game in which players are punished for playing sensibly.

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Asinine Inaccessibility: Hollow Knight

Whenever certain actions are done being performed (e.g., healing), bright bursts of light briefly appear around the eponymous character, bothering my eyes. There exists no official option that addresses this issue. And, the only thing that I can think of to address it from my end, lowering this game's brightness, doesn't do anything to resolve it.

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RoboPig - My Thoughts on RoboCop (1987)

Warning(s) for: spoilers.

Honesty is not a currency.

It is not "spendable" on the "expensive" depiction of corporate interference with institutions like law enforcement and the subsequent subjugation of the lower class via victimization from overlooked crimes. Nor is the illustration of law enforcement's inherent corruption so "unaffordable" that more "honesty" has to be earned by portraying the protagonist as heroic, even after a scene in which he was willing to forego arresting a supposed permanently legally untouchable criminal in favor of settling a personal vendetta.

This fear of "bankruptcy" results in RoboCop reading very much like pseudo-progressive propaganda.

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Ban Bad Manners (in Video-Games)!

Warning(s) for: references to drugs and drug addiction, and language.

"Bm" is the colloquial verb form of "bad manners." People who bm in video-games are assholes. Assholes deserve to be acted against. So, why is it that these assholes, who act with the intention of maliciously twisting other players' experiences into miserable times via mean-spirited taunts, are not regularly reportable?

A lack of resources? Sometimes, sure, but I'm not gonna pretend that all developers lack the means to form and maintain a support team that could handle additional reports. A loss of resources? The more players who'd get banned, the less money that'd potentially get earned in wealthy developers' eyes, and since money can become one hell of a drug, it's not a substance that they'd see fit to go into withdrawal for over any reason, even if that reason would be to create a healthier atmosphere that could draw in more players who were simply steering clear of mischievous negativity. A lack of willingness? That seems to be the case(, which would explain why the option to block players to prevent getting match-made with them is not commonly implemented, either, at least not in the multi-player games that I play).

So, what can be done about this matter of manners? Push for a cultural shift. Talk about the unacceptability of this shitty behavior while calling for developers to add in and actively utilize measures against it more and more. In doing so, this and worse forms of toxicity can hopefully be seen less and less.

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Asinine Inaccessibility: Dreams of Aether

Though I can't speak for what everyone may need, I can say that the physically uncomfortable, likely-painful-for-some microgames that require buttons to be rapidly pressed should either optionally allow inputs to be held or be excluded from the rotation of microgames.

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04/25/2025 Update:

On 04/23/2025, an in-game announcement in Dead by Daylight for a player satisfaction survey that's set to expire in twelve days from now was released. Though this survey uncomfortably focuses on the player's personal life via skippable questions, one question leaves room for BHVR's corruptible player-banning system to be brought up, specifically question twenty-eight, which reads, "...Which of the following are hindering you from recommending Dead by Daylight to someone…" I kindly encourage those reading this update who play Dead by Daylight to speak of said system using that question's open-ended "Other" response option:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/PERS25_G_APR?value=U-5ddac5c7-1603-442f-a317-5812a83a356e.

Behaviour Interactive's Player-Banning System for Dead by Daylight Is Corruptible

On the surface, the system in question is simply this way as a consequence of malicious hackers ruining players' means to hold unruly players such as them accountable by framing innocent ones for breaking rules, a type of event that's depicted in Choy's video entitled, "BHVR Lied to Us About Hackers…..." Digging deeper, though, unearths two primary pre-existing problems with said system -- an absence of transparency regarding reasons for bans and a lack of recourse for banned players to appeal bans -- that are specifically abused. How they are abusable can be better understood by checking out a context in which they were at play (mostly) without hackers, such as the following account of one with which I was involved:

March 21, 2025 was a day on which I was banned from playing Behaviour Interactive's video-game Dead by Daylight for seven days for the following reason: "Harassment: Communication Abuse." I was informed of this ban via a portion of a missed message that was sent the day before -- in a ticket originally intended for reporting a hacker and a person whom they were playing with -- that read:

After saying...

...I received a response on March 23 that read:

In response, I asked...

...only to be messaged:

Giving Behaviour Interactive one final chance to handle this matter properly, I stated:

To this, a team member repeated the contents of prior messages on March 24:

With these lackluster responses, Behaviour Interactive has shown how it expects the players of Dead by Daylight to trust bans against them without having any information on which to base that trust nor know what actions need to be avoided to not get banned again, assuming said bans are justifiable. It is because of this all that I urge players to discuss this overall issue on social media platforms and forums to raise awareness about it and, if willing, report any experiences like the one I described or the ones described in Choy's aforementioned video that they may have personally gone through to consumer protection agencies. Behaviour Interactive needs to be held accountable for its corruptible player-banning system.

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The World at a Glance - My Thoughts on Tokyo Ghoul, Vol. 1

Warning(s) for: spoilers.

Themes of morality and immorality are honed in on in the first volume of Tokyo Ghoul, most notably through the use of shading in its artwork to express whether a character's humanity or ghoulity is out in the open more, and whether or not that side of them is being justifiably displayed.

A stand-out case of this is the below scene between Ken Kaneki, a half-ghoul, half-human hybrid, and Touka Kirishima, a full ghoul. In it, Kaneki, shown to have a near-void of an eye and partially black attire, rejects his ghoulity with prejudice while Touka, who had just attempted to help him satiate his increasingly uncontrollable hunger for human flesh - ghouls' only nourishing source of food - is, minus her hair, devoid of such darkness. Kaneki, the human with "moral superiority," is depicted in a darker shade than Touka, the ghoul with "moral inferiority," communicating the overall moral complexities of this world at a glance.

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Help my family in Gaza and give them hope to live in peace 💔🚨

Hi, I am Ahmed from Palestine, from the northern part of Gaza City. I am 33 years old, married, and a father of two children. I live in the Jabalia refugee camp with my family, which consists of 19 members, in a four-story house.

Since the beginning of the war on Gaza on October 7th, life in northern Gaza has been extremely difficult, lacking basic necessities due to the siege imposed by the Israeli army on the northern part of the Gaza Strip. The occupation has blocked food, medicine, water, electricity, and even communication networks. Thousands of airstrikes have been carried out, and hundreds of massacres have been committed, mostly affecting innocent civilians, the majority of whom are children and women. The infrastructure, thousands of homes, and civilian facilities have been destroyed.

On May 12th, 2024, the Israeli army besieged the Jabalia camp for the second time and ordered us to evacuate, informing us that it was a military operation zone and a dangerous combat area. We were forced to leave our homes in the camp and flee under heavy bombardment and intense gunfire, navigating through the rubble and bodies lying in the streets and on the roads. We became homeless, with no food or water. During this difficult siege, I lost two of my brothers, Abdullah, 30 years old, and Atallah, 26 years old, due to random shelling and airstrikes on the camp.

Why am I collecting donations?

After more than 15 months of war, on January 19th, 2025, the ceasefire came into effect, and we returned to the camp to check on our home. However, we were shocked by the extent of the destruction and devastation in the camp. The homes had turned into piles of rubble, and we could no longer recognize the places or roads due to the scale of the damage. Our house was completely destroyed, leaving us homeless. Now, my family and I live in a small tent that is insufficient for the number of family members. It offers no privacy, no bathroom, no kitchen, and it does not protect us from the summer heat or the winter cold. We are living in an overcrowded environment with displaced people, chaos, piles of garbage, and the spread of diseases, especially among the displaced children.

This war has forced us to live in extremely harsh conditions and an environment that is unfit for human life. We continue to suffer every day from the ongoing war, repeated displacement, lack of resources and essentials, fear, pain, and oppression. Not to mention the hardship of fetching water, standing in long queues for basic needs, and struggling to find food—another challenge added to our suffering in this devastating war that is destroying people, buildings, trees, and animals. All of this has exhausted our bodies and deeply affected our mental well-being.

Therefore, I am reaching out to you through this humanitarian platform to help me support my family, rebuild our destroyed home, and contribute to providing the basic necessities of life so that I can live with my family with dignity and freedom.

• How will these donations be used?

1) An apartment will be rented to temporarily house my family until the reconstruction of the destroyed house is completed, as an alternative to a tent, at a cost of $600 per month for at least two years. (An estimated total cost of $14,000 over the two years.)

2) Purchase the basic tools and equipment necessary to furnish the rented apartment at an estimated cost of $5,000.

3) Purchase clothing and basic necessities for all family members at an estimated cost of $6,000.

4) Remove the rubble of the destroyed house and rebuild it at an estimated cost of $140,000.

5) Purchase the tools and equipment necessary to furnish all apartments in the new house at an estimated cost of $35,000.

• How does your donation and support make a difference?

Your support and donation is a noble humanitarian cause that supports and strengthens our resilience during the war. This contribution, even if it is small, will make a huge difference in my life and the life of my family.

Please help us to live in safety and peace, to start over to achieve our ambitions and dreams, and to create a safe environment for our children that will provide them with a bright future.

@gazavetters @brokenbackmountain@gazavetters @just-browsing1222 @mothblossoms @aleciosun @serica-e @fluoresensitive @katherineonline @khizuo @lesbiandardevil @transmutationisms @schoolhater @timogsilangan @appsa @buttercuparry @sayruq @malcriada @palestinegenocide @sar-soor @akajustmerry @annoyingloudmicrowavecultist @feluka @tortiefrancis @flower-tea-fairies @tsaricides @riding-with-the-wild-hunt @visenyasdragon @belleandsaintsebastian @ear-motif @kordeliiius @brutaliakhoa @raelyn-dreams @troythecatfish @theropoda @tamarrud @4ft10tvlandfangirl @queerstudiesnatural @northgazaupdates2 @skatezophrenic @awetistic-things @baby-girl-aaron-dessner @nabulsi @yetisidelblog

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Can Badham’s "Unbreakable Three-Gen" Be Broken? - A Dead by Daylight Video

Warning(s) for: intense violence and blood.

A solo-queue warrior. Three courageous randoms. Separate, their power is limited. Together, they have the power to do the impossible. The question is: Are they able to put that power to good use?: https://youtu.be/leFSE6kZOfg?si=Q9SdI8-K6isNZP8p.

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04/10/2025 Update:

It should be noted that posting about my negative experience with Behaviour Interactive's player-banning system on Dead by Daylight's Steam Forum got me permanently banned from it without recourse, as shown in the below screenshots:

My Steam Forum Ban:

My Conversation With Dbd’s Support Team About That Ban:

While I still encourage players to openly discuss their pertinent experiences with said system, the risks of doing so on Dead by Daylight's official forums should be known.

Behaviour Interactive's Player-Banning System for Dead by Daylight Is Corruptible

On the surface, the system in question is simply this way as a consequence of malicious hackers ruining players' means to hold unruly players such as them accountable by framing innocent ones for breaking rules, a type of event that's depicted in Choy's video entitled, "BHVR Lied to Us About Hackers…..." Digging deeper, though, unearths two primary pre-existing problems with said system -- an absence of transparency regarding reasons for bans and a lack of recourse for banned players to appeal bans -- that are specifically abused. How they are abusable can be better understood by checking out a context in which they were at play (mostly) without hackers, such as the following account of one with which I was involved:

March 21, 2025 was a day on which I was banned from playing Behaviour Interactive's video-game Dead by Daylight for seven days for the following reason: "Harassment: Communication Abuse." I was informed of this ban via a portion of a missed message that was sent the day before -- in a ticket originally intended for reporting a hacker and a person whom they were playing with -- that read:

After saying...

...I received a response on March 23 that read:

In response, I asked...

...only to be messaged:

Giving Behaviour Interactive one final chance to handle this matter properly, I stated:

To this, a team member repeated the contents of prior messages on March 24:

With these lackluster responses, Behaviour Interactive has shown how it expects the players of Dead by Daylight to trust bans against them without having any information on which to base that trust nor know what actions need to be avoided to not get banned again, assuming said bans are justifiable. It is because of this all that I urge players to discuss this overall issue on social media platforms and forums to raise awareness about it and, if willing, report any experiences like the one I described or the ones described in Choy's aforementioned video that they may have personally gone through to consumer protection agencies. Behaviour Interactive needs to be held accountable for its corruptible player-banning system.

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🌍✨ A Voice from Gaza: Fighting for Hope ❤️‍🩹

Hi, my name is Mosab , and I’m from Gaza. Life here has been harder than I could ever imagine, but today I’m sharing my story with hope in my heart, because your kindness has already given us so much strength.

This journey hasn’t been easy. The war has taken 25 family members from us—25 beautiful souls we loved deeply. Their laughter, their presence, their love… all of it is gone, leaving behind memories that are both precious and painful. Every day, I carry the weight of their loss, but I also carry their spirit, which gives me the strength to keep going.

Our Journey So Far

When I first reached out, I couldn’t have imagined we’d make it this far. Your support has been a light in these difficult times, and we are so deeply grateful for every single contribution.

But the road ahead is still challenging. Every day, we’re reminded of how much we’ve lost and how much we still need to rebuild.

Here’s what life in Gaza looks like for my family right now:

🏠 Safety: The uncertainty of tomorrow weighs heavily on us.

😢 Loss: The absence of the 25 family members we’ve lost is a pain we carry every moment.

💔 Dreams on Hold: The future feels so far away when survival takes all our strength.

How You Can Help Us Cross the Finish Line Even the smallest act of kindness can make a difference:

$5 may seem small, but for us, it’s a little relief, a moment of comfort, and a reminder that kindness still exists. ❤️

Can’t donate? Reblog this post to help us reach someone who can. Every share matters more than you know.

✅️ Vetted by @gazavetters ( #309 ) ✅️

Why Your Support Matters Your kindness isn’t just about helping us meet our goal—it’s about reminding us that we’re not alone in this fight. It’s about hope. It’s about survival. And it’s about giving my family a chance to rebuild our lives, even in the face of unimaginable loss.

Thank you for helping us get this far. Your generosity and compassion have already brought us closer to a better tomorrow, and for that, I’m endlessly grateful.

With all my love and gratitude,

Mosab and Family ❤️

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Lost in Expectation - My Lengthy Thoughts on Joker: Folie à Deux

Warning(s) for: violence and spoilers.

Arkham Asylum's guards only view Arthur Fleck as a plaything that must not dare to be more, his lawyer as a sympathetic victim of mental illness devoid of agency, his political supporters as a violent revolutionary righteously fighting back against society's corruption, and Lee Quinzel as an enableable icon with value that only comes from having an exciting status. With all these different one-sided expectations being pushed on him all at once, there is no room for Arthur Fleck to view himself multi-dimensionally. And, when he tries rejecting the world's many expectations to find and accept whomever he may be, the world rejects him even harder, so much so that he's viewed without substance more than ever before, this time by a copycat killer who fatally stabs him, projecting an interpretation of Fleck as a user of senseless violence for humorous punchlines back onto him.

Relatable as Folie à Deux's story of self-discovery and acceptance's accompanied struggles is, the dominant difference in my case is that the expectations I deal with are self-imposed. My anxiety, depression, heart defect, scoliosis, and seasonal allergies have me view myself as weak and lazy for not doing enough to show that I care about this world. My PTSD as a failed fighter unable to understand that a fight is never over and that, thus, rest is never earned. And, my OCD as a perfectionist deserving of immense shame if I leave something deemed to be a contaminant, reasonably or not, alone, including failures caused by other disabilities.

With this personal connection in mind, this sequel is more of a cautionary tale to me than anything else, warning me of the need to reject the expectations self-imposed upon me sooner than later if I want to maintain my multidimensionality as an individual before I bleed myself dry.

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Behaviour Interactive's Player-Banning System for Dead by Daylight Is Corruptible

On the surface, the system in question is simply this way as a consequence of malicious hackers ruining players' means to hold unruly players such as them accountable by framing innocent ones for breaking rules, a type of event that's depicted in Choy's video entitled, "BHVR Lied to Us About Hackers…..." Digging deeper, though, unearths two primary pre-existing problems with said system -- an absence of transparency regarding reasons for bans and a lack of recourse for banned players to appeal bans -- that are specifically abused. How they are abusable can be better understood by checking out a context in which they were at play (mostly) without hackers, such as the following account of one with which I was involved:

March 21, 2025 was a day on which I was banned from playing Behaviour Interactive's video-game Dead by Daylight for seven days for the following reason: "Harassment: Communication Abuse." I was informed of this ban via a portion of a missed message that was sent the day before -- in a ticket originally intended for reporting a hacker and a person whom they were playing with -- that read:

After saying...

...I received a response on March 23 that read:

In response, I asked...

...only to be messaged:

Giving Behaviour Interactive one final chance to handle this matter properly, I stated:

To this, a team member repeated the contents of prior messages on March 24:

With these lackluster responses, Behaviour Interactive has shown how it expects the players of Dead by Daylight to trust bans against them without having any information on which to base that trust nor know what actions need to be avoided to not get banned again, assuming said bans are justifiable. It is because of this all that I urge players to discuss this overall issue on social media platforms and forums to raise awareness about it and, if willing, report any experiences like the one I described or the ones described in Choy's aforementioned video that they may have personally gone through to consumer protection agencies. Behaviour Interactive needs to be held accountable for its corruptible player-banning system.

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Continued Incohesion - My Brief Thoughts on Dead by Daylight - Tokyo Ghoul

Warning(s) for: infrequent strong language.

Within Dead by Daylight, there exist paradoxes from an absence of connective tissue between its two very different Survivor and Killer roles that fucks over players of both. And, yet another paradox has come into being in the form of The Ghoul, a new Killer who is still unfairly difficult to avoid getting injured or downed by, all as his Power is unenjoyably difficult to aim with, to the point where the choice to either injure Survivors or cut them off from places of safety may as well be left unconsidered. This most-recent paradox is ultimately another example of Dead by Daylight's unrefined uniqueness that prompts me to ask myself once again how it's managed to stay around for all of these years.

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This week, Senator Bernie Sanders will force a vote to block $8.8 billion of Trump weapons sales to the Israeli military, including more than 35,000 massive 2,000-pound bombs.

Warmongering groups like AIPAC are already lobbying to keep these weapons flowing — so we need you to act now.  Call your Senators: tell them to vote to BLOCK weapons to Israel.

This vote forces attention back on Gaza.  The media and Congress have turned away from the Israeli government’s U.S.-backed genocide of Palestinians, but the genocide has only worsened.  On March 17, Israel shattered the temporary ceasefire — an agreement they had violated since its beginning — unleashing mass violence that has killed over 800 Palestinians in just two weeks. A Senate vote on the question of blocking the lethal weapons that fuel this violence will demand national attention back on U.S. complicity in this genocide.  This vote is an organizing opportunity to build support for an arms embargo.  The last time Bernie forced a vote on weapons sales to Israel was November 2024, when our movements mobilized to get more Senators voting in support of blocking weapons to Israel than ever before — yet this number still remains far too low. Now, Trump is deepening U.S. participation in Israel’s violence and openly calling for the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Gaza. Now is the time to once again force Senators to reckon with U.S. complicity and make it clear that the only moral, legal, and politically wise decision is to vote to block these lethal bombs. 

Join us in flooding the Senate phone lines to force their attention back to Gaza and demand they vote to block more weapons for Israeli genocide.

@upontheshelfreviews

@greenwingspino

@one-time-i-dreamt

@tenaflyviper

@akron-squirrel

@ifihadaworldofmyown

@justice-for-jacob-marley

@voicetalentbrendan

@thebigdeepcheatsy

@what-is-my-aesthetic

@ravenlynclemens

@writerofweird

@anon-lephant

@mentally-quiet-spycrab

@therealjacksepticeye

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Asinine Inaccessibility: Dandara

I played Dandara for the first time today and found its default controller and mouse-and-keyboard control schemes to be a pain, literally. If more ergonomic control schemes which account for its demand for precision are not going to be designed, then it would at least be good to have remappable controls to see if a player-made scheme can be put together.

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Asinine Inaccessibility: Tunche

The white flashes that appear on smaller enemies when damaging them don't bother my eyes, but the same cannot be said for when those flashes crop up on larger enemies getting damaged -- such as Tunche's first boss -- and I imagine that those with photosensitive epilepsy are likely more than just bothered by them. Ideally, the effects that indicate when attacks connect with enemies would be changed to be non-flash-oriented, but, failing that, it would be better to be able to deactivate them - a bandage-fix of an option - than to not be able to do anything at all.