#and like lying by omission etc

[devilsminionpdf]

walking the fine line between being honest with my therapist but also not being so honest that she decides im not stable enough to know my own gender and not give me that nice little dysphpria letter

[starblaster]

please remember that you don’t need to have a reaction to everything right away, especially economic/socio-politics and the news. it's important to practice media literacy, take time to process information. exercise critical thinking, remember that even so-called "credible" news outlets are often mouthpieces of the state, and of the wealthy. dig deeper than headlines, look at sources, ask yourself what claims are being made, and who stands to benefit if those claims are true (because plenty of people in positions of power love to outright lie about oppressed groups... remember that)

[cats-in-the-clouds]

is it selfish to feel lonely and want human friends in my life despite having God who is of course worth more than anything or anyone else

[ddarker-dreams]

mini love report — chrollo lucilfer

relationship health diagnosis — 70%*

symptom one — perceptive

this man is an information sponge. he notices everything. as a thief, he's accustomed to canvassing his surroundings. he'll have memorized the layout of your home by the second visit. it isn't for any nefarious purpose (probably), he's just always taking in information and cataloging it.

naturally, this sagacity extends to you. the normal cadence of your voice, mannerisms, favored words, and expressions; he'll know if something's bothering you before you realize it yourself. he isn't above using this knowledge of you for his own purposes. he'll gauge your body language and shift his approach to contentious topics. this is a lifelong habit of his that's difficult to break.

chrollo knows what people want to hear and he's used to utilizing that advantage. however, if you point this out, he'll try curbing the behavior. especially if you stress that it's his actual opinion you want to hear, not specially curated platitudes. he finds your desire for a candid approach almost... impressive? you'd rather disagree with his unfiltered thoughts than gloss over anything touchy. it bolsters his respect for you.

symptom two — enigmatic

there's a noticeable difference in what you know about each another. he knows the names of your co-workers, friends, and family members, as well as your hometown, job or school, etc... you can't say the same regarding him. he keeps his origins ambiguous. the way he frames his upbringing makes you feel guilty should you go prying. chrollo will tell you that he's an orphan who had a rough, destitute childhood, but that's about it. he could easily make up a story, but he doesn't like lying to you. he doesn't want the version of him that you love to be a false construct.

yes, there's the technicality of lying by omission. he doesn't get caught up on that detail.

symptom three — a lil lame

interestingly enough, the suave part of his brain starts acting up when he's known you long enough. this isn't to say that he loses his charm, but it stops being his go-to. now he just nerds out (he prefers the term 'discusses') whatever's caught his attention. there's this gleam in his eyes as he tells you about the history of a painting or antique, a childlike awe. he isn't elaborating to impress you with his knowledge, rather, he enjoys sharing his interests. especially since you care, you aren't just humoring him.

chrollo's emotions come out naturally when he's near you. it's subtle — a twitch of his eye if someone cuts you off, a light blush should you murmur his name while asleep. these simple forms of self-expression are foreign to him. he's used to playing roles, not the aftermath once the stage's curtains close. his corporeal form was all the evidence he had that he existed. lacking a sense of self invokes this numb, hollow feeling. you're his new, favorite proof that he's alive. his world's brighter with you in it.

primary area of concern

objectively speaking, chrollo's an ideal lover. he respects, cherishes, and admires you, altercations are rare. should disagreements occur, he never raises his voice or displays aggression. he'll hear you out and apologize should he feel he's in the wrong. he takes you out on dates, stares at you as if you were divinity incarnate whether you're wearing pajamas or a formal outfit. he's whipped and you both know it.

it's his immortality that keeps his score from being higher. he wouldn't ever hurt you, but his compassion for others is nonexistent. this unsightly side of him is hidden from your sight. at the end of the day, he's a murderer who experiences zero remorse for the pain he's inflicted upon others. he leads a double life. you won't ever completely know him.

selfishly, he doesn't want you to.

prognosis

everything hinges on chrollo preventing you from finding out about his illicit activities. luckily for him, subterfuge is his second nature. he rarely stresses about it. he has the manpower and resources necessary to make just about anything happen. if you're a civilian, the chances you'll uncover his identity on your own are next to nonexistent.

your future together is a priority to him — he doesn't take commitment lightly. you're likely the first person he's fallen in love with. if you'd have him, he'd want nothing more than to be your lifelong partner. marriage is a tradition he's never given much credence to. although, after meeting you, he understands the appeal. now it's a matter of finding a ring that matches your radiance...

*the universe has tried (and failed) to wrench you apart (0-20) your friends are praying that you'll break up (21-40) 'well it could/has be worse' bargaining mindset (41-60) a lil messiness as a treat (61-80) pure and wholesome (81-100)

[infernalurge]

The Astral Prism Isn't Grindr!- Why the Emperor didn't catfish you.🦑

Very long, rambling post I wrote while manic at 4 am. Enjoy!

I feel like the worst thing you can actually say about Emp in regards to his actions towards the player is that he lies by omission. But even then, to consider it lying you basically have to work from the perspective that you as a player, person, character or whatever, are entitled to know everything about someone you just met, who might have some very good reasons for not wanting to reveal certain things

He didn't "catfish" you the prism isn't grindr lmao?! And the game/companions/etc repeat to you over and over that the Dream Visitor is some kind of manufactured vision. You all have one and it's specific to your individual minds. He wasn't exactly doing some deepcover shit with a fake backstory to get your cryptowallet information or whatever real-life equivalence you keep trying to make. As if you run into alien squid monsters every day or something!

It's doubly bizarre because there is an extremely popular companion character whose entire arc is ACTUALLY lying to you about who they are, only admitting it when you catch them attacking you in your sleep, and then goes on to try to ACTUALLY manipulate you with sex and intimacy while at that point, not actually feeling it. This is the most popular character in the fandom btw- Astarion.

Emperor's morality is held up to a ridiculous standard. Not even the companions are held to that level- not even close!

A better equivalence to his situation than "catfishing" (a term completely exclusive to our world) would be if a sentient, alien creature was stranded on our planet and had to use a disguise to y'know....not be shot at and killed by confused humans? Why the heck would your brain first jump to catfishing? Girl if you approached your DG as a tindr date that's on you! Lliterally the only prompt the game gives you before creating them is "you need a guardian" (At least currently that's how it works, after official release.)

if you met a kind of weird guy and fell for him and he then revealed he's actually a sentient squid monster, I don't think your first response would be "OMG YOU CATFISHED ME?" I'm pretty sure it would be "HOLY FUCK A SQUID MONSTER!" because it would be very obvious and apparent (by virtue of them being a squid monster) that the intent was not to "catfish" you, but to survive a world that would be actively hostile towards him, on sight.

We accept this type of "ambiguous morality for the sake of survival" from characters like Astarion who are traditionally attractive, but we don't accept it from a being whose very appearance, forces them into that position of moral ambiguity. Emperor is not afforded the same privilege of even being able to consider full honesty, because just one look at him could make someone hysterical. Hiding himself from you is not an active choice he's able to make, anymore than a turtle can choose to break open it's shell- it will die.

Even if YOU wouldn't kill him, what about companions like Lae'zal, who are already suspicious of him and will definitely cut him down at that point? Even if you think that would be a good thing, you would then lose your protection from the tadpole/the Absolute. The game basically wouldn't exist without the Prism.

Let's also not use "well Astarion is traumatized" as an excuse here. Emperor is pretty obviously traumatized as well, in addition to being a brain-eating squid monster and having to manage that part of his nature, the way Astarion has to handle his. Yet he's still more up front than Astarion was. Astarion can accidentally kill you while drinking from you and he still doesn't reveal who he is to the others, AND pretends he doesn't know what happened to you lol.

Note my point here isn't "Astarion bad" but simply that if you have room in your heart to sympathize with characters like Astarion, then there's no reason you can't squeeze my man Emp in there too. He doesn't do anything significantly worse than any of the other main characters but is the most hated, and it's literally because of this ridiculous perception of him "catifshing" the player. The most media illiterate take I have ever seen in my life, honestly

Like first off, he's a squid, and secondly! ☝️ Read all that again.

tl;dr if you feel "cafished" by the Emperor you simply weren't paying attention for more than half the game. Fantasy might not be for you if you can't remove the plot from real life circumstances and turn complex fantasy monsters into human romance scammers, as if they're actually alike in any meaningful way.

Read more books maybe. That might help.

[nanomooselet]

On Narrators

You know what, fuck it.

I've seen a lot of references to Trigun Stampede having an unreliable narrator, and unfortunately it's activated my media analyst trap card. While there's always a degree of interpretation to these things, there is a difference between interpretation and declaring a banana skin to be orange zest. It makes a difference, especially if you're trying to bake a cake.

That isn't at all what Trigun Stampede is doing. Among other things, it doesn't have a narrator.

Narration, loosely defined, is text (or spoken lines etc) that directly addresses an assumed audience, which may or may not be the actual audience (it depends on the needs of the story). Think voice-overs, think Kuzco in The Emperor's New Groove, think the text panels in a comic or manga that list time and location, or describe the situation. The song of humanity continues to be sung is narration. A narrator is the character who performs narration; sometimes from with the story, sometimes from a position adjacent to it.

Honestly one of the most interesting things about Stampede, in my opinion, is that it makes a point of having neither.

There's no framing device, no presenter, no announcer, no chorus, no soliloquy, not even an internal monologue. There's no direct line to the writers, giving away their intentions. Indeed, the imposition of any text at all is almost entirely absent, save some pointed timing on the title cards, and no character's voice is objective. Zazie or Roberto, who come the closest, can definitely still be wrong - Roberto says Vash is "not long for this world" when Vash is longer for the world than almost anyone else; the man he says would kill with a smile was in fact coerced into becoming a killer. Zazie knows much and is always truthful, but isn't all-knowing, nor operating with complete understanding. And on the other end of the scale you have characters like Dr. Conrad or Knives, where the easiest way to tell they're mistaken or lying is if their mouths are moving. (Outside of brain fuckery. Then you're on your own.) Then there's Vash, who doesn't lie, necessarily, so much as he doesn't volunteer the truth, and tends to dodge giving answers when asked outright.

Now, an unreliable narrator is metafictional, taking advantage of the narrator being a character, and therefore capable of having an agenda.

What makes them unreliable is that they exert motivated influence over what we see - even accidental influence like distorted recollection or misconception. But before declaring such influence is occurring, we need a solid reason to doubt. You don't dismiss an account as unreliable just because it doesn't line up with your own expectations or desires - not without something like a clear contradiction, perhaps, or some conspicuous omission. *

We simply have no reason to believe what we see in Trigun Stampede is anything other than the truth (inasmuch as it's obviously fictional of course). We see some events from multiple viewpoints - here is what Vash experienced, here is what Knives saw, here is what other characters are doing - and what one character sees isn't different from what any other character sees when the perspectives swap. It's just from different distances and angles. The same words are said, the same events play out, and the same reactions are demonstrated by the characters, according to their established values and motivations.

The narrative itself is unadorned and unchanged by their viewpoints. Whether a character is being truthful is simply a judgement you're given to make as the events that occur and their actions reveal more about them.

The term for this isn't narration; it's focalisation, and it's hardly some avant-garde artistic statement. It's intrinsic to telling even the most simple story.

For instance, the way Knives evolves from his initial presentation. His introduction as an adult is as a wrathful would-be god and a merciless killer before his more nuanced motivations and origins are slowly revealed. It would have been different if he'd been introduced first, discovered Tesla and was then depicted destroying Jeneora Rock. He'd come across as more of a protagonist. Instead, because the central character is Vash, we see him first, the humanising struggles of Jeneora Rock's people and Vash's efforts to help them, his anguish when it's rendered moot, and all the ways he suffers as a result of Knives's actions. This is focalisation that makes Knives the antagonist, representing what Vash must overcome. A complex, compelling and perhaps tragic antagonist, but still - not the guy the story is about.

Oh, and that has nothing to do with their respective moral positions, good or evil. It's structural. A protagonist attempts to achieve while an antagonist obstructs, and both by nature will transgress.

Stampede isn't exactly free of ways to manipulate sympathy, and exerts strict control over the perspectives it presents. You could argue it misdirects, or lies by omission - but that's not the same as an unreliable narrator. A narrative is always going to impose some kind of order on events to produce a specific effect, and that does come with bias. But it's the nature of storytelling never to be entirely objective.

I'm not sure that I really have a point, honestly, except that Trigun Stampede is a show that's exceedingly careful to show the characters exactly as they are. It doesn't lie. Personally, I find that more interesting to contemplate than the alternative. We have everything we need to know why the characters do as they do. Certainly far more than some would rather have us know.

* There are two times I think something like this is happening. One is Wolfwood's flashbacks to the orphanage, which are coloured as memories of the softness the Eye ripped away from him. Hence the different art style, and the title of the episode they occur in: once upon a time. It's a fairy tale, more emotionally true than literal to highlight the harshness of his life since then by contrast. There's likely more to that story than Wolfwood is recalling at that moment.

The other, big surprise, is within the memory world. It has manipulative editing, clips taken out of context, video noise, ADR, everything. All you'd need to make it more obvious it can't be trusted is a disclaimer in the corner or inconsistent timestamps or something.

[olderthannetfic]

https://www.tumblr.com/olderthannetfic/751154405443878912/i-dont-do-it-anymore-bc-ive-realized-it?source=share

I really sympathize with this anon's hangups about honesty.

And yeah, I get the honesty thing. I've been tussling with this idea that I have to include an explanation of my entire sexual orientation (I use two labels) any time I reblog a post about being one identity or another. But then I think about it more and it's like, if some random tumblrite figures out I'm Thing A but doesn't know I'm also Thing B, that isn't actually a falsehood and I haven't mislead anyone. I don't need to natter on about my own complex identity to reblog a generic post about Blorbo Hot or something about experiences as XYZ identity.

In the same vein, you're not actually saying something untrue when you tell an author "I loved this fic", even if you leave out "I usually don't read this ship/kink/setting/etc." You're not lying by omission, because the fact you don't usually read fic like that isn't actually relevant. What matters is that you did enjoy that specific fic. Leaving out the personal details doesn't make the compliment untrue, it's just being consise and to the point.

--

[imeverywoman420]

Stupidity and lack of consideration are actually just as bad as other flaws but youre not allowed to call people out for things like being dismissive lying by omission not being considerate etc bc that makes you “crazy”.

[ardourie]

Hi I hope youre doing okay tyler. Ive been following this conflict since week 1 and i wanna just say that if you need to take measures in order to protect your mental wellbeing you definitely should. Nobody should put up with this kind of harassment after such a prolonged period of time. You should stay on tumblr but i think these assholes have already made up their minds and no proof is going to change that. I hope this doesnt come across as me saying you should just leave the issue alone but I wanted to say this because I worry that continuing to engage in this will hurt you. Regardless, I hope youre doing well and the people who see the truth of this are on your side.

thanku ya im gonna step away from it a bit and only answer things from ppl asking for genuine proof etc im not rlly trying to convince that crowd more so the ppl theyre lying to / lying to by omission bc like u said they already made their minds up about me and r deluded enough to ignore their actual actions but whatever, i appreciate the support just a little exhausted 🤍

[sketchingstars03]

teehee

re: ink being unhappy w/himself OP YOURE SO REAL FOR THAT??! he would at least feel an undercurrent of disappointment towards themself ykyk. like comyet herself did say that ink's entire existence is basically him lying to himself and everyone else. and that canonically that mf doesn't need to eat sleep drink etc and if he does it's pretend yk. them doing all that just to blend in and have a sense of belongingdjfkjgdhjbgJSDG the fact that they doesn't even really tell his dads about his condition (but the guy does hint towards it). going feral going insane rn.

I don’t actually remember if Ink has canonically told their dads about their soullessness or not. Maybe they have at some point and Comyet just hasn’t mentioned it yet (or maybe I’m missing a post. Smh I’m a fake Ink fan 😔 /silly).

I also am not sure if Ink’s “lying” about his soulless nature is intentional or not. I mean, it’s true that he’s pretending to have a soul and trying to act like how most monsters with souls do when that doesn’t come naturally to him, but idk if he’s trying to keep the fact he doesn’t have one explicitly hidden, like it’s a secret they don’t want anyone to know. Though lying by omission is still lying (though not maliciously, like some fanon interpretations would believe), and there was that bit about how they find not having a soul useful for fights where the enemy doesn’t know that fact.

Either way it’s very cool and interesting. Ink obscures so much of himself underneath the surface,, intentionally or not, including hiding that unhappiness with his current self underneath a cocky and confident image. Perhaps an image of how he wishes he viewed himself? But that’s just speculation 😅 a GAME SPECULATIO*gets shot with 3billionmillion gaster blasters*

[bizlybebo]

Times to die kinda gives me Gillion tidestrider vibes I don’t know if this makes sense

I’m vibing so hard with monomania right now ughcksknxsk

HIFOGJEHRRHEHRJWJJJE OHHHH MY GOD. MONOMANIA MENTION MONOMANIA.

YEAH NO I ABSOLJTELT UNDERSTAND TJAT.

to me, because of the slight difference between versions, the monomania version of times to die is more gillion coded:

while the teens of style version is more chip coded:

^ does this make sense. i’m unwell about these lyrics pertaining to chip specifically because i personally interpret these lyrics as referencing the tower of babel, and it makes me think about that one post about chip believing in the “one true god” meaning that he was raised in a potential cult in mana. does this make any fuckimg sense.

but then also the story of the tower of babel is kind of a hubris moment for humanity, and chip is nothing but his hubris— repeating old mistakes because he wants to be like the black rose pirates. idk and there’s something about “under the foundations; there is a graveyard” and the hole in the sea.

most nonsensical post and i derailed it so far but yeag. times to die is SOO gillion coded.

^ gillion pretending to be an honorable hero while lying via omission about his exile. btw. and making a deal with niklaus to save people because he has to prove to somebody, anybody, even if it’s just himself, that he is still a hero. that he is still good.

^ literally just gill’s entire childhood.

^ these lyrics are gil’s relationship with jay. “when you open your eyes / wont you please tell me?” <- “what do you really want, jay? and just tell me what it is so i can fight for it.”

^ and these lyrics are fnc post-ep 109. does this make sense.

^ this is just so. gillion coded. something something sacrificial lamb etc.

[batmanego]

after some consideration ive come to the conclusion that i do not think tao Lies in the traditional sense. he lies by omission, he deceives, he obfuscates, he avoids, he tells half-truths, he manipulates, etc, but he does not tell outright untruths (or at the very least does not do so habitually). it would probably make his job easier if he did lie, but i think lying kind of goes against some bizarre set of rules he operates by that are only known to him and that make interpreting his moral code like trying to solve one of the zodiac killers ciphers. it's also because i think he gains some sort of pleasure out of watching people realize that while he did trick them, he never did so with any dishonesty, and as a result really theyre to blame for not reading the fine print (metaphorically).

this is very interesting when in opposition with several people that i think play a huge role in taos life, holden cole and lynch, all three of which are defined (to varying extents) by their willingness + ability to lie, and the frequency with which they do so. holden's entire life in the syndicate is based on a lie, and cole is... well, cole is cole. lynch lies less than the other two, but his entire career has been based on black ops and lying to his squad and lying to teenagers (though his brand of manipulation does lean more towards the same half-truths that tao deals in).

this proximity to liars means that tao, who operates as a center of a web of deception and manipulation, is possibly the only honest person in the room at any given time.

[justtogetthrough]

Background info: I was finally diagnosed last month. My manager is like a mother figure to me. She’s been super supportive emotionally and tangibly, eg driving me to surgery/picking me up more than once, care packages for me and my cats, etc. She truly truly cares about me and offers so much love and support that I miss in my life from actual family. She is reliable and has always come through for me. She has taught me how to get by in the world and has always willingly helped me script work interactions on an ongoing basis, and when I don’t understand what’s happening socially she’s always patiently done her best to explain (which is often). She has taught me very explicit ways to perform socially in professional ways which has been so helpful and appreciated. I feel like to some degree she MUST already know. How many grown adults would she mentor to this extent, who lack such basic social communication skills. She’s been so supportive through all my work-caused emotion dysregulation/escalations and my rigidity/inability to cope with change and my rage at feelings of injustice. To a large degree I feel like telling her I was just officially diagnosed will be a very “oooooh yeah that explains a lot”. Part of me suspects she must already know, or at least suspects something is very delayed in me despite being bright. She’s been so accommodating and has taught me so much, has helped bring me up to speed about how to function as an adult as much as my brain wiring will allow for. She’s a major reason I’ve been as successful as I’ve been.

On the other hand, she’s my manager and after a few years of really oversharing, I’ve been trying to rein it in. She already knows a ton about my mental illness and life history and I’m not sure it’s appropriate given our professional roles. I don’t think she’d discriminate against me but you never know? Ableism slips out in sneaky ways sometimes? And then the dreaded, “No you’re not!” “No, you can’t be!” “No, you ____ too well!” Part of me feels it’s none of her business. But part of me wants her to know why I’ve been so fucked up lately, that the real reason I’m on leave now is because of autistic burn out. I feel like I’ve been lying by omission to her for several months as I descended to new levels of hell because I feared professional consequences if she knew how unstable I was. But I bottomed out in a very unstable way so to some extent we’ve already crossed that bridge I guess. But if I tell her I was diagnosed with autism, there’s no going back? Will the label make her start to think I’m incompetent? I’ve always been incompetent lol I functioned because she micromanaged me. But it’s possible now that she knows why I needed that, it’ll change how desirable I am as an employee idk. She seems to think I’m great at my job despite how much direct support I need from her to do it so maybe it won’t change much, but for all I know the stigma of the label may change how she views me even though she knows exactly who I am and what I struggle with already.

I’m very torn.

[cosmereplay]

KOWT PREVIEW CHAPTER

Call me a silly sod for wanting to talk about relationship therapy stuff but this Jaswit chapter is a great example of Gottman's solvable vs perpetual problems, and why either of those kinds of problems can be relationship breakers.

For some reason, the dealbreaker isn't the one people seem to think.

So in this preview chapter, Jasnah and Wit have two relationship problems: 1) they have mismatched sex drives, and 2) Wit has been lying to her by omission.

This is the problem that some think is the dealbreaker. Having mismatched sex drives is a perpetual problem - it will always exist as long as they're together. Jasnah herself is troubled by Wit being weird about it, but it's not a dealbreaker for her. In fact, every relationship has perpetual problems, and mismatched sex drives is a common one, even in allo/allo or ace/ace relationships! And they got the benefit of knowing that right from the beginning. To me, that shows that they both believe that they can adapt, or at least there are other things about the relationship that make it worth the ongoing mismatch. Again I cannot stress enough that every long-term relationship, friendship, family relationship, etc has perpetual problems that they have to work around.

Wit's dishonesty is the problem that causes Jasnah to feel like something has broken in her. She knew Wit would keep secrets, but she asked him to specifically share information he had about Odium, and he agreed and then withheld that information from her. This is a solvable problem! He could solve the problem by giving her the information she wants and being honest with her going forward. Or trying to negotiate a different level of secrecy. However, he will likely choose to keep lying because he's a bastard man. That's the dealbreaker for her, and quite rightly in my opinion!

In conclusion, Wit busting his nut isn't the dealbreaker, it's the fact that he's not busting his balls to say his next Ideal. And he's going to have to get honest fast if he's going to stay in this relationship. Jasnah deserves better!

[putnamcapital]

Deep dive wondering about Sara's backstory (CW: drug / alcohol abuse) (Part 1)

CW Drug & Alcohol abuse by a parent

I want to write about Sara and Simon as children who grew in a home damaged by drug and alcohol abuse. I’m going to focus on Sara, because I’m thinking about this in order to get a better insight into why she behaves as she does (for a WIP). People are really hard on her - and sometimes harder on her than on Simon or Wille, even when they do similar things. It makes my heart break for her, because I think she is misunderstood in a number of ways. Full disclosure, though, that I am not looking at this question from the perspective of neuro divergence / autism / ADHD, because I know less about than, um, I think I do about her family dynamic. I’ve split it into two parts because it’s long. I’d love feedback / thoughts, since I’m trying to work out her motivations.

Lying: Sara lies. The worst lie she tells is an omission: she doesn’t tell Simon she knows August filmed the video. But she also lies to Felice about her relationship with August. She lies to August at first about why she doesn’t want to go the ball with him. These are all lies about keeping up appearances; about her being afraid of people finding out what is true. It’s the kind of lie told to a child - often a lie by omission - “your father’s not feeling well today, he’s staying home from work” / “your father must have food poisoning” etc. when really he is passed out drunk or high. The thing about these lies is that both parties end up knowing they’re being told. Kids are smarter than it’s assumed, but they soon learn their role is to play along with the lie, so that they can maintain their role in the family dynamic, which is for everyone to collectively deny what is happening so that the wished-for world can be kept alive (as opposed to the actually-happening-world). A lot of what Sara does fits into this pattern of “i just wont say anything and provided I keep it up, the approved fact pattern will remain in place.” It’s why it took Wille threatening August with a gun for Sara to finally, brutally, have to step out of the lie.

Pretending: Sara isn’t happy at home. She wants to get out. But unlike Simon, who gets out ‘internally’ - by becoming more and more true to himself, and defending his boundaries - Sara tries to get out by changing her family (rather than changing herself). She tries to become one of the Manor House girls - right down to dressing like them, dancing like them, learning to laugh at the right jokes, etc. She’s trying to pass - i.e. she’s doing the same thing she learned at home, and learned as an immigrant - we can pretend everything is okay; she can pretend she really can be one of these rich girls. It’s why one of the most moving scenes to me is when she peeks her eyes open when all the girls are saying grace at the dinner table during her first sleep over, and she just can’t believe what she sees - that she is there, and she sees them, but they don’t see her watching them. It’s a way to heal that moment you can imagine between her, Simon, and her mother, where everyone knows the lies being told about Micke, but no one is going to say it aloud. At the Manor House dining table, though, Sara is briefly the only one who can see that she doesn’t quite fit in her new family. But only briefly - later, they all giggle at her when she makes too much of a fuss about wanting to know how to hypothetically address the Queen.

[part 2 = Watching / Attachment / August relationship]

[peachjagiya]

I’m not a shipper and definitely in no way a jkkr but since my last ask probably wasn’t worded correctly, let me rephrase and ask a proper question.

Everybody knows that there are certain times that a couple or people in romantic relationships are expected to prioritize being with each other over anyone else. So how do you explain the fact that for years, there is alot of evidence pointing to Taehyung and Jk never or almost never being together at such times? These times are nights, birthdays, holidays etc. I don’t believe any of the members are dating each other and i certainly don’t believe taekook are because why can they hang out on ordinary days but everytime we get information about birthdays or holidays or so, they are never together? If they are a couple, shouldn’t they prioritize being with each other on days and times like this over anyone else? That is why i said that wordy anon made some sense. I don’t think jikook is real either just so you know but even if they got that part wrong they are definitely not wrong about other things and i think it’s simple common sense.

Thanks for resending 💜

I've talked a lot lately about how I'm not sure a lot of what we're told is the actual full picture. Not lies but omissions and flexibility with details.

That's a bit of a cop out though and sounds convenient just to reinforce my belief, I'm aware.

But what I would say is that there's been a couple of times when they've said things and they've then been proven to be... frivolous with the truth. So if I'm wary of trusting absolutely everything they say, that's why. To uphold every word as absolute truth when they are media trained seems naïve. You know what I mean?

For example. JK said in 2023 he "knows all he needs to know" re: sex. He also consistently says he's not dating and only loves Army. Obviously you can have sex without dating but the truth and the agreed narrative are a little at odds, no? It's just buffing off the real edges a bit to make it shinier and cuter.

I see a lot of "oh so you're calling them LIARS?" as if it's that simple. First off, please. Of course they're capable of lying. They're not infallible and to love someone whilst thinking they're flawless is not actually love.

Secondly, though, no, they're not compulsive liars. They're just not in a situation where the truth is PR friendly. I think the only way to tell if it's likely to be more believable is when it's in a live that they've chosen to do without staff and from their own homes, maybe.

So sure, TKK might not be real but I still won't take every word as gospel.