#living while traumatized

[cuttledreams-bugs]

Invertebrate Tarot:

Card 7: The Lovers

Two parasitic Strepsiptera bound by fate to find each-other in the brief and narrow window they have. A relationship as inevitable as it is violent.

[sukibenders]

Me, watching some YJS fans justify what Shauna did to Mari by using clips of Mari and Jackie giggling in s1 (normal teenage girl things), or Mari speaking the truth and trying to take Jackie's jacket (even though it was the middle of winter and the group were already sharing clothes), with said fans saying that they've would've done worse to Mari in response, acting like that makes them any better:

[what-am-i-doing-in-this-fandom]

I was wondering, does Fiddleford still have a wife in your Halloween au? And if yes, does she know about him being a vampire?

I've been sitting on this ask for a bit, but I think I should finally answer.

In my AU, Fidds is actually pretty old-- not like ancient or anything, but surely a few centuries?

Anyway, so way back, when he was human, he did have a wife and a kid!! But when he got bit and became a vampire, he actually outlived them :(

He tries to think about them often, but it's definitely one of the things he chooses to erase when he creates the memory gun

[the-ace-with-spades]

You know people assume (and like it's their right to do so, its headcanons, etc etc don't come with pitchforks at me) that Bradley's youth queer experience would be very positive given Mav and the implied icemav of it all

But I think instead of making him more open about his sexuality in adulthood (or just unapologetic), it'd give the opposite result

This is to do with that, although he'd see happy queer people (Mav and Ice) behind closed doors, his childhood, mainly in the 80s and 90s, as well as Mav's and Ice's attitudes toward being open about their relationship, would teach him how cruel the world can be and the typical 'better safe than sorry' attitude being queer outside of typical queer spaces brings to many

He could see Mav and Ice love each other very very much, maybe to the point he'd even base his idea of love on them, but he'd also see how much maneuvering would keeping their relationship from the public cost. Sure, there are friends who supported them (flyboys, Carole, etc), but there were also countless people who would destroy their careers and lives if they ever found out (also if Mav ever adopted/fostered him, just suspicions of him being queer could put Bradley back in the system, the way things worked back in the 90s and also given how many fostering agency, even government employed, are christian-lead...)

In the instances someone would come close to discovering it, not only he'd see how distressing it can be but also how much being discovered would cost - whether this is personal safety, job security, respect, etc. And even if the worst didn't come to it, he'd still be left with the foil remarks and hate 'bullying'

As long as DADT was in place, I think he'd be equally if not more careful in comparison to what he had seen while with Mav and/or Ice

If anything I think Jake would have more of the naivety being openly and unashamedly queer takes (whether this is because he grew up in an environment with no visible queer people ergo never saw actual acts of hate toward them, or because he thinks he left the most hateful environment and nothing can be worse than it OR maybe because he is 100% or nothing kind of guy, no matter to what he commits)

[mycenaae]

ravi's little "that's my motto!" about enjoying it while it lasts in 7x09 was likely meant to be a throwaway line to bring him into the conversation, and he does not seem to be saying it cynically at all, but if i think about that line too long in the context of him being a pediatric cancer survivor i will lose what's left of my marbles

[buttercupshands]

Just a break from drawing something else also figuring out height for Loop that I had in my head while playing

Feat. Paper figures! Those guys are now always here

I also don't have a good place to put their first photo on a tree so here you have it.

They had a tree hangout for a minute or two now because it's dangerous to keep them like that for long

[frosting-surfeit]

Deathbed zadf/r where dib can feel his time coming and doesn't want to be immortal but zim begs over and over again with "just a little longer" presenting life saving technology or something

[a2zillustration]

May i request either 4 or 18 for your tav?

18: What would your Tav be doing if they weren't kidnapped on the Nautiloid?

Another question from the original tav prompts list (feel free to ask more, if you'd like!)

[[ All Croissant Adventures (chronological, desktop) ]]

[[ All Croissant Adventures (app) ]]

[serpentface]

Question about Couya! Since she is a bastard what are the reasons about her being brought into the main family by her father. Was it genuine care for his child or a way to save face politically/socially? Is her birth mother alive? Do you think she would have had a better life growing up anywhere else?

This is in large part due to how cultural perceptions and legal punishment of adultery varies between male and female citizens, looped into the very strictly patrilineal kinship system.

By legal definition, the word for 'adultery' applies only to situations where a man has an affair with a married woman, or a married woman has an affair with any man. Other forms of affairs (eg a married man having an affair with an unmarried woman) are wrapped into a broader set of sexual misdemeanors and aren't often charged or punished in practice, and the punishments are comparatively minor (if an unwed woman's father pursues charges, the man in the affair is likely to just pay a fine). On a social level, extramaritial affairs in general are certainly not Approved of and seen as lowly and dishonorable, but the average response is significantly less harsh/more willing to entertain Nuance with men than with women.

In this society there's differentiated shades of bastardry depending on the contexts of the child's birth, as well as a distinction for 'nameless bastards' (has not been claimed by their biological father or maternal grandfather, or claimed in adoption).

a) A child born to an unmarried woman via an unmarried man: non-issue for father, potentially serious social harm for the woman (especially if she has never been married and expected virginal, much less severe as a widow or divorcee). The child will not be notably disadvantaged in of themselves (their status will depend more on whether they are claimed and thus provided the social security of a family patriarch), the father will experience no hard disadvantages in claiming them.

b) A child born to an unmarried woman via a married man: mild sexual misdemeanor for the father carrying levels of social shame, even more serious social harm for the woman (often framed as not just loose but a manipulative Seductress of a married man). The child might experience minor to moderate social disadvantages, the consequences of the father claiming them are purely social and will not typically be severe. (Couya is this)

c) A child born to a married woman via an unmarried or married man: both man and woman have committed a crime and can be severely punished. The biological father can technically claim the child but will be disincentivized from doing so. This is the form of bastardry most comparable to the conventional definition, in that it is heavily stigmatized and has effects on concerns of kinship and inheritance.

In addendum to this, if the adulterous wife's legal husband claims the child, this may be punishable if determined to be active concealment of adultery (which is also a crime), and has EXTREME social consequences either way. (Either you're a cuckold too stupid to notice that your wife has been skipping out on you, or you're a MEGAcuckold adultery-accessory willingly rearing another man's child after being horribly shamed by him).

(This is separate from adoption- a man who marries a woman with an unclaimed child after the fact (whether it was a product of adultery or just a general out of wedlock birth) and claims the child is an adoptive father, he is not concealing adultery or being cuckolded.)

A child born in an affair can be considered an heir to their biological fathers (descent and kinship is fully patrilineal and on a Basic level it doesn't matter who the mother is), and can very smoothly and legally be claimed when the affair was not considered criminal adultery. The concern on that front is social perception rather than material legal consequences or kinship issues.

Couya's birth mother was an unwed servant working as a housekeeper for her father Saizen, so the Crime of adultery did not take place. It would be considered a minor sexual misdemeanor, and the woman's father was not about to pursue charges against a nobleman who could Ruin him (and had also formally expressed that he would claim the child, which meant he would not be saddled with a nameless bastard granddaughter). So the concerns here were entirely social.

The affair might have started beforehand but the pregnancy that produced Couya occurred after his wife's third viable pregnancy ended in the premature birth of a underdeveloped boy deemed necessary to euthanize (and tbr would Not have survived either way). This was after Livya Haidamane had a couple early term miscarriages, two viable but very difficult pregnancies wherein one child was very weak and sickly for the first several years of life, and struggled to conceive every time. A lot of people are going to be at least a little sympathetic to a married man having an affair and claiming a bastard in this context. It's definitely ideal and practical to have more than two children, and his wife (while not outright infertile) clearly could not reliably bear healthy children. (The average response is going to be "Well he shouldn't have done it but like, I get it")

Couya being claimed by her father was a mix of genuine care and saving face. Initially it was MUCH more the latter than the former. Saizen made attempts to hide the servant's pregnancy and to keep his own wife out of sight during the late term (to prevent the baby appearing after his wife had been seen Extremely not pregnant). But there's some levels of care involved, he could very easily have fired the pregnant servant and had nothing to do with his bastard and she would have no recompense whatsoever. The choice to keep and claim the baby and ensure its entrance into the world bore as little social scrutiny as possible is an act of care for his own progeny.

This was Not an act of care for Couya's birth mother (beyond the fact that concealing her pregnancy would benefit her in hiding that she is not only Not a virgin prior to marriage but had a child). She probably would have been about 17-19 at the time and was fired a few months after giving birth, and most likely never saw Couya again after this point (if she did, it would most likely be in the context of seeing her as an adult Odonii in public and noting her to look Scarily familiar). She has an Okayish chance at still being alive, she'd be around 50 (and a person who survives the high infant mortality and birth casualty rates stands a good chance of hitting their 60s), though she could very well be a casualty of the drought+famine.

Whether or not Couya's life would have been better is kind of a mixed bag. She had an awful fucking childhood in large part because her adoptive mother Livya Haidamane hated her. (Livya was ultimately a pretty horrible person but not just like. An Evil Bitch. She had A Lot going on and Couya was a living breathing insult to her and reminder of like, every one of her dashed hopes and dreams). Couya is also autistic and presented very intense symptoms as a child in a society that is Not equipped for a mass-understanding and support of cognitive differences. But she still did have an immensely privileged life with profound physical/economic levels of security inaccessible to the vast majority of people in this region, including her birth mother. Saizen also actually Liked her and cared about her, he just wasn't a routine physical presence in any of his children's lives.

Had she been left with her biological mother, she would be in a very disadvantaged situation as a nameless bastard to an unwed mother. Her biological grandfather may or may not have been willing to claim her, and her mother would have great difficulties in finding a husband (which is ultimately necessary for the security of women in this society). I think her mother was a relatively kind person but not like, a perfect angel. She would probably have complicated feelings about her bastard daughter, especially one whose very existence materially disadvantages her and was very, very difficult as a child. So this probably would not have been a good situation for Couya either.

If you broaden the question to ANY other family completely divorced from the circumstances of her birth, yeah it definitely could have been better. But in her case it's like either "Life of grotesque socioeconomic privilege but in an abusive household" or "Life of profound socioeconomic disadvantages in a household that Probably wouldn't have been this abusive but certainly wouldn't be healthy". There wasn't really a good option for her.

[palettepainter]

It's 8am watching DanandPhil play Poppy Playtime Chapter 4 and crying again over the Doey VHS tape

[ramenrescue]

Don't mind me I'm just yapping about Kaiba and Ishizu again

i'm just thinking about how Ishizu's calling Seto Kaiba "Seto" (Kanji) inadvertently appeals to the person he has always been from the moment he was born. Inadvertently because her calling him Seto (Kanji) allows Takahashi to more subtly switch to Seto (Katakana) for some Ancient Egyptian Foreshadowing. And I, in the good year of our lord 2025 reading the Yugioh manga for the first time with my rose-tinted shipper googles, am making a mountain out of a mole hill. REGARDLESS--

It's similar to how Mokuba calls him Big Brother: Kaiba has always been "big brother" since the moment Mokuba was born. He became "Kaiba" through the process of fighting his way up to the top. Kaiba is the name that he won. Seto is the name he was given.

And his subordinates do call him Seto-sama to differentiate between him and Mokuba. Of course. But ME over here with my shipper goggles wonders if he got a bit of a shock when this random woman he's meeting for the first time goes from "Mister Kaiba" to straight up "Seto". No honorifics. Overly familiar and out of place. The only other person I've seen up to this point in the manga call him Seto was "the hair guy" in Duelist Kingdom who was actively trying to kill him, so it was like, Seto (disrespectful) whereas with Ishizu it's Seto (neutral). I wonder when was the last time he heard Seto (neutral) or Seto (positive): was it before his dad died in a car accident when he was 8 years old?

I wonder if her over-familiar-ness is also a result of the Ancient Egyptian Foreshadowing. After all, they were colleagues and on a first-name basis in the B.C. era, which I am sure Ishizu has seen visions of.

Anyway I don't know where i'm going with this. I was just thinking hmm, something something symbolic about how "Kaiba" is a culmination of his competitive spirit and "Seto" encompasses everything about him since birth, including his competitive nature, of course, but also all of the softness to which Mokuba and their deceased parents bore witness.

[geddy-leesbian]

my problem is that I have very little interest in Ashley interacting with the characters she canonically interacts with tbh. like I want to see both post RE4 Ashley and post RE4 Serrennedy, but not post RE4 Ashley and Serrennedy, y'know? let Ashley be on her own or with a woman. (platonically or romantically idc just need her with a woman tbh) she doesn't need to be shackled to the loser that saved her once for the rest of her life.

[holmsister]

Kinda gets me when people age them down in AUs and stuff because to me those characters wouldn't be half as interesting if Chilchuck, Senshi and Mithrun were the tallman equivalent of in their twenties

[justmenoworries]

"Oooo Adam has a right to hate Lucifer, Lucifer took Lilith and Eve away from him"

Adam was an abusive asshat to Lilith. Lilith chose to be with the one who actually respected her and didn't demand she be solely his submissive hanger-on.

"From the dust of Earth, [the angels] created Adam and Lilith. Equals as the first of mankind, but despite this, Adam demanded control, and Lilith refused to submit to his will. She fled the Garden."

"Drawn in by her fierce independence, Lucifer found her and the two rebellious dreamers fell deeply in love."

2. Lucifer didn't "take" Eve. He offered her the forbidden fruit and she accepted.

"Together, [Lilith and Lucifer] wished to share the magic of free will with humanity, offering the Fruit of Knowledge to Adam's new bride, Eve, who gladly accepted."

We don't know what happened after aside from the fact that apparently because Eve took the fruit "evil" was let in to the world the angels created. Since humanity still, y'know, exists, we can gather that Eve stayed with Adam and they had kids like in the original myth.

3. It really says a lot that this wording denies Eve and Lilith any actual agency in what happened in favor of pushing all the blame and responsibility on Lucifer and making Adam out to be a poor uwu misunderstood baby. The misogyny is strong in this one.

[witchmd13]

everyone on my dash and around me irl is traumatized by sunrise on the repeaing and now im terrified of starting it lol i cried for an hour while holding the book to my chest after finishing mockingjay and that had a somewhat happy ending. this book will end me.

[rat-rosemary]

Mmmmmmmm Dnn au where Sapnap and George are both selkies and they haven't told Dream but he knows, and he doesn't blame them for not telling him, he gets it, and they always keep their furs hidden until one day someone breaks into their home and steals their furs, and while the two of them are freaking out because this is literally the worst case scenario ever and what are they going to even tell Dream, Dream goes after the guys and just kills them

Except Dream fucked up and now he's freaking out because he got fucking blood on their coats! He can't give the coats back with blood in them, that would be so rude and gross and what if the blood sticks to it after it dries????

So Sapnap and George suddenly feel a new pair of hands touch their coats, different from the ones that had grabbed and thrown it around and hidden. No, these hands tremble slightly as they touch their furs and they feel so familiar and then there's the feeling of water which... is very weird? What the fuck is happening to their coats??

But yeah, Dream washes the blood off and them puts the coats in the drier on a low setting with a bunch of towels (which is a very very weird feeling to Sapnap and George) and he leaves the coats on their beds without them seeing and now they kinda smell like the laundry cleaner Dream uses and it drives George and Sapnap insane (/pos)