#And I do feel that at a fundamental level the human body is an incredible thing

[driftingballoons]

I wholeheartedly agree that no one should mock anyone’s physical appearance for any reason but what do you mean “some people are just unattractive?” Aren’t all kinds of bodies supposed to be individually beautiful? Everyone is attractive and it’s your character that truly matters!

Oh I see what you mean, it did come out kind of blunt huh 🙈 My main point was that whatever’s on the outside is the least representative of who you are as a person—like you said, it’s your character that truly matters. I guess what I was trying to say is that, unfortunately, there’s always some people who will be viewed as conventionally unattractive, the definition of which may vary by culture. I know I personally have traits that are considered attractive in one culture, but not so in another, with the definition even varying between different individuals. But at the end of the day, a person’s aesthetic preferences shouldn’t have any bearing on their treatment/judgement of another person, which is why I find it infuriating when a) nice people get treated like shit just bc they’re not considered “good looking” and b) horrible people try to use their appearance to manipulate others.

[yuliasolsystem]

A continuation of my awesome Plants theory.

Part 1 is here

In the manga, it's constantly stated that the Plants are created by humans. But humans know very little about the Plants. That sounds suspicious. We know from the manga that a lot of aspects about the Plants are kept secret (such as the blackening of their hair or the fact that they have consciousness), so why are we so sure that what is being said about the origin of the Plants is true? I have a feeling the general public was told that the Plants were created by humans simply to bypass ethical restrictions.

My theory that it actually went something like this: there was a certain patient zero, a woman who came into contact with something from another planet or another dimension, and after that her body and consciousness began to transform and eventually she became a proto-Plant. (Why do I think there was a woman? Because dependent Plants look like human women for no good reason. The manga isn't particularly fanservicey, so the standard "because boobs" explanation doesn't fit.) She started producing "offsprings", the usual dependent Plants. Considering how many of them there are, it is likely that she has become a huge "hive queen", continuously laying eggs, spheres, which are then placed inside the "bulbs".

In fact, they are not separate beings at all, but parts of the "queen" and share the same consciousness with her.

According to the Chronica, the Dependent Plants "are fundamentally one large collective consciousness. It is incredibly vast, but this "species" shares consciousness at a deep level, initially having no concept of individuality, so apparently "fusion" occurs without fatal collisions."

This explains why Conrad, who had the equipment with which he was able to restore Knives' body, simply didn't make clones of dependent Plants. Cloned Plants that are not part of the queen will simply not work.

Now I'll get to the question of why the Plants, or more specifically the proto-Plant, the queen, needed humans.

We know that humans are dependent on the Plants, and the Plants can simply refuse to work (like when the soldiers tried to shoot at the ark), so the fact that they continue to "serve" humans indicates that there is a benefit to them in doing so.

As I wrote in the first post, I think the Plants cause humans to mutate, gradually turning them into members of their own species. I think this is their way of reproducing, or rather spreading their species to new territories. Different individuals of their species have different specializations. The dependents specialize in spreading their genetic information through food, water and radiation. The specialization of the independents is to control the main population. This is why the independents are so dangerous to "humans" but still resemble them and are able to communicate with them.

Legato and Elendira are perfect hybrids and likely the model for what all of humanity should eventually become: a strong harmonious human body plus Plant's abilities. That's why these two are so close to Knives. Even though he, like the other independents, is not connected to a shared consciousness and knows only what Rem and Conrad have told him, he still feels that Legato and Elendira are closer to his people.

Now a bit about the Plants' conflict with the people of No Man's Land.

We know that the Plants were not happy with the way they were being treated, although they did not wish for the complete genocide of the planet's population. On this page we can see exactly what they didn't like.

We see how friendly Plant is to the human worker in the first frame, but then it shows what the Plants don't like: people taking too much biomass, people throwing expensive parties for the upper class (and this on a planet where the majority of the population lives in starvation!), people making products to sell for money, even though it's important to the Plants that resources are distributed as evenly as possible. And on top of that, the Plants are dying as a result of these actions, and given that they share a single consciousness, it's not only their shared pain, it's also the death of a piece of their shared identity.

[meteortrails]

saw someone somewhere say ‘idk what the story in cass becoming Batman would be’ and literally since that day I’ve thought about it. NON FUCKING STOP. I’m on an amusement park ride where the operator has not only refused to let me off but wholesale left the fucking building. bc fundamentally, Cass becoming Batman is a culmination of her choosing her own ideals and beliefs and rejecting those she was raised with, and it is also Cass learning new dimensions and strengths within herself. it’s both a logical next step and a transformation of what it means to be Batman, what Cass is capable of as a hero, what Cass is capable of as a PERSON.

to tackle this from one angle to begin with: to be Batman is to be the lynchpin of Gotham’s vigilante and crime scene. to be Batman is to be the sun around which everything else orbits, the gravity well that distorts everyone else’s behavior. you are responsible for both Gotham as whole, and wrangling/keeping tabs on/assembling all the personalities therein. Cass is someone who is so fiercely independent that I think this could become a really fun point of conflict in her Batman run! she’s only ever been a member of the team or an independent agent, she’s never been RUNNING HERD on everyone else.

how does her relationship with Barbara and her siblings change as a result of these shifting roles? how does she grow into these new responsibilities?? these are things that take her out of her reliable comfort zone of martial ability and explore the way her strengths translate into different arenas; her ability to read body language is something that will both serve her well and trip her up as she learns the shape of her new role (think that one episode of Wayne family adventures - you can see what people are feeling, that doesn’t mean you know how best to react to it). this all also allows a reinforcement of a fundamental truth: Cass’s strength and value both as a person and as Batman has so little to do with her physical capabilities and everything to do with her strength of conviction and commitment to doing good.

now, building off of that and also coming in from a different angle: as Cass becomes Batman, her relationship not only with her siblings will change, but with the roles that they inhabit. she’s an adult who is discovering new depths of what she is capable of and prepared to be responsible for - how does this shape her relationship with the mantle of Robin? it’s something that could be a really interesting later plot point, is her finding that connection that Bruce did to the children of Gotham, and finding her feet as a mentor and a guardian to the next generation. show me Cass rediscovering the ways in which her guardians failed her through her attempts to do right by those she has tasked herself to take care of. show me Cass trying to set these new generations free of the cycles of violence that have defined her life, even as she herself struggles to even find self worth outside of them.

and to look at that from yet another angle, there is an incredibly poignant story here about Cass finding herself as she takes on the symbol that she chose and makes it her own. she rejected the ideals she was raised with because she realized that she, as a person, values human life above all else. she choose the symbol of the bat because it reflected those ideals, and in doing so she chose Bruce as her father, and his family and ideals as the ones she will let hold sway in her life. her becoming Batman would be a commitment to that choice and to her core values, and I think any storyline worth it’s salt would at least on some level be about Cass seeing and learning to believe that the traits she values so much in Batman are things that are intrinsic to who she is as a person. she doesn’t need to contort herself to fit other’s expectations of what Batman should do or act like or look like or be good at, she just needs to be her, because Cass already is and was always going to be an embodiment of exactly what the Bat symbolizes. she doesn’t need to sacrifice herself to be perfect! she just needs to be herself!!! that’s valuable enough all on its own!!!!!

and if all of that wasn’t enough to convince you on its own, any story about Cass acting as a bat is a continuation of the idea that like. everyone who has ever been even a little bit important to you has shaped you, whether you liked them and wanted them to or not. and you’ll never truly escape that influence, but that doesn’t mean you’re a slave to it either. so many people have tried to twist Cass to their agendas, but none of them can ever change or touch who she is as a person. once you acknowledge the impact someone has had on you, you also have the power to respond to and determine the shape of that impact, and Cass is such a beautiful example of that! David Cain and lady shiva may have raised her and shaped her, but she’s her own person, and she gets to decide what of that influence she takes with her going forward bc at the end of the day she’s the master of her own life!! how is that not some of the coolest shit you’ve EVER HEARD.

anyways. in conclusion. there’s all KINDS of story folded into the idea of Cass becoming Batman, she’s so fucking amazing. can someone please let me off the carnival ride now.

[thingsiwannareblog]

What follows is a long rant that comes from my personal experiences with disability and chronic illness. I think a lot of people may agree, but many will disagree too and that’s fine. I can’t and don’t speak for everyone who is disabled. But I hope that for others who feel the way I do, this might help you feel seen and heard.

Autonomy is a fundamental human need. Like breathing, like sleeping or eating, and like trace nutrients, humans genuinely require a minimum level of agency and self-determination.

When you are a captive or institutionalized - either literally, as prisoners are, or subtly, as schoolchildren are, or physically, as many disabled people are - most of your autonomy has been stripped from you. Depending on the exact nature of your captivity, you may have somewhat fewer choices than a free adult, very few choices, or none at all.

So to some extent, you are being railroaded, even if it’s by well-meaning helpers. You are a package on a conveyor belt in an automated shipping department, being pushed and pulled to various places you can’t choose at times you have no say in. Now you are going up a ramp, now you are being put on a shelf, now the conveyor belts have jostled you - and you are tipped onto your side like a stranded turtle, with no recourse but to go along for the ride.

Is it any wonder, then, that humans who have so few chances to make their own decisions sometimes make bad ones? When most details of your daily existence are not up to you, but are forced upon you by wardens and walls, adults who swear they know what’s best for you, or the limitations of your own disabled body, you will likely seize every opportunity to make a choice. If you literally have no options, no ability to do anything other than what you are forced to do most of the time, then when one presents itself, it’s incredibly tempting and genuinely satisfying even if it’s detrimental!

A student acts out, or speaks out of turn, or throws the ball over the playground fence. Why would they do that? Don’t they know that it only hurts them? They likely do - but their human need for autonomy supersedes the importance of paying attention in class, or gaining social standing, or even the fun of a group game. The fewer chances to make decisions for yourself that you have, the worse the decisions you’ll be willing to make, because at least it’s freely chosen!

All of this is to say… disabled and chronically ill people spend far more time and thought and deliberation and energy on managing and controlling their symptoms than able-bodied and non-ill people can possibly imagine. So many of us have modified every conceivable detail of our lives to revolve around our disability or illness to try to reduce its impact. Many of us pour countless hours and tears into making ourselves as well and as able and as palatable to the world as we can. And the ways that we can’t do that are most often just not an option. Everything that we do, we either MUST do (in order to manage our symptoms) or simply CANNOT do otherwise (because of the severity of our symptoms).

We pass up opportunities for enjoyment to avoid triggering flare ups. We back out of plans when our bodies or symptoms simply will not allow us to follow through. Choice after choice is stripped away from us.

So sometimes we make choices, take the opportunity to make a decision, even if it makes us worse. We try a risky food, even if it might (or even WILL) aggravate our symptoms. Or we stay up late, even though we need the rest. Or we drink or smoke, even though we know it has consequences. Most of the time we have to be “model citizens,” making every one of the precious few *choices* we have juuuuust right, or else we slip off the tightrope and get worse. Is it any wonder that sometimes we say “screw this!” and do things that we know will make our condition worse? At least then we are the ones making the choice!

It’s often seen as self-destructive, and when it’s common or out of balance, it can be… But ultimately it is an effort to meet a genuine need. Criticizing chronically ill people for doing something that exacerbates their problems is awful for many reasons, but this is one of the biggest.

[ghouljams]

Acespec anon! I totally get what you’re saying, I think I’m coming at it from like if alphas and omegas have ruts and heats to incite population growth and in modern society that would have mostly gone out of fashion, maybe betas also experience similar moments of stronger sexual need but they’re not to the same degree as alphas or omegas so they fall into a grey space in the middle and get categorized as betas. Not to say that betas are the only ace option or that they must be ace just that the way that they’re often written feels very relatable to me, choosing to opt in when they want (that’s probably not the best wording but it’s hard to describe when I’ve never felt the other side of the coin??)

In my perfect omegaverse everyone is having heats/ruts at every level of the spectrum. It's just a hormone cycle. The whole idea of heat/rut cycles is borrowed from animals anyway, so I just apply it broadly to the entire endotype spectrum. It's not a need to breed, it's just the natural cycle of human bodies and hormones set to a longer scale.

Like I get where you're coming from in regard to traditional omegaverse but it also directly feeds into my argument about biases in omegaverse fic. The idea that hormone cycles turns people into mindless sex crazed monster but only for the people on the high and low end of the spectrum, but there's one special group that isn't effected by that and can live their lives normally fundamentally splits humanity into two different species. I understand where you're coming from but I feel like traditional depictions of betas does more harm to ace people by singling you out as either another species entirely, or as missing the parts the "normal" people have. Do you get what I'm saying?

There's no winning designation in traditional omegaverse, they're all incredibly harmful to the individual if you spend like two seconds thinking about it. Also what's going out of fashion? Having a menstrual cycle?

In my mind alpha and omega designations have actually gotten more popular as hormone testing has become a thing. Beta would have been the biggest category for much of human history with only the highest and lowest ends of the spectrum being stereotypical and recognizable. But also like these days you got two people standing next to each other who act and look and dress totally different and they both say they're alphas, cool, they're both alphas.

All sex is opt in. Have it or don't. Your hormones don't dictate how much sex you have in real life why should they in my au?

[annyankers]

also hot take (?): but vampires DO have souls. the creation of a vampire in btvs lore is literally that a demonic essence/spirit/spiritual energy (in this instance a vampiric one and not some other kind of demon) enters a human corpse and parasitically latches on, altering the human corpse to better suit it with an initial burst of spooky evil demon magic (which is part of why i never think any lore that says vampire can't do magic makes sense like, how do you think they even function fam?). it then uses the info and identity of the former inhabitant that's all still locked up in those dead synapses to help it acclimate to the new dimension and build a sense of identity. you can argue that the vampire is not your dead friend but what is a person if not their memories and thoughts? all of which the vampire now shares too. so that's a fun little thing to puzzle on in philosophy class.

vampires in the buffy world are pretty explicitly a manufactured creature built of a demonic essence/entity grafted into a human cadaver which merge to make a new species which is why they're so low on the demon hierarchy. they're the most mongrel-y of all the half-breeds. what is the soul if not a spiritual essence that fuels and motivates the body? the metaphysical component that makes the system complete? what is the vampire of not a perversion of the human condition? does it not then stand that the vampire soul is the twisted mirror of the human one?

the thing is that while this is Kinda Common Sense when you sit down and just look at objectively how the vampire is made it's a dangerous concept in universe and we fall pray to believe the same propaganda built to ensnare our characters.

the slayer was made in almost the exact same process as a vampire only with a living subject-- a demonic essence grafted into a human host. there is no magic leash on a slayer, there are no words that can be chanted to bring her to heel, the watchers have to use standard psychological manipulation to control her. a slayer who realizes that she has more in common with vampires on a fundamental level than she does humans (tho not on a moral or motivation level obvs) is very dangerous to their control and to the concept of "slayer as sheepdog" as a whole. conditioning them to see vampires as animals and not sentient humanoid beings with thoughts, feelings, hopes and dreams, who have souls that while demonic are no less valid in their existence then any human one is integral to keeping the machine working and keeping your young emotionally/mentally vulnerable weapon from having a nervous breakdown because she just you know, massacred a whole bunch of people. fangy people, but people none the less.

btvs and the watcher council mentality the main btvs cast is tainted by is incredibly human centric, watch even a little of ats and it becomes glaringly obvious. ats is extremely flawed but one of it's strongest points was letting us see the expanded world of demons and non-human culture. the issue is then that buffy and co come off as rabid human-centrists because of how they talk about vampires and demons as a whole. there's a reason tara didn't want them to know she was half demon when she thought that line was true. the scoobies spout anti-demon rhetoric like it's their jobs. the way they treat anya is horrendous and it's because she has the Taint of demon and neurodivergence coding (which is a whole different kettle so).

the continued talk about spike like he's a subhuman while he's either at their mercy or on their side is galling. you cannot be called the good guys and then treat other sentient creatures like animals and vermin to be killed or mocked for your amusement. full stop. you cannot claim a moral high ground and behave like this which is what the scoobies consistently claim. they believe they are in the moral right and have the moral high ground consistently. when in reality they are pretty fucked up and have done repugnant immoral shit multiple times (hello all the various scoobie caused invasions of personal autonomy!). you can be a protagonist and have uh... Dodgey Morals™ (ex. the punisher) but when you claim you are better because you have better morals but also refuse to see the other side as even worthy of being seen as a truly living creature with like feelings and shit now i'm treating you with contempt.

there are people who will say that buffy was the sole victim of the toxicity that is s6 spuffy but if you believe that you also are tacitly agreeing that her belief that spike is an "it", an animal with no bodily autonomy to respect or feelings to hurt or be manipulated is true. and why? because he's a vampire? he has a soul, a demonic soul. he literally would not exist if a metaphysical entity/force hadn't entered william pratt's fucking corpse and make it theirs. this is an inherently repugnant act and even if we all sit down and agree she did nothing else to contribute to this toxicity she still looked another sentient being who she knew had some kind of feelings for her, used his want and his desperation to abuse herself with and spent the entire time considering him as something between cattle and a lamp. i'm sorry but that's wildly fucked up at it's core and if you can't see that i worry for you.

what if she was dating a nice half-bracken guy and she did all that shit to him? if he tried to stop her from turning herself in for a crime she didn't commit and then beat him bloody and called him an it, a thing, not a person, not real? are you still okay with that because he's a demon? are humans the only species in your eyes with the right to personhood in this universe? do you, like buffy and co, prefer to take the words of a group known to manipulate everything and who treat girls like buffy as things themselves over the evidence you see before your eyes on screen and the actions and words of the demons themselves? buffy's actions towards spike from s4 to s6 are repugnant because they're no longer enemies and she's no longer the council's attack dog but she still refuses to give him the basic decency of personhood.

and you can get into all kinds about shit about how vampires are evil and he's done terrible things and i will not respect you for using any of that to try and say it's okay to treat someone who you relay on or are in any kind of relationship with like they're a thing. otherization and depersonification are tools used to make it "okay" to commit atrocities. for every spike who you say it's "okay" to treat like an animal, there's a harmony who isn't really all that bad and happily switches to bagged blood and integrates pretty peacefully into human society when given the chance. and she will get put right next to spike as an animal to be killed because she doesn't matter. using his past actions to deny him the right of personhood is a lazy tactic to divert the discussion and absolve buffy and co of moral failings.

the nazis are also evil, but i will not deny they are people. doesn't mean i wouldn't take the shot if i had one if i was put in that position. it just means i acknowledge i ended a life that probably meant something to someone. and that's my issue with buffy and co. that's my issue with "vampires are soulless" and buffy's treatment of spike in s6 and how people talk about it. regardless of literally anything else either of them did, denying another sentient being the right to be acknowledged as one while still demanding things from them is inherently a core repugnant act. she is willing to use his feelings and body for her advantage but also refuses to respect them as real and just as valid as hers. again, how would you feel if she treated lorne like this? if she demanded things of him but didn't respect his basic right to be seen as a valid sentient being just like her?

in btvs vampires have souls, demons have souls, and they all deserve the basic decency to have that acknowledged. even by the slayer. especially by the slayer frankly since she is also in her own way One Of Them and if she's going to hunt them down and kill them she can at least acknowledge that she ended a life and didn't just flip an off switch. if you can't get with this whole concept of the validity of non-human life in a universe where the MCs humanity is frequently questioned and the Other and Otherism is frequently a theme then i really am not interested in talking to you.

[pumpumdemsugah]

“i've started to realize that the difference in their reaction to these two points is that they seem to sincerely believe on a fundamental level that being queer/trans racializes them, and especially does so that makes them analogous to Black people. so when they say "anti trans ideology is always racist", they're not necessarily saying that because they actually care about Black people, but because they think *they* are included as among those targeted by the racism.” saw this on twitter and made think of your points about how white queer people love using Black women’s dehumanisation as a gotcha and it feels incredibly precise. i bought into the whole “oh there’s kinship between Black women and trans women bc of beauty standards” for about ten minutes before I a) engaged my brain more seriously and b) noticed that Black trans women do not use our bodies as battering rams to break down gender. it’s not a coincidence that i don’t see Black people quote andrea long chu talking about how enslaved Black women were degendered so we shouldn’t have gender (this is a very ungenerous reading of that chapter but i fucking hated reading it so)

You can be as ungenerous with Andrea Chu as you like. Porn has clearly eroded the part of the brain where thinking should happen.

Exactly! Black trans women don't do this. The first time I saw a white trans woman talk about Black women and bone thickness, it was then and there I knew there was no kinship, or understanding because that behaviour would be impossible to do to someone you say is just like you. The mantras are clearly just performative nonsense to curry favour with us without the follow through or effort.

Many white people struggle to see humanity in Black people and often revert to civilised Vs savage dynamics when they claim solidarity or connection. They don't see equals or people but a simple crude opposite.

Everything I've seen white trans women say is transphobic, colonialist and creepy to say when it comes to talking about human bodies they do it to Black women. They bring up my foremothers with an "lol" as if they aren't talking about a person that lived. Even with how you see many white queer and white trans people talk about gender, even when they treat it as racialisation, it's obvious they view themselves at the top and Blackness as the worst thing you can be.

The more insecure the white trans woman is about beauty the more they love bringing up Black women. It's clear they're trying to make themselves feel better by essentially doing "they let the n*ggers be women" it's not sisterhood but contempt for Blackness. We're not people but dehumanisation given human form so they struggle to see how their behaviour is racist and cast misogynoir as what we are instead of a way we're oppressed. We are our oppression and nothing more.

The amount of masc Black women in spaces with these people who have said even though they're short, round faced and small, all these people who say they know better treat them as if they're 7ft tall. It's like the white person that clutches their bag when a Black person walks past and we're meant to pretend we don't see it as if the trans people that pay with their lives aren't largely poor, Black and in the sex industry not white suburbanites that don't leave their house.

Everyone understands when men say " they don't feel like a man " isn't a statement about traness or not being men but gender roles, expectations and being treated differently than everyone else but when Black women do it everyone ( including some Black women auditioning for America's/ Britain's etc next ally ) acts stupid and mass affirms the race essentialist idea of Black women.

If solidarity includes my othering so someone else can feel better about themselves, I don't want it. I don't do this shit for Black men who I'm actually related to so the expectation I'd do it for anyone white is crazy. One day they will have to address why so many of them repeat bio essentialism about Black women but considering how aggressive it got to get white gay men to stop their " I have an inner black woman" we're going to have to make people cry because I'm sick or the primary context enslaved Black women get brought up on social media now is for a white person to talk about their gender and not slavery.

So many of them struggle with the fact that even with our dehumanisation most Black women view ourselves as normal women and they don't. I wish I could remember which academic spoke about white people seeing Blackness as anti-social because that's part of it.

[halogenrobotics]

Brooooo the brainrot is consuming me alive-

I know a LOT of people are opposed to the idea of Inhuman!Gregory and find the GregBot/GregEvan theory very controversial (pretty much just like SentiAdrien from Miraculous Ladybug) but I freaking LOVE the trope of inhuman characters whom are masquerading as humans and has everyone around them think of them as just another human being. 

Especially if they were once human before tragedy struck in the form of their death, and them being ripped away from everything and everyone they ever loved and held dear and had their entire world crumble down to ash around them as they watched helplessly. 

Such good angst material, you know? I’d imagine it would be pretty traumatizing for a ten year old who was supposed to graduate from fifth grade but instead had his head and torso crushed inside the mouth of his best friend- during his birthday on a spring afternoon in 1983. Of course that would leave a pretty deep scar.

Not even that- I just created a whole backstory of messed up shit that happened to him afterwards, you know? Evan’s body gets repurposed- every cell, molecule, atom of his body fundamentally altered on the material level so that it’s not organic anymore, mixed in with robotics and remnant technology- his father sees him as his greatest creation- the first immortal lifeform, not just a soul being hosted inside of an empty husk of a body.

He was a cybernetic flesh puppet who was beyond human, but also not truly- there was a genuine consciousness within- the soul of his son, his youngest son, reborn inside, sleeping akin to a newborn that couldn’t be awoken no matter how hard one tried. William smiles- a twisted, deranged smile, knowing that the creation, an incredibly flawless and perfect replica of the regular human child that his son once was, was complete. And it was beautiful. Every thrum of power that made itself known in the form of a low hum of warmth and vibrations beneath his chest as it rose and fell, rose and fell with every steady, deep breath the creation took… the way his hands were folded over his chest as if in prayer, mouth only slightly ajar to reveal the thin crease of pearly white teeth within.

As if he never died.

Then, when the strange being awakens again after what feels like eternity, he is… confused, not to mention utterly time blind. Names linger on the tip of his tongue, but he can’t speak of them without a lump rising in his throat and a strange liquid brimming like brine on the edge of his eyes. Nothing lingers in his brain but the emotion of being perplexed and overwhelmed as his doll-like eyes blink so unnasumingly, large and gentle and compound in nature. 

The irises- dark like nebulous nights, the light reflected within glimmering like stars as they were lacking the little black dots of pupils to them entirely- they flicked around way too naturally to glimpse his surroundings of the dilapidated room- dark, cold, empty and falling into some degree of disrepair (it isn’t anything like the tomb-like chamber William stored him in when he was asleep, though is that even a memory?).

This isn’t how the world is supposed to be, he thinks to himself. This isn’t how the world works- dark and cold and empty and so, so terrible, with no knowledge of who I am or what I’m supposed to do. I’m supposed to be in my home, laughing and playing with my… my… my? My what? My who?

Things still feel wrong on a fundamental level, from the ground up as static lingers where his memories should be- a thick white fog that is impenetrable, that makes his head ring with sheer pain whenever he tries to push past it.

Or had things already been wrong to begin with? Had there been cracks since the beginning?

My family. My name. My home.

As the creation arbitrarily decides on a name- the title of the watchful and vigilant, “Gregory”, who’s eyes don’t let anything escape their encroaching, scrutinizing gaze- he stares down at his trembling hands, the grief within his heart waiting to be unlocked and flood every pore of his being until he had shed his last tear for the ruined past and the future that could never be in this time.

With every second that passed, as his being gradually trembled into consciousness more and more, the question was burned into his mind that he quaked as he thought about it, shook with ferocity and passion and desire, NEEDING NEEDING NEEDING to know moremoremoreMOREMOREMORESHOWMEMORE.

Who am I? He wants to ask to the heavens that remained out of reach- he was still tethered to the earth for god knows what reason. Why am I alive?

But out of his mouth comes trills and beeps that he arbitrarily writes on a miniscule slip of paper and sticks it to the box that he found, the things that he could do with just his hands still fascinating him so much. 

01110111 01101000 01111001 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01101001

Why is I.

This is quite the well constructed theory/story idea. Personally I kinda, uh, hate the gregbot/greg is evan theory (the latter because I think the afton family has had its time in the sun and should be put to rest, except William lol). No offense.

However I won't knock anyone for believing it, and I have to say that this is probably one of the better posts on the subject. I can tell that a lot of passion and real effort went into it. The little segments that show the thoughts of...Grevan? Evagory? are really well made and show a lot of depth.

(I am not a writer so sorry if my complements seem repetitive :P )

Keep up the good work and idea making/explaining!

[starry-skies-116]

Brooooo the brainrot is consuming me alive-

I know a LOT of people are opposed to the idea of Inhuman!Gregory and find the GregBot/GregEvan theory very controversial (pretty much just like SentiAdrien from Miraculous Ladybug) but I freaking LOVE the trope of inhuman characters whom are masquerading as humans and has everyone around them think of them as just another human being. 

Especially if they were once human before tragedy struck in the form of their death, and them being ripped away from everything and everyone they ever loved and held dear and had their entire world crumble down to ash around them as they watched helplessly. 

Such good angst material, you know? I’d imagine it would be pretty traumatizing for a ten year old who was supposed to graduate from fifth grade but instead had his head and torso crushed inside the mouth of his best friend- during his birthday on a spring afternoon in 1983. Of course that would leave a pretty deep scar.

Not even that- I just created a whole backstory of messed up shit that happened to him afterwards, you know? Evan’s body gets repurposed- every cell, molecule, atom of his body fundamentally altered on the material level so that it’s not organic anymore, mixed in with robotics and remnant technology- his father sees him as his greatest creation- the first immortal lifeform, not just a soul being hosted inside of an empty husk of a body.

He was a cybernetic flesh puppet who was beyond human, but also not truly- there was a genuine consciousness within- the soul of his son, his youngest son, reborn inside, sleeping akin to a newborn that couldn’t be awoken no matter how hard one tried. William smiles- a twisted, deranged smile, knowing that the creation, an incredibly flawless and perfect replica of the regular human child that his son once was, was complete. And it was beautiful. Every thrum of power that made itself known in the form of a low hum of warmth and vibrations beneath his chest as it rose and fell, rose and fell with every steady, deep breath the creation took… the way his hands were folded over his chest as if in prayer, mouth only slightly ajar to reveal the thin crease of pearly white teeth within.

As if he never died.

Then, when the strange being awakens again after what feels like eternity, he is… confused, not to mention utterly time blind. Names linger on the tip of his tongue, but he can’t speak of them without a lump rising in his throat and a strange liquid brimming like brine on the edge of his eyes. Nothing lingers in his brain but the emotion of being perplexed and overwhelmed as his doll-like eyes blink so unnasumingly, large and gentle and compound in nature. 

The irises- dark like nebulous nights, the light reflected within glimmering like stars as they were lacking the little black dots of pupils to them entirely- they flicked around way too naturally to glimpse his surroundings of the dilapidated room- dark, cold, empty and falling into some degree of disrepair (it isn’t anything like the tomb-like chamber William stored him in when he was asleep, though is that even a memory?).

This isn’t how the world is supposed to be, he thinks to himself. This isn’t how the world works- dark and cold and empty and so, so terrible, with no knowledge of who I am or what I’m supposed to do. I’m supposed to be in my home, laughing and playing with my… my… my? My what? My who?

Things still feel wrong on a fundamental level, from the ground up as static lingers where his memories should be- a thick white fog that is impenetrable, that makes his head ring with sheer pain whenever he tries to push past it.

Or had things already been wrong to begin with? Had there been cracks since the beginning?

My family. My name. My home.

As the creation arbitrarily decides on a name- the title of the watchful and vigilant, “Gregory”, who’s eyes don’t let anything escape their encroaching, scrutinizing gaze- he stares down at his trembling hands, the grief within his heart waiting to be unlocked and flood every pore of his being until he had shed his last tear for the ruined past and the future that could never be in this time.

With every second that passed, as his being gradually trembled into consciousness more and more, the question was burned into his mind that he quaked as he thought about it, shook with ferocity and passion and desire, NEEDING NEEDING NEEDING to know moremoremoreMOREMOREMORESHOWMEMORE.

Who am I? He wants to ask to the heavens that remained out of reach- he was still tethered to the earth for god knows what reason. Why am I alive?

But out of his mouth comes trills and beeps that he arbitrarily writes on a miniscule slip of paper and sticks it to the box that he found, the things that he could do with just his hands still fascinating him so much. 

01110111 01101000 01111001 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01101001

Why is I.

(nvm reverted back the AU change. Gregory is still the one that accidentally slaughtered the mechanics in a paranoia and hysteria-induced meltdown, though they were few in number- and he was the one that also took out the therapists one by one before Vanny could plan on killing them at all, since they were growing suspicious about him in the Patient 46 logs more than her.)

[unfried-mouth-wheat]

Hey, as an intersex person I'm wondering how victor Frankenstein could also be? This is a genuine curiosity for if you're willing to explain?

Thank you so much for asking!

A lot of it is just speculation, but it closely aligns with how he could also be read as trans.

Victor Frankenstein is, all things considered, an incredibly interesting character as he goes against a lot of trends that we see with classical literature. He is constantly ill and faints often, yet is strong enough to haul bodies around and is able to chase his creation across various climates including the attic for about a year. He has incredibly low empathy, even stating that the grief he’s going through is worse than what Justine feels when she is about the be hanged as a murderer, get cares deeply about all of his friends and family, Justine included to a great degree. Even when he has already cemented in his mind that his Creation is a fiend and has killed William, he feels compassion for him when the creature details what he’s gone through, even stating that he finally felt a connection to his creature for the first time.

Victor as a character depends heavily on contradiction. And key parts of these contradictions paint a very interesting picture when is comes to his sex and gender presentation.

He faints numerous times, something that was commonly ascribed to women during this time period, and even explains how he feared being labeled as hysterical at Justine’s trial, a common diagnosis for women when they acted out of the norm. It’s also interesting to note that one of his first concerns when it came to the creation of a female counterpart for his Creature is what she would want for herself.

Victor also finds himself immensely fascinated with science, a field that has historically been male dominated. He studies natural life, questioning how organic machines work and why they do. Then he moves on to anatomy, deconstructing it down to a fundamental level as to reverse engineer a human creature. He is obsessed with the vision of a perfect man, and completely breaks down once that vision is shattered.

Victor displays an intense disconnect from other people and even himself at times, not having any control over his body after he finds his creature missing and contemplating drowning himself multiple times. It often reads like he isn’t fully there.

Victor is marked by a particular sense of isolation. He doesn’t fit into the societal image of a man or a woman, and fails at both of the stereotypical designations that come with them (ie protecting your family/raising your child). He’s obsessed with the idea of the perfect man yet absolutely despises it once he finds out that image is unattainable. He exhibits intense self loathing to the point of feeling a complete disconnect with his body, and when he connects with his creation on a fundamental level, it is when the Creature details the isolation he feels and how much he hates the body he’s in. Victor also chose his main study to be that of anatomy.

I’m well aware that this doesn’t make for the most light hearted connection, but it does make for a very confounding one, at least to me.

Do let me know if I’ve made hurtful assumptions or comments during this, as I myself am not Intersex so all of this is just what I’ve found compelling when in comparison to when I’ve read about Intersex experiences.

(also thank you for giving me a reason to talk about this, I’ve had WAY too many thoughts that I couldn’t find a good way to express about this)

[helpless-againstthe-tide]

I’m fucking sad. This isn’t the life I pictured, late diagnosed autistic, disabled, mentally ill, feeling EVERYTHING with such intensity, thinking I was just a failure of an adult, so far behind my peers. Recognizing there are things I cannot do, because of physical limitations, because of mental health, because of the toll chronic stress caused my body. Sad to find out I can’t do the things I was able to when I was younger and admittedly pushing myself beyond my limits. Sad that life requires more planning, panic kits, stimming toys on the go, tools for grounding in distressing situations, counting my spoons, evaluating the power of choice. Asking myself if I have the energy to brush my teeth AND get ready for the day AND tackle my to do list AND still have enough spoons to exercise self compassion on a harder day. But I honor myself by allowing the emotions to flow through me. I know I am allowed to grieve and be sad. On the flip side, I’m also incredibly happy. Happily married, surrounded by deep and meaningful relationships on multiple levels, quiet mornings and slow nights. Belly aching giggles over something fundamentally silly. My chest aches with amazement, every breathe filled with awe. This incredibly beautiful life I live, full of beauty, only increasing with each passing second. So, I think I’ll take it. The good, the bad. The funny, the offensive, the sadness, the happiness. Feeling so full of love you could burst, and feeling so weighed down with the human existence, after all, what is life without the balance of it all?

So, I’ll take the hard days, because I understand that they aren’t going anywhere but I am getting much better at navigating them, rain doesn’t last forever even when it feels endless, the sun will greet me lovingly again.

[godsnameisjoy]

DHARANA

Date: 24 June 2023

Duration: 51 minutes at 10:30 PM

Depth:

I don’t know where to begin. All the links from the finest sources won’t suffice.

The energies that run our body-mind joint ventures can be freed by calming the mind. Imprisoned by the desires that motivate the average us, energies can be freed by tested techniques. Energies have been imprisoned since before one can remember but they are so benign that they need no rehabilitation. Just freeing knotted energies is enough. Blessed energies know where to go and what to do if you free them.

Meditation is calming. Calmness is wild. Calmness to human minds is so unusual that it is experienced as crazy wild when it happens. There is so much that’s happening to me through each meditation session that I sit for, it’s incredible.

Last night’s meditation is the only meditation of yesterday. Highlights:

I couldn’t feel my body at some point in the session.

I don’t think I was breathing through some moments in the session.

There was stillness of attention.

I heard sounds in my head towards the end of the session.

My body shook hard with excess life energies.

Strong bodily shakes didn’t distract.

My experience of a gradually awakening Kundalini goes as follows. I have been experiencing Kundalini shakes for 3 years plus. The spinal energies have moved up the spine in the first round of energies rising. It took months for energies to rise up in the first round. Energies rose till the neck. They didn’t enter the head and then the second round began.

Resuming their journey from the tail end of the spine, energies rose a second time. It took months for energies to gather enough to enter the head. It took months for the head to fill up with energies. Life sustaining energies in the head is experienced as Peace.

Peace grew despite there being a steady flow of mind generated imagery. As Peace began to reach exploding proportions, energies rose again for the third time. This time, they seem to be working on widening the chakras.

In their third attempt to find release from this body, blessed energies brought relief to the lower half of my body. At the heart level, blessed energies streamed through the heart as Peace. At the level of upper neck, they are changing my consciousness. The change is irreversible, according to the Bhagwad Gita. I am changing irreversibly and fundamentally right now.

[vizhen-thoughts]

Thu June 9 2022 3:18pm

i recognize that this is just American entitlement in my subconscious, but i truly believe that people shouldn’t have to pay for the things they can’t live without. all humans can’t live without food, water, and some form of shelter.

i believe we’ve reached a point where established societies have all of those things to some extent. but i also believe that the human existence as a whole was meant to progress. continuously evolving and changing, doing not only better for humans across the globe, but doing better for the planet that provides us with these essentials.

forgive me for my mind and way of thinking are quite abstract and i’m often misunderstood, but i’ll do my best to explain this cohesively.

i think of the planet and human existence as ouroboros—the snake depicted eating its own tail. i view it this way because humans have the incredible ability of sentience, meaning that our brains evolve as we take in new information and that falls in the same category as learning, only it goes much deeper than that.

humans are able to walk on 2 legs with a straight back.

we learned how to make controlled fires to cook our food.

we learned how to make language to communicate our thoughts with words.

we went on to adapting to our environments by forming communities and utilizing shelter, eventually learning how to build our own houses. we learned how to build towns, cities, countries.

we developed cultures—which if you really think about it, the depth of any one culture is crazy, but the way that humans created multiple different cultures?? my god.

we were able to learn about how the body works, and how to cure disease and even do smaller things like alleviating pain or medicinally aiding a fever so you don’t die from it at any age.

right now, we are learning about how our brains work—how we have come to be “humans” as we now know it.

there’s still a lot to learn, but one truth has been rearing its ugly head lately—that is, we cannot go on like this, to say the least.

everything we are doing is not doing anyone any good. we can look at numbers and productivity levels and all that man-made crap. but the fact of the matter is personal satisfaction rates—maybe even overall satisfaction rates—are so low that i dont know a single person who’s happy with their life and genuinely means it.

and of course i do recognize that my perspective is limited to what i’ve seen. maybe there are more ppl satisfied with the true state of the world than the opposite. its just very hard for me to imagine that the majority of 7B humans would be okay with knowing that global warming will claim this Earth if we continue on this path, which will effect all humans—even the rich humans who think they’re untouchable.

nature’s funny like that, and so is karma. you see these are all very real things.

powerful humans do conquer the weak, and to be more specific, it is humans who have been allotted power by their human ancestors.

but nature will always find its balance, and that is a force that no human can stand against.

so, to put it bluntly, how do you feel about knowing that a lot of the things that are the fundamentals of our societies are actually killing us?

through diversifying our minds we can come together in ways never seen before and save our planet while saving ourselves. i think it’s absolutely stupid to insist on fighting when our home is at stake. when the planet’s uninhabitable there won’t be anywhere or anyone left to fight. we’ll all be screwed.

that is the reality of this dilemma we face.

so many factors go into this, major factors like nationalist ideals and diplomacy, and smaller factors down to the individual level of consciousness.

i’m definitely not going to pretend like i know every single thing or have all the answers, but i know for certain where we need to start. we all have a part to play in this, but until we all get on the same page and realize that life can be better, safer, and more gratifying for everyone, we will not get anywhere. in fact we will be the cause of our own destruction. but it doesn’t have to be this way.

we can come together.

“the internet will change the world,” is a quote i heard recently.

the fact is, the internet made us aware of the fact that other humans exist in worlds beyond our own. and that did not have to be a bad thing, but humans often repeat the same mistakes, such as extreme culture shock to the point of extreme rejection. depending on how you’re looking at the situation that could be either a good or a bad thing.

but the fact of the matter is, the internet opened our eyes to the world as a whole. there’s no way that that in itself isn’t a sign telling us to do better as one collective.

i stand firm on my beliefs and my morals—and call it entitlement, narcissism, or whatever you want— but all i wish to do with my life is be apart of the movement that’s gonna take all of humanity to a brighter future.

the future where every human can live in comfort and peace, no matter where their home is, and no matter where they wish their home to be.

the future where traveling is much easier and more efficient and safer for the environment.

the future where we can actually explore our own oceans and learn something abt this planet before we no longer have the opportunity for christ’s sake…

the future i envision is one where anyone can become whoever they want. whether they want to be a marine biologist, a doctor, a chef, or even just an at-home tech support or full-time parent.

everyone, and i do mean everyone, would love the opportunity to be productive in the way that works best for their physical and mental needs.

this future focuses on the individual within a greater society with the common goal of survival & prosperity. we all need it. for ourselves alive today, and for our children who will take our place.

i truly believe that we can change, and i have hope that we wont squander our planet and all the progress we’ve made up to this point.

— VIZHEN

[eclipsednodes]

SHADOW WORK SIMPLIFIED

What is shadow work?

If I had to describe shadow work in one word, it would be introspection. Introspection is the examination of your own mental state and is necessary in order to learn more about your fundamental nature. Although it may sound off-putting and even scary at first, shadow work is a necessary component in the process of healing. We all have aspects of ourselves that we’ve rejected and hidden away out of fear. Through shadow work, we’re able to reflect on our thoughts, emotions, and habits so that we can find the root cause of our suffering and heal ourselves. By reincorporating those aspects of ourselves that we’ve denied, we feel more fulfilled and can begin to love ourselves fully. 

Where does shadow work come from? 

The concept of the shadow self comes from Carl Jung who believed that our shadow self is the subconscious aspect, or “dark side”, of our personality that our conscious ego doesn’t identify with. However, I would like to clarify that “dark” does not imply or equate with bad. That which resides outside of our consciousness can be either good or bad, but aren’t inherently reflective of our value or “goodness” as a person. 

Although these repressed aspects of ourselves can manifest negatively, it isn’t because those parts of us are “bad”, but that the process of repression is inherently painful and toxic. This is reflected by Jung when he states, "Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.” He believed that until we’ve merged our conscious and subconscious selves, that our conscious would be “the slave of the autonomous shadow”. This is due to the shadow self overwhelming our conscious selves by falling victim to our own self-imposed traps. 

Through assimilating this shadow self, not over-identifying with it, Jung believed we go through the process of enantiodromia, thereby integrating the subconscious by reincorporating our shadow selves into our personality and allowing us to solidify ourselves through wholeness. He best described this by stating "assimilation of the shadow gives a man body, so to speak.” However, don’t fall into the misconception that shadow work is a short-term practice. Shadow work is a continuous practice and integration of the shadow self is a will take place throughout your life.

How do I do shadow work?

In the last question, I identified that practicing self-reflection is a key component of shadow work, but what does that mean? What am I supposed to be reflecting on? Well, the first thing that you should focus on is being present throughout the day. Identify feelings that come up throughout the day and observe them objectively. What situation or interaction triggered these emotions? How did I react to those emotions? Were my emotions controlling me or was I in control of my emotions? Why did this situation or interaction cause me to feel this way? How did I cope with those feelings (self-harming, lashing out at others, communicating my feelings, journalling, etc.)? Did I punish myself for getting upset? If so, why? 

There are numerous ways to reflect on your feelings and experiences in order to get a better understanding of yourself. Through evaluating how you react to situations, which situations upset you, and how you managed those feelings, you’re able to build the foundation to understanding your emotions and bridge the gap between your subconscious and conscious mind.

Once you’ve done this, you’ll find that the emotions you feel in the present are reflective of unhealed emotions from your past. Perhaps the reason you feel that you’re unable to set boundaries as an adult is because as a child, your parents never respected your boundaries by going through your phone or diary, yelling at you when you said no to a request, forcing you into situations that made you feel you had no choice. 

By identifying the root cause of your emotional pain, you’re able to address it in the present and heal from the trauma. The simplest way that I’ve found to address them is through journalling. You can purchase a physical journal or even use your notes app, either way, you’re writing out your feelings and reflections to gain deeper insight. It’s important to remember that this looks different for anyone and that the best way to approach shadow work is by doing what feels most natural! You can choose to stick to self-reflective journal prompts, vent about whatever is upsetting you, write letters to whoever has hurt you, etc. Ultimately, you can guide yourself based off of what you feel you need and where you are in your journey.

What parts of yourself do you find yourself rejecting the most? Many of us have experienced the pain of rejection in some aspects of our lives and sometimes, it’s incredibly painful and leaves us with long-lasting wounds. We end up going through our lives carrying baggage that we don’t even know we have! Many times, I’ve found myself wondering why I felt so repulsed by aspects of myself and why I felt so strongly that they needed to be locked away forever. I couldn’t allow myself or others to see my truest self, my whole self, out of fear. I was scared of being rejected, shamed, humiliated by the people around me. I was scared of hurting other people by being myself and of being hurt by others. That’s no way to live, is it? When we tell ourselves that aspects of ourselves aren’t good enough, we end up going through life devaluing ourself. We’ve broken our own trust by rejecting ourselves, we’ve told ourselves that we aren’t good enough or worthy of love. In shadow work, you’re called to go inward and unpack everything that we’ve kept hidden for years and sometimes even decades. 

Bring the parts of yourself that you’ve repressed to the surface and nourish them with love, allow yourself to see that ALL OF YOU is deserving of love and support. For you, that could mean unlearning your unhealthy beliefs about food or eating, allowing yourself to be emotional around the people you love (despite how much you were told that you were too emotional, a crybaby, too sensitive in the past), allowing yourself to relax without feeling guilty about not being productive because you recognize your needs (even though you feel your sense of worth is tied to being productive at the cost of your own health).

Common misconceptions about shadow work?

Shadow work is evil or bad, the shadow is evil or bad 

The purpose of shadow work is healing through working with your subconscious to release repressed aspects of yourself and heal from painful, traumatic experiences. Your shadow side is simply your unconscious and to believe that it’s bad is to believe that you are bad. It’s merely the part of yourself that you aren’t aware of consciously and shouldn’t be feared. 

Certain emotions are “bad”

When you let go of the idea that emotions are either good or bad, you’ll allow yourself to just be and stop putting so much pressure on yourself to feel “good” all of the time. Happiness isn’t a constant state of being so stop expecting to be all of the time, we have a range of emotions for a reason so stop being ashamed of them. Your feelings are natural and if you feel like they’re out of control and something to be ashamed of, there is nothing wrong with that! It’s okay to feel like your emotions are controlling you because that isn’t permanent. Your feelings aren’t permanent and are completely manageable with proper guidance! The reason you feel like your emotions are controlling you is because you probably don’t have the knowledge to cope with them in an effective and healthy way. It’s helpful to sit with your emotions alone and look at them objectively without placing any judgement on them, this will help you calm down and assess your feelings. From there, you can identify what you need to relax and recover as well as acknowledge to yourself that your feelings are natural. When you stop categorizing your emotions as bad, they’re no longer shameful to experience and therefore you can see with better clarity how to cope with them and move on.

I’ve already released it so…

Why am I still upset?

Why does it still keep popping up in my head?

Why haven’t I moved on?

Why am I not making progress?

With the rise of self development and spirituality, I find that more and more people are rushing to complete their healing. Healing is a continuous, life-long cycle and not a destination. Putting the pressure on yourself to reach the place of ultimate healing is not only toxic, but it impedes your ability to actually heal anything. Healing is about love, compassion, and patience and it’s not going to happen according to a timeline. Allow yourself the time to experience your emotions, see them objectively, forgive yourself and others and move on without the pressure of expectations. 

 Another reason that you could be experiencing this is that despite the work you think you’ve done, it hasn’t been sufficient. I’ve found that a lot of journal prompts provided online are surface level at best and can be more pacifying than revealing. If you’re not feeling anything while doing your inner work, you’re not doing it correctly. Ultimately, this is about uncovering what makes us UNCOMFORTABLE and moving through those feelings. When you allow yourself to experience the sadness, hurt, anger, and/or frustration than you’re telling yourself that these feelings are okay and don’t need to be suppressed. The reality is that no matter what you’re feeling, you are allowed to experience those emotions and it’s only human! Unfortunately, many people associate lower vibrational emotions as bad, but this is a huge misconception! Telling yourself that anger, sadness, etc. are “bad” implies that you shouldn’t experience these emotions and that you have to get rid of them which is not only wrong, but unhealthy. There is no right or wrong emotions so don’t buy into the belief that you should feel a certain way, simply allow yourself to be and you’ll find that it’s much easier to navigate your emotions and needs. The only way to make it to the other side is by wading through the water, be patient and know that you’re feeling exactly what you should be. When you stop censoring yourself, you’ll discover a newfound sense of freedom and wholeness. 

 If you find yourself circling back to certain topics, for example, your ex-boyfriend than perhaps there are triggers in your environment that remind you of the situation, you have more that needs to be addressed that you may not have been ready for or aware of previously (hence why shadow work is a practice that is ongoing), or they’re representative of a deeper issue that you’re repressing. Whatever the cause is, the same methods as earlier will apply and can be discerned through your own intuition. 

What are some basic journal prompts that I can do?

What feelings come up when you think of ____?

How did that experience make you feel emotionally? How did it make you feel about yourself? How did it make you feel about the other person or people?

Write a letter to yourself, your inner child, the people who’ve hurt you, and the people you’ve hurt. Express how you feel honestly, without holding back and then forgive yourself and the other person.

If you could say anything to yourself or another person for closure, what would it be?

How have these situations and experiences impacted your mental health? How have they affected your belief system about yourself, other people, and the world?

What about yourself are you ashamed of? What about yourself are you embarrassed of? What about yourself makes you angry? What do you regret? Why do you feel this way about yourself and where do these feelings stem from?

What makes you feel most alone? What makes you feel most loved? How can you incorporate that knowledge into your life to make it better?

What’s the most hurtful thing someone has said or done to you? Why did it hurt you so much? How does it still affect you now? How can you heal from it and allow yourself to move on?

What do you need to forgive yourself for? What do you need to forgive others for?

Where do you feel you lack security in your life? Why? How does this impact your life and your relationships?

This is a list of generic prompts for you to start with, but feel free to message me if you need help with more specific topics or I can make another post altogether for journal prompts.

[number5theboy]

Please elaborate on how Five could've turned into the most insufferable character to watch

Thanks for asking me to elaborate on this text post:

@tessapercygranger​, @waywardd1​ and @margarita-umbrella​ also wanted to see a more detailed version of it, and I ended up writing an essay that’s longer than some of my actual academic essays. So buckle up.

WHY NUMBER FIVE SHOULD BE THE MOST OBNOXIOUS CHARACTER IN TV HISTORY, AND HOW HE MANAGES NOT TO BE

Number Five: The Concept That Could Go Horribly Wrong

Alright, let’s first look at Five in theory in an overarching way, without taking into account the execution of the show. The basic set-up of the character, of course, is being a 58-year-old consciousness in a teenager’s body, due to a miscalculation in time travel. Right off the bat, Five is bar none the most overpowered of the siblings; by the end of Season 2, no one has yet been able to defeat him in a fight. He is a master assassin – and not just any master assassin, but the best one there is – and a survival expert, able to do complex maths and physics without the aid of a calculator, shown to have knowledge of half a dozen languages, has very developed observational skills and, to top that all off, he can manipulate time and space to the point where he can literally erase events that happened and change the course of history. And Five knows how skilled he is; he is arrogant, self-assured and sarcastic, and his streak of goodness is buried deep inside. David Castañeda once described Five in an interview as 90% chocolate with a cherry in the middle, meaning that you have to get through a lot of darkness and bitterness before knowing there is a good core, and I think it’s an excellent metaphor. However, Five is also incredibly, fundamentally terrible at communicating with anyone, and, because he is the only one with time travel abilities, the character a lot of the actual plot - and the moving forward of it - centres around. Also he’s earnestly in love with a mannequin, who is pretty much a projection of his own consciousness that functions as a coping mechanism for all the trauma he has endured. All in all, this gives you a character who looks like a teenager, but with the smug superiority of a fifty-something, who a) is extremely skilled in many different things, b) has a superiority complex, is arrogant and vocal about it, and most of the superiority is expressed through cutting sarcasm, c) has one very hidden ounce of goodness that he is literally the worst at communicating to other human beings, d) is what moves the plot along but is also bad at talking to anyone else, meaning that the plot largely remains with him, and e) his love interest is essentially a projection of himself. Tell me that’s not a character who is destined to be just…obnoxious, annoying, egocentric, a necessary evil that one has to put up with to get through this show. There are so many elements of this characterisation that can and should easily make Five beyond insufferable, but the show manages to avoid it, and I’m putting this down to three aspects.

That Trick of Age and Appearance

Bluntly put, Five as a character would not work if he was anything else than an old man in a 13-year-old body. Imagine this character and all his skills and knowledge, but actually just…a teenager. Immediately insufferable. Same goes for him being around 30, like his siblings, all of which are stunted and traumatised by their father’s abuse. If Five, being comparatively unscathed by Reginald to the point where he explicitly does not want to be defined by his association with his father, were 30 like his siblings, it would just take the bite out of that plot point and also give him a lot less time in the apocalypse, reducing the impact it had on him as a person. And making Five his actual 58-year-old self would make him very similar to Reginald, at least on surface level, with the appearance and attitude. Five and Reginald are two fundamentally different people, but having one of the siblings being a senior citizen that’s dressed to the nines and bosses his siblings around in a relatively self-centred way does open up that parallel, and would take away from Five’s charm as a character. Because pairing the life experience of a 58-year-old with the appearance of a teenager gives you the best of both worlds. You get the other siblings (and a lot of the audience, from a glance in the tags of my gifsets) feeling protective and paternal about Five, but his age and experience also give the justifications for his many skills, his arrogance, in a way, and his ability to decimate a room full of people. It’s the very interesting and not new concept of someone dangerous with the appearance of something harmless, a child. This is also where Five’s singular outfit comes in. I know we like to clown on Five to get a new outfit, but I think what gets forgotten often is how effective this outfit is at making the viewer take him seriously. The preppy school uniform is the perfect encapsulation of the tension between old man in spirit and young teenager in appearance. The blazer, vest and especially the shirt and tie are quite formal, relatively grown up. They’re not something we, the audience, usually associate with a teenage boy wearing; it makes Five just a little bit more grown up. But there is also a reason characters in this show keep bringing up Five’s shorts and his socks, because those are not things that we associate with grown men wearing; they’re the unmistakably childish part of his school uniform. Take a moment and imagine Five wearing a hoodie or a t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers; would that outfit work for him as well as the uniform does? Would he be able to command the same kind of respect or seriousness as a character? I don’t think so; the outfit is a lot more pivotal in making Five believable than a lot of people give it credit for.

Writing Nuance

The other big building block in not making Five incredibly insufferable is the writing. Objectively speaking, I think Five is the most well-written, and, more importantly, most coherently written character on the show (which does have to do with the fact that the show’s events are all sequential for him), and his arc and personality remain relatively intact over the course of the two seasons. More to the point, a giant part of what makes Five bearable as a character is that he is allowed to fail. He is written to have high highs and low lows, big victories through his skills and his intelligence, but also catastrophic failures and the freedom to be wrong. His superior intellect and skillset are not the be-all end-all of the plot or his character, just something that influences both. His inability for communication has not (yet) been used to fabricate a contrived misunderstanding that derails the plot and left all of us seething; instead, it’s a characteristic that makes him fail to reconnect with the people he loves. This is a bit simplified, as he does find common ground with Luther, for example, but in general, a lot of the rift between Five and his siblings is that they can’t relate to his traumas and he does not understand the depth of Reginald’s abuse, which is an interesting conflict worth exploring. Another thing that really works in Five’s favour is that he is definitely written to be mean and sarcastic, but it is never driven to the point of complete unlikability, and a lot of the time, the context makes it understandable why he reacts the way he does. Most of the sarcastic lines he gets are actually funny, that certainly helps, but in general, Five is a good example of a bearable character whose default personality is sharp and relatively cold, because it is balanced out with many moments of vulnerability. Delores is incredibly important for this in the first season, she is the main focus of Five’s humanising moments, and well-written as she totes the line between clearly being a coping mechanism for an extremely traumatised man and still coming across to the viewer as the human contact Five needs her to be. In the second season, the vulnerability is about his guilt for his siblings, it’s about Five connecting a little bit better to them. There’s also his relationship with the Commission and the Handler specifically – which honestly could be an essay on its own – that deserves a mention, because the Handler is why Five became the man he is, and this dynamic between creator and creation is explored in a very interesting way – their scenes are some of the most well-written in the entire show. And TUA never falls into the trap of making Five a hero, he is always morally ambiguous at best, and it just makes for an interesting, multi-faceted character, well-written character, and none of the characteristics that should make him unlikeable are allowed to take centre-stage for long enough to be defining on their own. I know a lot of people especially champion the scenes where Five goes apeshit, but without his more nuanced characterisation, if he was like that all the time, those scenes would not hit as hard.

Aidan Gallagher’s Performance is Underrated

But honestly, none of the above would matter that much if the Umbrella Academy didn’t luck out hard with the casting of Aidan Gallagher. I think what he achieves as an actor in this show is genuinely underappreciated. Like, the first season set out to cast six adults having to deal with various ramifications of childhood trauma, and a literal child that had to be able to act smart and wise beyond his years, seamlessly integrate into a family of adults while seeming like an adult, traumatised by the literal end of the world, AND had to be able to create the romantic chemistry of a thirty-year-long marriage with a lifeless department store doll. The only role I could think of to compare is Kirsten Dunst in Interview with a Vampire, where she plays a vampire child who, because she is undead, doesn’t age physically, but does mentally, so she’s 400 in a child’s body. And Kirsten Dunst had to do that for a two-hour movie. Five is a main character in a show that spans 20 episodes now. That’s insane, and it’s a risk. Five is a character that can’t be allowed to go wrong; if you don’t buy Five as a character, the entire first season loses believability. And they found someone who could do that not only convincingly, but also likeably. As I said, he is incredibly helped by the costuming department and the script, but Aidan Gallager’s Five has so much personality, he’s threatening and funny and charming and arrogant and heartbreaking. He has the range to be convincing in the quiet moments where Five’s humanity comes to show and in the moments where Five goes completely off the rails. Most child actors act with other children, but he is the only child in the main cast, and holds his own in scenes with adults not as a child, but as an adult on equal footing with the other adult characters. That’s not something to be taken for granted. But even apart from the fact that it’s a child actor who carries a lot of the plot and the drama of a series for adults, Aidan Gallagher’s portrayal of Five is also just so much fun. The comedic timing is on point, he has the dramatic chops for the serious scenes, the mannerisms and visual ticks add to the character rather than distract from him, and his line deliveries, paired with his physical acting, make Five arrogant and smug but never outright malicious and unlikeable. It’s just some terrific acting that really does justice to the character as he is written, but the writing would not be as strong if it wasn’t delivered and acted out the way Aidan Gallagher does. He is an incredible asset for this show.

Alright, onto concluding this rambling. If you made it this far, I commend you, and thank you for it. The point of all of this is that Five, as a character, could have been an unmitigated disaster of a TV character. He is overpowered, arrogant, uncommunicative and could so easily have been either unconvincing or completely unlikeable, but he turned out to be neither. It’s a combination of choices in the costume department, decisions in the writing room, and Aidan Gallagher’s acting skills that make the things that should make him obnoxious and annoying incredibly entertaining, and I hope you liked my long-winded exploration of these. Some nuance was lost along the way, but if I had not stopped myself, this would’ve become a full-blown thesis.

[qwanderer]

What makes a Loki a Loki?

Loki is called upon to be a lot of different people. He’s been raised on Asgard, and that’s formed some of the more basic aspects of his personality and values, but at the same time he has attributes that have been consistently discouraged and pushed down by that culture, and we can see them step forward as he moves into situations where they are encouraged.

Throughout the canons, there are a lot of Lokis. Siege Loki, Lady Loki, Kid Loki and his murderer, Ikol, King Loki, and the God/Goddess of Stories. The earlier aspects I know only by secondhand information, but I’m very familiar with Loki from Young Avengers and Agent of Asgard, some of my favorite comics of all time. But I know some basic facts - the way the earliest Loki was a quintessential comic book villain full of pure simple theatrical mischief and ridiculous schemes, the fact that Lady Loki was a somewhat more sinister appropriator of bodies for her own use.

In my view, MCU!Loki has, at the very least, the same capacity to shift personalities depending on the circumstances, and I haven’t yet seen anything in the Loki show that’s thrown my suspension of disbelief with regards to his characterization.

I’ve seen some people rebel at the idea of Loki gleeful over the destruction of Pompeii and the causing of chaos it allowed, but it reminds me of some meta I wrote very early on in my years of meta-writing in the MCU. The values Loki was raised with, Asgardian values, sometimes treat death very lightly, especially death in battle, especially human or otherwise non-Aesir death. In the Aesir context, at least to a certain extent and certainly in terms of what we’ve seen Odin teach his sons onscreen, violence is honorable, fighting is an adventure, lives are cheap and Valhalla is the ultimate goal.

I think a lot of the central conflict of Loki’s character is that he follows some of these principles to their logical conclusions in situations that Aesir values never meant them to cover. If life is unimportant, then it won’t be so bad if I tell Thor that Odin is dead. If the throne of Asgard has dominion over all the Nine Realms, then why shouldn’t I rule Midgard?

But he also shifts the way he acts to suit the situation. He is a shifter, it’s what he does. On Asgard, he is expected to be a warrior, a dignified prince, a companion and support for his brother. The values are bravery and dignity, and so a lot of what he projects there is bravado and elegance, which are close enough for him to get by.

When he is taken by Thanos, the only things Thanos wants and values are power and death. So Loki becomes an avatar of power and death. He carries that with him to Earth, because he is still very much under the jurisdiction of Thanos. But he very quickly learns how to use and manipulate Earth values, like wit and pathos. They seem to fit him better than the others, and he carries them through the other movies and the different frameworks he finds himself in.

He also tends to carry Asgard with him, the knowledge that he’s a prince, destined to be a king, that he needs to carry himself a certain way, with that elegance, dignity and bravado.

When I see Loki in the first episode of the show, I recognize him as some of the deepest, most quintessential parts of Loki that have only been allowed to peek out on occasion before. And that is due to manipulation on Mobius’s part - Mobius makes it very clear what he expects of Loki. To get down to the very basic levels of him and find out his motivations, what makes him fundamentally himself - “What makes Loki tick?” There’s a quiet void there, and the only thing that’s being asked of Loki, for once, is that he sit down and fill that void with words - the truest and most sincere words possible.

There’s a clear and interesting divide between that phase for Loki, and the phase we see in episode two - Mobius has stopped providing that space, and in the interim, he’s made it very clear what he expects Loki to be like, what mold he’d prefer the trickster to fit into.

The hard-working, lovable scamp.

Loki is hiding his deepest self again, which we all do most of the time. Loki can’t feel that deeply and express that freely all the time. Because of the environment he’s in - which may not be any more or less free than any of the other environments he’s experienced - he expresses himself in a particular way. He is the hard-working, mischievous scamp Mobius has been pushing him to be.

I don’t think he’s any more or less himself than he’s ever been - he’s simply responding to different pressures. And the pressures of this episode press him very hard into the Neal Caffrey mold. Which is an interesting mold in itself - when I was writing White Collar fic, I made a point to distinguish who Neal was when he was with Peter and who he was under different circumstances - prison, witness protection, with Mozzie, with Kate. (I wrote an autistic Kate, and had him most freely himself when he was with her.)

Like Neal Caffrey, the Episode 2 Loki is treading a line between behaviors that will get him things because he’s useful and compliant, behaviors that will demonstrate that he’s into minor trickery for fun now and might not be getting up to anything bigger, and those bigger tricks that are definitely still running in the background. It’s the obvious balance for a trickster on a leash with an indulgent bureaucrat.

You can see that it’s a facade in the way that he is near tears when he sees the Ragnarok paperwork, but when he brings it to Mobius’s attention and Mobius expresses his sympathies, Loki says “Yes, very sad,” and then dismisses it in favor of moving on to his mischievous enthusiasm over the resulting theory he’s had.

Like all good lies, it’s built out of truth, so when I see this Loki, I see pieces of the Loki I know, just put together a little differently, which is how Loki seems to do it.

Although he’s not free as he might hope to be, and in fact threading a narrow path between a very constricting set of pressures, I do still think he’s enjoying the dropped expectations of dignity and elegance. I think he’s enjoying being in a culture that encourages him to be a geek. To go on about the things he’s passionate about and his areas of expertise. And I think that’s a lot of what unsettles people about this Loki, because that elegance and dignity have carried everywhere else with him. And I’m not going to argue that the TVA are doing anything nice for him - quite the contrary - but I still do enjoy seeing him able to be the geek he’s always had the inclination to be, in the right circumstances.

It makes me wonder, a little, how much his mother is on his mind right now, after the first episode, because if I had a guess, the last time he’s felt free to be this enthusiastic and expressive about his interests is in magic lessons with her as a child.

So. The other variant.

We know from the Lady Loki comics arc that Loki can possess other people’s bodies over the long term, and we know from kid!Loki and his murderer interacting in YA that the original occupant of a body can sometimes hang around and talk back, if only as a figment of his imagination. We know from most incarnations that Loki can go to a lot of dark places if the circumstances push him to it.

As I’ve said before, I’m intrigued by the question the difference between the two variants poses - how much different can two Lokis be before they are no longer meaningfully the same person?

We’ve got clues on both sides, of course - our scamp on a leash saying “I wouldn’t do this to myself” on the side of them being not the same person, and the vengeful goddess he’s chasing saying “I was afraid they’d found a better version of me” on the side of them being the same person.

The more I think about it, the more I’m willing to predict that this vengeful goddess is, in some way, an incarnation of Loki. But (be warned, I’m going to reference Stephenie Meyer now) it could be in as small a way as something out of The Host - a stolen body’s original personality fighting dirty against the invading spirit.

If this is something based on the character of Sylvie from the comics, it could still be anything from a person - human or Asgardian - chosen and manipulated by Loki to do his bidding, to a full-on possession, or even a body constructed for a specific purpose but developing its own personality traits.

We know this variant is a body hopper, and Mobius’s briefing mentioned that it’s an inherent ability of most Lokis to shapeshift, so there are a lot of potential explanations for this unfamiliar shape.

But the differences between the variants could also stem mostly from different experiences.

The only thing I’m at all sure of is that this variant has also been tortured by Thanos. It’s possible that she branched earlier - that the wild desperation of having freshly escaped Thanos translated into being dragged into the TVA like a cornered wildcat, on the raggedy edge and desperate enough to go all-out to get out of the collar while still in the custody of the minute men. Then, as she became familiar with the TVA in concept and execution, developed opinions and built a personality around taking them down, taking them apart the way she wished she could do to Thanos, the way Thanos did to her.

But she could also have branched later - after the destruction of Asgard, or when Thanos appeared on the refugee ship. After the worst has happened to her people. With some preexisting notion that time could have gone differently, that some things that had happened should not be allowed to happen.

I have a weak spot for interactions between incarnations of Loki in the comics, so I am incredibly eager to see the MCU’s take on this.