#It's because like there's not any sort of more emotional or moral connection to them

[cepheustarot]

What does fate have in store for you in the near future?

Attention! This reading is for entertainment purposes only. This tarot reading does not give a 100% guarantee that all the described situations will occur or being ultimate truth. You build your own life and destiny and only you know yourself best.

Paid readings

Pick a pile. Choose one or more pictures. Trust your intuition.

Pile 1: Here fate will arrange for you to meet a person. It will be an unexpected meeting for you, since a person will literally appear suddenly out of nowhere but from the first days you will feel a strong connection with them, you will get very close to this person, you will open your soul to them, as they will open theirs to you, in general, emotional and personal conversations will be involved here. By themself the person is calm, perhaps they are not very emotional and in some places can behave as if they do not care but in fact it is not so! Person is very sensitive, prone to empathy, they are a good listener and you can say they generally like to listen more than talk. They may also be well versed in psychology or something similar, may have a lot of experience in terms of relationships between people. And although a person is very sensitive, still relies on logic and common sense, not allowing emotions to take over. In general fate organized this meeting for you to help you succeed in some area (mostly in terms of studies, finances, work) or if you had problems then they will help you solve them. It is also necessary for you to find support in it since now you may be in limbo and feel unstable or you constantly have situations that unsettle you.

Pile 2: As I see it this option could be chosen by those who do not feel very well morally, you feel exhausted or you have been depressed lately, you may feel very tired, burnout, stress and all that sort of thing. You may also miss a lot of privacy, being alone and you may feel a lot of pressure from your family or people around you. Here you might not find the opportunity to relax or generally forget to rest because you were immersed in some kind of activity. So here fate, roughly speaking, will "force you" to take a break, perhaps your plans will be interrupted and you will be forced to spend time with yourself. Perhaps your loved ones will leave for other cities, places or will be too busy to meet you or vice versa you will have to leave for some reason.

Pile 3: Here fate will give you a choice that cannot be abandoned, where there will be no third option and you will have to choose from what you have. In particular this choice is associated with some person dear to you, with whom you have known for a long time, communicate closely and in general you can have a very strong connection. It can be your close friend, your lover, your colleague, your partner with whom you work, etc. In particular here you will have to make a choice to continue communicating with this person or not, since your relationship has reached some kind of dead end and is not developing in any way, you may not feel the same warmth on his part, the same interest and it may seem to you that this person has changed. This choice is a turning point in your life or on your life path but in any case, thanks to this situation, you will be able to gain wisdom, become stronger, more experienced — in any case, all this will only be a plus for you even if it is hard or painful at the beginning, then everything will bear fruit in the end.

Thank you for reading! I will be glad of any feedback 🖤

[subtract-me-from-your-heart]

I like the show version of Chishiya, and here’s why.

I love manga!Chishiya, but he always felt pretty one-dimensional to me. His backstory is one of parental neglect, similar to Arisu. Chishiya basically fails to develop a sense of empathy (unlike Arisu, who just has ye olde Main Character Syndrome). He decides to enter med school because he thinks that a profession where he saves lives might actually help him grow a Give-a-Shitter. Spoiler: it doesn’t.

Manga!Chishiya is an emotional flat line. He doesn’t care about other characters because he can’t. I remember thinking that he had a lot of the same traits as a serial killer. He viewed the world through nothing but intellect, and other people were either nonexistent or pawns to be used to further his own ends. Even the idea that maybe being responsible for the lives of others will help him grow some empathy is a chilling one.

That’s cool. I actually really like those kinds of characters. I also think there are enough characters like that in the story. Characters who you look at and think, “Okay, yes, you are terrible.” The big problem is that it makes his weird self-sacrifice with Usagi absolutely senseless. Like, it came out of nowhere. There wasn't any sort of satisfying build-up where I felt like, "Okay, yeah, this makes sense."

His updated backstory adds a dimension that wasn’t present in the manga version. Rather than simply lacking empathy for other people, you can actually see the moment in which he makes the conscious decision to turn it off. He has this light bulb moment where he realizes that the world is a cruel and unfair place. He realizes that allowing himself to feel for other people is only going to hurt him in the end because he’s powerless to change the systems that are actively harming them. It's better to protect himself and survive.

Chishiya is a selfish character, but the idea that his selfishness stems out of a desire to protect himself from pain gives his character some actual depth that was always missing for me. It also makes the King of Diamonds game a lot more meaningful. Kuzuryu went through the same exact thing, but instead of turning off his feelings, he paralyzed himself with a moral dilemma. Where Chishiya chose to treat all human life as equally worthless, Kuzuryu couldn’t stop looking for some value to assign, whether that was to ease his conscience or to inform a sense of justice he was desperately trying to find.

I really, really like how that dichotomy played out.

I also think it's interesting that Chishiya feels a lot more psychological in the show. He's clearly highly intelligent in both the manga and the show, and maybe it's just Murakami's performance, but there's something more sinister to him. He's clearly developed some sort of friendly relationship with Kuina. He displays an ability to be playful and seems to genuinely be extending an offer of friendship to Arisu (up until he sells him out for one corn chip). Seeing how he can make these connections that feel genuine to the people involved (unlike his manga self who is pretty universally despised) and still be willing to fuck those people over for his own survival makes him feel a lot more menacing to me.

This ability to flawlessly manipulate and betray also means he has a deep understanding of human emotion, which is illogical by nature. In the manga, Chishiya says outright that he isn't suited for Hearts games, but show!Chishiya feels tailor-made for them.

It's also interesting that in the manga, he seems to get harsher and more isolated. By contrast, in the show, he feels to me like he softens episode by episode. It really struck me in the Jack of Hearts game when he said something about his partner dying because he was too kind. On the surface, you could take it as a typical judgy Chishiya comment, but there actually appeared to be a glimmer of sadness, or envy, or regret. Or all of the above. Or maybe it's just Murakami Nijiro's face that made me think that. Either way, I think it was smart of the showrunners to throw him in that game.

In the end, the King of Diamonds game pushes him to the realization that he really is envious of people who have the ability to be kind. He's envious of people who can make the selfless choice. And it's not because he can't be. It's because he's closed himself off to the vulnerability that allows a person to make that kind of decision. You can't truly save others if you're always protecting yourself.

So, he saves Usagi to try to become that person. And I don't feel it was out of character at all.

[inbarfink]

I’ve seen some interpretations of the Rocky Horror Picture Show that compare Frank to the Christian Devil and/or the Serpent of Eden. And… it’s not like that doesn’t make sense. Frank is a tempter who stands against the restraint of the explicitly Christian morality of the mainstream culture our protagonists come from. The Criminologist even calls his temptation of Brad and Janet a “forbidden fruit”.  But… I just think that’s not the only angle one can take when looking at Frank. Frank is many things both as an in-universe person and a narrative character. But we are first and foremost introduced to him, before we even get a chance to see him, as a Frankenstein Pastiche.

Is it any wonder that he does such a good job of playing God?

Like any good Postmodern Prometheus, Frank creates new life, but this goes beyond just Rocky. It’s Brad and Janet who are kind of the Adam and Eve in this comparison, and while Frank didn’t literally create them with mad science - he did re-make them in his own image.

(And after first turning them to stone - a form of earth - and then back to flesh)

Also, if we're looking at the Frankenstein's Place as a sort of twisted Garden of Eden -  a place where Brad and Janet lose their innocence, gain greater knowledge and understanding of themselves, commit a transgression by giving into temptation, and then get cast down to Earth unsure of what to do with what they have learned - then Frank as the Master of the castle, who first welcome Brad and Janet but eventually then targets them with furious punishment, fits much better playing the role of God than a random snake or even the Devil himself. 

Yes, it's a weird-reverse-sort-of-God whose creed is exactly the opposite of the Conservative Christian God in whose church Ralph and Betty got married - but this is already a weird-reverse-sort-of-Eden as well. Adam and Eve started off so 'innocent' in that they felt no shame about their nude bodies, and when they lost said innocence is also when they started feeling the need to cover up. Brad and Janet’s 'innocent' state has them dressed very modestly, and their 'corruption' is marked by them... well, they're never fully naked, but certainly gradually get more confortable walking around in their underwears or lingerie.

And following the narrative thread of this weird-reverse-Garden-of-Eden, the real Forbidden Fruit isn’t actually Frank’s dick, it’s Rocky. The Garden of Eden was this wonderland of earthly delights where Adam and Eve could pertake of any fruit they desired.... except for the Tree of Wisdom. That was the one pleasure they were forbidden from. And the Frankenstein’s Place is similarly a paradise of desires - just less of a fruitbowl and more of the Sex, Drugs and Rock n’ Roll variety - but the one thing you can’t do, the one person you’re not allowed to have sex with... is Rocky.

And I think the interesting question here is ‘why is Rocky the one thing that’s off-limits in Frank’s Fantastic FuckCastle?’.  Because, well, if we look at it from an Eden Perspective, here’s what the Serpent had to say about the subject of the Fruit of Knowledge:

Eating the Forbidden Fruit isn’t just about succumbing to mortal pleasures about godly morality or whatever, it’s about becoming kinda like God. And maybe that’s the real reason why Frank’s so upset about the idea that Rocky has slept with someone else. It’s less actual romantic jealousy and more... galling at the idea that someone else can tempt his Significant Other to cheat on him. That’s his thing!

And like, espacially since Janet has that line in “Touch-A-Touch-A-Touch-A-Touch Me”

Which I always read as a kind of admission that she’s like... exploiting Rocky’s desire for an emotional connection for own sexual pleasures. She is maybe falling into this very Frank-Brand of hedonistic manipulativeness. Her newfound knowledge of her sexuality is making her more like ‘God’ in a way, and now this God is pissed about that idea.

And this also does places a ‘Serpent’ figure in our Garden of Eden and that’s Riff-Raff. It’s through his manipulation of events that Janet get offered that Forbidden Himbo in the first place. He probably wasn’t really counting on it directly, more like just causing random chaos in the hopes of distracting Frank long enough to prepre for the coup. But still, without Riff-Raff and Magenta’s tormenting of Rocky, he wouldn’t have fallen in Janet’s lap like this.

And I think, this is taking very directly from the Christian interpetation of the Garden of Eden myth, where the Serpent is retconned as Satan. Riff-Raff is, after all, a resentful servant planning to usurp his master out of jealousy and uses the humans as pawns in his scheme to do that. If Frank is playing God, than Riff-Raff is clearly playing Devil here!

And, like the pitchfork is OBVIOUSLY a reference to the American Gothic motif but... there’s no reason why you couldn’t also connect it to a Satanic motif? Especially as, with Frank being a Reverse-God who preaches for sin and pleasure, Riff-Raff is a Devil of... well, I dunno if he necessarily believes in all of that sexual conservatism stuff - but he’s certainly willing to use it as an excuse for his personal beef with Frank! Either way the point remains, the pitchfork ties together the concepts of traditionalism and sexual shame, as symbolized by American Gothic, with the Devil.

[astral-mariner]

Wait a minute I can just send you an ask about how you think saiyan culture varies by region and also about that religious tail removal headcanon you mentioned on the extremely long tail post lol

Infodump incoming! (Caveat: these are just some fun headcanons, and I love other people's headcanons just as much. I love when there are a million different versions of things so I can enjoy them all and enjoy the content millions of times over!)

Epic Rambling below the cut.

Okay, so. I made up all of this to be background stuff for my Saiyans under Freeza fic. Like a collective memory the characters have that people like Nappa could reference. To give the fic a sense of history and context even if we don't see the saiyan planet. To show how the characters see the world, how they think about things, what they care about, and why.

Basically, I imagine that Vegeta-sei had a handful of "nations" that roughly correspond to different population groups on different parts of the planet. They each have some unique cultural practices, beliefs, fighting styles, etc. Only in the recent(ish) past had their culture become more globalized due to receiving more access to technology from the Planet Trade. So they may have had scouters and whatnot before, but not everyone would have had them. They may have had healing/incubation pods too, but they weren't readily available to most people. All of this is to say that their different cultures wouldn't have converged into a uniform one due to globalization/colonization.

As for the different nations themselves, I imagine that different regions prioritized different things about being saiyan. Or they had different ways of approaching class hierarchies. For example, one nation might center Super Saiyan legends in their cultural consciousness, whereas another might center Oozaru transformation. This is precisely the difference I imagine between the nation that surrounds the royal palace/lands and the nation that houses a population closer to one of the planet's poles:

The royal bloodline bases their claim to power not just on their (supposed) higher latent strength, but also their alleged ancestral ties to saiyans that have become Super Saiyans. And the royals/nobles themselves perpetuate this narrative to consolidate power. Even though it seems pretty apparent that no saiyans have living memory of actually seeing a Super Saiyan---just that there are stories about their might, what they look like, etc. So the royals and everyone around them would be steeped in these legends. And the general culture of nobility, too, would contribute to obsessing over ancestry, power level, etc., where having ties to the royal family grants social status.

But it's not just social status---probably one of the reasons why SSJ legends have such a hold on people is that the Super Saiyans of legend helped them conquer their own planet(s?), won critical battles in the distant past, and perhaps played a sort of "savior" role. They have a sort of spiritual/religious significance. They provide a sort of "ideal" to which any strong, virtuous saiyan should aspire. An avatar for how saiyans construct morality and excellence (beyond just those in power wanting to maintain order and control).

Vegeta references that a Super Saiyan is a warrior with a "cold" or "pure" heart. Some of this is probably his own or his father's spin on the stories he was told as a child. Shutting down his emotions and detaching himself simultaneously from forming any connections as well as from the horrors he was experiencing/committing was certainly a coping strategy for surviving under Freeza. But some of it definitely came from his culture and from saiyan spiritual sensibility generally.

Different translations refer to the heart of the Super Saiyan as "pure," "cold," or even "tranquil." Because "pure of heart" captures a different kind of vibe in a Western mind than it does an Eastern one. It's not about being, like, "morally good" or anything---it's more about being empty, or single of purpose. Unaffected by attachment, and not in the "I don't care about anyone" sense (though it definitely is about that as well in some cases). Think along the lines of nonattachment philosophy you see described in Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, or (for a more Western flavor) Stoicism. So you can see how it simultaneously captures the adjectives of "pure" and "cold/tranquil." Or, for a pop culture reference that many will be familiar with, how the Jedi and Star Wars try to stay above attachment to the world and being swayed by personal passions.

And I bring all of this up to make a point about how saiyans might approach virtue. It's more about excellence than it is about doing what is right. So, something done excellently is virtuous, even if it is something humans would consider evil. A virtuous saiyan is someone who is as strong as possible, fights with clearness of purpose, and is unswayed by personal passions. The state of SSJ is a kind of state of enlightenment. (Which puts the differences between Goku and Vegeta on display: Goku is actually more exemplary of someone who fights in this "enlightened" way---purely for the sake of itself---whereas Vegeta is caught up in his emotions in every fucking battle he fights. He hates Kakarot, he hates Freeza. He's always trying to prove something. While Goku isn't trying to prove anything. He's just fighting because fighting is what he does, and he does it excellently.)

Now contrast this with a group of saiyans who prioritize Oozaru transformation more. Instead of trying to detach oneself, imagine leaning into one's passions and becoming a fucking monster. You know, the call of the moon, the bloodlust of the beast. Totally different vibe from the Enlightened Warrior. I find it absolutely fascinating that you have these two competing narratives for how a saiyan shows strength. That they have these two main transformations with these totally different flavors (that are later unified in transformations like SSJ3/4?). And you even see little nods to how saiyans think about their Oozaru transformation. Sometimes it's just about letting loose and being destructive. Other times, different saiyans in canon (such as Vegeta in the Saiyan Saga) seem to turn to it as a last resort. Not their main line of defense; something messy and unbecoming, even.

I'll write more about the saiyan cultures that lean more into Oozaru vs. SSJ in another post about the backstory I've constructed for Vegeta's mom! I headcanon that she belonged to one of these cultures, and that Vegeta's parents followed different traditions. (Also makes the relationship between King Vegeta and Vegeta's mom quite interesting!)

Now about saiyans who remove their tails: So with alllllllll of that said about SSJ vs. Oozaru and the different approaches/philosophies behind them, you can imagine a kind of extremist faction of the SSJ-prioritizing culture that eschews Oozaru transformation altogether as an attempt to strive for excellence only, to be totally pure-hearted, to have no passions whatsoever. And some of them would remove their tails as an expression of their spiritual sensibilities. Perhaps they belong to an ascetic warrior tradition. Tail removal would simultaneously be seen as something scandalous/taboo as well as very serious, as for most saiyans, this removes their access to one of their more powerful transformations (at least for a little while, if the tail eventually grows back).

I don't think King Vegeta would have belonged to this faction even if he would be drawn to some of their philosophies/practices. He probably couldn't remove his tail for social status reasons as well. But I can see him employing some of the tailless saiyans in various corners of his regime. Like, think of what kind of flex it would be to employ ascetic warrior fanatics to positions of, say, law enforcement. As in "these people are going to torture you, and they aren't going to give a single fuck about you or anything else while they are doing it." Because of the nonattachment stuff. People who just follow the will of the heir to the Super Saiyan Legacy and pursue strength/excellence while casting off all else.

I could literally go on and on about this. How these different philosophies shape the characters we know, how the characters twist these narratives to suit their aims or cope with their lives. I know this is super rambly, but I think you get some of the ideas here?

[whateven333]

What you prefer bonnie going dark with kai or kai being redeemed for bonnie?

I think, and forgive me, I feel like I’m always picking answers that are kind of in-between (I’m a “little” bit of an indecisive person lmao) but I like when they’re sort of a mix of both.

What I mean by that is like for Bonnie’s character, -I think she’s not as “good” as the show tries to convince us, and don’t get me wrong I think this is a positive because it makes for a more interesting/ complex character, -well it would have if the writers actually acknowledged it and did something with it, instead they kept her boxed away as some sort of “saint-like” figure (with none of the respect) but I think they did that in order to keep her away from any of the fun action in the show that the other leading ladies were allowed to be apart of, -like getting romantically/ sexually involved with villains, being careless/ misusing her powers for selfish reasons (like how the vamps in the show got to be reckless/ indulgent with their powers) without consequences, going to parties/ balls whatever and just being there to look pretty in a dress and have fun etc. and I think the writers liked to describe her like she’s “too good” as an excuse to leave her out of storylines that would allow more development for her character and to neglect writing for her character unless they needed to use her as a plot device.

But even though Bonnie is selfless etc, she’s still done plenty of morally questionable things in order to protect her friends (who are mostly killers) so the “too good” thing the writer’s tried to pin on her is pretty stupid and an obvious ploy to keep her away from being a part of more interesting storylines.

So because of that I think although Bonnie is kind of a mostly ‘good’ character, she’s also at least a little bit morally grey? As well as a little dark at times (considering her expression arc, -we know she’ll go to great extremes to do what she believes needs to be done).

Though with Kai I do think he brings out more of that darkness in her and that’s really fun (this concept has been explored in a lot of fantastic BK fanfics and I LOVE IT).

And with Kai, I think that he doesn’t need to be redeemed and actually I think this applies to other characters as well, -like should they even be redeemed ? Do we need to ? I think it’s perfectly fine for darker/ morally grey characters to exist without any sort of redemption arc. I’ve enjoyed redemption arcs before so I’m not against them or anything but I think on TVD it’s been done a lot (though I wouldn’t say they’ve done it well,- also TVD focussed on the ‘her lOvE redeemed him’ trope which I’m not really a fan of, I think it can be one of the reasons a character is redeemed but not the sole reason).

I liked that Post-merge Kai still seemed to have kept his pre-merge traits. I would have hated if they turned him into some sort of strangely good version of Luke, -even though some people insist that’s what he was post-merge and that’s why he was apologising to Bonnie, although that doesn’t make sense since the merge is not supposed to erase him- Kai’s meant to just be himself but with emotions now and Luke really did not have any serious connections to Bonnie to make him care that much about her.

One of the things I like about BK is the intense way they affected each other even when they didn’t want to be affected, even when they tried to act indifferent to the other it was obvious how they were still influenced by each other.

The type of redemption arcs that TVD focussed on had one person changing because of / for the other person. I think with BK they would change each other, both for the better and worse tbh, and that would be so delicious to watch -some of Bonnie’s good bleeding into Kai’s bad and vice versa.

And it would be an unwilling change for the both of them that they would probably try to fight tooth and nail, but regardless of what they want, their mutual obsession would inevitably lead them there.

So all that to say... I'd prefer them to mutually destroy each others perceptions of their own self-concepts and egos 💖

And I mean if that isn't ✨️True Romance✨️ then what is 💕

Thanks so much for the ask ! this was interesting to think about, I tried to answer this earlier but I couldn’t decide which I preferred and ended up kinda in the middle after all anyways… 😭

[lakesbian]

Hey there you’ve broadened my understanding of alec greatly through your posts. I kind of skimmed over his stuff previously cause he didn’t seem like a deep character but he is!

Anyways, I’m going to ask a question to wash down the praise. I’d like to see if I can get any more alec stuff out of you by telling you what I used to think (I say I, maybe this take has come up before, but I haven’t seen).

Basically I used to think that alec really was emotionless, unless he was controlling other people. But he only knew what negative emotion was like because the people he controlled weren’t exactly willing participants until Aisha. Through controlling hwr consensually he experienced positive feelings and this is want inspired his “passing taylor on the opposite track of the morality rail” and his eventual sacrifice for Aisha. Thoughts?

he's a shallow puddle but he's My favorite shallow puddle and there are actually 5 inches of water in the puddle when most people only think there is 1 inch.

anyway yeah that's basically not correct, alec's power is about (among other things) intense dissociation/literally only being able to feel emotions from a distance. presuming him to be 'emotionless' (<- this is kind of a vague term that seems like it comes with loaded connotations) is simply not correct because his entire thing is that he's had to cope/psychologically protect himself from his trauma by completely shutting down his ability to notice/'feel' or interpret his own emotions. all that hurt he felt as a smaller kid got packed into a box and chained up and tossed into the basement of his mind, because he just literally could not process it without completely crashing and becoming unable to keep himself alive. and he's still not in a safe place to start unpacking any of it, so he still remains almost completely oblivious to when he's, e.g., upset or nervous.

the other thing about his power is that it's got the irony of meaning that he can force people to protect him or act like they care about him, but he can never make them actually care about him. it speaks 2 the deep deep loneliness he felt as a kid and the way he was coerced into a cycle of abuse centered in large part around the notion that he would never receive love or physical affection or emotional intimacy or respect or anything unless he violently took it. so he can Pretend people want to be with him using his power, but he knows it's an act, and he can feel their palpable hatred the entire time. (<- the way his power enables incredibly deep and intimate understanding of other ppls emotions is also deeply indicative of what he's desperate for.)

with aisha, using his power consensually, it's letting him understand the first friend he's ever had in the closest way possible. he's actively Feeling that she cares about him & trusts him & wants to be close to him, and gaining a mental map for powerful emotions that have been rare in his life until then. it's not the first time he's ever Had Any Positive Feelings but it Is the first time he's ever had a connection like this. and it Is something he's been desperate for since he was very small and little. a lot of his worst behavior is driven by anger and hurt over being lonely & traumatized that he has no understanding of how to parse or vent appropriately, so i do think having a second person to bounce off of helps him sort himself out in a way that lowers the chances of him having another joker moment. so you could say his friendship w aisha contributes a bit to his improved moral compass. but we also do see that he's overall making slow upwards progress either way, and his joker moment is more of a backslide due to varying factors than his Usual.

the part where it's literally the only positive close connection he's ever had in his entire ass fucking life is why he kills himself for her though yeah. he has very little to live for other than Little Treats and the vague idea of being better than/getting revenge on his father prior 2 meeting aisha, and he ultimately realizes that her friendship is so meaningful to him that his life would just feel worthless without her in it, and he would rather die for the chance that the best person he's ever met will get to keep going. it's sad as hell. guy who gets one (1) friendship in his entire life and just genuinely does not have much of anything to live for outside of it. my alec essays tag isnt perfectly up to date but it gets into the explanations for a lot of this if you havent read it all already

[misrepresentedmorallygrey]

PROPAGANDA

Basil

In Omori, Basil used to be your best friend up until the tragic events 4 years ago, where Sunny accidentally pushed his sister Mari down the stairs. Basil was the one who found Sunny action-paralyzed, realising that his sister was dead because of him. Basil panicked, thinking the police would take his best friend away forever. Thus, he orchestrated making it look like Mari hung herself, worsening the events of the game. Pretty fucked up stuff. Did I mention both Sunny and Basil were 12 years old at the time? Basil is often portrayed as either irrevocably evil or a pure soul who did nothing wrong. Both of these interpretations ignore the central issue that he COVERED UP A POTENTIAL MURDER because he was 12 AND DID NOT KNOW WHAT ELSE TO DO. Prior to meeting Sunny and his group of friends, Basil was said to be isolated and alone. Finally creating this connection with others seemed to have made him terrified to lose these connections, and he's portrayed throughout the game to be haunted by guilt and characterized by his loneliness and fear of losing his friends, but especially his best friend, Sunny. He seems to understand now that he's older that the whole situation was incredibly wrong, and lives in denial mostly about his friend's hand in the events. Nothing seems to suggest that he doesn't realize what he himself did was wrong by the time of the game. He doesn't speak up, though, for the player's sake. After all, Basil has no idea that Mari's death was an accident, and Sunny has retracted into himself and refused to communicate on the issue. The creator themselves descriped the character like this: "OMOCAT describes BASIL as caring and thoughtful in regards to the friends he so deeply cherishes. However, his loneliness and insecurities are what make him dependent on others, sometimes to a dangerous extent." "In fact, OMOCAT adds that BASIL feels deep emotions for those he cares about, and this sometimes places him in situations where he unintentionally hurts others and himself." An additional moment that occassionally garners criticism, is that sometime in the course of those 4 years, Basil marked out Mari's face from his photo album, which he kept of him and all of his friends. This creates conflict between him and another character in-universe. What many fans seem to miss about this issue is that Basil himself is engaging in the same destructive tendency that most of the other characters also are - trying to deal with overwhelming pain with some form of denial and alienation of his old relationships. At no point is there shown any sort of hostility towards Mari from him as a character. Basil is overall a character who used to be a pure small bean but ended up doing something incredibly serious because he was a scared child, unable to deal with the situation at hand rationally. The horrendous guilt and consequences of the tragedy that happened when everyone were too young to process it make up the central themes of the game. By trying to morally simplify Basil's actions, we're also ignoring the overall point of the story; The deeprooted consequences of something extremely traumatic happening to children at an age where they're not able to handle it, and the permanent consequences it's going to have on their lives going forwards.

There's definitely a chunk of the fandom that likes to over-villianize Basil, I suspect to make the main character seem better. A lot of them say Basil forced Sunny into doing something bad, which given what we know about Basil's character seems highly unlikely. And they also give him a lot of flack for (admittedly bad) actions he takes during a mental health crisis.

Yuno Kashiki

She's far more morally grey than folks want to admit. She's not evil, not by a long shot, but she's not exactly innocent either. She's innocent of her (perceived) crime in her media, but in terms of her attitude and outlook on life, I feel people downplay her incredibly grey actions. She uses / used compensated dating as a way to feel "warm" without forming emotional attachments. She hasn't killed anyone, nor has she manipulated anyone into killing for her, but that's why she's a good representative of a more everyday morally grey person. Her actions aren't outlandish or extreme, and if anything she can fade into the background with relative ease, yet I still firmly believe she's morally grey. tldr; Yuno has far more depth than the (general) fandom sees her as having. She gets misrepresented and her voice as a character is often unheard.

Yuno Kashiki is an 18 year old rental girlfriend and sexworker in Japan. She was incarcerated in Milgram for murder at the start of the series in 2020. Since then she has been repeatedly dehumanized by the fandom. Having her agency and statements on her own life overwhelmingly ignored in order to give her a sob story she has consistently rebuked at every turn. Stating from the beginning even if she had to beg for forgiveness like her life depended on it she would. However, it's simply been handed to her as the audience continually goes she was too young and stupid to actually be held accountable for her actions. The same audience that later tries to vote a 12 year old child abuse victim guilty because she has to learn her lesson and she knew what she was doing. Yes the fandom interprets the eighteen year old who chose to work in the profession they did simply because they wanted to something they have no qualms admitting as having less agency than the twelve year old. They treat her like a stupid baby who's only error was not knowing how a condom worked as a sexworker. They say her only crime is an abortion despite her overtly getting upset at other individuals alluded to be clients throughout her songs. Having the literal lyrics of her second song go, ""Poor naive little girl"? So off the mark, what's it to you? It's absurd. Like really who do you think you are? Don't weigh me meassure me against your morality. Just shut it, will you? You know it all." And "Carrssing me with your "good girl". Who needs your self-righteous pardon?" They're so committed to the abortion equating to the murder she's in here for idea that fans got mad at the writer for even writing it that way when at least several other very not fetuses are alluded to throughout her songs and at points literally shown. Her first song even highlighting her clients belongings throughout it with inverted coloring. But instead of thinking she may have just killed a client who was bothering her they've convinced themselves that she's just a silly little outlier who's not meant to be here because abortion isn't murder her body her choice which fair if it wasn't for the fact the only people putting it on the table to compare to murder is the audience themselves. Despite everyone else in here very literally killing actual people with lives, professions, etc as they frame her case as a feminism issue and say if you vote her guilty you just hate women or are anti-abortion. In response to the framing of her situation as she can hear the audiences thoughts on her she's only gotten more depressed and closed off as tge series has progressed blatantly stating to hurry all this up so she can go home. Because it doesn't matter what she says about her situation the audience and the guard by proxy will just end up creating whatever story they want about her so it doesn't matter she's over it. Which in all honesty fucking fair- Wouldn't anyone be after getting treated like that for going on four years.

[teeth-collecter]

The thing I really like about Torchwood is that despite the fact its a spin-off of an alien show it's not about aliens at all. It's a show entirely about humans.

Our main cast is entirely human, and we are supposed to be rooting for them, but none of them are morally perfect. They all do bad things and make bad decisions. But that doesn't make them bad people.

Cyberwoman is a good example of this, and I genuinely think it's a good episode but it happens way to early. Ianto hides his girlfriend in the basement of Torchwood, and this will eventually put the entire team's life at risk. But Ianto never had any ill intentions to begin with. This was all just him refusing to accept the fact his girlfriend was dead, willing to do anything to help her. He was desperately trying to get back the person who loved him, who understood him. Something he really didn't have with any of the other people at Torchwood. The episode is really intense, high with emotion. The episode's only fault is not really establishing any of those emotional moments earlier on in the show, and not really delving into them afterwards.

Same with Tosh in Greeks bearing Gifts. There were so many red flags showing with Mary, almost immediately, but Tosh was so desperate for someone that she could talk to, someone that could understand her, that she ignored all those things. Her using the necklace with her teammates wasn't a great thing for her to do, but you can't really be mad at her for being curious how her colleagues thought of her. And even after finding out that Mary was an alien and just using her, Tosh was still sad that Jack had killed her.

Even Suzie wasn't evil. You find out she had been murdering people, but she was doing it in hopes that she could achieve resurrection, that no one would have to die via alien again. And when she was taking life from Gwen, it had nothing to do with any negative feelings towards her, or the fact that Gwen had sort of replaced her, but she simply wanted another chance at life. After finding out that her one life was all she'd ever get she wanted another chance at appreciating it more. That's why both of her deaths were equally heartbreaking.

I even think that having the team betray Jack at the end of the season wasn't an entirely bad idea. But, a lot like Cyberwoman, there were just too many things going on that were shoved into one episode. But I think the general idea of their betrayal makes sense because the team doesn't know anything about Jack. He never lets them in, never talks about himself, and yet he expects all of them to never question him or his orders. Some mistrust is definitely going to develop there.

All of them being part of Torchwood automatically makes them distant from the rest of society. But they're still human. They still need and value those connections and relationships. That's why the five of them trying to keep an entirely professional relationship doesn't really work. The only way Jack's idea for Torchwood is going to work is if they have strong trust and a strong relationship with one another. Torchwood is a family, not a business.

[ghouljams]

What the Hell are Tethers

Since I made one of these about tapping and Price’s story is a lot to do with debts I thought I’d make this. It should be quick but y’all know I say that about everything.

Tethers are the strings that connect debt holders to their debtors. Done. JK

They’re the ties that bind relationships and are seen as sort of budges for how much power a fae might have over another person. You can think of them like favors. If someone does something nice for you and you feel like you owe them for it, that’s a tether. It’s all about intent and balancing what different actions are worth to each individual involved.

What do tethers do?

Great question, thanks for asking. Tethers do a lot, but mostly they’re used for control. Say you owe someone a favor(a tether) they might call on that favor later to make you do something for them. If it’s a really heavy favor they might even ask you to do something you otherwise wouldn’t or don’t want to, because they know you can’t refuse.

So you can pull on a tether as a sort of warning that you’ll cash it in and force the person to do what you’re asking. Or you can just burn the tether and make the person do what you’re asking.

I thought pulling on tethers was for nsfw stuff...?

Interacting with a tether transmits emotion from one person to another. Tethers are bridges between the people they tie. So when one of the fae boys pulls on a darling’s tether usually they’re thinking about sex and that goes through the tether. Just because that’s what we’ve primarily seen doesn’t mean that’s all they’re used for.

If they’re just debts why are Liebling and the Witch scared of them?

Liebling is scared of anything regarding the fae, but mostly she was scared of König having any leverage over her. She didn’t know his intentions and he’s a scary guy. In her mind it was like having someone over and over ask if they could buy her for future use.

The Witch on the other hand knows full well how tethers work. She understands that being indebted to the fae is a very bad spot to be in. The fae don’t work with human morals, and the idea that they could make her do something that goes against her will if a very bad one. She’s also well aware that having a witch in your debt is a powerful temptation, and would like to avoid having her magic called on by a fae she doesn’t trust(which is all of them tbh Sorry Price).

Ok but what about Ghost and Love? They use their tethers for sex stuff.

They’re insane. They’re really an exception and not a rule. Ghost doesn’t have hooks in anyone but Love and the 141, he is not meant to hold debts he’s meant to enforce Price’s collection of them. He and Love went a little overboard tying themselves together and pretty much only pull on or burn tethers for sex at this point. They don’t need to collect on each others debts, so they just keep making more because they like it. Don’t let the kinksters win.

Can humans hold debts?

YES! Absolutely they can. Most fae are quick to repay debts that humans hold over them, but some fae (like König) use those debts that humans unknowingly create to tie themselves to their favorite person. Unlike the fae, humans don’t know the intrinsic value of the things they do for each other so for us a tether is just a relationship with another person. There’s nothing stopping humans from doing things for the fae like they would anything else so they can form tethers.

But for the fae, they know the weight of everything, and they can see the strands that hold that weight. So tethers are more serious for them.

TL;DR Everything has strings attached to it, and eventually someone will bring one of those strings up. That’s a tether.

[ephemeral--dreams]

Late night yandere thoughts - Kaveh, Zhongli, Yelan

☆ ☾ ☆ ──────────────────

Kaveh

I worry severely for his ability to be a proper yandere tbh

By which I mean he struggles so much with not just letting you go the moment you plead with him to. He's really too emotional for this - rather, he folds too easily, and is almost more likely to be manipulated than to manipulate you.

It's that very same quality that has the power to guilt trip you into staying, though. It almost feels more like taking pity on him rather than being kidnapped, with how clingy he gets when you tell him to stop this nonsense…

(Of course, he is not entirely oblivious to this, either. He knows what he is doing is wrong, and that he wouldn't have the heart to harm you if you tried to fight your way to freedom. However guilty he feels about playing on your emotions to get you to stay, though, isn't it for the best? You're safe with him. He will not lose another person he loves, so this is better for you both. Anyway, if you'd loved him before, can't you love him while stuck here, too?)

He'll take good care of you, he promises!! Pretend he hasn't put security measures on every exit and everything will seem normal.

Don't expect Alhaitham to help. It's too much energy to get involved in Kaveh's affairs. He'll leave you alone as long as you leave him alone.

Kaveh honey can you even afford to keep a person. Where are you getting the money to do that from.

Zhongli

Dragon. Possessive. You see where this goes.

He doesn't follow any sort of human morals. He has been above such things for centuries. Even living among them, his polite demeanor is partially an act. He would like to blend in with society, and does not feel any particular bloodlust. But he feels no remorse for being swayed into taking you.

Likely manipulated you into signing a contract that effectively placed your life into his hands. Who knows what it was… All that matters is that he has you now, and by Liyue laws, you agreed to it. No matter if you try to fight after the fact.

Will keep you chained up if he must. It will be much easier on you if you cooperate, however. Zhongli would like you to be able to move around your shared home freely. Keeping you bound to a single place is much like locking up a beautiful treasure in a box - a useless endeavor. Pretty things should be enjoyed, so do behave yourself.

Also not above training you to behave. Don't test him.

He might even let you have little outings once he knows you won't bolt from his side the moment the door opens. Wouldn't you like a romantic dinner out? <3

It's very simple with him. Be good and get spoiled, or don't, and face consequences. Either way, you will be his until the end of your life.

Yelan

Another possessive one. In a different way, though. She won't kidnap you, but she will always be watching. Best get used to the prickling of eyes on you.

That, and her sudden appearances. The unexpected way she appears behind you while you wander the local market, leaning over your shoulder to point out which produce to buy (someone was looking at you for a bit too long, and she had to make certain her claim was stated), or when she climbed in through your window late in the evening (she was overly concerned about you being targeted because of her. Better to stay the night just in case she needed to protect you. She dealt with dangerous people each day, after all).

There is that paranoia - that you may get hurt due to your connection with her. Or in some way entirely unconnected. The mere thought that you could be taken from her is enough to make her arms tighten around you, for her to spend time resecuring the house after you're sleeping, to guard over you even more.

You're kept in the dark about the trail of bodies that follows you. Anyone she deems a threat, anyone who bothers you or irritates you. Gone, just like that. You will have peace and safety, without disturbance from any criminal scum. And then you will come back to her happily without an inkling of the blood spilled for your sake.

Wife that loves you enough to kill people for you what more could you want.

[genderkoolaid]

Ngl i dont really get 'feminist' mens rights activism. Are men hurt by the patriarchy? Yeah... but they benefit from it too, and more than they hurt. Straight people are hurt by homophobia and transmisogyny too, but no one is out here doing 'pro lgbtq rights straight activism'.

So, first of all, while I personally don't know of any queer liberation-based cishet activists, there are plenty of cishet activsts for queer liberation. And honestly, if some cishet people wanted to use queer theory and queer activism as a lens to examine cishet issues in solidarity with queer liberation, then good for them! That sounds like it could be really cool and really helpful for dismantling homophobia, transphobia, gncphobia in cishet relationships/spaces. I think that could be really beneficial for a lot of people, especially cishets who still don't fit perfectly in patriarchal gender roles.

Second of all, and to actually answer your question, I don't feel there's a minimum amount of suffering needed before someone deserves to be helped. I don't see the point in acknowledging that men are harmed by the patriarchy if we aren't going to try to address those harms. Why are these issues used as a rhetorical argument but then actually critically examining them is seen as bad? If we agree that the patriarchy is harmful to men, and that men would, as a group, benefit from it's destruction, why shouldn't we encourage men to seek liberate in solidarity with other genders?It feels to me that at least one reason this is viewed negatively is because it's not punishment-based. It doesn't suggest that men need to suffer or that their suffering is deserved or "their own fault", and it's focused on redemption and connection. If we agree that men are harmed by the patriarchy, why shouldn't men want liberation from that? Do you think that the patriarchy should be dismantled without ever critically examining how men are harmed by it? That kind of thing is what brings more men into gender activism and makes feminism stronger. It helps further collective healing from the damage patriarchal gender roles have done. And on top of all this, I'm not sure we can make any sort of assessment of how much men benefit from the patriarchy vs how much they are harmed, especially since the benefits can vary from situation to situation and person to person. Trans men are men who benefit little to none from the patriarchy, and I can't imagine many of us would appreciate being told that we are helped more than we are hurt by it. There are also many people who were AMAB who live mostly as men, regardless of their actual gender, who are severely hurt by the patriarchy. Some die because of it (through various things, not only issues caused by emotional repression but things like gaybashing, bullying, child abuse, etc.). And personally, I don't feel I can say that none of this deserves active concern and treatment until women's issues are resolved, morally- and I think it's unlikely that women's issues can be perfectly treated in a way completely detached from men's issues. The idea that we can only fight for one struggle at a time is a fallacy. We don't have to "choose" between men's issues or women's. I literally cannot- both affect me personally, and I cannot live in peace without fighting both fights. Even if it weren't personal, I don't want any group of people to be suffering if it can be helped.

Plus, men's issues intersect in the same way misogyny does. I got into men's liberation through transmasc-specific activism, because I realized that so many issues trans men faced intersected with other groups because of a shared antimasculism problem. In the same way that a lot of other issues intertwine with misogyny, and that can't be ignored when studying non-gendered forms of oppression, men's gendered experiences with bigotry matter too. Gender roles are sticky, they get everywhere. It's foolish, in my opinion, to think that women's gender roles intersect with everything (true) but that men's gender is a non-entity that has no bearing on the other issues they experience. When Black men (as well as butches and studs) are viewed as hyper-aggressive, hyper-sexual, hyper-masculine, that's the intersection of patriarchal male gender roles (men are aggressive and sexually active) with anti-Black racism. The idea of "savage" men being cartoonishly violent and sexually aggressive (making them a threat to White women) is pretty common in various forms of racism, as gender roles are played up to demonize or mock another group. Disabled women are often painted as failures if they are unable to have children, or cook & clean, because of misogyny. Disabled men are often painted as failures if they cannot do manual labor, or impregnate someone, because of antimasculism. I don't think we can analyze other forms of oppression without looking at how gender plays into it, and we can't do that only focused on women & especially cis women. We need the trans perspective, and we need the male perspective. And "male perspective" does not mean "patriarchal perspective".

I hope this was a good explanation of why I feel men's liberation and studying of antimasculism is important.

[jessepinwheel]

tell us about all your obiclones?

all the obi-clones? but there's 2000 of them 🤔

nah, just kidding. the obi-clones are definitely main characters of parex, and we meet a good handful of them. this one is longer so I will tuck it under a read more

for quick background, all the obi-clones were raised in kamino. obi-wan taught them most of their morals and ways to use the force via psychic skype and also by possessing one of the obi-clones to teach them in a more hands-on manner, while mandalorian trainers taught the obi-clones stuff like speaking the language, combat, and technical skills. of course among these mandalorian trainers was cin drallig, a mandalorian jedi who was supposed to teach the obi-clones some stuff about the force, but obviously obi-wan's knowledge far outstrips cin's, and also cin was so depressed and lonely that a bunch of obi-clone children decided to make him feel better by forming a psychic connection with him that, uh, ended up absorbing him into their hive mind along with the entire contents of his brain. so if you want to be technical, he did teach them everything he knew about the force!

the obi-clones were created in batches of 100, numbered sequentially going from 0000 to 1999, but within each batch of 100 the ID number doesn't correspond to order in which they were decanted, so 0000 isn't necessarily the oldest out of the 0 batch. the obi-clones all have names, with the early batches were named by the mandalorians (and so tend to have mandalorian names) while later batches were named by obi-wan or the older obi-clones (and so do not have mandalorian names)

while I'm going to refer to all the obi-clones as 'he', they're gender neutral by default because they didn't really inherit any kind of gender identity from obi-wan, who is very apathetic about his own gender identity. some obi-clones do end up identifying specifically as male or female or something else as time goes on (especially after they absorbed cin into the hive mind and learned about the concept of being male), but that's kind of beyond the scope of what parex is actually about, which is kicking jango's ass for being the worst father of all time and destroying the mandalorian empire

all obi-clones have been made to wear collars pretty much from birth. the collars are different from the mandalorian jedi ranking collars in that they are made specifically to control the obi-clones--they track the obi-clones vitals, with visible light pips on the outside that are synced with their heartbeat and which change color when they're using the force, and they are fitted with electroshock and location tracking capabilities. the only way to remove a collar is with a special device, or by cutting through it with a lightsaber. the obi-clone uniform is all white, and includes a tunic, surcoat, and full-face mask much in the style of old jedi temple guards. customizing the uniform isn't something that the obi-clones do very much, because physical individuality isn't really something they value, all being part of a psychic hive mind and everything. they do sometimes customize the masks, though, and each obi-clone has their own preferences of whether they like wearing the mask. they're not required to wear the mask at all times though because the mandalorian trainers were creeped the fuck out by a bunch of kids wearing faceless masks.

also for the purposes of parex, obi-wan and his clones are played by toshiro mifune but with lighter hair because I said so.

moving on to the obi-clones themselves...

the first obi-clone we meet is Kote (#0066). he was chosen by jango, possibly because of his name, which as most people reading this know means 'glory'. as part of the 0 batch, he has a strong sense of self and is seen as a sort of leader within the obi-clones. he's very competent and very good at keeping his emotions under control, which is good because if he didn't he would have murdered jango so many times. kote acts as jango's personal aide, with increasing duties as time goes on, until he's helping jango don his armor, sparring with him, advising on imperial affairs, and becoming all but the emperor consort. of all the obi-clones, kote is the only one who sees obi-wan in person and is able to confirm that obi-wan is a real person who is still alive. which is great except for the fact that obi-wan is in jango's torture basement after 11 years of solitary confinement and torture and looks like shit. kote is so angry at jango for the entirety of this story that kicking jango's ass on live television is probably the best day of his life. after the coup he changes his name to Six

the next clone we meet is Kenobi (#0212). his actual name is gratika, which means 'little revenge' and he hates that name, so he tells everyone else to call him Kenobi, while his brothers refer to him as Ori. kenobi is assigned to cody's squad, which is specifically a jedi hunting special forces team. kenobi is one of the most proficient force users of all his brothers, and he wears his hair in a braid that goes down across the scalp behind his right ear--because he's heard of jedi padawans and the braids they used to wear, but the practice died after the mandalorians destroyed the jedi and he doesn't actually know what the braid is supposed to look like. kenobi is polite, but at the core he's ruthless and a bit mean. he ends up forcibly absorbing ventress into the obi-collective to stop her from leaking information and destroying at least one other person's mind. cody ends up infatuated with him because kenobi offers emotional support that cody needs so badly it's not even funny but kenobi isn't even a little bit interested in cody

after that is Surau (#0501). his name means 'light eyes', so named because he has a mutation which gives him gold eyes. he is assigned to rex, probably because jango is an asshole and thinks it would be funny to remind rex of that time anakin went full darkside and rex had to put him down. surau is mild-tempered and diligent, but rex hates interacting with him because rex has huge hangups about both jedi and clones. rex's squad is mostly law enforcement and suppression of rebellion forces, so surau ends up incidentally coming into contact with multiple rebel forces, who see his gold eyes and are like uhhh is he evil? do we need to worry about that?

next on the list is Azar (#916). here we get into the clones that don't have mandalorian names. azar is assigned to work under ursa wren, whose squad also includes padme and ahsoka, which is primarily an intimidation and enforcement squad to keep citizens in line. azar is probably the most obi-wan of the obi-clones, with a tendency towards teaching and watching over others. he ends up being a sort of mentor figure to ahsoka, helping her through her anger issues and teaching her things like mindfulness and how maybe murder is bad, actually. this leads to a huge clusterfuck where azar has to fucking book it and is on the run from the empire with a literal tracking beacon attached to his neck. this does not end well for him.

then we have Ben (#1555). sometimes called fives by his brothers, he is assigned to the kryzes to effectively monitor them (and death watch, who hate jango's guts) for rebellious activity. he's got more of a soft personality, and doesn't really like confrontation. for some reason satine really likes the look of ben and dresses him up and takes him out to parties, which ben finds extremely uncomfortable, while bo-katan hates the fact that satine is getting sweet on a clone. he spends time around mandalorian high society and generally gets treated like shit or like a pet, because clones are not really thought of as people, since most of them are just purchased to be on standby as spare parts and are chipped or otherwise lobotomized. anyways, ben snoops around and overhears the fact that death watch does, in fact, have a plan to murder jango and obliterate all of keldabe, and he gets found out and murdered by bo-katan for it

which leads us to Ira (#1565), who is brought in as ben's replacement after ben was 'killed by an unknown attacker' but which ira knows is bullshit because he is in the hivemind and saw bo-katan strangle ben to death. ira is forced by bo-katan to pretend he is ben, and satine doesn't even notice that he's a different clone. ira and ben were very close brothers, so ira is very angry about this whole situation and he is just biding his time so that he can turn bo-katan and satine against each other

then we have our last main obi-clone, which is Boga (#1977). as one of the youngest clones, he really doesn't have a very strong sense of self or individuality, instead deferring heavily to the collective consciousness. he's assigned to pre viszla, who is leading a bunch of soldiers who are basically cleaning up at the end of mandalore's successful conquest of zygerria. he ends up befriending another soldier, who turns out to be fox, the third jango clone (after cody and rex) who has been brainwashed into oblivion and is being used as a soldier and on standby as spare parts. boga stands up to pre about how he treats fox like shit, and pre ends sending boga off a cliff. boga, however, is able to send out a psychic distress call and is rescued by the jedi order, which allows the obi-collective to finally touch base with the jedi and coordinate their efforts

there are of course many other obi-clones. the ones who aren't deployed across the military are stationed in keldabe to work with myles and dooku as intelligence officers, and also cin ends up adopting one of the obi-clones as his son, who helps him manage his disability and also keeps him psychic connected to the hive mind

at the start of the story, about 1800 of the clones are alive, with the remainder being killed in kamino mostly from unethical research into force suppression methods, and by the end of the story about 1000 of the clones are still alive, with many having been killed by neglectful or malicious squads, or during the coup where they do a mass assassination of major mandalorian commanders and leaders and the mandalorians are not really into that for some reason

there are a lot of characters in parex :)

ask me questions about parasitic extraction, the role reversal mandalorian empire au that I have

[cebwrites]

“men don’t cry” (shanks, buggy, rayleigh)

a/n: there’s no way on god’s greenest earth given the era and crew they grew up in that shanks and buggy would be ANY kind of emotionally stable rayleigh is-- also here eajsdfbfjgk

implied masc leaning reader for Buggy, others are pretty gn word count: 1k

Shanks

Shanks ignores his negative feelings and drinks until they go away or become small enough for him to push into the back of his mind where they can’t bother him

He’d much prefer to laugh it off and brush something away as just another scratch on his armor than actually acknowledge potentially horrendous damage done to his emotional and mental state

Shanks is compassionate enough to acknowledge that mental struggles are a real thing when it comes to other people, but himself? Naw, that’s not something anyone should worry themselves about

The YEARS of unaddressed/resolved trauma this man is sitting on. Ridiculous.

His comforting is there but it’s almost surface level because of how little vulnerability Shanks is willing to show, kind of a “chin up, sport, you’ll walk it off” type approach

He’s aware that it’s not healthy in the long run, he’s had many relationships crumble under the weight of his seemingly uncaring and irresponsible response to hardship - it’s childish, running away from his problems and walling them away with a veneer of cheerfulness

He isn’t going to rub it in when his partner or the crew are genuinely down, but Shanks ends up being frustratingly scarce during those times - leaving morale up too Benn and his other officers better equipped to handle it

Eventually he comes waltzing back in, apologizing sheepishly with the boyish smile that coasted Shanks through his twenties but looks silly on him now and some sort of gift to make up to his partner, be it a favorite snack, something they’d been eyeing in the shops for a while, or even just a cheesy old plushie because he ran out of ideas

He’s understanding if his partner ends up leaving him because of this behavior, but at the same time he’s become so set in his ways that at this point it’d take a major intervention to change it

Buggy

As far as Buggy’s concerned, men aren’t supposed to have ‘mushy’ emotions so as a man; he doesn’t have any - or at least refuses to acknowledge them

Like birds of the same stupid feather, Buggy’s just as reluctant to deal with any heavily emotional issue as Shanks is, if anything he’s even more apprehensive of the idea

Emotions, feelings, sentimentality all that junk only drags a person down in his eyes - connections? Pah, connections will get you killed in this world and especially on the grand line where everyone has a target on their back, when it comes to having a partner Buggy needs someone who understands that if they slowed him down he’d drop them in an instant

Except of course, that’s not at all true - Buggy puts up that ‘tough’ front like all his other grandiose gestures of flaunting power or resources (that he’d miraculously obtained through sheer backwards luck it seemed) as a means of protecting himself, just like Shanks

He’s not as much of a brick wall as Red-hair, thankfully, but this does mean that when Buggy’s upset about something serious he’s explosive, frustrated and hurt with fuck all else to do about it

It’s always been easier to just hide things away, put on a brave front like nothing ever bothered him when everything was crumbling around him, losing Roger meant the world shattering to most of the crew and the subsequent hunts from the navy Buggy had to endure after the Roger Pirates dissolved no older than a shitty tweenager

Buggy knows that he can’t bottle it up forever but actually feeling these things is horrendous, he hates it so much - he’ll drink and drink until he catches the worst hangover he’s had in a while, mope about it in a foul mood for the whole day, before eventually slinking into their lover’s quarters to seek their comfort

His brand of comforting isn’t too dissimilar to Shanks either, but he’ll at least try with physical contact rather than running away until his partner feels better 

Buggy throws in the occasional rib about how stupid it was for a tough, “manly” man to be such a mess during either his lower moments but never to his partner, even if his subconscious thinks it sometimes but Buggy chases those thoughts away quickly

Rayleigh

I feel like Rayleigh’s come to a point in life where the merit in phrases like that have long lost their luster

He wept openly at Whitebeard’s death - he’s too old to die on a hill like hiding emotions for the sake of masculinity or “power”, he’ll leave that to the shrimps with daddy issues to sort out on their own

Rayleigh at times looks at Shanks and Buggy and how they turned out with regret - pride, sure, they’ve become well and true menaces to the world at large - but some part of him aches when he sees his boys unable to process the pain that these seas have put them through

Obviously, no one on the Oro Jackson really signed up to be a parent but they ended up with these kids anyway, Roger treated them like family; Shanks in particular

So it pains a deep part him that the furthest he could probably get with them is probably a pat on the shoulder or a side hug from Shanks, not treating this too seriously while Buggy complains, but never a proper hug or to speak of his real feelings without either getting too skittish or uncomfortable

With a partner, he expects the same if not similar amount of emotional maturity - posturing and machismo is well and good and all but Rayleigh wants someone, who can actually talk out their feelings when the road starts getting bumpy

He’ll gladly drink them under the table and cuddle after numerous rounds of gilf sex, but when it comes down to brass tacks Rayleigh doesn’t have the time to waste on anyone who isn’t taking this seriously 

None of that “too strong to show vulnerability” nonsense in his house

[resonancewitness]

witnessing resonance, part 3: holding on to what's important

what do I mean when I call myself a witness of resonance? continuing from here and here

and the third layer of meaning of witnessing, the last one for me (so far?) 

here I am going to dare to go out on a limb and give words to some experiences that in the modern world often seem to be much more taboo for discussion than the experiences of kinky sexuality (but I don’t have data, so maybe I am wrong :)) 

I am going to talk about witnessing something precious as a

personal non-religious spiritual practice in a secular world

I need to make a disclaimer that I do not assume that participating in any fandom or in this particular fandom may have such meaning for other participants, I am talking only about myself, using writing to make sense of my own experience

because not talking about it is subjecting myself to silencing as a form of self-oppression, and for the sake of what? I would need a valid reason to self-silence

anyway, back to definitions

I would call “spiritual” any practice of maintaining connection with the important values and principles that are not obvious and not very common in the everyday world

say, I want to believe in love that goes beyond distance, or in going strong against the current when it would be so much easier, in a certain practical sense, to give up and just drift along, or in justice and nobility, in human decency, mercy and empathy, — and, say, I don’t see many examples of these in my everyday surroundings, especially when I read the news

I would need special practices to keep re-connecting with these values that are so important to me

I consider the situation when people lose hope, perspective, sense of direction, persistence, and strength to go on, to be a spiritual crisis. “the dark night of the soul”

this can be also accompanied by a feeling of profound isolation

the practices of re-connecting with hope, perspective, sense of direction, persistence and strength to go on I will be calling spiritual practices. they are also recreating a sense of connection and belonging

as Casper ter Kuile says in “The Power of Ritual”, anything can be a spiritual practice if it is done with intention, attention and repetition 

everybody is capable of feeling awe, the emotion that accompanies meeting with something vast and mysterious, unconceivable in ordinary circumstances (“…how are you even real, sir?..”) 

when I come to the turtledom for my daily dose of beauty, inspiration and awe, I experience some sort of a boost that helps me reconnect to the values that are important to me, and I become more capable of continuing to do what I consider important in circumstances that, from a rational perspective, do not look too promising

…if they can, I can, right?.. albeit, of course, I possess less resources, but neither do I aim that high nor are the demands on me that intense. 

so, now to the Quakers. when George Fox formulated their mission in the 1600s,  it sounded like this: “Walking through the world cheerfully, responding to that of God in every person in such a way that the person will feel blessed and you will feel the blessings”. 

One of the central values (they call them testimonies) of the Quakers is honesty/ integrity: you have the right / and sometimes the duty to speak about what is true in your experience. If you met God personally in your experience, you speak of it, if you didn’t, you don’t. Easy :) Thus one can be a Quaker, but not a Christian (albeit here can be different opinions, but we’ll set them aside). 

but “that of God in every person” is something that we respond to with awe; amazing talent, giftedness, moral beauty in all its forms: courage, kindness, mercy, steadfastness etc. 

when I say that as a turtle I am witnessing something precious, it means that I also speak of what I see that is for me “that of God”, without implying any religious connotations 

what touches and inspires me today? how can I witness/ testify about it in such a way that it might also touch and inspire others and give them hope and strength to persevere? and in such a way that I would feel (the energy of) the blessings? 

bringing together all three layers of meaning, what touches me most in what I experience when I follow yizhan’s expressions of their preferred identities, is what I interpret as something intangible and related to maintaining hope and persistence when the road ahead is long, and the outcome uncertain; the feeling of purity and “dirt doesn’t stick to the pure ones”; something that makes me think of magic, mysticism and out-of-the-ordinary-world quality of the connection. 

I am aware that it is my personal need for this that focuses my attention in this manner

but I am very grateful that at this moment in my life I found something that feeds and supports me in such a way 

[faithfromanewperspective]

jesse deep dive cause i can't sleep

was thinking about the Controversial Jesse Scene and--before i do any hard takes or really have opinions on it--i can't help but think the way he perfectly captures Traumatised Victorian-Edwardian Man. how we don't see how he's feeling most of the time, considering he's not a main narrator and nor is he in a position where he's constantly able to talk about his emotions. In fact it would be canon consistent to assume he actually has never been able to talk about his emotions with anyone ever. Nor is he or has he really ever been able to show them or express himself in any way. With Grace he could express his love for her, but he was always in a bit of a carer position for her; she was never really there for him to confide in properly. He's not overly guarded about everything--his trauma doesn't manifest like that. He recognises a generally caring community when he sees one; he applies all his skills on how to be respectful and kind and connect with people that he no doubt had to teach himself (Tatiana not being the best role model and all, and also keeping him away from the rest of the world for the most part).

With this background, it makes perfect sense for him to latch onto the Herondales, whom he's realised over decades how unfounded and exaggerated his mother's hatred of is. He's heard horrible things about them, and they're nothing like that when he gets to know Lucie and she tells him about her family (which as much as she vents about them in her first writing project, she actually loves her family and finds them generally supportive and not a source of trauma or hurt, so different from Jesse's experience of family). To him, getting to know the Herondales is a bit like leaving a restrictive cult and realising that rock and roll and dungeons and dragons are actually great and not charged with supernatural villains at all (and of course, subsequently getting far more into them than if they had never been forbidden in the first place). He idealises the Herondales a bit, and if I'm honest--I can't really blame him. They gave him the life he always wanted and his in-laws and wife are always going to feel like a sort of rebellion against and liberation from his mother, especially when she inadvertently but also kind of intentionally put him through you know, the whole possession thing. In which he 'did' everything he's worked so hard to not be anything like and which would've been traumatising on so many levels.

I know possession is a supernatural trauma and not really relatable to any of us (as far as I'm aware, can't ever say never) on here. But when it comes down to it: Jesse was raised solely by an arguably evil if not at least bitter, vengeful and delusional (in terms of feeding herself lies because she can't face the truth until they become her truth, I'm not sure if I'm using the word correctly here and understand it can be a sensitive and ableist thing if I'm not) woman, who isolated him from the rest of the world (much like a cult does). I know Tatiana did things to Grace she didn't do to Jesse. But it's also not a competition of who had it worse: each of their childhoods was what it was. Jesse has known literally nothing else. And yet he figured out how to be generally a good person, he researched how to be a shadowhunter and trained himself and his sister, did all the things that Gideon and Gabriel didn't figure out about their family until they left it, without actually ever leaving. We don't really get page time talking about these things, but it's pretty impressive when you think about it. But it also means his (relative, okay, okay) morality has been hard-fought for, and even though he logically knows none of what Belial did in his body isn't his fault, it's still as if he failed in the one thing he thought to be critical, more critical than what he wants or prefers: breaking the cycle of hurt breeding hurt that Tatiana lives in.

Combine that with the fact that he's never had anyone to hold space for his feelings. Had to figure that all out on his own, and grew up in an era (has it really changed though??) where it's virtuous to be calm on the surface even if, as we know, it leads to emotions simmering into rage when they do eventually surface, making an anger/trauma response when it does happen bigger than if, say, hurt was felt and processed and grieved with others who offer a corrective experience as would be ideal. And the fact that though he has a new network around him, they're not there to all be his therapists and he's still the new guy, still super polite and trying to make a good impression and super grateful and kind of surprised when they do include him--so he's not about to process, really, how to look past his own trauma and be there for his sister, when, in his eyes, she's had more agency than he had in his possession, something he would have longed to have just a smidge of so he could hopefully stop it, and seemingly taken the easy way out and done the thing that Jesse could never, ever condone and honestly thinks he raised his sister to be better than. It feels like a betrayal of Jesse: his morals he fought so hard for. And it reminds him too much of what he went through: James, who he's heard how much Lucie adores and all the times she's been worried about, not being in control of himself and accidentally hurting people (Cordelia at least, Lucie fills him in on that) for three and a half years.

Yes, he isn't taking into account the dynamics of power and abuse and how what Grace went through, too young to know better or really have any choice in the matter until it was normalised, held over her in ways she couldn't fight until Tatiana was briefly out of the picture (at which point she did straight away). Going with the cult metaphor, the brainwashing and gaslighting and blackmail and total under-thumb squishing was exactly what Grace was going through, she was being controlled as well, but from Jesse's point of view she had a little bit of autonomy, she didn't use it or even come to him for advice and help, and it just feels like a betrayal especially given all his unprocessed trauma. It's too much of a shock for a man who's just been resurrected (which would also have some jarring effects one would imagine). Yes, he wasn't kind in how he treated her, the way he should've been. Yes, he hurt someone so vulnerable and it's always going to be there in their sibling relationship history. Yes, the shock wears off and she's still his sister, James and Cordelia are back together, yes he should've stood up for her more but. I don't think it's out of cowardice, even if one could call it morally grey. He's behaving like someone with his resources and trauma would, arguably better than many. He did make a brother out of that event, putting in an effort to reach out to James. So many people don't know how to mediate, and honestly, this is a really tricky situation for all who do (Christopher mainly, who does accidentally belittle James' pain in a way and brush over it with the turn-the-other-cheek-privilege rhetoric, which is in some ways the attitude Jesse places on himself and those around him including Grace if you get where I'm taking you and the irony of it).

Anyway, I have thoroughly enjoyed every fic exploring this relationship and everything that went down with this event in every different way. I don't have a problem with saying 'oh Jesse should've' but I also don't see the point in expecting him to be morally perfect when we don't expect that of other characters, and when it happens to the extent the imperfections that make him three-dimensional are washed away, when he has so few of them to begin with and he's probably the least fleshed out male character of the main cast (not saying he's complete cardboard!!! he's just the amount of fleshiness many of the female characters are, who we also tend to expect to be morally perfect!) like yes it creates an island for Grace in many ways that Tatiana all but orchestrated the way she did Jesse's death--a lasting punishment if you will, for ceasing to be her 'weapon' by exposing her to the others she forced her to hurt. It's a shitty situation in so many ways and I hate that she gets this legacy even from beyond the grave. I only don't think Jesse should bear the full responsibility for bridging everything and processing it for all of them

[cbk1000]

Unpopular opinion, maybe, but sometimes in fandom spaces I see this weird hostility toward traditionally published fiction which I'm sure is a defensive reaction from a community that has been shit on for a long time by the sort of people who read one whole bad fanfic and declared the entire genre a gross perpetuation of illiterate pornography by a bunch of hacks who can't make it as real writers. And I understand this, but I also need you to know: fanfiction is not inherently better than traditionally published fiction. It's not automatically more creative, more passionate, more morally pure because it's done for free. I've seen just as much derivative garbage in fanfiction as I have in traditionally published literature. Of course publishing houses sometimes release twaddle that is so bad it's actually reprehensible they expect someone to pay for it. But there is still an element of quality control. The worst book you can find on the shelves of a Barnes and Noble is not going to be worse than the worst fanfiction you can find online, because Big Publishing does have some standards, whereas any eight-year-old with an internet connection can throw up a story they wrote about their favourite book.

Here's the thing: fanfiction, as a whole, is not better than traditional publishing. It is a space inhabited mostly by amateurs, with a few professionals dabbling for fun. Some of those amateurs are as good as many professionals; but more of them are people, often young people, still getting their feet under them. And there is nothing wrong with this. Something does not have to be superior for you to enjoy it. There is joy alone in seeing people creating for the sheer love of it; there is joy in watching them improve and grow. There is joy in being part of a community of people who are doing something that can never be monetized simply because they're having fun. You do not have to shit on traditionally published literature, and by extension the authors who write it, who are themselves storytellers passionate about writing just like you.

Fanfiction often fulfills a different need for us than much of traditionally published literature; there are people telling stories in fandom spaces that historically have not had a voice, or at least a very loud one, in traditional publishing. And too sometimes we need the familiarity of settings and characters we already know, especially in These Trying Times when our emotional bandwidth is historically low. Fanfiction does not have to be a guilty pleasure you have to justify by shitting on traditional lit. It can just be a pleasure that you enjoy, full stop, because storytelling is something humans have engaged in since the beginning of our species, and fanfiction authors are merely carrying on that tradition. They might not be doing it in as polished a way as the professionals; but neither were the people sitting around campfires passing down folklore in the dark. And quite frankly, and full offence, some of you could really benefit from reading one of those dread traditionally published books once in a while.