So a fun thing that came up in therapy is how I have a lot of trouble believing that I can be in a long-term loving romantic relationship and how that relates to being told over and over that going into medicine would make me difficult to marry. There were other things about me that garnered this criticism (I was a weird kid growing up and had the typical weird kid experiences that make you believe you're unlovable), but it mostly revolved around wanting to go into medicine, and it mostly came from my parents. There was a lot of fretting over how men would struggle with a woman having such a demanding career and how they would be emasculated by my salary, etc. There was also fretting over how I should avoid ambitious men because it would make it even more difficult to balance careers, and this concern usually came with the message that the man's career is more important. Sometimes this was implicit, but sometimes it was explicit: at the beginning of med school, my mom told me I shouldn't date a classmate because "[their] career will come first." I once had a hypothetical discussion with my dad about what I would do if I had a disabled child who needed a parent at home, and his immediate response was "you can't ask a man to quit his job." Never mind the work you put in to your career, how much you like it, how your respective jobs impact household finances--you can't ask a man to quit his job. That's that. I was also asked repeatedly, and not just by my parents, if I would give up my job if my husband asked (no additional context was given, of course). When I said I wouldn't, I was accused of being unwilling to make any sacrifices in a relationship.
In retrospect, I think my parents thought they were preparing me for realistic relationship struggles. Obviously having a demanding job can create tension, and it created tension in their marriage when they both had demanding careers and small children. Ultimately my mom quit her job, for that and other reasons. But I think that decision was also due, in some part, to patriarchal assumptions about who should be at home and whose career matters. That assumption was passed along in the concerns they harbored about my career, and instead of making me feel prepared to deal with relationship stressors, I started believing I couldn't have a career and a marriage. I picked a career.
Medicine is deeply, deeply important to me, and it feels like part of who I am, and I can't imagine giving it up to be more appealing as a wife. I can't stop being someone who loves medicine and work. I don't want to be married for the sake of it or loved halfway; I want to be loved as what I am or I want to be alone. For years, it felt like I couldn't both want things and be married. To be married, I had to be ready to give up everything at the drop of a hat, throw out all my dreams and ambitions if someone asked. The context doesn't matter--I'm the woman, so I'm the one who quits. I'm the one who gives things up.
I couldn't do it. I couldn't stop wanting things: I want to be a physician and teach and work in sexual violence prevention for the rest of my life. I want to paint and write novels. And I don't want to give any of it up unless I absolutely have to. Worse, I want someone to actually like all those things about me rather than simply tolerate them. And I want to be seen as kind and smart and funny and interesting and attractive, and it's just too much. I want too much. I just don't think it's possible to want this much from life and from a partner. I've had some people tell me that what I want is fine and realistic, and I don't really believe them.
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so we know you love diasomnia endlessly, but who is your favorite character from each of the other dorms
this is SO hard to answer, because so many of the characters are, like, those pet adoption ads that say "MUST STAY TOGETHER, CANNOT BE SEPARATED". it's all about the relationship dynamics! and I think everybody in the main cast is pretty neat, honestly; there isn't anyone who doesn't have something I really like about them. but if I haaaaad to choose...
Hearts - Trey, partly because I do like me a good Mom Friend™ character, and partly because he pretends like he's all sane and normal, right up until he does something to prove he's just as much of a dipshit as everyone else. you're not immune, sir.
Savana - BUFF 👏 TSUNDERE 👏 WEREWOLF 👏
Octa - this one took a lot of soul-searching, because I do feel like the Octatrio is at their very best when it's all three of them, especially when they're in full Ed Edd n Eddy mode. but in the end, Jade ekes out a win, because sometimes you get this Jade:
and then when he gets back from his nice mushroom-foraging hike, you get this Jade:
Scara - Kalim, my sweet little moron. such a good heart, so few braincells.
Pome - 90% of the time when Rook shows up, you know it's going to a be fun time watching a silly little man dance around and break into song for no reason and wax poetic about the beauty of, like, a chair. always a delight!
except every once in a while, he'll bust out something that is absolutely insane even by Twst standards:
this isn't a complaint, it's just. why is he like this. I want to study him under a microscope, except I'm afraid of what I might find.
Igni - MUST STAY TOGETHER! CANNOT BE SEPARATED! ...but I would probably go with Ortho, just because right now I'm pretty invested in his Learning Emotions story arc and looking forward to seeing it progress. he's a good boy who will post your cringe fanfic publicly if you annoy him
...and at this point I'm calling technicality because the ask says "other dorms", and I genuinely do not think I could choose between the Dia boys at this point. let's see how episode 7 goes first!
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there was some Twitter madness recently where someone left a comment on someone's art to the effect of, "Ed shouldn't wear a dress, he's a man!" which I do disagree with on principle, but unfortunately, it brought out one of my least favourite trends in the fandom
so, naturally, I had to write a twitter essay about it. and I already largely argued this in a post here, but the thread is clearer and better structured, so I thought I'd cross-post for those not on the Hellsite (derogatory). edited for formatting/structure's sake, since I no longer have to keep to tweet lengths, and incorporating a couple of points other people brought up in the replies
so
I want to point out that the wedding cake toppers in OFMD s2 aren't evidence that Ed wants to wear dresses. Gender is fake, men can wear skirts, play with these dolls how you like, but it's not canon, and that scene especially Doesn't Mean That.
People cite it often: 'He put himself in a dress by painting the bride as himself! It's what he wants!' But that fundamentally misunderstands the scene, and the series' framing of weddings as a whole. I'd argue that Ed paints the figure not from desire, but from self-hatred; it's not what he wants, but what he thinks he should, and has failed to, be.
(Yes, I am slightly biased by my rampant anti-marriage opinions, but bear with me here, because it is relevant to the interpretation of the scene, and season two as a whole.)
The show is not subtle. It keeps telling us that the institution of marriage is a prison that suffocates everyone involved. Ed's parents' cycle of abuse is passed to their son in both the violence he witnesses then enacts on his father, and the self-repression his mother teaches, despite her good intentions ("It's not up to us, is it? It's up to God. ... We're just not those kind of people. We never will be."). Stede and Mary are both oppressed by their arranged marriage, with 1x04 blunty titled Discomfort in a Married State. The Barbados widows revel in their freedom ("We're alive. They're dead. Now is your time").
But even without this context, the particular wedding crashed in 2x01 is COMICALLY evil. The scene is introduced with this speech from the priest:
"The natural condition of humanity is base and vile. It is the obligation of people of standing ... to elevate the common human rabble through the sacred transaction of matrimony."
It's upper class, all-white, and religiously sanctioned. "Vile natural conditions" include queerness, sexual freedom, and family structures outside the cisheteropatriarchal capitalist unit. "The obligation of people of standing" invokes ideas like the white man's burden, innate class hierarchy, religious missions, and conversion therapy. Matrimony is presented as both "sacred" (endorsed by the ruling religious body), and a "transaction" (business performed to transfer property and people-as-property, regardless of their desires), a tool of the oppressive society that pirates escape and destroy. That is where the figurines come from.
When Ed, in a drunk, depressive spiral, paints himself onto the bride, he's not yearning for a pretty dress. He's sort of yearning for a wedding, but that's not framed as positive. What he's doing is projecting himself into an 'ideal' image of marriage because he believes that: a) that's what Stede (and everyone) wants; b) he can never live up to that ideal because he's unlovable and broken (brown, queer, lower-class, violent, abused, etc); c) that's why Stede left. He tries to make himself fit into the social ideal by painting himself onto the closest match - long-haired, partner to Stede/groom, but a demure, white woman, a frozen, porcelain miniature - because, if he could just shrink himself down and squeeze into that box, maybe Stede would love him and he'd live happily ever after. But he can't. So he won't.
The fantasy fails: Ed is morose, turns away from the figurines, then tips them into the sea, a lost cause. He knows he won't ever fulfil that bride's role, but he sees that as a failure in himself, not the role. It's not just that "Stede left, so Ed will never have a dream wedding and might as well die." Stede left when Ed was honest and vulnerable, "proving" what his trauma and depression tell him: there's one image of love (of personhood), and he'll never live up to it because he's fundamentally deficient. So he might as well die.
This hit me from my very first viewing. The scene is devastating, because Ed is wrong, and we know it! He doesn't need to change or reduce himself to fit an image and be accepted (as, eg, Izzy demanded). Stede knows and loves him exactly as he is; it's the main thread and theme of season two!
(@/everyonegetcake suggested that Ed's yearning in these scenes includes his broader desire for the vulnerability and safety Stede offered, literalised through unattainable "fine" things like the status of gentleman in s1, or the figurine's blue dress. I'd argue, though, that these scenes don't incorporate this beyond a general knowledge of Ed's character. Ed is always pining for both literal and emotional softness, but the significance of the figurines specifically, to both Ed and the audience, is poisoned by their origin and context: there is no positive fantasy in the bride figure, only Ed's perceived deficiency.
Further, assuming that a desire for vulnerability necessarily corresponds with an explicit desire for femininity, dresses, etc, kind of contradicts the major themes of the show. OFMD asserts that there is nothing wrong with men assuming femininity (through drag, self-care, nurturing, emotional vulnerability, etc), but also that many of these traits are, in fact, genderless, and should be available to men without affecting their perceived or actual masculinity. It thematically invokes the potential for cross-gender expression in Ed's desires, especially through the transgender echoes in his relieved disposal, then comfortable reincorporation, of the Blackbeard leathers/identity. It's a rich, valuable area of analysis and exploration. But it remains a suggestion, not a canon or on-screen trait.)
Importantly, the groom figure doesn't fit Stede, either. Not just in dress: it's stiff and formal, and marriage nearly killed him. He's shabbier now, yes, but also shedding his privilege and property, embracing his queerness, and trying to take responsibility for his community. In a s1 flashback, Stede hesitantly says, "I thought that, when I did marry, it could be for love," but he would never find love in marriage. Not just because he's gay, but because marriage in OFMD is an oppressive, transactional institution that precludes love altogether. All formal marriages in OFMD are loveless.
So, he becomes a pirate, where they reject society altogether and have matelotages instead. Lucius and Pete's "mateys" ceremony is shot and framed not like a wedding, but as an honest, personal bond, willingly conducted in community (in a circle; no presiding authority, procession, or transaction).
That is how Stede and Ed can find love, companionship, and happiness: by rejecting those figurines and their oppressive exchange of property, overseen by a church that enables colonialism and abuse. Ed is loved, and deserves happiness, as he is, no paint or projection required.
ALL OF THIS IS TO SAY: draw Ed in dresses! Write him getting gender euphoria in skirts! Write trans/nb Ed, draw men being feminine! Gender is fake, the show invites exploration, that's what 'transformative works' means! But please, stop citing the cake toppers as evidence it's canon. Stop citing a scene where a depressed Māori man gets drunk and projects himself onto a rich, white, silent bride because he thinks he's innately unlovable and only people like her can find happiness, shortly before deciding to kill himself, as canon evidence it's what he wants.
(Also, please don't come in here with "lmao we're just having fun," I know, I get it. Unfortunately, I'm an academiapilled researchmaxxer, and some of youse need to remember that the word "canon" has meaning. NOW GO HAVE FUN PUTTING THAT MAN IN A PRETTY DRESS!! 💖💖)
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