#it’s some tragedy— they become their illness— and the story is about people dealing with it

[ultfan]

sigh. was watching a let’s player go through komaeda’s FTEs and they said he was using his diagnosis as an excuse for his actions. “oh, i’m dying and insane so everything i do is justified” like — agH stfu!!! i’ll never claim komaeda’s actions to be good, and yeah i joke about his “insane”ness a lot, but at the end of the day you genuinely can’t hold him accountable. he is not in control of his facilities — FTD specifically targets your personality/behaviors — he is not in a right state of mind and is completely unaware he is in the wrong. he CANNOT COMPREHEND that. he’s just genuinely unable to!!! i’ll never claim he isn’t a bad person, or that he isn’t an antagonist, but at the end of the day he is someone who needs not help necessarily, but to be taken care of/looked after. he doesn’t belong in a prison, he belongs in a mental facility. where he can have trained professionals who can keep watch over him and actually work with him and keep him in check. — in any canon related verse he’ll never actually get that, esp given the state of the world, but it’s true that’s what he needs more than anything else.

and people really do tend to overlook just how much bvFTD truly fits komaeda as a diagnosis. especially in ways that aren’t touched upon by the vaaaaast majority of people. a while back i read a research paper about hyper-religiousity in patients with FTD; which could very easily be applied to the way he views hope. first clinging to it as a coping mechanism and that being exaggerated through the deterioration to become a blind faith that he is obsessed over which leads every action he takes.

anyway i just think it’s ridiculous to call a disease like FTD an “excuse.” there are people who use their mental illness as excuses for their actions to justify themselves, yes. but this isn’t a mental illness — it’s a degenerative brain disease. it’s an entirely different category. this isn’t a case of an illness making it difficult to control his actions and act reasonably, it’s a case of a disease making it IMPOSSIBLE to control his actions and act reasonably. it just really upsets me to see people brush that off because that is one of the main things that makes komaeda actually sympathetic.

[fuck-hamas-go-israel]

No matter what, don’t lose your humanity.

I see this rhetoric very often, that if you call for the release of the hostages and condemn Hamas terrorism and the atrocities they’ve committed, then you automatically “must support the death of Palestinian civilians”.

Conversely, those who claim to care about the Palestinian civilians don’t seem to call for the release of hostages, never acknowledge the rape, torture, and murder of civilians on Oct 7. In fact, they seem to celebrate death of who they perceive as “Zionist”.

I saw this play out before my eyes on TikTok. A singer named Cat Janice was dying from cancer, and she asked her audience to use her song in their videos as she had willed the proceeds to her young son who is not more than 7 or 8 years old. People labelled her a Zionist because she apparently was following an Israeli account on Instagram.

It was a very tragic story and her family was going through a hard time dealing with the aggressive cancer that was slowly weakening her body.

But as we’ve seen:

They don’t care about people who are suffering from terminal illnesses and will harass them anyway.

In her videos of her giving updates on her situation and pleading with people for empathy for her young son, they flooded her comment section with spam:

Unfortunately, Cat Janice passed away, BDE. But that didn’t stop the harassment. In fact, some celebrated her death and even lauded it as a good thing as there is “one less Zionist” now.

Yes, there are people like this out there. This shouldn’t come as a surprise as they’ve been violent, they’ve been sending death threats, they’ve been chanting for violent “resistance” and “intifada” and the death of Jews and Israelis, as well as their allies. They celebrate violence in the most disgusting and dehumanising way possible.

Just look at the comments in this video of a Jewish creator saying that in Berlin, a Jewish student was attacked:

Meanwhile, we chant “Am Yisrael Chai”. We call for life, we focus on saving all lives, no matter who.

As the leaders of Hamas said in an interview, “The Israelis are known to love life. We, on the other hand, sacrifice ourselves. We consider our dead to be martyrs.”

Every innocent death is a tragedy, Israeli and Palestinian. Death IS a tragedy. The killing of Hamas terrorists, albeit deserved, is a tragedy because of the terroristic path they chose in life and what horrific crimes they had committed in order to warrant death as a means of justice.

As much as I wish that one day, those people who have spewed those vile, antisemitic, inhuman things will feel guilty for what they have said, I doubt they will. The perceived safety and anonymity of social media coupled with their complete absence of humanity, compassion, and empathy evaporates any drop of guilty conscience they may have. All we can wish is that fair and just consequences for their actions will be meted out to them one day.

But my fellow Jews, my fellow zionists, my fellow allies, please never, NEVER stoop to that level. It goes against everything we are about.

Once we lose our humanity, we’ll become dulled to the suffering of others. That’s not what we want, and it directly goes against the spirit of Judaism and Israel.

Continue to mourn the death of innocents, continue to get angry and weep for tragedy and injustice, continue to celebrate new life and lives saved. Continue to feel like a human being. Don’t be like them.

Don’t. Lose. Your. Humanity.

[bluespiderlully]

KNY- My Lore

Blue spider lily AU

Okay: I'm finally here to explain you all something about my AU, this is the one set in the 1930s, I'll post something about my Taisho era AU too, but we're not here to talk about this.

Before diving in my AU I need to explain something about the general lore.

The main prompt for me was just "the Demon Slayer Corp is searching for the blue spider lily to take it from Muzan... but is this the whole truth?"

In the past there was just only one obligation when it came to choosing the ones who would have become Hashiras: there must be a Water Hashira, a Wind Hashira, a Stone Hashira, a Flame Hashira, a Thunder Hashira and, last but ABSOLUTELY not least, a Dream Hashira.

The Dream Hashira has one job in particular, keeping the secret that the Ubuyashiki family has links with Muzan, and that their "illness" is actually a curse caused by the Demon King himself, if the Corp were to find out they would probably stop respecting him, they would kill him I think. You might ask me how does the Dream Hashira respect him, well... there are a lot of things that people can do: brainwash, death threats...

And another question can be "how can the Dream Hashira keep the secret?"

Well, there's just one requirement to become a Dream Hashira: rare blood, a type of rare blood that can induce sleep and control dreams and that can be trained to erase and change memories, so if someone finds out something, the Dream Hashira has to do this.

In the previous generation a strange thing happened: Shinjuro Rengoku retired due to his alcohol addiction and some days after the other Hashiras all died in different missions, plus, the Dream Hashira (Enmu's master) was found dead in a room in the Butterfly Mansion, he apparently hanged himself... to the door handle.

Enmu was the one who found the body of the ex Dream Hashira, he immediately noticed hand signs under the rope, he understood that this was a threat for him, this because it was difficult for Kagaya to brainwash him, both him and his master started spying on him and found out he made deals with demons, and found out his true purpose about the blue spider lily: the Ubuyashiki family wants it to break the curse, and possibly become demons, immortality is tempting for everyone, let's be honest.

The day after, Enmu had to swore loyalty to the Ubuyashiki family and some hours later the new formation of Hashiras was convened and made official. Eighteen Hashiras to avoid the tragedy that happened with the last generation.

And this is all for this post, I hope you liked it; this is kinda funny because I have a lot of lore, I have a good base but I don't have any ideas on the story I could write, I don't have a timeline, I just have some interactions in my mind, I'll work about this and I'll come up with something!💙

[soft-for-xie-lian]

Hi 🤗 how are you? How is it going? Hopefully you have a good day today. So, if you dont mind me coming in here to ask, pls what is purple hyacinth about and what do you like about it/why do you like it so much personally? Im curious 🥰 and thank you!

omg hi!!!!! I have had a good day thank you! And I hope yours has been well, too! ^-^

I'm am DELIGHTED to talk about Purple Hyacinth thank you so much for the ask omg this is going to be long I hope you're okay with that hahaha

Purple Hyacinth is a webcomic on the website/app Webtoon. It is free to read. The authors are Ephemeris and Sophism, and Sophism does the bulk of the artwork :)

Right off, I think the premise of it is really good. The main character Lauren can hear when people lie. Because of a tragedy that took her best friend when they were kids, she becomes a cop to fight the group that caused it, teaming up with an assasin who unwillingly works for that group and hates his job lol. This means we have a traumatized main cast with tragic pasts, slow burn enemies to lovers between the main character Lauren and the assasin, and a delicious mystery to watch them solve as they try to uncover the leader of the Bad Group's identity so they can be taken down.

Start reading for the tropes, stay for the heart. My favorite thing about stories is when they have heart. I love that this webtoon is so character focused. The plot is really good I love watching them follow leads and have had moments where I was like "oh my god no fucking way." but the way the characters live in the plot is my favorite bit. The friendships? Flawlesly written. I'm not sure how to say too much without giving spoilers, but let's just say Lauren's friend Kym can recognize her in a dark room it's so good and yes the authors use that to make you cry. We've got some "family isn't just blood" themes here, too, with Lauren and her childhood friend Will.

(the story is also sprinkled with memes and makes me laugh so much. I refuse to read something if it can't be silly and make me ugly chuckle at least sometimes and PH DOES IT)

There's self loathing, there's characters who make decisions and mistakes because of their trauma, there's characters comforting each other, there's really good fight scenes, there's some ACAB and talk about privilege, there's some queer rep--there is just so much to talk about and appreciate about with this story.

OH MY GOD AND THE SOUNDTRACK (which is on Spotify and I think Apple Music under the artist's name Sophism) this webtoon is a cinematic experience at times

thanks again for the ask! i've been swimming in circles in my head without anyone to talk to about it haha. i absolutely love it, but I will warn you, while there are two and a half seasons out, we're on hiatus haflway through season three because Sophism is dealing with a chronic illness. it is planned to make a return in spring of 2024, but there's no guarantee, as we all want Sophism to put her health first. that being said, I really think it is still worth reading, and I can't believe it isn't more popular. I'd 100% buy physical copies if the authors ever go that route

[jasperjv]

Hey. So 2 years ago Connor Lavery's aka khonjin's psychological torture of me reached fever pitch in my psyche and I was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital in a severe psychotic breakdown that lasted almost 3 months. Now I'm indexed in his long story of his supposed inexplicable persecution. He thinks me, in my psychotic state, demanding monetary compensation for his gaslighting and harassment, was some kind of attempt at "cancellation" and me throwing a tantrum instead of communicating like an adult. However I deleted my entire social media presence after getting back from the hospital and haven't bothered him since. But he still thinks I did something to him.

The man is dangerous. He believes that the worst sin of mankind is the ego, so he makes it his mission to bully the fuck out of everyone until they have no self-esteem, boundaries of their own, or healthy sense of self whatsoever. The elimination of the ego however is what psychosis is, also unable to suppress the flow of the unconscious, identical to a waking dream. But when that happened to me after 2 years of mind games, he retreated into himself and framed it in the most disgusting way possible. Which you will see.

Embedded here is the first video I made myself specifically on this topic. You will see more details in a more recent video, and follow the trail I put in that video's description to get my full story. For the podcast in particular I would give a content warning for assault, sexual assault, ableism ("saneism"?) and general torture and terror.

There's nothing on God's green earth I could do or say to force him to take me seriously. I have probably half of you people blocked because just seeing anything to do with him would make my blood pressure spike. And it's high enough as-is just due to genetics. Maybe the rest of you might be able to be reached.

I'm so sick of fucking self-centered freaks trying to hold me accountable for actual psychosis because they're so desperate to blame anyone or anything but themselves for their part in tragedy. I really get gaslit about my own psychosis, and forced to prove a negative repeatedly (which we know is a lexical impossibility). I'm handed a blatant double-standard about mental health awareness and basic human decency, when in many cases I desperately need it more than most. Schizophrenia sufferers are 1% of the population. We're dwarfed by most, if not all, other mental illnesses. In this I continue to be thrown alone to the wolves. Sometimes even while being laughed at, it truly feels like. So I feel like I have to do all in my power to help make sure that this happens to fewer people than it would otherwise.

The callouts in 2018, the types of points of persuasion they were trying didn't make sense to me. Maybe this, though, could strike others. I'm more specific about how exactly he destroys people from the inside out. Stay the fuck away from him.

He's scared of losing his financial support from Patreon and ad revenue or whatever. I really, truly felt for that for a long time. But now I know that none of us are obligated to keep his ass afloat. It would be nobody's fault but his own if he didn't even try to heal his fucked up mindset and was just a raging misanthrope nobody wants to deal with. When you get to be my age, you become aware of all the ways to make a living. He could get disability. He could get a factory job, for instance. And that paid me an absurd amount of money. He needs to make up his mind about if he wants to be around people or not. Because he can't keep treating them the way that he does.

Oh, and if you're reading this and you happen to have any social connections with him whatsoever, for the love of God, do not let him put you on the defensive. About anything. Over and over again. It chips away at you. He doesn't have the answers. He doesn't have any objective taste like he desperately wants to think. He doesn't know any wisdoms that you couldn't get from someone who won't talk down to you.

Took me quite a while to convince him of the truth that he is only older than me by only a few months. I needed my hope in humanity and the future in order to not go and end it all. He did not give a fuck. He kept accusing me of lying about not being a naïve teenager. Just for that. Ask any well-adjusted and experienced adult and they will tell you to stay far away from people like that. The motivations that drive them to that behavior and opinion are bad, bad news.

He is intelligent, in the scariest ways. Intelligence of that type allows dysfunctional people like him to fabricate lines of logic that justify and enable the abuse they already sought to do. Literally anything can be justified with just the right kind of logic. Trust your gut. Guard your mind. It's the only one you've got.

He leads an excessively stressful life, creates his own dysfunctional world both inside and around him. I truly believe that this causes him many health problems. I've been having nightmares because of him. And as this built up and weighed heavy on my mind I got a fucking hemorrhoid. It went away very quickly after I made this video.

I'm feeling anxious as I type this. But I have to tell myself that anyone who would continue harassment of me over all the truth I've spoken is not worth my time or space. This isn't for them. It's for me, and it's for people who still have basic respect and empathy left in them.

Yours truly,

"slug"

[unhingedwomandiaries]

Another day, another tragedy. Today's burnt offering to chaos comes courtesy of Owassa, Oklahoma, where a transgender kid named Nex was bullied into an early grave. The specific details are murky (if not outright conspiratorial), but the broad outline is painfully clear: Kid gets harassed by small-minded jerks. Kid retaliates. Kid gets suspended. Kid sees no exit from an unlivable reality. Kid checks out. And we're left to pick through the ashen remains of a life that needn't have been sacrificed to the great volcanic maw of rural ignorance.

I can sadly relate to the hopelessness of being bullied as a kid. When I was 9 years old, some girl punched me in the eye during a fire drill just because she thought my curly hair made me look ugly. The teachers saw it, my classmates saw it, and nobody did a damn thing besides a half-hearted "stop it." My parents tried taking it to the administration and were stonewalled. The bullying only escalated from there. The cruel taunts over AOL Messenger in middle school, the relentless mocking about my awkward appearance. By 12 years old I had a suicide plan hatched, seeing no way out of the torment. Even asking to be homeschooled was denied by my own mother, who incredibly rationalized that "bullies are everywhere, just deal with it." Yeah, great advice.

So I know the feeling of wanting to just exit this reality altogether, to preemptively abandon a cruel existence that doesn't seem destined to improve. The self-hatred bullying breeds is a toxin. I'm grateful I hung on, but also still deeply angry at the cyclical abuse society allows under the guise of kids just "being kids." This normalization needs to end.

Which brings me back to poor Nex. What's the ultimate difference between homicide and suicide here? The semantics don't change the underlying truth: This kid was bullied to death. Whether the final blow came from an assailant or the victim's own hand is almost irrelevant—Nex died because small people have big fears, and they expressed those fears through cruelty. The school failed by suspending Nex instead of the perpetrators. The town failed by harboring the sort of anti-difference hatred that crushes gentle souls. Nex's parents failed by being unable to create a safe space. And we all fail when incidents like this just become think-pieces instead of catalysts for actual change.

This isn't a new story, sadly. It's the same tired tale conservatives love to ignore until it lands on their doorstep, then sweep under the rug with half-truths about psychoactive drugs and mental illness. The same culture war garbage that gets trotted out whenever reality inconveniences the regressive agenda. I can't muster much more energy than an exhausted sigh.

But here's the important part, penned directly to any LGBTQ+ youths who might find my diary: It gets better. Being a teenager is a temporarily horrific condition, but it won't last forever. The high school hellscape will eventually give way to a bigger world where you get to surround yourself with people who embrace your uniqueness. Everything feels terminal when you're young, but human existence is startlingly malleable. The alluring permanence of the grave ends up being the ultimate impermanence. You've got to hang in there and pursue the chance to build a life where rubbing others the wrong way isn't punished by ritualized torment.

It's tragic that Nex never got that opportunity. But we'd multiply the tragedy by allowing the next gender-nonconforming kid to meet the same fate. Maybe next time it'll be different. But today is just another day of profound disappointment in my fellow humans.

[travelling-on-the-octopath]

To touch on your great analysis meta about the routes, why do you think so many Dimitri haters lament about AM being a character driven narrative? Do you think it's just salty haters who can't accept that CF wasn't the same character driven narrative for Edelgard? Or salty Claude fans who dislike that VW was more about Fodlan lore than about Claude himself? I've always been of the belief that character driven plots are the best types of stories because I prefer characterization to lore tbh.

I was thinking about this exact thing yesterday actually: Why have I seen so many complaints over the years that Dimitri's route is about . . . Dimitri?

I came to a conclusion that may be absolute horseshit, but oh well:

We come to stories for escapism, right? On the surface that comes across as just a different set of rules to a world, to the point where we can't recognize our current circumstances.

That's not entirely true. At least, it's not true on its own. We want stories that make us feel. We come to pieces of media to listen to, read, watch stories that could be about us, but in a different world. We want to witness people, who could be us, who might just be us, go through the trials and tribulations of life--if not something astoundingly worse--and walk out okay, because that means we'll be okay. Humans are fickle creatures, and we want just enough about a story to be foreign to entice us into looking at it, and then be relatable enough for us to sink our teeth in and love it for years. Strangeness draws us in, and relatability keeps us there.

You can only do that with really good characters. You can only get that resolution when you watch realistic characters go through problems that are likely (i.e., probable within the narrative) to affect them, if not ruin them, only for them to emerge victorious. (And I say probable, because if rabid doves were to start attacking Fódlan, it would turn into a comedy long before anything else.)

I've seen various complaints about AM. Some of them are warranted. Others not so much.

Why doesn't Dimitri tackle TWSITD? Well, he kills three of their major players on accident, and while he wants to learn the truth of the Tragedy, he comes to accept that if he focuses on what he doesn't know, he's going to find himself in an even earlier grave. Also, Dimitri's story is about him. Trying to shoehorn in Fodlan's past would a) contradict his themes of leaving behind the uncertain and moving forward with the certain and b) force him into a claude-like role where he's not important, the lore is. (Which isn't to say that it couldn't have been done, just that several things would have had to be reworked and changed to write a compelling Dimitri story alongside that of the church/agarthans/nabateans. Claude was more primed for a story that ties in his character with the lore, but, again--shafted.)

Why does Dimitri focus on the painful parts of his life? I hate to break it to people, but pain is pain. It goes away when it wants, if it wants. Post-skip, he's just spent five years up to his eyes in that pain, at the whims of his mental illness. The biggest point in favour of AM is that he becomes better at bearing it, as we all do with time and support.

Why do I have to hold his hand? Sorry, that's all Byleth (and a hefty sprinkling of writers' work.) At the end of the day, Byleth wants to help Dimitri. Their character isn't as fleshed out as others', courtesy of the curse of avatar-ness, but that they want to help people is a pretty consist characteristic across the game. Also, I understand that the more aggressive symptoms of mental illness are frustrating (I deal with it from my own family), but that does not, and will never, mean someone deserves to be abandoned. That someone inconveniences you or frustrates you does not warrant the total removal of their support. Now, I wanted to rattle him at moments, because godDAMMIT Dimitri, can you sit down for a second instead of trying to march off to your death, but if you equate being frustrated with someone's mental illness to thinking they deserve to fester in their own pain . . . You need to do some serious soul-searching.

Why does Dimitri make a complete 180 the minute Rodrigue dies? He doesn't. You have to actively stop him from riding off to Enbarr on a suicide mission. To boot (and I blame this first and foremost on the support structure), he admits that he's going to be seeing and hearing shit till the day he dies in his S support with Byleth. He doesn't make a 180; he just tries to get his shit together to save his kingdom.

Why does Dimitri make everything about him? I don't know how to explain the concept of empathy to people, really, but he's being empathetic. I've been comforted by people who share my pain, and I do the same thing, because pain is manageable, but pain you face alone is lethal. Dimitri continually says this, that without the support of those around him, he likely would have died a long time ago.

Dimitri is a character that is completely and utterly relatable in his pain. No, a vast majority of us haven't watched our families get slaughtered in front of our eyes in a blaze of terror, but it's his pain we feel. I've forgotten the voices of my dead loved ones; I have a hard time remembering to take care of myself; I have to remind myself that I am not my mistakes, and I am not the hurt I've dealt to people. Sure, he's a king in magical, distant not-Europe, but first and foremost he is a person whose journey we witnessed, from a prince who sees himself first and foremost as a weapon for the grief of his dead family to a king who wants nothing more than to see his home safe and sound. He isn't his pain, and neither am I. That's what brings tears to my eyes; that's how I can play White Clouds over and over in the name of getting to AM, because his journey is woven into it so neatly.

That's the thing people want when they come to a story; they want a tale of people overcoming the obstacles they themselves face, often in window dressings that don't match their own world's. Ultimately, the window dressing doesn't matter, but rather the victory of the character. Stories are for people, and so they have to be about people. That's why characters carry plot, and not the other way around.

Anyway. That's just my two cents.

[cometblaster2070]

*cracks spine* okay, let’s go, i’ve put this off for about a year now, and im really sorry, and im not going to put it off any longer.

(please forgive me @feline17ff)

this is the first post in this weird series; please dont mind me, i am a nuisance.

Destiny 2.0

we have previously discussed a few characters and the tragedies that befall them because of their story, but due to the nature of this fucked up franchise; we’re going to be talking about a few others.

Cedar Wood is someone who is not real. You might think she is. She’s just like a person isn’t she? She thinks, she feels, she loves just like someone who is real

but she isn’t

she’s just a puppet, right?

someone who is cursed to tell the truth. who cannot do anything but. who is sometimes forced to tell the truth against her will simply for some cruel person’s amusement. someone who is sometimes kept at a distance by her friends because they are afraid of telling her secrets that may be accidently divulged later.

Cedar Wood is real. she is no less a person than anyone else is. and while she may not always be able to express what she is able to say, she paints her emotions away; trying to explain what words cannot.

Cedar Wood is eager to follow her father’s destiny because she wishes, she hopes to be free of her curse and someday become a real girl.

there is something so inexplicably sad about wanting to feel real so badly.

hunter huntsman. despite his name (which is horrific, but i digress), there is nothing of a hunter in this boy.

he’s a vegetarian. he’s someone who sabotages the traps his father sets out for the animals. he’s on the cheer squad. he’s sweet and kind and sincere and he loves ashlynn ella with all of his heart.

hunter’s ‘destiny’ destiny isnt too big of a deal for him. he’s a part of two stories and honestly, i think he’s pretty happy in both of them; after all, he’s no villain. in snow white’s tale, he refuses to kill her, and warns her of the queen’s ill intentions, while in red riding hood, he’s the hero who saves the day.

but the thing is, there is something hunter’s destiny does not entail

or rather, someone: ashlynn ella.

as destiny dictates, someone like hunter, a simple commoner; cannot be with someone like ashlynn, a princess, a royal, someone with a big role to play.

why does it matter? why can’t they just be happy? why does hunter have to be molded into what they think will fit best for his story? why cant he just be with the girl he loves?

why are they so cruel to a child?

there’s a story we’ve all heard before. 

a story about a brother and a sister who were left in the woods by their father after there was nothing more for them to eat at home. how they found a house made of candy and were lured and trapped by the cannibal witch to whom it belonged. and how they finally bested her and escaped to warn the world of her evil.

what an utterly absurd lie created by two horrible children.

and yes, while the candy witch herself rather enjoys the controversy caused by her horrific tale, there is someone who does not.

ginger breadhouse. such a kind young girl, whose only desire is to bake and make people happy.

yet ginger is feared and rebuffed time and time again for what people assume her to be: a cannibal. a vicious, cruel monster who represents the worst in all of us. someone who uses her gifts simply to exploit others.

ginger cooks and bakes because she simply wants to; it is her passion. she just wants to share her treats with others and to just let them be happy. she doesn’t want to be the cannibal witch. she doesnt want to poison people. she just wants to be a pastry chef.  

it just isnt fair.

duchess swan is a royal through and through, and if anyone has a problem with that, then they could go fuck themselves.

it is no secret that duchess doesnt get a ‘happily ever after’ like most princesses, and yes, if you tend to remind her of that, you may get kicked in some very sensitive places by ballet shoes.

but duchess swan does not see herself as a coward. yes, she may be bitter about her story. yes, she may be envious of others such as the ever so perfect apple white, or ashlynn fucking ella.

yes, she may desperately want out of this fate. yes, she may be terrified knowing that what happened to her mother will happen to her. yes, she may try to swap stories with other princesses just to get a happier ending and to make sure that her story ends without her true love inadvertently betraying her.

but duchess is not a coward. and by whatever god there is in their fucked up world, duchess swan refuses to act like those ‘rebels’ and go against her destiny.

even though she might die. even though she’ll be stuck a swan forever. even though she might be the villain of her story.

duchess is a child who has been fed this horrific future from birth.

and apple white. god. what is there to say about apple white?

the perfect heir to the throne of ever after high? the girl who has it all? the one who is so effortlessly perfect? who has people fawning over her every move? who is the prettiest, smartest, and most popular girl in school? the girl with the ‘best’ story? the girl who is going to end up with everything, just like destiny intended for her?

her perfect happily ever after.

except, that isnt true, is it?

apple is not perfect. her hair is blonde instead of ‘as black as coal’. she hides the fact that she wears glasses and is nearly blind without them, because that is an ‘imperfection’. she is supposed to be the most popular, but is instead beaten by a rebel like raven queen. 

her prince isnt even a prince, for crying out loud. the ever so perfect daring charming is not her prince, rather, his sister, darling charming, the white knight, is apple’s true love.

all her life, the expectations set upon apple white have suffocated her and distorted her vision of what life she has and wants. she has been fed lies after lies about what she has to be, and what her ‘perfect’ future has to be like.

she is afraid of messing up. she is afraid of not being perfect. she is afraid from straying from the comfortable bubble of her destiny. she is afraid of deviating from her ‘happily ever after’ because she is literally terrified that she will die.

apple white, for all her bravado, is simply a scared child who doesnt know what to do.

and the truth is, the rest of them are like that as well.

they’re just kids.

and they’re afraid of what’s going to happen to them in the future.

[aotopmha]

Final Fantasy XIV thoughts:

Hermes (Fandaniel/Amon).

The criticism for Hermes from people who say they've struggled with mental illness themselves and then proceed to be extremely dismissive or condescending towards people who are struggling with mental illness and do relate to him and understand him makes me sad.

(Just yesterday I saw a comment from someone who said they went through mental illness themselves that said anyone who thinks Hermes is a good depiction of depression is probably 'crazy' themselves because that's what FF14 fans are according to them.)

Mental illness is so often mocked and looked down upon even by those who have gone through it, for whatever reason this might be (for a few examples, perhaps forgetting the struggle they had themselves, or maybe the anger/unhappiness of still having to deal with it in the first place).

Not all characters are going to be relatable to everyone and I think there will be disagreements on how well or how badly a theme or topic is handled in a story, but this particular disagreement strikes me as fascinating because this is the exact kind of dismissiveness of mental health that I think the story criticises.

Part of the reason everything that happened, happened was because the ancients were really bad at being considerate of feelings.

Meteion ended up being an empath because Hermes was an empath.

And Hermes cared deeply for life.

And needing to kill life in his job is what slowly screwed him up, too.

He couldn't find connection in front of him, so he created another being just to fulfill his wish of finding it in space. He created another being with feelings he used for selfish reasons.

And mental illness doesn't exclude you from consequences. It shouldn't be an excuse to hurt other people.

And all of these elements, as someone who has struggled with mental health, as well, I can relate to and understand.

"Why is he so annoying?"

"Why won't he stop being sad, although he's at this high ranking job?"

"Why won't he get over his sadness and pain of killing other living beings?"

This is exactly the attitude the story criticises and in turn is some of the criticism I see directed at Hermes and from there in turn is criticism directed at many struggling with mental illness irl.

People say they really care about those who struggle with mental illness until they don't.

When those who struggle become frustrating/an inconvinience, many just turn on them anyway because "they're whiny" or "it's not that bad".

So to me Hermes is a fantastic depiction of what being dismissive of mental health (and lack of peer review, actually) looks like and can end up looking like.

Because, above all, mental illness traps you in your own mind and often does make things seem worse than they are, too.

It's a closed cycle that can only be mitigated by other perspectives, other people genuinely supporting you. This is why simply talking to other people saves so many and isolation leads to many tragedies.

This is why the Blasphemies spread so strongly and you can't save everyone from becoming one.

In my own struggle I also didn't need anyone telling me 'how wonderful the world is, actually' – I needed to be told that it was horrible, but you can forge on anyway.

And that's what was effective about Endwalker's conclusion to me.

I think the story saying that you aren't alone in your suffering is great, too, but the detail that yes, the world sucks, but instead of burying the issue to "make you feel better", the dark feelings are acknowledged, is what I really liked.

Validation and acknowledgement is what truly lead to me getting better.

And if things truly reach the lowest point, where you truly have nothing left, the memory of the good times with those you loved or even just the smallest moments of good still live on within you, for you to find new ones in the future.

"The sorrow of a thousand, thousand worlds weighs heavy. And yet you can walk on."

All of this said, the final detail I'd like to talk about is the karmic cycle of the rebirth of Hermes.

Hermes, Amon and Fandaniel all reach one singular nihilistic viewpoint: nothing matters, so it all must go away. Just like Meteion.

This happens with every incarnation, so I think it's kind of a fascinating cycle that has been built here of a soul looking for peace and closure.

And this cycle is finally broken when Hermes acknowledges he has hurt Meteion and for the first time truly connects with her on an emotional level.

He didn't see what was in front of him all along, but now that he did, he finally found the connection he so wished for.

This is, of course, not literally happening because at this point Hermes is long dead, but this is the reason why his words so often make me tear up whenever I rewatch the scene with his message to Meteion.

I actually wasn't initially too big on Hermes, either because I thought just a tad too little time was spent to exploring him, but subsequent revisits of the Endwalker story really warmed me up to his character.

As said, right now I feel like his story ended up being really satisfying.

But I'd also like to validate anyone who didn't find Hermes to be well-written or effective. You're not crazy or wierd or whatever else anyone might call you because of disliking or liking a fictional character, especially if you have struggled with mental illness yourself because the character of Hermes is exactly about this and views can absolutely differ with a topic like this.

[warmothered]

hc + 🗡 for a weapon-themed headcanon , can we hear more about the bow ...

» — >  ⌜ PROMPTS & IC ASKS⌟ , always accepting

— @windchaser

ashe's bow is said to have belonged to avarosa herself, once upon a time. it's impossible in universe to know for certain, though from a writer point of view that does seem to be the case. much like ashe doesn't believe she is avarosa reborn, she doesn't personally care if the bow belonged to the divine figure. she reveres the three sisters as much as anyone else in the freljord — it's the association of that divinity with herself she doesn't care for, though she's not above using it.

the bow ties into that because it's the greatest 'proof' and symbol of her connection to avarosa. in her short story, there's even a paragraph about it, and about how people make the association between her and avarosa because of the bow:

Inwardly, she grimaced. As so often, she wondered if it was her leadership that drew them all together, or the weapon she carried. It was the symbol of Avarosa, and many in the Freljord believed that, as its wielder, she was Avarosa reborn. Ashe slung the bow over her shoulder and shook the thought. Why they joined wasn’t as important as what they had become. She hopped off the stage and moved into the crowd as they dispersed to feast-laden tables.

so not only the bow is a weapon, it's a very important symbol, one that makes people believe her and her cause, even if they do so because they think she's connected to a divine being she doesn't feel connected to at all. but like i said, ashe is not above using it. if it's that belief that unites people, and if it's the bow that secures their beliefs, then so be it — she'll use it in a ceremony and let everyone see her wield it if it's what it takes for them to follow her.

unrelated but still about the bow: we see other weapons of true ice or containing true ice, like braum's shield being encrusted with true ice, olaf's axes being tempered with it, trundle's club and sejuani's weapons, but i think it's interesting ashe's bow is the only one entirely made of true ice, with no handle or parts that are made of more ordinary materials. i also think it makes it more difficult to wield, even for an iceborn — because although it's said only the iceborn can wield true ice, it's also suggested some preparation can be done and that it's painful nonetheless. in her short story, ashe says even after a long time with the bow it is still painful to use it (in the way holding anything made of ice for too long would be, i imagine), she just learned to deal with the feeling and let the cold clear her mind instead of being a hindrance. and i just think it'd make sense that the more true ice there is in a weapon, the harder it'll be to wield and withstand the cold.

basically i think it's powerful as a weapon and difficult to master as anything entirely made of true ice would be, but i also think its symbolic significance is very important, perhaps the most important reason why it's ashe's bow. of course, she wouldn't settle for a common one instead of a true ice one because the true ice weapon is just more powerful (it does conjure ice arrows from nothing, and the falcon spirit that grants her sight). but say there was some other true ice bow, this one is the one people believe belonged to avarosa, and it makes people listen and brings them to her cause and that's also part of why it's important to ashe.

there's the personal bond too, of course. she found it as a teenager, after losing her entire tribe, because her mother's desperate quest to find the throne of avarosa led her to the bow. it saved her life; it's what her mother and her fathers sacrificed themselves for her to get. it's just deeply tied to tragedy and legacy and purpose and solace at the same time. over the years, i'd say it became a source of comfort, too, and that she's usually ill at ease if her bow is too far, regardless of having other weapons.

[mirrorsoftheotherself]

Some self-indulgent(?) rambles about how I developed this whole AU-

Originally, the whole role swap idea was random and simple. Swap the Personas with their Users. The whole thing of the original story came... I dunno... A few weeks after I had the concept? And it was just the basics. I used a couple old Rinmaru dressup games to get a baseline concept for the Mirror Trio and their Personas. i had their names. I had the premise.

After that, through RP, I gradually expanded upon them as characters.

At first, Messiah Anima was simply just Messiah. However, I renamed him to how he's named now to help differentiate him.

I wanted to make a fangame but that went nowhere unfortunately due to a lot of things being beyond my scope. But it was through the early days of it that I got the first proper references for everyone. Big shoutout to Jamhardt on Instagram for that.

I also learned a few things in terms of RPG Maker-

It took me many, MANY hours to get Messiah Anima's model done. The model assembly process became much more easier thanks to the help of a lot of helpful people from the VRChat community. This also lead me to improve my own 3D modeling skills, even making some models from scratch!

I have 24 chapters (each of varying length) in the fanfic so far. I want to continue updating but the battery for that is still low. I'll get to it eventually... But I've already got a good start!

And it's so amazing to me how far I've come skill-wise because of this whole thing... How much has evolved over time...

Which is funny because I said at one point that the whole story is like an analogy to the struggles of an artist of any form. There are so many possibilities and what-ifs out there that you are able to bring to life with what you create or with your actions in life. So many ideas to come up with. But, with every step, something will get in your way of that. Something that might make you give up.

Maybe you're not in a sound state of mind to do anything; the emotional distress from whatever may be plaguing you (tragedy, illness, etc) might take away that spark and leave you drained. Maybe it just doesn't feel the same as before. Maybe it all lost its charm....

Maybe you're in a place where you're overworking yourself. Maybe you were put on a pedestal (either of your own will or so suddenly) and want to make sure you please everyone. Maybe you're afraid of what might happen when it all crumbles. Maybe you lose sight of your self along the way. You might be so close to burning out due to all of that pressure...

Maybe you just want to do the right thing but so many factors make it hard to do so. When the bad speaks louder than the good... When manipulations run rampant... When you can be taken out of context so much which can lead to many things of detriment... There's so much that can overwhelm you even when you do want to fight for the sake of what's right or even just to protect those you care for. When will it be too much? Will you just become complacent instead of resistant? Maybe you'll end up keeping everything you stand for to yourself out of fear...

But you can heal. You can grow beyond these uncertainties and doubts. While it all may linger, you learn to deal with them. You may have your bad days but that doesn't mean good days aren't on the horizon. You still have so much more you can give, even if you don't think so. You can still create.

You can still regain that spark.

You can still be vulnerable, find your self, and know your limits.

You can still fight.

And through that healing... Through fighting against the temptation to give up... You can create something wonderful. The road is rough, scary, and long... But that doesn't mean it's impossible to traverse. Not everyone crosses that road the same way of course. Cross it how you feel is best for you.

I think having that theme in place for a story based within an alternate universe of all places speaks volumes to me. What is a fanwork if not a well of creativity? You can take a simple concept but your vision of it can be different from another's. And while it may be a shame that some works out there never get a chance to continue developing, it's still amazing that they got to exist at all despite it... That we still get to enjoy them.

This whole AU has existed for over two years now. I hold everything so dear to my heart due to how much it helped me grow as a person... Even if that growth was mainly in my skillset. I'm glad I get to share it with everyone.

The story isn't over. The blog may portray everything after the plot concludes but that doesn't mean the story isn't being written still. There's a lot to think about... And it's a challenge to portray the boys as they were at the start when I mainly portray them after the end. But, as a writer, it's a challenge I'm willing to take.

I also hope I conveyed my point well.

[khangthecinephile]

Silver Linings Playbook (2012): My review

The winter season has arrived, what better way to enjoy the chilly weather than watching a romance movie while snucking inside your warm blanket. One of my personal favorite movies to watch during the winter is Silver Linings Playbook by the director David. O Russell. First presented in 2012, this unique movie has all of the good qualities required in a great romance like the chemistry, the conflict, and even some comedy. No questions why it has been nominated for 8 different Oscars and won 1 of them. 

Quick summary: Silver Linings Playbook tells a story of a man named Pat who had been put in a mental institution for having an unknown mental breakdown. After getting discharged, he comes back and lives with his parents. One time while having dinner at a friend’s house, Pat meets Tiffany, a person who’s also mentally ill, specifically sex addiction. They get on with each other just because of the fact that they both have mental issues and are “crazy.” They make a deal with each other that benefits both of them and from there, their love story begins. 

The first thing that I really like about the movie is that it’s a very well written story. Silver Linings Playbook is really catchy and it got me sucked into it when Tiffany appears. The director and the writers also didn’t rush the story line and let Tiffany and Pat come together very naturally, exactly how I imagined two people that came out of broken relationships would react when getting into another relationship. David Russell even included many comedy details with the participation of Chris Tucker in the role of Pat’s friend from the mental institution. These comedy elements makes the movie become less intense from all the mental health issues of the main characters and makes the movie become more enjoyable in general. I love the way that the director builds up two storylines that are very related to each other. It gives more room for the producers to show more characteristics and different aspects about the characters, especially Pat. 

Silver Linings Playbook is such a relatable movie. Although not everybody has the same mental issues as people in the movie does, we can see how we all have a little bit of craziness inside each of us. Everybody has their own problems like for example, Pat Sr. has OCD. These are all really normal real life problems, real life tragedy and it makes the movie become really realistic and close to the audiences. Director David Russell also did a great job in portraying people with mental health, specifically bipolar disorder. He shows the audiences the suffering, the obstacles that people like Pat and Tiffany have to go through and even the medicines that they have to use or how those meds affect them. 

The performances of the cast in this movie is absolutely amazing. Robert De Niro has really shown his class in the movie and this is easily one of my most favorite De Niro performances of all time. As a person who doesn't really watch a lot of Bradley Cooper’s movies, Cooper has really impressed me with his performance in Silver Linings Playbook. He had really succeeded in playing a character that had been through tragedies and having a lot of inner struggles. Lastly, I really can’t give enough compliments to Jennifer Lawrence for her performance. If I have to use one word to describe Jennifer Lawrence's performance, I would use amazing. From the facial expressions to the way she says the dialogue, in some way she must have felt really connected with her character. Jennifer Lawrence really deserved her Oscar award for this role. 

Silver Linings Playbook is one of the best romances I have ever seen for a long time  and it is up there with the Notebook for one of the best romances of all time in my opinion. This movie is definitely worth rewatching and I hope to hear more discussions about it since it's an underrated movie. Besides portraying mental health problems in a very relatable way, this movie also shows the importance of family, friends and also love in general in any person’s life. It also shows the importance of entertainment and art when dancing has helped Tiffany and Pat so much in dealing with their problems, art is the thing that has connected them. David. O Russell has created such a unique love story of two “crazy” but also inspiring people.  

[ysds]

I’ve finished Pentiment and I don’t know man. RAMBLINGS BELOW.

Wow, what a clickbait. For sure I feel very emotional and connected to Andreas as protagonist, as I am also artist dealing with depression and desire to run away and hide from anything that is too much to bear, while still nurse the guilt, but I am not sure about depth of themes and critique. I see often comparisons to Disco Elysium and Pathologic but story wise I would’t compare Pentiment to mentioned stories as with amount of themes or intricate of narrative. Although because of simplicity of storytelling I don’t think the Pentiment is a bad story to experience, or a game to go through. For sure is emotional, and there is nothing wrong with universal messages since for a reason they are universal, but I have doubts if I will have different thoughts or new discoveries if I replay the game at some point in the future. Nevertheless the amount of research and love to detail, choice with art direction on every branch (not only visuals but audio) is something I have to ave about. It is really feels as it was made fully conscious with other reasons than to fit the budget. Another thing that I enjoy and I will think about in next days is how the game is in-between natural and supernatural, that every event can be explained by both, without interrupting each other, and this theme is always ingame. Even with dramatic scooby-doo reveal of the real culprits the events can be still interpret as effects of will of supernatural being and will of human being at the same time, even if motivation is different. On another note, Father Thomas reveal was very... true crime. I can see a long podcast/youtube video about him and his case. 

Another thing I think is how the game is trying to be our world and personal/mind world at the same time as Andreas is going through cathartic misery and then conclusion and tries to move out of his mental illness by solving the crimes that cursed the Tassig. Which idk, it worked? But not like... that I am truly sold? Maybe this love needs to be worked out by both sides. As I am in euphoric phase freshly out of crying during mural reveals. Good or even great game? For sure, but if this is a game that will shape new path and be changing for other creators and game developers? Maybe, but I doubt. I do hope it will become a cult classic, it deserves the crazy niche people to be obsessed with it for over decades. I regret my game choices as I feel like I missed a lot of stuff, and my decisions could path for those game character a little bit better life. But what do I know. Life is full of miseries, but there is hope and some good coming out of them. Just like this game is, a wholesome one even tho is full of tragedy and melancholy.

[lorenfangor]

I heard that #40 was super homophobic :/ so I skipped it. But now your fic is making me want to give it a try. How problematic is it? Are the characters worth it?

Okay.

Okay.

Let’s talk about #40.

The plot of The Other (a Marco POV) is that Marco sees an Andalite on a video tape sent in to some Unsolved Mysteries-esque TV show, and he assumes it’s Ax and hauls ass to save him from being captured. Ax, being Ax, has videotaped the show, and they pull it up and Tobias uses his hawk eyes to figure out that it’s not Ax, it’s another Andalite - one without a tailblade. Ax is appalled at the presence of this vecol (an Andalite word for a disabled person) and we find out that he and others of his species have deep ingrained prejudices against at least some kinds of disabled people.

Despite this, Marco and Ax go looking for the Andalite in question because he’s been spotted by national TV, and they meet a second one, named Gafinilan-Estrif-Valad. The vecol is Mertil-Iscar-Elmand, a former fighter pilot with a reputation and Gafinilan’s coded-gay life partner. The two of them have been on Earth since book 1; they crashed their fighters on the planet and have been trapped there thanks to the GalaxyTree going down. Gafinilan has adopted a human cover, a physics professor, and they’ve been living in secret ever since.

Thanks to that tape, Mertil has been captured by Visser Three, and he’s not morph-capable so he can’t escape. Gafinilan wants to trade the leader of the “Andalite Bandits” to the Yeerks to get his boyfriend back; he can’t fight to free Mertil because he’s terminally ill with a genetic disorder that will eventually kill him, and (it’s implied that) the Yeerks aren’t interested in disabled hosts, even disabled Andalite ones. Despite Ax’s ableism, the Animorphs agree to work with Gafinilan and free Mertil, and they’re successful. Marco ends the book talking about how there are all kinds of prejudices you’ll have to face and boxes that people will put you in, and you can’t necessarily escape them even if they’re reductive and inaccurate, but you can still live your life with pride.

So now that I’ve explained the plot, I’m gonna come out the gate saying that I love this book. I love it wholeheartedly, I love Marco’s narration, I love Ax having to deal with Andalite society’s ableism, I love these characters, and as a disabled lesbian I don’t find these disabled gays to be inherently Bad Rep.

that’s of course just my opinion and it doesn’t overshadow other issues that people might have? but at the same time, I don’t like the seemingly-common narrative that this book is all bad all the time, and I want to offer up a different read.To that end, I’m going to go point by point through some of the criticisms and common complaints that I’ve seen across the fandom over the years.

“Mertil and Gafinilan were put on a bus after one appearance because they were gay!”

this is one I’m going to have to disagree with hardcore. I talked about this yesterday, but in Animorphs there are a lot of characters or ideas that only get introduced once or twice and then get written off or dropped - in order off the top of my head, #11 (the Amazon trip), #16 (Fenestre and his cannibalism), #17 (the oatmeal), #18 (the hint of Yeerks doing genetic experiments in the hospital basement), #24/#39/#42 (the Helmacrons’ ability to detect morphing tech), #25 (the Venber), #28 (experiments with limiting brain function through drugs), #34 (the Hork-Bajir homeworld being retaken, the Ixcila procedure), #36 (the Nartec), #41 (Jake’s Bad Future Dream), and #44 (the Aboriginal people Cassie meets in Australia) all feature things that either seem to exist just for the sake of having a particular trope explored Animorphs-style or to feature an idea for One Single Book.

This is a series that’s episodic and has a very limited overall story arc because of how children’s literature in the 90s was structured - these books are closer to The Saddle Club, Sweet Valley High, Animal Ark, or The Baby-Sitters’ Club than they are to Harry Potter or A Series of Unfortunate Events. Mertil and Gafinilan don’t get to be in more than one book because they’re not established in the main cast or the supporting cast, I don’t think that it’s solely got anything to do with their being gay.

“Gafinilan has AIDS, this is a book about AIDS, and that’s homophobic!”

Okay, this is… hard. First, yes, Gafinilan does have a terminal illness. Yes, Gafinilan is gay. No, Soola’s Disease is not AIDS.

I have two responses to this, and I’ll attack them in order of their occurrence in my thought. First, there’s coded AIDS diseases all over genre fiction, especially genre fiction from that era, because the AIDS epidemic made a massive impact on public life and fundamentally changed both how the public perceived illness and queerness and how queer people themselves experienced it. I was too young to live through it, but my dad’s college roommate was out, and my dad himself has a lot of friends who he just ceases to talk about if the conversation gets past 1986 or so - this was devastating and it got examined in art for more reasons than “gay people all have AIDS”, and I dislike the implication that the only reason it could ever appear was as a tired stereotype or a message that Being Queer Means Death. Gafinilan is kind, fond of flowers, and fond of children - he’s multifaceted, and he’s got a terminal illness. Those kinds of people really exist, and they aren’t Bad Rep.

Second off, Soola’s Disease? Really isn’t AIDS. It’s a congenital genetic illness that develops over time, cannot be transmitted, and does not carry a serious stigma the way AIDS did. Gafinilan also has access to a cure - he could become a nothlit and no longer be afflicted by it, even if it’s considered somewhat dishonorable to go nothlit to escape that way. That’s not AIDS, and in fact at no point in my read and rereads did I assume that his having a terminal illness was supposed to be a commentary on homosexuality until I found out that other people were assuming it.

“Mertil losing his tail means he’s lost his masculinity, and that’s bad because he’s gay! That’s homophobic!”

so this is another one I’ve gotta hardcore disagree with, because while Mertil is one of two Very Obviously Queer Characters, he’s not the only character who loses something fundamental about himself, or even loses access to sexual and/or romantic capability in ways he was familiar with.

Tobias and Arbron both get ripped out of their ordinary normal lives by going nothlit in bad situations, and while they both wind up finding fulfillment and freedom despite that, it’s still traumatic, even more for Arbron I’d say than for Tobias. And on a psychological level, none of the main cast is left unmarked or free of trauma or free of deep change thanks to the bad things that have happened to them - they’re no less fundamentally altered than Mertil, even if it’s mental rather than physical. And yes, tail loss is equated with castration or emasculation, but that doesn’t automatically mean Mertil suffering it is tied to his homosexuality and therefore the takeaway we’re intended to have is “Being gay is tragic and makes you less of a man”. This is a series where bad shit happens to everyone, and enduring losses that take away things central to one’s self-conception or identity or body is just part of the story.

Also, frankly? Plenty of IRL disabled people have to grapple with a loss of sexual function, and again, they’re not Bad Rep just because they’re messy.

“Andalite society is confusingly written in this book, and the disability aspects are clearly just a coverup for the gay stuff!”

Andalite society is canonically sexist, a bit exceptionalist and prejudiced in their own favor, and pretty contradictory and often challenged internally on its own norms. In essence, it’s a pretty ordinary society, and they’re really realistic as sci-fi races go. It makes sense from that perspective that Andalites would tolerate scarring or a lost stalk eye or a lost skull eye, but not tolerate serious injuries that significantly impact your perceived quality of life. Ableism is like that - it’s not one-size-fits-all. I look at Ax’s reactions and I see a lot of my own family and friends’ behaviors - this vibes with my understanding of prejudice, you know?

“Mertil and Gafinilan have a tragic ending, which means the story is saying that being gay dooms you to tragedy!”

Mertil and Gafinilan have the best possible ending that they could ask for? They are victims of the war, they are suffering because of the war, they get the same cocktail of trauma and damage that every other soldier gets. But unlike Jake and Tobias and Marco, unlike Elfangor, unlike Aximili? Their ending comes in peace, in their own home. Gafinilan isn’t dying alone, he’s got the love of his life with him. Mertil isn’t going to be as isolated anymore, he’s got Marco for a friend. Animorphs is a tragedy, it’s not a happy story, it’s not something that guarantees a beautiful sunshine-and-roses ending for everyone, and I love tragedy, and so I will fight for this story. Yes, it hurts. Yes, it deserved better. But it’s not less meaningful just because it’s sad. Nobody is entitled to anything in this book, and it’s just as true for these two as it is for anyone else.

“It’s not cool that the only canonically gay characters in this series don’t get to be happy and trauma-free and unblemished Good Rep!”

This is one I can kind of understand, and I’ll give some ground to it, because it is sucky. The only thing I’ll say is that I stand by my argument that nothing that happens to Mertil and Gafinilan is unusual compared to what happens to the rest of the cast, and that their ending is way happier than Rachel and Tobias’s, or Jake and Cassie’s. But it’s a legitimate point of frustration, and the one argument I’ll say I agree has validity.

(Though, I also want to point out that I think there are plenty of equally queercoded characters in the story who aren’t Mertil and Gafinilan - Tobias, Rachel, Cassie, and Marco all get at least one or two moments that signal to me that they’re potentially LGBT+, not to mention Mr. Tidwell and Illim in #29 and their long-term domestic partnership. There’s no reason to assume that the only queer people here are those two aliens when Marco’s descriptions of Jake exist.)

“Marco uses slurs and reduces Gafinilan’s whole identity to his illness!”

Technically, yes, this is true, except putting it that way strips the whole passage of its context. Marco is discussing the boxes society puts you into, the ones you don’t have a choice about facing or escaping. He’s talking about negative stereotypes and reductive generalizations, he’s referring to them as bad things that you get inflicted upon you by an outside world or by friends who don’t know the whole story or the real you. The slurs he uses are real slurs that get thrown at people still, and they’re not okay, and the point is that they’re not okay but assholes are going to call you by them anyway. He ends by saying “you just have to learn to live with it”, and since this is coming from a fifteen-year-old Latino kid who we know is picked on by bullies for all sorts of reasons and who faces racism and homophobia? He knows what he’s talking about. He’s bitter about what’s been said and done, he’s not stating it like it’s a good thing.

Yes, absolutely, this speech is a product of its time, but it’s a product of its time that speaks of defiance and says “We aren’t what we’re said to be,” and in the year this was published? That’s a good message.

tl;dr The Other is good, actually, and Mertil and Gafinilan are incredible characters who deserve all the love they could possibly get.

[tiesthatbind-tf]

I accidentally deleted 2000 words of story for poor Soundwave last night and had to rewrite everything but tbh, they’re absolutely worthit.  Their armor definitely makes me want to experiment with Celtic motifs for Hot Rod!

Full story below.

Suraya Widodo was born to parents Wijaya and Ni Made Saraswati on the island of Madura, Indonesia. They noticed that something didn’t quite seem right with their baby, who was fussier than most, threw fits when brought into crowded spaces and seemed mostly lost in their own thoughts, though this did little to dampen their love.

The name ‘Widodo’ (healthy) was given to Suraya (despite the masculine nature of it, which does lend to Suraya’s nonchalance about their gender in later years) in hopes that they would grow up alright despite their quirks.

Wijaya, a fisherman who wanted to give his family a better life in the more industrialized town of Bangkalan west of the island, pushed himself hard at his work, hoping to earn enough to allow them to settle down there comfortably.

He began to risk venturing out into ocean areas which were occasionally used as smuggling routes where more lucrative catches laid, careful to fish there during specific times to the day to avoid crossing paths with pirates and smugglers.

However, his luck ran out one day when a smuggling vessel came across him in broad daylight and silenced him from alerting the coast guards to their existence with five shots.

Suraya was five.

Saraswati, desperate to find a way to care for her child as the new breadwinner thought she had gotten lucky when a job scouter for a factory in Bangkalan came to the village. They were looking to offer work to single mothers as part of their corporate responsibility programme and extended the offer of employment to her and promised a hostel and training so she wasn’t out of her depth in the assembly line.

Seeing it as the best option, she left Suraya with her husband’s family while she worked and lived in a worker’s hostel on weekdays and returned to see Suraya every weekend.

She would give money to the family to care for Suraya in her absence, which was crucial since they weren’t fond of Saraswati (they had not agreed to Wijaya’s marriage) and found Suraya’s odd behavior off-putting and claims of ‘hearing voices’ potentially a sign of mental illness (which was fodder for them to demand even more money from Saraswati with the excuse that Suraya was a handful).

This routine continued until Saraswati was suddenly killed in a factory accident.

Suraya was nine.

The compensation for Saraswati’s death was enough for the family for only a few months and after it dried up, the neglect and abuse began. Though at times it was odd because Suraya seemed to know when they were in a bad mood and when they were looking for an outlet for their anger, and  the child would somehow almost always magically disappear during those times.

Then an agent claiming to be from the government came to see them.

He claimed he had heard about Suraya via their mother and wanted to inspect the child to see if they would qualify for a place in a ‘special school’ for ‘different’ children, and this had sounded tame enough to the family, who allowed him to see the shy, withdrawn little waif.

However Suraya immediately could tell what his true intentions were—-to have them locked up in a testing facility to figure out their ‘mutation’—-and attempted to run, only to be caught by his fellow officers outside the home.

The family was paid compensation for officially relinquishing Suraya’s care to the state, and did so without question, only relieved to be rid of their ‘burden’.

Suraya was taken to facility after facility in the state for the first few years to have a battery of tests, many painful, run on them to figure out their ‘special ability’ as an Outlier and to see if it could be replicated.

When they were in their early teens, they were transported overseas to a different facility as a bargaining chip for intel, tech and the like, coming into the ‘care’ of people who intended to use them as a government asset.

They never saw daylight except during transportation and they began to plan their escape as they studied the facility’s layout.

Their first attempt at escape didn’t go well however; they were caught, dragged back and had their eyes burned and blinded as punishment (at this point they had shown their handlers that their highly-enhanced hearing made them capable of navigating the world in total darkness, so said handlers didn’t not see this as ‘damaging the goods’).

If the handlers thought that the punishment would deter them however, it didn’t; Suraya just became more careful and subtle with the planning of their next attempt.

The second attempt came during a transport session where there were less guards and less access to tech to subdue them, though it came with a problem they did not plan for.

In their first attempt, they had tried escaping into the countryside. In this one, they hurled themselves out completely unprepared into a world louder than any world they had ever known; downtown London on a weekend.

The cacophony completely overwhelmed their senses and they barely managed to crawl-stumble into an alley as bounty hunters were enlisted to track them down.

It was here that they ran into one Ramiro Vasquez (Ravage) who was immediately concerned about their situation and once figuring out the nature of their distress, gave them his headphones to drown out the noise and kept them safe and hidden until the bounty hunters had left.

He then took Suraya back to the rented apartment he shared with Lara Soelberg (Laserbeak) and both agreed to let the waif stay with them for as long as they needed to be alright, and the three formed a little familial unit as Suraya grew deeply fond of the two Beast Men whom they saw as two of the most compassionate people in a horrible world.

Ramiro however understood that Suraya needed tutelage to properly harness and deal with their Outlier ability; having heard whispers of a secret Outlier school run Senator Sharifuddin Waseem (Shockwave) and knowing Sharifuddin as one of the few good men in the Senate, he decided to take the risk and confronted the Senator about the matter, promising to keep the secret a secret in return for helping out Suraya.

As it turned out the threats were not necessary, as Sharifuddin was genuinely  concerned for them and came to see them personally at the apartment. Initially,  Suraya was apprehensive about meeting someone else about their abilities, remembering full well how the first such meeting ended, but to their pleasant surprise, they detected no malice in Sharifuddin’s intentions; only the desire to help.

They agreed to enroll in Sharifuddin’s Outlier institute, coming back home to see Ramiro and Lara every weekend.

They excelled in their classes and soon mastered their ability and knew how to deal with the overstimulation that came from it, to the point where they could walk the streets with no problem.

In the wake of murders of Senators Nikomedes Momus and Gayathri Sharma, Suraya offered to become a spy for Sharifuddin, who was determined to solve the deaths, and Sharifuddin began bringing them to Senate meetings under the guise of them being his new aide.

They caught the eye of Senator Radbourne (RatBat) who seemed to pick up the fact that they were an Outlier, but rather than bring up the matter, requested that they work with him as well on.... matters regarding his constituents with disabilities.

Sharifuddin has his reservations about Radbourne and Suraya knew they were up to no good and both agreed to the arrangement so Suraya could dig up more information about them.

As it turned out, Radbourne was dirty as dirty as politicians came, but he had nothing to do with the murders. Rather, he was mostly preoccupied with an individual named Morgan Trayton (Megatron), the same individual whom Omar Parvez (Orion Pax)  a friend of Sharifuddin’s, had mentioned as a great writer.

Radbourne asked Suraya to track down Morgan with an offer the man hopefully wouldn’t refuse and Suraya, intrigued about this man with what they’d heard about him from Omar, agreed to do so.

They found Morgan in a vast underground fighting ring in Moscow, and after voicing some skepticism about him walking his written talk, he allowed them to peek into his mind to see how genuine and committed he was to his cause, and it took them aback for a bit to meet someone who despite being mired in tragedy, had Sharifuddin’s desire to make a better world and the iron will to back it up.

They pledged themself to be among the first members of Morgan’s rising revolution (which was aided by Omar spreading his writings through an underground press) and told them about Radbourne’s offer to supply weapons and augmentations to increase profits from the pitfighting racket.

Morgan agreed if only to use these exact items against the Senate once he’d acquired an army.

It was during this time with Morgan that they also met Ramsey (Rumble) and Friedel (Frenzy), a pair of dwarf miners who the man had been friends with for years, and almost immediately got along with their boisterous, gregarious natures. 

They continued to be Radbourne’s liaison with Megatron until the start of the Clampdown when they watched Morgan kill the owner of the Pit, free those who wanted their freedom and take those who were loyal to him to meet with Sharifuddin to formally establish a rebellion.

It was about this time that Suraya found out that Radbourne had been conducting illegal experiments on Beast Men, something they took grave offense to, and they kept mining Radbourne for more information about where the experiments were taking place.

Upon finding out, they personally hunted down Radbourne as Stefan Scavarro (Starscream) initiated the Senate massacre to Radbourne’s labs, where he tried to fight them off only to finally find out the true extent of their abilities.

Badly-injured, his attempt at stopping them from freeing the captive Beast Men—-his “property” as he would yell at them—-ended up with him hurled into a genetic splicing pod (commissioned from a ‘Mesothulas’) which he accidentally activated.

The process twisted him into a Rat-Bat-human hybrid, and rather than kill him, Suraya decided to leave the option to the Beast Men he tortured for profit in what they saw as poetic justice.

After those who wanted vengeance were done with Radbourne, Suraya gave the  Beast Men the option of leaving free or coming with them to be a part of Morgan’s revolution which would ensure that they were never mistreated and ostracized by the larger world again.

Two of the Beast Men took up the offer; Bastien Saville (Buzzsaw) and Gan Go-eun (Glit).

When Morgan, confident in Suraya’s abilities asked them  to establish their own division focussed on spying and intel gathering, Suraya chose Ramiro, Lara, Ramsey, Friedel and Bastien to work alongside them.

While Suraya occasionally questions Morgan’s actions, two things they have never questioned are his dedication to his cause and the compassion he shows to those they care for, and it’s enough for them to consider themself a true Decepticon till the day his objectives are achieved.

[troquantary]

Edward Cullen: That Boy Ain’t Right

So I was doing a reread of @therealvinelle 's collection of Twilight metas, as one does, and in "Edward, Denial, and a Human Girlfriend" she mentions that she doesn't believe Edward is sane. I thought, "ha, yeah, he's definitely not," and also, "but wait, what does that mean exactly, please say more about that." But since she's already inundated with asks, I've decided to use my own head-muscle and explore this idea. (TL;DR: I start out more or less organized, synthesize some points Vinelle has made across several posts (and have hopefully linked to them all where relevant but please tell me if not), touch a little on narcissism, then take a hard left into the negative effects of being a telepath.)

Just a couple things to note at the outset, though. Theses have been written already (probably) about Edward as an abuser. Edward being insane doesn't negate that at all; he's definitely an asshole and just...a disaster of a human being. (I find it more funny than anything, but YMMV.) I'm also going to try to avoid talking specifically about mental illness and how it relates (or doesn't relate) to abusive behavior -- that's territory I'm not really equipped to discuss, like at all. My starting point is "Edward has a deeply warped perception of reality," not "Edward has X disorder."

So: deeply warped perception of reality. The evidence? Goes behind a cut, because my one character trait is Verbose.

Vinelle provides a great example of it in the post linked above, which I'll just quote because she does words good: "[Edward] keeps acting like his romance with Bella is a romantic tragedy, and all the cast of Twilight are actors on a stage making it as sublime as possible." Edward's the one to pursue Bella, but he does so with the full belief, from the very beginning, that it will never last; Bella will "outgrow" him, go on her human way, and he can spend the rest of eternity brooding magnificently over his too-short romantic bliss. [Insert premature ejaculation joke.] Turning her is never an option, even though Alice, Noted Psychic, says that romancing Bella will either end with her dead (exsanguinated) or dead (vampire).

This framing, where he's a dark anti-hero in love with -- but never tainting! -- the pure maiden and eventually leaving her in a grand, tragic sacrifice to preserve her soul? It's fucking bonkers. Bella isn't a person to him in this scenario. As Vinelle points out, Bella's never really a person to him at all; he falls in love with his own mental construct, cherry-picking from what he observes of her behavior and her responses to his 20 (thousand) Questions to convince himself that she is the ideal woman.

Bella's not the only one who gets the projection/cardboard-cutout treatment. Edward sees everything and everyone through a highly particular, personalized lens. He filters his entire reality, which we all do to an extent, but the thing with Edward is that he starts with his conclusions and then only pays attention to the evidence that supports those conclusions. Often that evidence consists of what he admits in New Moon are only "surface" thoughts -- but recognizing that limitation doesn't keep him from taking those thoughts as representative of what people are. Edward then becomes absolutely convinced by his own "reasoning" and won't be swayed from what he has decided is Objectively True. It's obvious with Bella; it's also painfully obvious with Rosalie. (Vinelle explains this and brings up Edward's raging Madonna/Whore complex in the same post, so refer to that again -- she's right.)

He also catastrophizes. Everything. Bella's just vibing in her room, rereading Wuthering Heights for the 87th time? She's gonna be hit by a meteor, better sneak into her room while she sleeps. Bella's going to the beach with the filthy mundanes their human classmates? She's gonna fall in the ocean. Jasper's cannibal pals are stopping by for a visit, but know not to hunt in the area? DISASTER, DEFCON 1, ALSO FUCK YOU JASPER FOR EVEN EXISTING IN MY AND BELLA'S SPHERE YOU UNSPEAKABLE BURDEN. Edward must believe that Bella is vulnerable and in near-constant peril, to support the reality he has created in which he is the villain turned protector and maybe?? hero??? (!!!) for his beloved. So when the actual, James-shaped danger arrives, he goes berserk, snarling and flipping his shit and generally not helping the situation. His fantasy demands that Bella remain human, so instead of doing the very thing Alice, Noted Psychic, assures him will neutralize the threat (and not just a threat to Bella, either, but to Bella's family and any other human James might decide to include in the "game"), he vetoes it immediately, no discussion. Bella Must Not Turn, and he sticks to those guns despite James nearly reducing her to ground beef, despite leaving Bella catatonic with depression (but human! success!) in New Moon, despite Aro's order and his family's vote and, let's not forget, Bella's clearly and repeatedly stated desire to be a vampire. It's going to happen. But he doesn't accept it until Renesmee busts out of Bella like the Kool-Aid man and the poor girl's heart finally, unequivocally stops.

Sane people don't behave this way. I don't want to slap labels on Edward, but I can't help but note that he comes across as highly narcissistic. He's the only real person in his universe, the lone player among us NPCs. That probably has a lot to do with him being frozen in the mindset and maturity of a seventeen-year-old boy, but I think it's also just...him, on some fundamental level. His failure to connect with others and recognize them as full, independent beings with their own wants and priorities isn't like Bella's failure -- she's badly depressed. Edward is...something else, and I get the sense that his sanity has been steadily deteriorating over time. And a cursory google of narcissistic traits turns up some familiar-looking stuff. He's self-loathing, yes, but also grandiose; he hates himself for the monster he is (and hates most vampires besides Esme and Carlisle for their monstrosity, too) but still feels superior to humans, to the extent that he felt entitled to human blood and resented Carlisle for depriving him of his "proper" diet. He eventually returns to Carlisle, but he's far from content -- the beginning of Midnight Sun finds him in a state of ennui, bored and dismissive of (if not outright disgusted by) everyone around him, that has apparently persisted for years and years. He doesn't play the piano, he doesn't compose, he doesn't enjoy anything...at least until Bella comes along and then he becomes obsessed to a disturbing degree with her and his new, romantic tragedy spin on reality.

[Next-day edit: I’m not sure where else to fit this in, but the way Edward casually contemplates violence against people who have, at best, mildly annoyed him is...chilling. I have a hard time writing off his strategizing how to murder the entire Biology class as a result of bloodlust -- it’s so calculated, nothing like the blackout state of thirst Emmett describes when he encountered his own “singer,” and that is probably the default for when a vampire is extremely thirsty. But even ignoring the Biology class incident, Edward still does things like consider, with disturbing frequency, how he might grievously injure or kill Mike Newton, all because...Edward considers him his romantic rival (despite Bella barely giving the kid the time of day). He thinks about slapping Mike through a wall, which might be an amusing slapstick image, except as a vampire Edward’s actually capable of turning this boy’s skeleton to a fine powder. So it’s, y’know, kind of sick when you think about it.

But even worse than that, when Bella tells Edward about how she flirted with Jacob to get at that sweet, sweet vampire lore, Edward chuckles and then, after dropping Bella home, flippantly observes that now that the treaty’s broken, why not genocide? I’m not even kidding, it’s right there in Midnight Sun; he seriously thinks about the fact that he’d be technically justified now in wiping out the entire tribe because a teenager tried to impress a girl with a spooky story. That is fucked. Remember, Edward was there with Carlisle when the treaty was first established. He knows how remarkable it is that they even came to a truce in the first place, that it was only ever possible because Carlisle is...well, Carlisle, and that it marks a pretty significant moment in supernatural history. He doesn’t care; he doesn’t respect it, or he’d never think something like “Ha ha, if I went and killed them all, I wouldn’t even be wrong. I mean, I won’t do it, but I’m just saying, I wouldn’t be wrong.”

Again: not the thought process or behavior of a sane person. (Or a person that respects life in general -- sorry Carlisle, big L.)]

Finally, whether he's a narcissist or not, I think the fact that Edward has constant, unavoidable access to everyone's thoughts is a powerful contributing factor to his instability. He can tune out the mental noise to an extent, but he can't stop it -- so he comes to rely on it like another sense. This causes issues with disconnect and lack of empathy, of course, but there's another facet to this shit diamond: he's basically experiencing a ceaseless flow of intrusive thoughts. His narration in Midnight Sun suggests that he "hears" the words people think, can "see" what they visualize in their mind's eye, and can sense the emotional "tone" and intensity of their thoughts. Therefore, perceiving Jasper's thirst through his thoughts makes Edward more aware of his own, "doubling" the discomfort. This would be a lot to deal with even from just his immediate coven members, but Edward gets all of this pouring into his head like a firehose on a day-to-day basis because the Cullens live right alongside humans. I know Meyerpires have galaxy brains or whatever, but that's a ton to process.

Besides the compounding effect on his own thirst when he "feels" the thirst of others, Meyer never suggests that Edward has difficulty separating his own thoughts from other people's; even when he was newly turned, he recognized Carlisle's "voice" in his head as Carlisle's. That would create a whole different host of issues around identity, but it looks like Edward's escaped that particular torment. However, I can easily imagine that what he does experience is just shy of unbearable nonetheless, with an eroding effect on his sanity over decades. He can't sleep to escape it; he's on a dishwater diet and probably (like the rest of his family) experiencing a perpetual, low-grade physical discomfort due to his thirst never being fully satisfied; and he's around far more people than is the norm for vampires -- even discounting all the humans, his own coven is unusually large -- meaning more noise.

Honestly, it would be weirder if he were all there, considering.

And even though I feel like I lost a sense of structure around where I started ranting about telepathy, I've written like 1.5k words about Edward fucking Cullen and I think that's enough for one post.