I just saw the excellent post about Chuuya's loyalty and 1) how he hasn't questioned his philosophy and 2) "In a world where a "path" typically involves challenging the characters' philosophies and forcing them to reevaluate, what the hell is going to have to happen to get Chuuya to do the same?" (quoting you)
Chuuya is always used by others. He's not the only BSD character whose been taken advantage of, but it does seem to be reoccurring with him? First by the government who intended to use him as a super weapon, then by the Sheep who used him for his ability, then by mafia/Mori (getting him to join in exchange for sparing the sheep, keeping his past from him and giving him incentive to become an executive and stay in the organization). He's constantly used for his power.
Please tell me if I'm misinterpreting what you all said, but it seems (to me) that Chuuya ignores the mafia's/Mori's manipulation because they have helped him and given him a home+family, so he's instead loyal to them.
Because even though Mori has not and is using him for his power, he still allows it/goes along with it because they've helped him in the past and earned his loyalty.
So Chuuya tolerates being used.
He's now being used again, obviously, in part, because of his power. We have Fyodor referring to him as just his ability and bragging about how he can "use" him better than Dazai ("doesn't that mean you're unfit to USE a gravity manipulator")
Do you think it's possible that just being vamped and used again will cause him to reflect on his mentality? He's once again being used (but be it in far more blatant way: literal mind control. Also reminds me of Verlaine+his creator). Reflecting on how he's been used in the past and no longer accepting being used by others anymore?
Or do you think it might have the opposite affect and push him deeper into the mafia somehow
Also it's interesting that Fyodor is using him but hasn't earned his loyalty (like the sheep+mafia) and how that'll affect Chuuya
I'll get to the second ask in a bit but I'm combining these because they're related.
About the first ask: I mean, yeah, you're right about this. I don't know that I'd consider it so much "ignoring" though as "the benefits outweigh the costs so whatever", and I do want to state that I'm pretty sure Mori is genuinely at least a little fond of Chuuya (see: their conversation about leadership at the end of Fifteen), and his Mafia colleagues do respect him.
But yeah, you are absolutely right to say that there is a pattern of people who want Chuuya for his ability and his loyalty, and/or reduced him down to these traits. Playing hot potato with the escaped military lab experiment and the Mafia won (<-simplification for the funnies but still).
But here's the thing: if this was the end of it, we might expect to see some resentment mixed in there from Chuuya. He was blackmailed with the Sheep's lives. His past was intentionally locked away from him until he worked his way up to executive. That's... not great.
But instead we find pretty much only gratitude from him. Why?
Well, see, there's a reason I put the return of Chuuya's screwed up self-concept in the tags on that post, because it's kind of at the heart of his impressive loyalty. Chuuya believes that since he is the one with the strongest power, that makes him responsible for protecting everyone else, which means that he rationalizes any concern or protection directed at him as something "above and beyond", and worthy of recognition and repayment. Remember that he genuinely felt like just a vessel for power and nothing else for apparently quite a bit of his childhood, and the Sheep emphasizing that he owed them for taking him in probably did not help.
When it comes to having his back, the Mafia did this for him in a way no one else did. They protect their own, a value that aligns closely with Chuuya's own personal philosophy. The Mafia is also relatively safe from external threat, if we recall Dazai's pitch to Odasaku in Day I Picked Up Dazai - Odasaku is being targeted, but no one in their right mind would challenge the Mafia just to get to him. So, the Mafia has provided Chuuya with protection, comradery, and relative safety, which in my mind all condenses into a central need that takes precedence over everything else to him.
Chuuya's core need is actually stability.
And this makes quite a bit of sense. He started off as a kid with no memories and a whole lot of trauma he couldn't remember the roots of. One's past is a source of stability, but that had been taken from him. His position as leader of the Sheep was shaky. Even his identity as a human being was called into question. Chuuya as a kid and teen was largely untethered, separate from everyone else with no way to ground himself. Under those circumstances, something that originated as a chain could easily become a safety rope.
And once Chuuya found this stability, there was really no need for him to change anything. So he didn't. He settled into his new role and became really, really good at it, and didn't bother to re-evaluate beyond that. Why would he? That minimal core need has been met, despite the rocky beginning.
Which brings me to this second ask because it's actually incredibly relevant. Yes, Chuuya and Sigma are alike. You are not losing it anon.
Let's run a list, shall we? They both awoke with no memories and a missing history, and had their humanity called into question. They were used and blackmailed repeatedly, which they were, fortunately and unfortunately, consciously aware of. When they find something that matters to them, they become violently defensive of it. They both operate on principles of reciprocity and transaction because that is what they believe to be normal in relationships (Sigma's ability even is quite literally a transaction!). They both have pretty low standards for their assistance (Sigma hearing one (1) single person (Atsushi) be kind to him in what he thought were his last moments, Chuuya "You have helped Chuuya! Chuuya will now kill and die for you!" Nakahara).
Above all else, they are looking for stability. They are looking for a home.
As of yet, Sigma hasn't found a true home, but it seems we may be building up to him joining the ADA. The key part is Sigma's realization that the Agency doesn't rely solely on transaction. Dazai is not using the Agency, the Agency is not using Dazai. The Agency members are all helping each other. They care about each other.
Meanwhile, Chuuya has already found a place that provides his core need, but there's one caveat about the Mafia that should be clarified here - as Odasaku says in Dark Era, people within its ranks don't talk about personal matters and feelings with each other, and everyone instead keeps to themselves. If you don't talk about your issues or air them out, relations tend to stay personally shallow and dictated almost entirely by the demands and positions of the organization. This is not a conducive environment for reappraisal or self-exploration.
Unfortunately, this is ideal for Mr. Chuuya "I'll keep all my emotions right here and then one day I'll die" Nakahara.
Chuuya has found some measure of stability - solace in his own self-defined identity in spite of the initial ambiguity as to his humanity. "This is who I am", "Till those flames die down, I can't just do whatever I want", "I'm gonna do what I need to do", etc. But importantly, this identity is entangled in whichever group he happens to be a part of, which in this case is the Mafia. This kind of self-identity cannot exist without the structure of an organization. It relies on the reciprocity of a group.
Moreover, it relies on Chuuya showing very little vulnerability. Compartmentalize, and move on. He expects that of himself.
So, we've established that Chuuya has his core need for stability met by the Mafia - a relatively secure place that runs on transaction, which is familiar to him - yet it also doesn't push him out of his comfort zone with respect to emotional vulnerability and openness. What this means is that, in the Mafia, Chuuya is practically invincible, both physically (his ability, his martial arts prowess) and emotionally (personal life kept hidden and guarded as a Mafia expectation).
Unfortunately, this means Chuuya also remains stagnant as a character, which finally, finally brings me back to your original question anon.
No, I don't think the vampirism is enough to trigger change in Chuuya's character. Chuuya has some standards, and treating him like a tool (and Dazai's tool, no less) is going to seriously piss him off, but that's anger at Fyodor, and it doesn't impact his stability with the Mafia any which way. If Chuuya had've been forced to activate Corruption to escape the drowning then maybe he would've been angry with Dazai enough for something to shift (activation being his own choice is a huge theme with them), but since he didn't, I expect Chuuya will unfortunately just shrug it off and roll with it. Probably yell at him for a bit, but nothing that would have far-reaching consequences for his character unless there is something about his current situation we don't yet know.
I think for Chuuya to grow and change as a character, he needs something major to shift in his life - the threat has to come from within his place of security. He needs to be destabilized. Something needs to happen that specifically targets his tethers and his self-concept.
Personally, my money's on the destabilization of his bond with Mori, who he has the most respect for, because that might trigger development related to leadership and goals, but I guess we'll see. I think it'll probably be incredibly heart wrenching and hurt us all severely, whatever it is.
Huh. I wrote a lot. Congrats for making it to the end! I'm going to sleep now. :D
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Edited by removing the entire middle section because it was absolute garbage and probably should’ve been its own post. I hope the rest of this holds up. That’s what I get for writing things at 2 in the morning I guess.
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seeing some people's reaction to weird gamer men oversexualizing kiriko is "mauga is right there, half naked, with serveral pin-up sprays" and while i do agree to an extent, i do feel like alot of people are kind of ignoring like. the racial element of mauga's sexualization, like i like mauga, he's hot, but the second i saw him in the short story, i wasn't a big fan of the whole "big savage brown indigenious guy" and it feels like very few people are pointing that out.
RIGHT LIKE. we cannot fix "gamer men fixate on fictional asian girls to a violent degree, usually in a racist way or enabling racist tropes already present in the character" with "gamer girls fixate on fictional brown men to a violent degree in a racist way or enabling racist tropes present in the character" like you guys are part of the same problemmmmmmm youre doing the same thinggg its not better because youre doing it to men like.
i think some people only want to see the kiriko problem as misogyny and while im not going to even pretend that ISNT a massive part of it, theres still like. a reason kiriko and d.va and mei are fascinations for these dudes. there is a pointed difference between the way these three get spoken about compared to their white counterparts (and their dark-skinned counterparts too - look at the responses to illari for a really easy comparison to how kiriko is treated). their ~exoticism~ as asian women is part of the appeal. even if you dont just wanna take the way dudes online treat them (like making a joke that shes "obvious pornbait" for speaking japanese and using JSL) as evidence of that, look at their marketing. kirikos whole thing is atheleisure traditional, shes got her Mystical Japanese Spiritualism Ninja Powers and her magic doggy and they constantly put her in japanese and korean fashion, and dva has been constantly crossing over with korean merch companies. i cant help but notice theres no brazilian IP crossovers or merch launches for lucio, or any attempt to Sell Peru To Gamers for illari. they couldnt even pick a town in Samoa to name maugas map after. these people wouldn't buy that stuff because it's not fetishized in the same way asia is.
but like. a lot of the people trying to Gotcha these racist dudes with an asian fetish just whip out their favourite racist tropes instead and its a really bad look. like you guys dont wanna examine how your examples of The Characters Its Okay To Hypersexualize are all brown? even the people who wanna fuck cassidy dont talk about him like this. or like. fuck if you want a good comparison for mauga lets look at roadhog. big half-naked tank who theyve been playing up a sexual energy/comic relief duology on since day one with racially insensitive cosmetic options. nobody treats it like its completely normal to talk about him that way. the dev team isnt pushing pinups of him out. he isnt flexing his boobs in trailers. hes a white dude*, so he gets the bare minimum dignity of being treated normally. incidentially hot, maybe, but for the most part his character is sold on being cool , funny and scary. mauga is being sold 50% on being a Sexy Rogue Love Interest and 50% on. releasing late. they put in so little effort for him to be anything else despite hyping him up as suuuper significant to the lore and a major gamechanger its almost embarrassing to watch. (this is why that short annoyed me so much for anyone keeping track).
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Hi Uncle Nina !!
I don't wanna clog your ask box with stupid shit but this is stupid shit but it was also my bday on the thirteenth so shjdjdjs
As a fellow Monster addict ( I got a flat of Monster for my bday and collect the cans I have 30 diff ones so far <3 ) I need to know what Stan's favourite is
And on the less stupid side of things I was also hoping to potentially hear more about Stan's trans journey/Kyle finding out Raven is trans
Also I'm sorry your job has been so stressful lately :(( I hope you have a good day 🧡
- Stan 🧡
hi orange heart stan! <3
it's so good to hear from you, baby.
HAPPY BELATED BIRTHSLAY, MY LOVE! i'm sorry i'm a little late, but you know me -- everything i do is fashionably late, darling. ;)
but also!!!!! call your wonderful, lovely ask message stupid shit again!!! see what happens!!! i'm gonna frown So WIDE, i'm gonna look so Upset. i'm going to hold you up to the sun!!! JUST WATCH!!!! >;/
my sweet stannie; you are a gift, a treasure. and your ask memes are a pleasure. i don't find them stupid in any shape or form, be nice. conversely, they are extremely special to me and it's why i put off writing this message for a little while because i wanted to respond to it thoughtfully, seeing as though it's your bday message.
which, *cracks knuckles* to get the ball roooollling.
i can absolutely tell you what monster energy is stan's favorite, but as a bday bonus, bc i wasn't sure which stan you wanted to know about, or if you wanted both: i'll give you both my style's fave monster flavs
and i was going to go into some ravenstan trans lore after that, but i feel like that info should go in it's own ask, yeah? i just don't want it to get cluttered. so if you feel so inclined, would you mind sending me a second anon where i can drop that info? thank you, baby! mwah
but now, w/o further ado...
please enjoy the most Refreshing part of your day <333
for context ( and actually because i got an anon once who wanted to know whether i drink energy drinks ), i don't really know that much about energy drinks/flavors because i don't really drink energy drinks.
i mean okay, i'm not really sure if it counts as an energy drink, but i will chug a guayaki yerba mate like it is the elixir of life. ( also i fully maintain that pep stan drinks the enlightenment flavor and ravenstan drinks the raspberry one -- crunchy eco kings ) my favorite one is the passion terrere one. it's like the only one that doesn't come in a can and only comes in a glass bottle...that ice cold passion terrere mate in the glass...it hits so different than the can...oh my god. so good.
and as far as monsters go, i pretty much only drink pipeline punch bc i'm a pretty pink princess and that's what hot girls drink <3 but other than that i drink black coffee because i am an exhausted teacher girlie, but that's purely for fuel. to be honest, i rarely drink energy drinks just for fun, i only have caffeine to stay upright.
which isn't a great idea...but...i am not a role model....
speaking of:
so i told riley this story the other day, bc i needed to get her brilliant genius girl insight on energy drink flavors because she is the sugar free energy queen ( riley's answer was kyle x ultra strawberry dreams and stan x ultra mango fiesta, which, everyone say thank u riley <3 )
-- also god if you are real, bring back the watermelon lime venom you discontinued, you sick fuck, it was riley's favorite, thank you for giving us lovely orange heart stan, and fuck you very much for making ME, bitch! come on down, king! you won't! why the fuck would you extend my coworkers vacation! fight me, ugly!!!! --
and i was telling her about how i am the chaotic kenny friend, i make really bad, chaotic decisions, have no self preservation, hype and gas up my extremely bad ideas and convince myself i'm big brain, wow.
and...oof. so like 2-3 years ago during finals week, i had a fuck ton of essays and projects due ( i was a very bad student btw which is funny bc i'm a teacher ) and no idea how i was gonna do them, so i had the Brilliant Idea...to buy three Random bang energy drinks...
AND SHOTGUN ALL OF THEM BACK TO BACK LIKE BEER CANS.
ohhhhhhhhhhhh my god, party girl nina. help. crying.
and yknow, i thought this was such a good idea! i was like wow i'm gonna be so awake, i am going to b invincible.
i....was not Invicible. i was...very, very sick. i was like almost catatonic and shaking on the floor of my dorm bathroom, lmao. i had to have my roomate take a picture of me on the floor and text all my teachers what happened, which, thank god they were all really nice and laughed but...i feel like that tells you everything you need to know about me...people who think i'm their hero...i am a fucking idiot.
but!! BUUUUTTT! just for You, baby. i deep dived a lot of forums and read a lot about the flavor profiles and think...i made a pretty accurate assertion of what my kid's energy drink preferences are <3
me: paris hilton pipeline punch bc i am bad as hell ;)
stan the man with the plan: okay, so i think that pep stan is definitely that ultra paradise monster energy. it just seems really crisp, clean, earthy. stan also doesn't really care for sweets or sugar, so it makes sense to me that he would be drinking a zero sugar monster ( kyle is disgusted ) idk the kiwi, lime, cucumber flavor profile just feels like pep stan. please tell me you can see the vision, help.
kyle pile: hmmm...so what i've concluded with my research is that kyle pile probably likes that pacific pipeline monster that seems to taste like fruit punch <3 it has to be the full sugar ones because of his blood sugar and stan does kind of scold kyle for drinking them bc he's not really supposed to and he gets really cracked out ahdslkshd like he's really cute but stan is like oh my god bro you gotta lay down but yeah i think that one or the orange dreamsicle one, which is hilarious because the only foods stmwtp canonically does not like are pickles and artifical orange flavoring...he really loves kp.
raven: soooooo i know that i said pep stan was the mango loco monster energy, BUT RAVENSTAN IS LITERALLY THE MANGO LOCO MONSTER ENERGY LIKE HELLO??? also i feel like he is like those mexican dads that put a little tajin in whatever they're eating and act like they've invented fire heeeeeelp ravenstan is so the dad that cuts u up fruit into little shapes and pus tajin on them and feeds u them when ur sad <333 luv u raven ;-; <3 but yeah i feel like he full on turns it into a raspado its so unserious sometimes theres a shot in there, it's usually the spicy tamarind smirnoff vodka,
...what can i say my man is a visionary and i see it
jersey: oooookaaaaay. so...sigh. for Obvious Reasons, pre and during rm, because of kyle's ed, he only drinks the sugar free monsters. for energy because he's exhausted ( my baby </3 ) but i also do think he thinks they taste good. i think he fucks with that ultra watermelon flavor that just tastes like the most beautiful, delectable, mouth watering liquid watermelon candy ever. i also think he could rock with the strawberry or the peach one sounds dank.
if the watermelon one isn't there it does stress him out, but he has a mental list of what one is next on the tier list, and acts accordingly. its kind of a nice change of pace but...his brain does not think that. however, when kyle is healing, weirdly enough, i think he ACTUALLY LIKES???? those coffee flavored ones??? which is Insane and everyone including tweek points and laughs at him
i hope...that suffices? you're totally welcome to offer me what you think is the right answer: you're the monster expert, after all. but this is what i feel in my heart! i think it feels accurate but, lmk! :')
and also...speaking of my job. UUUUUUGH. thank you baby. :((( i am actually criminally depressed because my fucking HOE-WORKER fucking extended his vacation ONE MORE WEEK! so i have to cover all his shifts for an extra week while he's on vacation. so that means i don't get to watch my testing accommodation kids who i miss very much, i still don't get his kinder reccess shift and literally??? spring break is next week like he couldn't WAIT???? holy fuck i'm Sad. :(
but i will be fine darling. but it's actually why i wanted to see if you could send me another anon so i can use that anon to talk about trans stan journey stuff? i just don't want it to get lost in this post and also, i'm not in great spirits rn and don't want to answer it until i can write something that's not flaming garbage.
but happy late birthday baby, i'm so glad you were born. <333
-uncle nina, monster shot gun queen
p.s. what is your favorite monster energy? :)
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