#enabling abuse

[valtsv]

i'm a disgusting little centrist when it comes to the was shrue's family real or fake question because to me that matters much less than the way it illustrates the experience of paranoid stress psychosis. like i never want a definitive answer because it just doesn't really matter. do you understand me. like. either way, they experienced that loss and heartbreak. they were confronted with an unflattering portrait of themself as a destructive absence in other people's lives, sacrificing human connection for sociopolitical status. they were exploited and had their mind fucked with and were made vulnerable to manipulation. answering that question makes no difference to the fact that what they experienced was real and horrifying to them. they were vulnerable and someone noticed and took advantage. there is no absolution nor satisfaction to be found in certainty, only further pain and regret. the end outcome is the same.

[paranoidpdsuggestion]

you ever just wanna say 'fuck it' and act like a complete caricature of the worst of your personality disorder even though you know it's gonna make you look like an asshole/annoying/etc. to perso/neurotypicals and make other people with the PD look 'bad', but you don't care anymore? like we are gonna be villainized by these people for the rest of time, why should we care to appease them anymore if they aren't ever gonna listen to us or our experiences anyway

[allpiesforourown]

Svsss character summary

Shen Yuan: victim of tragedy

Luo Binghe: victim of tragedy who did bad things due to trauma

Shen Jiu: victim of tragedy who did bad things due to trauma

Yue Qingyuan: victim of tragedy who did bad things due to trauma

Qiu Haitang: victim of tragedy who was an unknowing accomplice

Gongyi Xiao: victim of tragedy

Tianlang-Jun: victim of tragedy who did bad things due to trauma

Qiu Jianluo and Old Palace Master: literally just assholes

[razormaze]

what fear a man like you brings upon a woman like me (please don’t look at me)

[theevilfishywizard]

I think there’s a decent case to be made that MCD Laurance was a victim of some form of sexual assault by Michi and that informs a lot of his actions in season two, but I don’t know if I’m reaching or not.

[furiousgoldfish]

'I had it worse' is a not a true reason to do anything to anyone. The real reason is 'I enjoy doing this to you, and I have an excuse to get away with it.'

[ohwolfling]

Gale, Mystra, and Abuse as Mentorship

(author’s note: this is part of what I hope to be an eventual video essay on godhood/coercion/consent in BG3 - you can see my other work and help fuel this efforts via my ko-fi :) if you're so inclined - and I will of course highly consider suggested deep dives from supporters, as you help me stay alive. I still have not actually finished this game so please go easy on me in regard to spoilers and note that some of what I’m discussing is from lore & knowledge I have as a little DnD gremlin for a decade before Baldur’s Gate 3, thank u, ily)

It’s really something to go through Act I and II of Baldur’s Gate 3 and hear Gale speak about being Mysta’s chosen. The way that Gale speaks of it, of his relationship with the Weave, the way the Weave feels to YOU if you have that moment of magic with Gale… 

You feel that Mystra’s Chosen, however perilous, however imbalanced, is a term of endearment.

And then you see Gale meet with Mystra… and the context of everything Gale has shared with you shifts.

Religious trauma holds obvious weight with most characters in BG3, in subtle and unsubtle ways, but what resonates with me beyond even the queer experience with every flavor of Christianity and Evangelicalism is the way “mentors” use it to mask their own abuse. And yes, some of those mentors are gods. 

Mystra is cold and formal with Gale in a way that reminds me of the abuse typical in art spaces specifically. A mentor who crosses lines of intimacy at their convenience, but is cold to you if they’re in any way displeased. The focus always comes down to YOUR GIFT and how YOU FAILED YOUR GIFT.  This is an easier parallel for me to make because ultimately Gale reads as much as an artist as he does an academic. He’s not just interested in magical academia, he loves the ROMANCE of it. Even the way he speaks of his connection to the Weave smacks of inspiration and artistry, not rigid study and observation, “[...] could not only control the Weave, but compose it, like a musician or a poet.”

I suppose there is validity in interpreting Mystra as a reliable source, maybe she is just like this all the time and Gale was clouded by his service to her, maybe she means everything she says to and offers Gale. But that is not my interpretation (and I think that even in that interpretation there is no redeeming Mystra because she is still wholly uncaring of the serious power imbalance and just… TIME and EXPERIENCE imbalance between herself and a mortal man). 

She tells Gale that what he lacked was patience… What exactly was patience meant to get Gale? Enough magical prowess that he would no longer want to be intimate with her or please her in a human way? Enough knowledge that he would stop requiring a sense of partnership from his god, who first connected to him as a child, who returned from her presumed death (assuming a rough DnD timeline here this is the best case scenario) to take either the initial special interest in him or an increased special interest in him, to teach him with special instruction, to feed off of his own skill or potential, to take him as a lover? Gale did not wish to prove himself to the public at large. Gale wanted to be enough for her. Gale wanted to give to Mystra as Mystra (per her claims and his interpretation) gave to him so that she would take Gale further into her world and be a real partner to him. There is not a level of patience that makes a man seeking an equal partnership with a GOD able to like… be chill about what that must require of him if a lifetime of devotion and proven skill doesn’t? 

This is not to paint Gale as a man without mistakes. Of course he is flawed. Of course his choices are reckless and dumb. But he doesn’t intend to raise himself ABOVE Mystra until the Crown presents itself as an option and Gale sees that he could both save the world- particularly this new found family he cares about in a context outside of the pursuit of Weave academia, I imagine very new for him- and in his mind finally feel a sense of agency outside of his abuser, even if he still can’t really identify her as that*. Gale’s craving for validation and power is not- in my reading of this as a survivor of various DV/CA situations, salt and personal perspective to taste- inherently selfish. It exists BECAUSE of Mystra. Even some of Gale’s stories about chaotic childhood stories, depending on what he means by being connected to it at a young age, could still be from that influence. To modernize this, theater kids dramatically backstabbing theater kids via tattle-tells or sabotage is very often about the atmosphere and choices the drama teacher has on offer. They’re kids adapting to the space that was given to them. 

“But such is Mystra’s Will” - Elminster the Enabler

Elminster provides such a specific frame for this dynamic, too. He is the kinder, more reasonable, more accessible mentor theoretically… but it’s like the “nice” parent in a narcissistic household as far as I’m concerned. Any kindness, leniency, or leveling with Gale is ultimately not about showing Gale kindness or teaching Gale. It is about enabling and supporting Mystra. “Just blow yourself up, you know how she gets.” “Well, you did remind her of Karsus and that hurt her feelings.” That kinda thing. 

If your Tav pushes back the second time Elminster crashes your camp, he says something along the lines of, “yes, her actions seem cold and tyrannical but that’s because you’re a mortal. She’s a god, you can’t judge her actions.” If you made the narrative choices to get that response from Elminster, you and your Tav know that that is, for lack of a more graceful term, complete horse shit. Even the way Elminster approaches Gale and delivers the news is in service of Mystra’s coldness. Elminster appears as more of an equal to Gale, but he twists the knife in ways that Mystra can’t be bothered to. I do not interpret ambushing Gale, demanding comfort and catering, and then delivering the news that Mystra wants Gale to die with half-truths, guilt trips, and tsk-tsks as general wizard eccentricity. That is dickhead behavior. Elminster is not pained to deliver this news. He is honored to be the one chosen to do it. 

Gale’s motivation in pursuing the crown and wielding it himself, as he expresses in the Act III boat scene- and again, I can’t believe people read Gale as blindly ambition or egotistical- is that gods shouldn’t have the power that they do, shouldn’t be able to make us live for them and die for them. He speaks of gods using Ao as a shield or an excuse and in DnD lore I believe Ao is truly the only god that would outrank Mystra. 

If Gale’s orb is truly a fragment created from Karsus’ attempt at godhood, I think we have to question Mystra’s relationship to Karsus. Early on both Gale himself and the game paint parallels between Gale and Karsus. Perhaps being chosen and the power imbalance and grief that entails is implied. For me, the narrative weight is better if it is. She speaks of allowing the orb to feed on the Weave as some sort of temporary measure, some gift to Gale, some great thing she is giving up… but if it is born of the Weave, ultimately, it is enabled by Mystra. 

I don’t mean to imply that Mystra is walking around as a figure of deliberate cruelty. I’m sure in Mystra’s mind she thinks she is fair, measured, and even doting of her “chosens”. But that is not unlike any abuser- particularly in religious contexts, particularly in mentorship contexts- who grooms and crosses lines because they see “potential” in their victims. For Mystra, the potential of her Chosen does not offer them protection. It simply justifies (to her) that she can harness, wield, consume, and control them. Why else would they be so magically inclined, so skilled, so bright, if not for her to do with them as she will? In her mind, as both a goddess and arguably the Weave itself, Mystra may not even think of what she does as harming those below her for her own gain. She may see it as reasonable and necessary sacrifices to preserve magic. I won’t try to summarize 3e to present DnD here, but Mystra has died and been reborn several times, in questionable ways. She is a fractured entity, whatever you consider her, and could very well have indoctrinated HERSELF into the religion of herself, essentially. Mystra is arguably her own cult and cult leader (though almost always aided by Elminster).

Karsus and Coercion

Mystra knows anything and everything that touches the Weave. Gale tells you point blank that Mystra would know he accessed the Karsus text, that just freeing it and reading it would be like shooting up a beacon. How does this interpretation stand if Mystra saw no signs of what she was doing to Gale, did not see him researching her prior death and fracturing? Could the same be true for Karsus?

The Karsus fragments devour the Weave, but why? Do they intend to harm her? Are they desperate for her? Does it feel like agency? Is there an additional parallel between Karsus and Gale here - meaning, as Karsus sought to make himself god-like, to stand above Mystra, perhaps in some way Gale thought bringing Mystra lost fragments of her former self would at the very least mean that Mystra needed him, controlled him, fed off of him in whatever way less? 

By Mystra’s own admission (I have not found this in game, I’m going from some Candlekeep lore and deity guides in 2e to now), those who use the Weave are to love the Weave, to do magic for the love of magic, to constantly explore and create new magic, anything to preserve and empower magic. So assuming that somehow Mystra legitimately has no idea when a Karsus or a Gale is setting out on a precarious path of potential godhood or at least hubris and hamartia, how then is Gale’s pursuit of the lost fragments of Mystra herself a violation? How even is Karsus' invention of his relics doing so? Mystra has the ability to cut the Weave off entirely for people, just as she had the ability the entire time to give the orb within Gale access to the Weave directly. This has me theorizing that perhaps, just as she condemned Gale to die when him EXACTLY FOLLOWING THE PHILOSOPHY SHE HANDED DOWN upset her for whatever reason, perhaps Mystra is why Karsus was pursuing higher magics in the first place, seeking to make up for some access he may have been denied after being suddenly cut off from her? Mystra does not set boundaries or make things clear. To be her Chosen does not seem to be a process of understanding and consent. It is thrust upon mortal men, in Gale’s case a mortal man she pursues a deeper emotional and sexual connection to, and then they are meant to “be patient” and anticipate what is or isn’t acceptable to her. 

And ultimately, I want to end with this, in regards to some middling discourse I keep seeing around Mystra that I think is well-intentioned but disastrous if we apply it to the reality of imbalance power dynamics, abuse, and trauma with any sense of realism** -

Grooming is not just sexual - Mystra being the provider of the magic Gale is naturally inclined to is enough of a power imbalance from the jump. The man repeatedly responsible for enabling new forms of Mystra being a close mentor to Gale and possibly responsible for his education is in itself a gateway of grooming. Institutions and systems use grooming as a tool as well. 

There is not an age at which you become immune to abuse or at which abuse is less abusive. Grooming and harming a teenager is neurologically different from doing so to an adult, but both are still incredibly common, and again, see number one. 

Abuses within any system- be it a church, an outright cult, an educational system, a dojo, a theatre, a volunteer organization- are significantly harder to escape because the isolation and indoctrination are built in. Group-think, the affects of trauma on the brain, etc, legitimately stunt a person’s cognitive development in relationship to the subject. A god waiting until a wizard is of age to fuck him when said wizard has been attuned to and charmed by the magic that is a part of herself since childhood would certainly fall under this category. 

There is not a way that Gale- or any real world person harmed on a scale of toxic relationship to outright abuse- can respond to abuse that legitimizes the introduction of abuse and coercion in the first place.

*note - depending on your Tav’s relationship to Gale, I DO THINK this is something Gale is beginning to identify… His comment when in a romantic partnership with Tav are that essentially everything he thought Mystra was is fading away because she condemned him to die when giving up the crown to her was always on the table, done after a year plus of shutting him out for his “folly,” and he speaks of "tenderness" and "feeling" from Tav, the subtext there being he knows now he never received that from Mystra but I want to leave room in this conversation for folks who didn’t romance Gale or didn’t romance him in service of the Gale the Man is Enough narrative to explore this topic

**Pretend is pretend and a valid way to explore so many things but as a survivor of various kinds of abuse who lives with C-PTSD every day, I think it’s important we apply some level of weight and realism to portrayals of these dynamics, even when the metaphor is literal magic, because 1- how we speak about abusers and the abused in fiction historically reflects our real world feelings on them, often to the point of LEGISLATION and 2- trauma should not be a sandbox for the unscathed to play in more than it should be a space for exploration, catharsis, and perhaps even healing for the many of us who have survived or are trying to survive those dynamics. If you don’t agree with that, that is technically legal but my interpretations will annoy you until the end of time always. 

[drcaglestein-blog]

When breaking generational curses, don’t expect support from those who passed it on.

[burningcheese-merchant]

imma answer two asks at once just because I can. (I really wish that was an actual feature, instead of me having to screenshot asks and paste them into a post lol. Tumblr is almost 20 years old when are they going to add this QoL feature)

When you care so little about Clotted Cream that you forgot about a popular ship that he's part of lmaooo. I never really understood Clottedcier, it just feels really... nothing? Financier is his guard, she just takes her job really seriously. I admit that I haven't looked through the Odyssey arc for a really long time save for wanting to enjoy little fuel crumbs of HollyCacao so maybe I'm remembering wrong? But I don't remember any particular closeness between them. He's the stuck up politician and she's Secret Service basically. And I can understand the appeal of Public Figure x Guard, I just don't really feel anything with these two in particular. But more power to fans of it, y'all have fun. I prefer FinanChip personally

Some of it seems to be joking, some of it seems to be sincere. More power to all those people either way, of course. I just don't really understand this one either lol

For one, Black Forest is reeeeaaaaallllyyyy not in any position to be in a relationship at all. She's mentally ill/unstable and a victim of cult brainwashing. Just feels a little sad and strange to impose a relationship on such a confused and vulnerable person. Girl needs a date with a good psychologist before anyone else lol

Second, I think people just kind of ran away with "Wedding Cake is very fond of all the brides" and "you're the most passionate bride I've ever worked with" and automatically made it a lesbian thing because of course they did lol. Just another show of "no one is able or allowed to care about other people outside of a romantic context" imo. Again, I like gay shit as much as the next person, but this is kind of a stretch. Wedding planning was always her dream job, she's just really happy that her dream came true and she can help couples plan their special day (and she probably feels closer to brides specifically because a) she herself is a woman, women relate better to each other on principle b) weddings are often catered more to the bride than the groom (not necessarily a good thing, just how it is), c) the wedding dress is a key component of wedding planning and Wedding Cake obviously cares a lot about acquiring a good dress for the bride. Hell, look at her own attire. She's very feminine and is wearing a high-quality, formal dress herself. She must already love fashion and dresses even outside of her work)

Finally, as far as Wedding Cake knows, Black Forest is already happily engaged to a person she loves. She doesn't know it's a cult thing, she doesn't know Black Forest is brainwashed. She thinks she's just helping another bride plan her special day. Why would Wedding Cake pursue her if she thinks Black Forest is already taken? Are you guys saying Wedding Cake is a homewrecker? Lmao. Black Forest wouldn't have her anyway, she's completely batshit insane over the Witches and probably wouldn't even register someone else being interested in her

But you know. Ship what you want. Shipping is just playing dollhouse. I may not necessarily understand or agree with your way of playing with the dolls but I'm not going to try to take them from you. Have fun, friends

[arte072]

"Sansa bullied Arya? Oh so you think she's worse than Tywin Lannister, Gregor Clegane and Ramsay Bolton??" is such a hyperbolic, insincere and ultimately non-existent argument. Literally name one person who says this shit with any sort of sincerity, if at all lol

This is up there with "Talking about Arya's importance to the North means you think Jeyne Poole's life doesn't matter!!!" in terms of disningenous talking points.

It's only ever used to shut down any attempts at considering Arya's feelings and well-being when discussing the girls' relationship.

and no offense, but why are 🫵 YOU🫵 equating the acknowledgement of a fictional child's flaws with calling her a war criminal? why are you treating it like that?? 👀👀👀

I mean, this fandom regularly says Arya lacks morality for surviving war zones with violence. They consider her a walking tragedy whose story is about losing her humanity and becoming the ultimate killing machine. Everyday Dany gets called a N@zi Barbie for not abolishing slavery perfectly. But Sansa gets clocked as a mean girl bully in the first book and y'all fall apart at the seams at that?? C'mon now

[redladydeath]

*For the purposes of this poll, "abusive" can mean both actively malicious or inadvertently neglectful

[bugwolfsstuff]

Hermes: *does the most heinous grief fuelled shit that even the other gods balk at*

Peitho, his wife: Okay okay so he's a little bit insane

Peitho: ...But it's hot and it makes him happy

[r-biter]

I say this with love and sincerity but i don't get people who stan charecters in svsss in like a 'moral superiority' way because i'm trying hard to think of a main charecter who isn't when viewed objectively a Huge Cunt and i'm genuinely getting a blank.

[droppedpears]

Back then space seemed endless. Now it's empty.

a sort of companion piece to my anya one; i just think they share more parallels than people realize

[maxterclass]

.

[bonefall]

what concerning behaviors does bramble show in fatherhood? Genuine question I didnt read PO3 and I haven’t really heard anyone talking about that

I can't go and grab book quotations at the moment, hopefully I'll have time to make a big thing on this later this month (the breeze one took a couple days), but he has some odd trends.

NEVER once stands up for Breezepaw while seeing Crow openly, flagrantly abusing him, even responds to Crow's "I HOPE YOU'RE NOT STOPPING SO THESE LITTLE BASTARDS CAN REST" comment with "dont worry im not"

Completely ignores every sign that Lionpaw is being abused by Ashfur. There are several.

Quick to anger. Though he never "HITS" his children the same way Crow did to Breeze, he does a lot of "cuffing" and can be pretty mean to his kids verbally when they disappoint him.

When Hollypaw witnesses Ashfur physically abusing her brother, she tries to tell Brambleclaw and he tells her that it's fine.

During that, he launches into this big speech about how Ashfur came to butter him up, tell him how strong his son is, how good of a warrior he'll be, that beating the shit out of his teenage child was just a misunderstanding.

And then he segways into telling Hollypaw how Mature and Responsible she is, and how he needs to Rely on her to Keep Her Brothers In Line. All of this, REMEMBER, was in response to Hollypaw trying to tell her dad about her brother being abused by a teacher.

But in spite of all this, the narrative basically holds him up as the pinnacle of fatherhood. The Three are constantly thinking about how much they love him as their dad, BEST dad in the whole world, perfect amazing cool.

None of his flaws are addressed, as usual. He seems egotistical, emotional, and even sometimes oblivious to what's happening in front of him as he focuses on his OWN feelings at all times... and that's all without getting into OotS and his post-reveal behavior, which is a whole essay topic.

But I will end it off with this; the way he acts in OotS was never out-of-character. It's very consistent, actually.