#look it's not that he's incapable of understanding the concept of illness. obviously.

[flatstarcarcosa]

karnaka when i'm trying to explain to him if i eat or drink certain things my body thinks we're under attack and responds by actually attacking itself in its confusion

[blankjournal]

Hi! I'm the anon that asked about the 'romanticising mental illness' question. I'm sorry, I'm still a little bit confused! I asked my friend about it and he said that even the popular concept of the main character (MC1) having, for example, anxiety or depression and then the other main character (MC2) coming into their lives and help them throughout, he sees it as a hint of 'romanticising mental illness' because it seems like the MC2 is 'fixing' MC1 and that without MC2, MC1 would never 'be normal'. Personally, even though I can see why he interprets it this way, I feel like the whole idea of 'fixing' is just another perspective. Personally this popular concept makes me feel giddy and excited but I understand his perspective too.

I'm not sure whether you've reblogged any of these types of popular concept in books/fanfiction but when does this concept become a hurt/comfort genre to a 'romanticising mental illness' genre.

I apologise for any inconveniences that I may have caused with this ask.

Hello again, anon! No worries at all and I'm so sorry for delaying your answer for a few days because I have been busy :')

To start off, I can agree with your friend's view as well (to an extent). The hurt/comfort genre, especially ones who put a (often) anxious or depressed reader as their subject, is a tricky place to navigate through. Especially for inexperienced writers who actually want to do good by producing something that can be of help to readers looking for some comfort, but end up writing something that ends up infantilizing and/or portraying them as incapable and crippled to the point where the other character is the only thing that is keeping them together and is their sole lifeline— their saviour.

In real life, there are cases where this rings true and people do genuinely struggle to function without someone's help, but that said person is just that: help. You require professional intervention and medical/psychiatric assistance and not some love interest to heal in the long term. Fics often make MC1 go through hell, but be completely fine again once MC2 is there to get them through it and that's just not realistic at all. They can be of help, but are very often unqualified.

I think for a hurt/comfort fic to not end up as a romanticization is for the hurt character to actually make progress within the story and show how healing comes from within oneself (with the help of others, obviously) and not because some character comes and kisses it away. One big flaw I find with fics like this on this site is that they're usually too short to really dive into the process of healing and wrap it up with just the love interest coming and making it all go away for reader, most popular cases are with panic attacks (in this case, helping someone getting through it is totally valid!!) and depression. In the end, the love interest should (for me, at least) serve as a distraction from the pain in hand, not be the actual solution to the trauma or mental struggle that the reader is going through.

It's really tricky, as I said, because the line for everyone varies. Some say it is, some say it isn't. People want to read hurt/comfort fics for a reason and it's understandable that they crave the comfort it gives (I like them as well!), but it sets unrealistic expectations. Knights in shining armour aren't the solution to crippling depression or anxiety or mania or ocd, etc. They can help only to a certain extent. As long as the story does not make the love interest be this magical cure for reader's problems, then I don't think it's an issue at all.

Then again, one's experience dealing with mental health isn't the same as the millions of others, so maybe some people really do heal just by being with their own love interest, so I don't know. Maybe love is all someone needs, who knows? This is, again, just my opinion and it varies for everyone. People (and I, too) don't immediately read a hurt/comfort story and think "this is a romanticization and it's harmful", instead it's more in the "aw good for them, they have someone to help get them through this".

It's pretty blurry, so as long as the story isn't telling you that you don't need to seek out professional help and your boyfriend is your saviour and will get you through this terrible terrible thing then it's not a problem, I guess. There are great fics in this genre! Plus, they're great to get through lonely times.

— admin vienna

[snekdood]

~hidden between the branches and leaves

lies a hundred stars beyond the trees~

about:

hi u can call me snake or animal, im a shapeshifting trickster elf, im a man, im 26, he/him, and im a vegan (but not annoying about it, and no, none of my vegan takes are about targeting native americans tyvm 😌 idgaf what they do.), anti fascist, solarpunk and eco friendly, and i really like to draw, cook, garden, sew, carve and make bead bracelets with gemstones and learn new things and grow and change everyday :^) oh also i like weed 🌿 ओम नमः शिवाय

im not perfect, but neither are you, so lets make it work.

stay wyrd ✌️

art | comic → deviant art | insta | youtube | twitch | links | hate mail

to whom it may concern, here’s information you definitely don’t need to know about from my bio at all and probably haven’t even earned the right to know about but that ppl will demand out of me regardless surely: 

BASICALLY IM OFTEN SEEN AS “WHITE” BY PEOPLE AND SOMETIMES NOT AND IT USUALLY DEPENDS ON HOW THEY FEEL ABOUT ME MOMENT TO MOMENT, LEFTISTS BEING CHARITABLE ABOUT ME TRY TO SEE ME AS BEING MIXED, LEFTISTS BEING UNCHARITABLE ABOUT ME TRY TO SEE ME AS WHITE, RWINGERS BEING CHARITABLE TOWARDS ME TRY TO SEE ME AS WHITE, RWINGERS BEING UNCHARITABLE TO ME TRY TO SEE ME AS MIXED, MAKE OF THAT WHAT YOU WILL. I DO NOT CONTROL HOW PEOPLE TREAT ME. I DO NOT OWE YOU DISCLOSING WHAT ETHNICITIES I HAVE IN ME ESP SINCE I DONT EVEN REALLY KNOW ANYWAYS. WHITENESS IS A FAKE USELESS DIVISIVE CONCEPT CREATED BY WHITE SUPREMACISTS. YES I UNDERSTAND WE NEED TO HAVE CONVOS ABOUT IT SINCE THEY MADE UP THE TERM AND A LOT OF “WHITE” PPL ARE ATTACHED TO THEIR PRIVILEGE OF BEING SEEN AS WHITE. BUT ULTIMATELY IT IS A TERM I THINK WE NEED TO GET RID OF. “THE MASTERS TOOLS WILL NOT DISMANTLE THE MASTERS HOUSE”, ETC. I THINK DISCUSSIONS ABOUT COLORISM IS MORE USEFUL, BUT STILL ULTIMATELY DIVIDES PEOPLE INTO BOXES THAT PPL CANT EVEN AGREE ON SO IDK. I THINK CULTURE IS MORE IMPORTANT AND TELLS YOU MORE ABOUT SOMEONE THAN SKIN COLOR/TONES, AND ALL YA GOTTA KNOW IS IM A EMO MIDWESTERN MURICAN’ WHO’S BASICALLY HAD TO INVENT MY OWN CULTURE FOR MYSELF. I'VE NOT BEEN MISTAKEN FOR BEING BLACK, I DO NOT HAVE DARK SKIN, AND DONT CLAIM TO BE BLACK OR ANYTHING LIKE THAT. SOME PPL ASSUME IM OF SWANA OR NATIVE AMERICAN DESCENT SOMETIMES, BUT IDK WTF IM MIXED WITH ENTIRELY. I DONT CLAIM TO BE MIXED OR ANYTHING EITHER BC I DONT FUCKIN KNOW, BUT IM ALSO NOT WILLING TO SHARE WHAT ALL I DO KNOW I’M MIXED WITH, BC YALL CANT BE TRUSTED TO NOT PUT THINGS IN PRISTINE, NO LINE-BLURRING, B/W BOXES THE WAY WHITE SUPREMACISTS WANT YOU TO DO. I’M NOT GONNA CLAIM THAT IM NOT WHITE, OBVIOUSLY SOME PPL PERCEIVE ME TO BE, BUT IM ALSO NOT GONNA SAY THAT I AM BC I DONT IDENTIFY WITH WHITENESS BC I DONT THINK WHITENESS IS REAL. AND SINCE I GET MISTAKEN FOR OTHER STUFF AND DONT KNOW EVERYTHING ABT MY ANCESTRY ANYWAYS, WHO FUCKIN KNOWS. WHY DOES IT MATTER. LOOK AT MY FUCKIN INSTAGRAM IS YA WANNA KNOW WTF I LOOK LIKE SO BADLY. AS MUCH AS YOU MIGHT BE BEGGING ME TO JUST “TELL YOU” I AM ALSO BEGGING GOD TO TELL ME SO I CAN TELL YALL TO SHUT UP BUT I WILL PROBABLY NEVER KNOW AND I THINK HOW PPL TREAT ME IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO CONSIDER IN MY SITUATION.

BE HONEST: THE ONLY REASON YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT MY “RACE” OR ETHNICITY IS IS SO YOU CAN KNOW IF YOU CAN YELL AT ME ABOUT CERTAIN THINGS. FUCK OFF AND DIE IDK, FIND A HOBBY MAYBE

I have expressive language disorder and severe anxiety. i also have seizures and i might talk abt it sometimes. other issues too that i dont feel like I need to mention that’s really relevant to tumblr, all you need to know is im mentally ill bc of severe trauma.

reasons i dont want you to follow me:

I used to have a paragraph in here about having “discussions with people i disagree with” but something about this website makes people incapable of not being bad faith assholes so idc to try anymore. maybe I will if I actually think you’re being good faith but that hardly ever fuckin happens on here, so, I’m not waiting around to find out anymore. it’s impossible to have productive conversations on here I’ve concluded.

anyways, aside from that:

terfs/tirfs/swerfs/radfems out, baeddels out, transmeds/truscum (still dont know the difference) out, pedophiles/pedo apologists/maps gtfo, white supremacists, ethnonationalists, racists, nazis, hindutva’s, fascists in general out, ancaps out, authoritarians out, class reductionists out, mls/tankies out, accelerationists out, anti theists suck and should gtfo too

[send your hate mail here, i prolly wont be reading it tho]

[cruelfeline]

This Got Long and I am Sorry

Well, the anti in the Hordak tag deleted their post, which is a huge bummer because it means no fun games for me. But! I have been looking forward to addressing the points in that post all day, and I won’t give up my chance to talk ad nauseam about Hordak. Because y’all know that I love to talk about Hordak.

also I saved the post as a draft prior to it getting deleted so I actually have the whole thing hahaha

However: in order to prevent the original poster from getting harassed for said post, I’m just going to address points via my own summary. Safer that way! So, here we go: addressing some posited reasons that Catra and Hordak are not comparable, plus some claims about why Hordak can’t be treated with the same kindness many like to treat Catra with. 

1. Hordak being a clone of a dictator/not being biologically similar to Catra et. al, acting as he does because of this biology as a clone.

This portion of that post was a little odd because I don’t really understand what the argument was. Perhaps the idea that Hordak literally cannot be anything different than his progenitor due to... cloning science? I’m not sure.

But assuming that that was the intended argument: being a clone essentially means having the same DNA as someone else. That’s all. It does not mean that you are the exact same person (ask some identical twins if they are the same exact person as their sibling). The environment one is raised in, along with epigenetics (changes in individuals due to gene expression rather than DNA), provides infinite variations between individuals that might share the same DNA. So this argument is a little... nonsensical?

Now, I can definitely buy that some of Hordak’s morality might be biology-based; that is a legitimate argument. See this post regarding why an individual like Hordak may not have issues raising children for his army, for example. Mind you, I don’t really see this as an argument in support of him just being an evil, irredeemable bastard; rather, I look at it as an argument against “natural evil” and more in favor of different biological, cultural, and environmental factors creating an alien morality.

2. Hordak created a social system that resulted in all sorts of abuses being visited upon children. He viewed said children as disposable materials for his war.

...yeah, actually, just go to this post again. Honestly, I have zero expectation for Hordak to have any sort of special tenderness towards children. I don’t expect a clone from a society of clones to value children, not because he’s pure evil, but because he comes from a world where children aren’t a thing. Why would he value them?

A creature whose life is so different from ours as to give it a different sense of morals isn’t necessarily evil, even if they do things that we look upon as evil via our morality. Morality is not a universal constant; our evil may be meaningless to an alien, whereas our good might be horrifying to them. It all depends on the creature.

And as far as seeing children as disposable material for war: well, that follows, doesn’t it? Because after all, Hordak is also disposable material for war. Material that was actually disposed of.

3. Hordak was ready to murder Catra for disobeying orders; he’s likely murdered other high ranking officers for the same.

There is no evidence that Hordak has personally murdered anyone, so we’re just going to pass on that. One may speculate all one wants, but unless Hordak presents me with a neatly-written list of all the poor souls he’s slain, I don’t have much to say about this.

However, regarding him being ready to kill Catra: this is a complex situation because it was not as simple as “Catra disobeyed, so she must die.” Catra did not just disobey Hordak; she lied to him. He gave her a chance to come clean, to be trustworthy and loyal, to own up to a mistake, and she lied to him.

This is an issue for a couple of reasons: first, Hordak appears to have a thing about lies. He has a thing about people deceiving him (potentially because, where he comes from, he is truly incapable of lying), about not knowing what people around him are planning. Personally, I think that this is at least somewhat rooted in self-defense: he is physically weak without armor and prone to emotional manipulation by anyone who knows anything remotely intimate about him. Catra proves this point by manipulating the bejeezus out of him during season four, right after showing him that she can kill him anytime she likes by disarming him via crystal-grab. If one of his subordinates is prone to deceiving him, he needs to get rid of that subordinate to protect himself. 

Second, when Catra loses Shadow Weaver, she truly does endanger the whole Horde. Like, Shadow Weaver literally helps the Princesses infiltrate during season three. That is a thing that happens. Hordak isn’t just pulling dumb moments of insubordination from thin air; he elects to eliminate Catra because she has done something that proves to be actually detrimental to the Horde in a serious way.

I don’t mean to say that Hordak is morally correct in sentencing Catra to death, first via Beast Island, then via Crimson waste; what I mean to say is that he enacts an extremely dramatic punishment not due to simple disobedience, but due to Catra being legitimately dangerous to his life and the life of the Horde. It’s still not “good,” but it’s not the same as killing Catra for mouthing off. It’s not some grand confirmation of irredeemable evil; it’s not that simple.

4. Catra is an abused child who has been broken physically, emotionally, and psychologically since she was an infant; Hordak, on the other hand, has no background in abuse. The only bad that has happened to him is being called a defect and sent out to fight and die, which didn’t really matter because he was a clone anyway.

This… this is a sentiment some antis hold that is honestly disturbing to me.

I won’t touch on the Catra portion; all of that is true.

But Hordak… I cannot comprehend how some people don’t seem to understand the true horror of Hordak’s situation. As far as we currently know, as of season four, Hordak was manufactured to be a tool of war. He was never meant to be his own person, despite clearly having the psyche of one. He didn’t even have, couldn’t have, his own name. He was born into this purpose with no way out, no hope for any choice of his own. For pity’s sake, he has a port in the back of his neck that allows him to be erased without a moment’s notice. That is a piece of hardware someone put in him to completely control him against his will. It is a level of bodily autonomy violation suffered by no one else on this show. 

Hordak has essentially no personal self-esteem and no ability to self-validate outside of his identity as Prime’s clone. His entire concept of self-worth is based upon being useful to Prime, to the point that he doesn’t seem to understand that his being thrown away for getting sick is not only not his fault, but morally abhorrent. He is so emotionally dependent on his Brother that, despite severe risk to his own life, he seeks to return to him rather than simply taking Etheria for himself (which is what he would have done if he simply wanted to be a ruler). He needs Prime’s validation, Prime’s approval, that badly. 

And he tries to obtain that approval despite being absolutely terrified of Prime, despite it being very clear to us that there is no way that Prime will ever give it as long as Hordak remains his own self. Despite all of that, Hordak needs it because he was manufactured and programmed and conditioned to worship this terrible creature, and he simply cannot grasp a different way to live. He’s too emotionally sick.

I’m not sure how someone can look at this character and not see what has happened to him, what is happening to him, as abuse. 

5. Hordak only starts to care about anything else when Entrapta enters his life, and he only does so because she validates him; even then, it takes a long time.

This is a perplexing concept to me because… well, yes? Of course he only starts to see things differently when he bonds with Entrapta? Obviously?

Until then, he never had anyone suggest to him that he could be a worthwhile person without having some sort of practical use. He never had a companion to share his vulnerabilities with. He only had his sick ties to Prime.

Perhaps this means to suggest that Hordak should have started building a new life without the help he received from Entrapta? As if people suffering from mental illness and severe emotional pain should just be able to lift themselves up with zero support and fix their whole lives in a snap.

Ailing people tend to need other people’s support to get through their troubles. Hordak not being able to see new possibilities for his life without Entrapta’s help doesn’t say anything negative about him; all it says is that he needed someone’s support to start healing. Just as the overwhelming majority of people do.

6. Catra wants to be in charge so that others can’t hurt her. Hordak wants to be in charge just so he can “be on top,” and he only regrets what occurs with Prime because it means he is no longer dominant.

Hordak as a warlord is actually a very interesting thing to look at. He fails to act in the way that many enthusiastic, traditional warlord characters do, to the point that he seems less into the ruling and more into the obtainment of Prime’s esteem via conquering a planet to prove his worth. Which is, y’know, what’s happening: Hordak doesn’t care about ruling Etheria. He cares about conquering it so he can present it to Prime and prove that he deserves to live. The full post about that is right here.

If Hordak really cared about ruling something, he would have never bothered wasting all of that time building a portal to get in contact with Prime. He would have focused all of his efforts on conquering Etheria and left it at that. His actions only make sense when one understands that he doesn’t actually care about being a tyrannical lord; he cares about showing his Brother that he’s a good boy.

7. Catra feels regret for her actions; Hordak does not. Catra sees herself as an irredeemable bad person and hates herself. Hordak doesn’t believe he needs to be redeemed and just wants to control everything.

Again, I won’t touch Catra here, because that assessment is valid.

Hordak, however: Hordak literally thinks so little of himself that he believes it his own job to prove to his brother that he shouldn’t have been tossed aside to die. He doesn’t see this as a moral failing on Prime’s part. He doesn’t see it as wrong, that he was thrown away because he got sick. He sees it as a problem that it is his responsibility to fix.

Hordak admits to Entrapta that he has doubts: perhaps Prime was right. Perhaps he, Hordak, is a failure. Perhaps it was okay to send him out to die.

Hordak believes Catra’s lies about Entrapta’s “betrayal” because, Twitter Word of God, he views himself as undeserving of friendship.

Whether Hordak believes himself needing redemption is beside the point: the core of Hordak’s story and character arc has nothing to do with being a morally good person. It has to do with learning, understanding, and internalizing that he has his own value beyond what Horde Prime grants him. It has to do with accepting himself as he is, triumphs and shortcomings alike. It has to do with realizing that he has a right to live with or without Prime’s say-so. 

Moral redemption has nothing to do with it because before Hordak has any hope of learning to respect the rights of others, he has to learn to fight for his own.

Am I done? I think I’m done.

Well. Regrettably, I had to summarize this, so the original poster’s words are not verbatim intact, but I think I got the sense of them! Also regrettably, they will likely not see or respond to this, so that chance for active dialogue is gone. But anyone else can respond if they like, including any antis lurking about the tag. Well; if you can slog through this whole thing!

Anyway, in conclusion: Hordak is a sad bastard man. He has just as many painful personal problems as Catra and will forever have all of my sympathy and kindness because I have decided that he deserves it. So there.

[firelord-frowny]

honestly like!

i HATE!!!! the very CONCEPT of guns. and i’m theoretically SO fundamentally opposed to violence. 

but that opposition is based on an idealist assumption that no one is doing anything that they need to be stopped from doing. 

and there are obviously a fucking hell of a lot of people doing a fucking hell of a lot of vile shit, and no amount of ~peaceful protesting~ or litigating or campaigning or Reaching Across The Aisle is going to stop them, and it’s fucking RIDICULOUS that anyone at all thinks people should just wait patiently for The Powers That Be to spontaneously manifest a conscience and finally quit trying to maim and murder people For Funsies. 

i would LOVE it we could just hug them into submission and invite them over for tea and chit chat and take their ugly ass hand and smile at them and show them that I’m Just A Normal Person Like You and have them finally decide to stop wanting me to die. and honestly, some people REALLY CAN be reached through those kinds of methods. and i don’t think people should stop trying to do that. and if anything, i think MORE people need to be trying to do that.

but i ALSO think that more people need to start punching some bigots in the fucking face. 

if self proclaimed conservatives and right wingers and proud wimpy boys get to go around committing terroristic acts against other peoples, and if the politicians and ceos they stan for refuse to take any actions to stop them at best, and at worst go out of their way to FACILITATE the suffering of all but bigoted, well-off white people....

then we should get to punch them in the fucking face and not have anyone say WORD ONE about it. 

they wanna be all big and bad and parade around threatening and committing violence against teachers and health care workers and black people and asian people and jewish people and indigenous people and women of all backgrounds, then they should be fucking tough enough to cope with a goddamn punch in the face every now and then. they should WELCOME every fist that ever collides with their flesh. 

if they want a fucking fight, we should GIVE THEM A FIGHT! and make sure they fucking lose.  make sure the pathetic little ~civil war~ they’re begging for is HUMILIATINGLY short. chase their fucking asses into the most barren, useless parts of the world where they can be vile all by themselves. 

bc i SWEAR TO GOD, the only reason why these people have any power at all to impact anything or anyone is because people LET THEM. not because they’re soooo smart, or they’re soooo dangerous, or there are sooooo many of them. it’s STRICTLY because an enormous majority of bare-minimum-decent people care more about Taking The Moral High Ground than about actually doing what’s necessary to disable evil people from doing evil things.

This is a hella problematic way to put it, buuuut

black people know not to do or say certain things to a cop because we’ve been conditioned to fear the consequences of even the most benign ~infractions.~ We swallow our fucking pride and whip out those “yes sirs” and “no sirs” and we move slowly and we try to keep our hands visible at all costs because we’ve seen, over and over again, for DECADES (centuries, really) what those people might do to us if our hand isn’t totally visible for a fraction of a second. And sometimes it doesn’t even work. Sometimes we do everything in our power to demonstrate that there’s no need to hurt us, and we get murdered anyway. 

WOULDN’T IT BE NICE if those wack ass bigots could learn to fear the consequences of being disgusting out loud and in public? 

Imagine if, over the last several decades, malicious bigots were met with SWIFT physical consequences every time they did some fucked up shit. 

do you think they’d be so bold now? 

i don’t. 

i think if they thought for one second that whoever they pull a gun on might pull one out back at them, then they would keep their fucking mouths shut and behave. i think if they LEGITIMATELY thought that they’re actual lives and their actual freedom were at stake, they wouldn’t say SHIT. Because they know that whether or not they have to wear a mask or get vaccinated or whateverthefuck has absolutely NO real impact on their place in the world. there is NO. WAY. that they would be all up in arms over something so fucking absurd if they thought anyone would actually try to hurt them in response. 

they don’t think anyone is going to show up at their dumb lil protests with tear gas. they don’t think an angry BLM activist is going to shoot up their country club in retaliation against the oppressive policies they support. they don’t think anyone is going to stop them on the street and start screaming in their face and threaten to kill them. they don’t think they’re going to lose a damn fucking thing. they think they’re literally going to just waltz into some of the most secure buildings in the world and wreak havoc, and that NO ONE is going to do shit about it. 

that’s the problem :) :) :) :) :) :) 

the problem isn’t that these people exist. i mean, it fucking sucks that they exist and if they could somehow cease to exist, whether by alien abduction or some sort of freak simultaneous lightning strike or WHATEVER, i would be THRILLED. but just existing doesn’t hurt anyone. Having a stupid belief doesn’t automatically make someone dangerous. It just makes them a shitty person.

But to have a stupid belief and to feel SO ENTITLED to acting upon those beliefs???

those motherfuckers need to fear for their safety. those motherfuckers need to be SO PETRIFIED that they dig themselves underground and bury themselves alive and NEVER resurface. 

i don’t understand how, at this point, with over half a million people DEAD because of the actions of these assholes, and with thousands of people CONTINUING to drop dead over it every day, the so-called “good guys” still don’t see fit to resort to drastic measures to render these people INCAPABLE of causing further harm. 

so many people have died. not just in the time of covid, but decades before that. so many people are murdered in the name of carrying out the pettiest whims of the most wretched people on earth. People get injured. People get poisoned by their own water supply or the very air they breathe. People get sick because they’re forced to live under unhealthy circumstances, and then they DIE because they can’t afford treatment for the illnesses they developed because of the unhealthy circumstances that made them sick in the first place! Children starve. Global warming sets people on fire and drowns them and destroys homes and lives and landscapes. 

literally, at WHAT point does it become acceptable to finally just declare war on these fucking demons? WHEN do we meet them where they’re at and start punching back instead of just curling up and trying to survive the attack?

i KNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW that there are groups out there who are taking direct action in some form or another. but CLEARLY it’s not enough.

and i ALSO know that there are MANY PEOPLE who have the actual skills and resources to stage a legitimate countereffort, and they’re just. not. doing it. 

we’ve got all these vile-ass ~ex military~ types boasting about their arsenal and how they intend to use it to reign terror upon innocent people. these fuckfaces who are LITERALLY HOLDING PUBLIC OFFICE and saying Out Loud that they want to attack us. and their peers exalt them for it. 

you CANNOT tell me that there are 0 ~ex military~ people who are sympathetic to the cause of resisting these malicious bigots. you CANNOT tell me that there aren’t people in public office who know that something MUST be done, and who have the POWER and ACCESS to do something - even if it’s “unlawful.” 

but they’re not doing it. :) because they’re weak. :) and they fear for their lives in a way that ~the right~ has NEVER had to contend with. A democratic state senator knows someone might hunt them down and try to kill them if they say anything ~too radical~. a republican state senator is confident that he could literally call for the public execution of someone and be met only with a pathetic verbal reprimand from some spineless liberal congressman who bends over backward to be Respectful And Fair as they gently try to explain why it’s not okay to facilitate mass death in every demographic but their own.

can somebody with the actual power and means to do so PLEASE start doing ANYTHING to terrorize these people back to the bland, tasteless, spiritually bankrupt cesspit they congealed in? When one of these american terrorists brandishes a gun in someone’s face, can someone PLEASE brandish their own gun right back at them? THEY should be the ones who are too terrified to speak up. Not us. THEY should be the ones compelled to look over their shoulder. 

im so sick of a world where mass suffering and exploitation are accepted as Just The Natural Order Of Things. instead of a harrowing dystopia that should be burned to the ground quick, fast, and in a motherfucking hurry.

[threelivesthreeworlds]

Anonymous asked: Hello sorry if I was unclear. What I meant to say is that most people have a superficial view on intimacy of any sort, and so while I love Tang Qi's portrayal of romance, I hate most people's physicality-obsessed interpretations. Dunno if it's a western thing, but fanfiction is so out of alignment with canon romance themes that the characters are barely recognisable anymore. (1/4)

Secondly, Most readers/viewers do not give characters like Yehua or Lian Song a chance before making stereotypical assumptions about them. I love their real personalities, flaws and all, but I hate the sheer hyperexaggeration the fandom makes out of it (e.g. hating on Ji Heng). People just cannot see a character as a whole but put them into one category or the other. (2/4)

Thirdly, I just added that I relate to Lian Song(depression etc) because I kinda share his views on romance/love and don't really care for physical aspects that much. I'm aware he's a playboy, but he's also not a stereotypical one (which is unfortunately how most people interpret him) so it's a relief that your blog instead backs up my interpretation of him with facts. (3/4)

Lastly, I'm so sorry for ranting in the Q & A section. Making several points with a word limit really compromises what I'm trying to say 😆. But the bottom line was that fandoms' misinterpretations of your favourite characters makes it hard to see them in an objective light again. (4/4)  

(this 4th one came in after most of our answers were done, so we apologize if it comes off a little ??? we weren’t aware of the end goal for the anons received. We mean no ill-will in how we come across, just elaborating on things and we hope that’s alright with you. <3)

(Admin Lin): Hey! Thanks for sharing your opinions, though these anons are starting to get a little haughty for our own comfort to continue addressing. Both admins have our own grievances with the fandom / how it views particular characters (Ji Heng being a prime example here), however the fandom still offers plenty of good things from it. This is not only a western fandom “issue” (I say as this physicality isn’t necessarily an issue), it can be found in the eastern fandom as well for not only this series but others as well. Both admins are in fact western fandom despite Admin Ro being Asian.  

        As for when it comes down to interpretations - Peach Blossoms is written in first person and hard to find on the western side of the internet; Yehua has an extra from his perspective but that’s the only direct contact we get with him that isn’t through Bai Qian’s eyes. Qian isn’t a romantic person nor does she necessarily find what he does romantic, she’s been engaged to him for so long she kind of considered their engagement troublesome due to her past experience with his Uncle Sang Ji. When it comes to the drama’s take of Yehua, we get a clearer idea of him but at the same time it’s easy to see where others can’t grasp him in his entirety or simplify things when in a fanfiction. Or, for the likes of me, knows what he’s like but can’t formulate a more articulate summary or introspective version of him because of his extensive complexities and in some ways, the knowledge of a Chinese household of some fashion to express the intricacies of his upbringing. It’s merely harder. 

         In the case of Lian Song - the Western fandom doesn’t have access to the information that can be found on this blog as easily because Lotus Step is in the middle of a hiatus but will continue serializing by next year. So, it’s no one’s fault for misunderstanding what kind of playboy he is since that was only addressed in the fall of last year and the dramas both make it clear he’s a playboy / amorous person but never elaborates on it. So it’s an easy assumption to make that he may be a typical playboy by fans of the other available media because he’s not featured beyond Yehua’s uncle or Donghua’s best friend with touches here and there of his connection to Cheng Yu. It’s only in his novel that we get to see a different side of him that will ultimately have a shift at some point to what we see 50,000 years down the line. So, I’m not actually bothered by this myself, personally. It is bound to happen because no one on the western side of the fandom has as much access or want to read an untranslated novel. 

        With TQ’s stance on romance writing, I will say the concept of eternal love or a love that lasts 3,000 lifetimes is a very Chinese one that unless one digs through it with patience and interest in Buddhism / other Eastern religions, that it can be a harder nuance to grasp for those unfamiliar. 

(Admin Ro): We’re sorry you’ve had bad experiences with “fanon” material. We’re thankful that you like the content on this blog enough to comment on it! These are my opinions on the whole affair: as a Chinese woman who reads Chinese novels, from a perspective of writing tropes, hyper-exaggeration is already frequently utilized...in canon. And - from a personal standpoint, when the tropes hit right, I - don’t necessarily mind. Depth can be dug out of the text, but it’s understandable for people to simplify when they’re simply writing or analyzing for their enjoyment.  

        I’m ace, so maybe I understand, Nonny, when you say that you don’t care for the physical aspects of love.  I personally, in my life, don’t necessarily want or need that kind of intimacy, and I don’t find myself straying into the smut tag too often to read about it as it stretches my comfort limits. Granted, I am not sex-repulsed, and it takes a great deal to upset me - however, if everything is in layers and someone enjoys writing smut, then they simply enjoy that layer. Romance isn’t less good and interpretations aren’t less good if there’s a degree of physicality in it. Heck, Admin Lins and I have discussed extensively the physicality of these books - we keep it off the blog 80% of the time because tagging, but it’s a present theme. And, all of us enjoy different things. At the end of the day I think we can’t say the tropes aren’t good when the tropes are the lead-ins that drew us into the more extensive stories.

         Furthermore, a lot of what is on this blog is “read,”and I will never say my read of a character or a part of canon is “right” - or that it's “right”-er than someone else’s. Yes, there’s room for passionate debate as evidenced by many, many essays, but I’m not upset when I can’t change anyone’s mind. People are not automatically wrong when they disagree with me - even if there’s textual evidence, there is difference in interpretation of that textual evidence. I understand why fandom thinks the way it does - though, you’ll have to forgive me, my brain is 90% of the time focused on Pillow Book. Regardless, whether you walk out of a book thinking “this character has this much depth and this many flaws” or “this character is just a flat out antagonist” is very much dependent on you. Yes, we as a blog synthesize textual evidence to make that synthesis easier, but ultimately we are no better judges of anyone’s personality than anyone else out in the fandom.

         Rather, I think sometimes for the sake of finding reasons or understanding, or when we look for evidence fitting our own assumptions about characters sometimes we lean into a softer read, maybe entirely without realizing it. This is a big no in the world of analytical writing for the sake of, ironically “objectivity”  - but this is for enjoyment and not academia. There are times when textual evidence is untouched by the author's tone in terms of connotation and so when we take it for our reading and we have our pre-formed opinions we fall a little more between the lines. Admin Lins and I obviously differ in where this happens as we each have our own, minutely different vibes for characters in question. We know where our confirmation biases in interpretation might lie. Everyone has those. 

         Up till about February or March this year, I, like a lot of the rest of this fandom, wanted to roast Ji Heng on a spitfire. That is my bias. We are humans, and I think we are perhaps incapable of reading something and staying entirely objective to each character. I clawed my way out of my bias (I say ‘clawed’ because it was difficult), however, by looking at the book, looking at my own opinions, looking at other people’s opinions and asking myself: which parts of this is most likely to be true? I think the only way of striving toward objectivity in terms of portrayal is to consider other people’s portrayals, even if you don’t like them - and see if there’s any truth you can see past your bias. And to accept that truth, even if it’s a hard pill to swallow.

         I guess what I have been trying to say, for this entire time, is that we are not the authority on what is and isn’t objective, on what is and isn’t right in these characters, interpretations, and this blog. We are glad to be an interpretation you enjoy - but that doesn’t mean the rest of the fandom who have different opinions are wrong or misinterpretations. I realize we can come across like that sometimes because we make salty memes and because we write long paragraph essays when we have opinions, but ultimately, no one is wrong. Our bubble of enjoyment is our bubble, and no one has to agree with us.

[intersex-ionality]

I think you're assuming too much good faith when you're stating that narcissism as a concept is distinct from NPD. Just because you don't conflate them doesn't mean that other people don't. People aren't just calling tyrants toxically selfish, they quite literally demanded #diagnoseTrump (with NPD, to prove he was unfit for office). Many of the "resources for survivors of narcissistic abuse" explicitly name-drop cluster B PDs as well, or list the DSM criteria of npd and bpd as signs of abuse.

Okay, I’ve decided that out of the anons I got yesterday, this one is probably a legitimate attempt to converse. You got the bad luck of being surrounded on all sides by death threats, hate mail, and general chicanery. While I’ve tried to calm myself down so that I can engage with you fairly, please try to forgive my if I get a bit acidic here.

Before we begin, I want to re-center the fact that this discussion was about whether the word “narcissist” should be dropped from the English language.

The “diagnose trump” movement was an ableist shitstorm. And that’s not the same thing as just using the word narcissist in casual conversation. The word came way before the diagnosis. The diagnosis is named after the word, not the other way around. And the word continues to have perfectly valid, non-diagnostic utility, as well as to simply be a common word.

Ableist movements that try to simultaneously claim that evil men are evil because they are sick, that sick people are all evil, and that being sick means you cannot be trusted, therefore anyone who cannot be trusted is sick? They’re conflating a harmless word, a harmless group of people, and massive scale war crimes. Something like “diagnose trump” was functionally trying ti both punish him for crimes, and simultnaeously, absolving him of any guilt for those crimes. It was a chaotic blame-shifting mess than hinged entirely on the idea that mentally ill people are monsters.

And a movement that hinges on calling the mentally ill all monsters, is abelist by definition.

But saying that those movements mean the word must be retired also conflates the word with the group of people.

This is not to suggest that the latter reinforces the former. Rather, both rely on inappropriately ascribing sameness to very different things.

And hey, maybe just making people stop saying “narcissist” would have some degree of positive impact. If you believe that, and you want to focus your activism towards that, I’m not going to be the one to stop you! Do as you like and as you will!

But it is not and will never be what I want to do with my own activism. I have other projects, goals, and actions that I am always going to prioritize over that.

If I spend my time saying, “you can’t ever say the word narcissist because it’s a medical term,” then when someone says sociopath instead, I need to now expand it to, “you can’t ever say the words narcissist or sociopath because […],” and so when someone says, psycho, I need to expand it again, “you can’t ever say the words sociopath, narcissist, or psycho […],” and when someone says, delusional I have to expand again, and when someone says crazy, I have to expand again. I will never stop expanding the list, and it will not only be a waste of my time, but it will become increasingly difficult to impossible for my audience to remember all the fine details of that ever-expanding list.

As such, I choose to focus on other kinds of writing. To say, “self-centeredness is a completely common, human trait that most people have, and it can drive people–especially people with a lot of power–to act in ways that are careless of the others around them, or the others living under their power. So, when someone is behaving carelessly, self-centeredly, that’s worth criticizing, worth stopping. People in power who make the conscious choice to harm others should have everything that gives them that power and enables that harm taken from them.

“In contrast, mentally ill people don’t choose to be mentally ill. And those compulsions can cause them to act in ways that are on the surface similar to the violent behaviour of tyrants and abusers, but those behaviours are not choices. They cannot be approached in the same way. Mentally ill people require the support to help them control their compulsions and to help them avoid situations which would set off those behaviours.

“Where evil and powerful people must have things taken to resolve the problem, mentally ill people must instead have things given–namely help and accommodation–to resolve the problem. Since these two groups require two very different approaches, one should not suggest that they are interchangeable. Rather than claiming people in power are incapable of being decent, acknowledge their choices as fucked up. Rather than suggesting mentally ill people are de-facto monstrous, acknowledge that they simply need accommodations that they often aren’t receiving, to help them deal with the internal stresses of mental illness.”

That way, I only have to make that explanation once, and it applies to every single use of mental illness as an insult. I can link back to it, and move on to other things, instead of repeating the same discussion for every new variation. It equips my audience with the skills necessary to examine any new slag or vocabulary that pops up and make an informed choice about the implications of those words without me needing to make a new bullet point and add it to a list of inviolate rulings. People who look at that explanation, who come to understand it, will make their own choices about what language to use.

But most of them will shy away from using obviously diagnostic language such as “psychopathy,” and will also has the tools to differentiate between harmless uses of overlapping terms, from manipulative attempts to conflate a group of mentally ill people with a group of violent criminals. They’ll be better equipped to understand the difference between someone saying, “my ex-boyfriend was so narcissistic, always getting on my case about my clothes/figure/hair making him look bad, so we broke up,” and saying, “my mother beat the shit out of me any time I did something that disappointed her; but hey, you know how narcissists are.”

For me, that’s more appealing, efficient communication and the more appealing final goal. It lets me focus on other things, like considering angles and details I had not previously considered on old subjects, or learning about new subjects.

That’s not going to be the case for everyone or every situation. Sometimes I don’t feel like making a big old explanation, so I ask the people around me, “as a favour, could you not complain about ‘The Borderlines at Work,’ and instead just talk about, IDK, whatever specific crap they pulled, instead?”

But this blog is a public space. I’m a private citizen, but I make these posts to have a public discussion on a public platform. So I write them for a public audience. I don’t want to ask personal favours of that audience. They have no reason to grant those favours, even if I did ask.

Different audiences, along with different situations, require different tactics.

[memory-bees]

Hanahaki

Parts: I II Warnings: Gore, Death, Vomiting, Suicide Mention, Body Horror, Hanahaki Disease Pairings: Original Characters Throughout Babey A/N: This is a two parter, the second part will be posted later today along with the ao3 link. Also, the hanahaki disease isn’t explained that well, so fair warning, also the start of me posting original writing on Tumblr!!

---

‘ Hanahaki Disease: A disease which is the effect of the patient’s romantic feelings being unrequited. This causes a flower to grow in the patient's lungs, which will grow until it renders breathing impossible. The disease can be cured with the roots being removed, but the operation renders the patient incapable of having romantic feelings. It can also be cured if the patient's feelings are returned.

Symptoms: Coughing/vomiting up blood and flower petals, difficulty breathing. ’

He swallowed and looked up at the doctor. He felt something rise in his throat and he quickly grabbed the trash bin to cough up whatever it was in his throat. He pulled away and grimaced when he saw the yellow, blood-covered. petals. He looked up at the doctor, and she shrugged helplessly.

“You’d still be able to feel platonic love and familial love, just not romantic feelings,” She reminded him, “nobody's really survived without the operation.”

He was quiet for a few minutes before saying, “You say that like people have before.”

She smiled sadly and nodded, she tucked some of her red hair behind her ear. She scratched her cheek as she spoke, “Well, yes, but there’s only about three hundred out of the millions who are affected every year.”

He nodded and swallowed, he could still taste the almost plastic of the flower petals.

There was an uneasy quietness that had settled in the room. A woman was crying down the hall, a man screaming in agony. Maybe they had just lost a child, or maybe they were siblings and they had just lost a parent.

The thought of lost love made more petals rise in his throat and he quickly spat them into the trash. He grimaced at the smell of stale blood that had settled there. He stared down at the petals and hesitantly grabbed one from the puddle of new and old blood. He stared at it and looked up at the doctor, she smiled slightly and grabbed it from him.

She wiped away the blood from the yellow petal, she glanced back up at the taller man, who was clearly weak from the illness.

“It’s a sunflower petal, you have a good chance that the person you love has feelings for you too.” The doctor said, trying to give her patient some hope.

He smiled at her and nodded, “I’ll think about the operation, and, uh, just a quick question, will I still be able to work?”

The doctor nodded, adjusting her shirt. “Yes, at least until the flower makes it too hard to breathe. What do you do for work?”

“I’m the manager at the local grocery store, I also bag items there too.” He explained, getting up from the table and walking to the door.

Before the doctor could say anything else, he walked out of the room and down the hall. He passed a few people before he had to cough again, he covered his mouth with his hand, sighing at the sight of the bloody flower petals sticking to his hand. Somebody passing him noticed and gasped.

The woman touched his shoulder and gave him a sympathetic look, “I’m so sorry.”

He nodded and continued to walk on, grabbing a wet wipe and wiping off his hand. He couldn’t shake the look the woman had, or what she had said. It was almost as if she was saying sorry for a death, almost like he was already dead.

He went on to his car and quickly got in. He buckled his seat belt and started to drive. He was going to die, but he wasn’t going to die because of a car accident.

 —

 When he got home he was almost immediately surrounded by his friends. They pulled him to sit on the couch, staring at him intently.

“So?” His brother asked, tapping his foot rapidly. “What did the doctor say?”

He swallowed and looked down, he licked his lips. He couldn’t seem to get the taste of stale blood out of his mouth these days. What was he supposed to say? That he was fine? Tell them the truth?

He finally made his choice and took a deep breath, his heart felt like it was beating out of his chest as he made his confession.

“I was right. It’s Hanahaki Disease.”

The room went silent instantly, it was like a morgue. Or like a funeral room already full of mourners. He looked up and around at his friends. He didn’t want to die, not this young. His eyes finally landed on the one who had caused him his illness. They made eye contact for a second before he looked away.

“W-what’re you gonna do?”

He shrugged helplessly, patting his youngest brother on the shoulder.

“I’ll figure something out, don’t worry.”

They all watched as he stood up and left the room.

 —

 He sat in the living room and watched as the older man walked out. He looked around at his friends and they all looked down when they heard the horrible coughing come from his room.

He knew what he should do, but what if it wasn’t him causing it? He shook his head minutely and leaned his elbows on his knees. He was sat on the floor cross-legged. He didn’t know what to do, he felt horrible.

They all looked up when they heard rapid footsteps come out of the man’s room and into the bathroom. They all knew what was happening.

He swallowed and stood up, “I’ll go check on ‘im.”

And as he left the others dispersed out of the room. He sighed and slowly walked into the bathroom, frowning when he saw the other man was still vomiting. He walked over and kneeled down behind him, rubbing his back gently.

The touch almost instantly caused another wave of half-digested food, blood, and flower petals to spill out of his mouth. His frown deepened and he brushed his friend’s golden-brown hair away from his forehead.

“You’re gonna be okay.” He whispered, still rubbing his back.

The older man laughed softly and nodded, “I sure hope so.”

 —

 He didn’t want to die, but lord he sure felt like he was going to every time he breathed. The sickness was starting to take its hold on him, on certain parts of his arms you could see the stems start to poke out from underneath his skin. He felt tired all the time, out of breath. He could still hold down most food, that was good.

But he was vomiting and coughing up the petals and tiny flowers more often, that wasn’t good. But he had developed an odd sort of appreciation for sunflowers. He had looked for the meaning in an old gardening book the person who had caused this illness owned.

‘ Sunflowers are symbols of adoration, loyalty, and longevity. ’

He thought the longevity part of the meaning was funny, seeing as the flower was slowly killing him from the inside out. He had also become oddly at peace with the thought of death, the idea of it. The concept of just not living anymore.

He didn’t want it to happen though, obviously, nobody did. Who wanted to die? nobody. Unless you were suicidal, of course. But he wasn’t, he still wanted to live. He still wanted to be able to get married, to the person who was causing him his illness, of course.

He sighed and leaned against the wall, it hurt to breathe. He had gone in for an x-ray yesterday, the flower was occupying almost half of his lungs now. He’d need to stop the physical labor soon. Maybe even now, his boss would understand. He had said he’d still pay him the double wage while he was sick.

Everybody acted like they were walking on eggshells around him since he had been diagnosed too. That was the worst part of the whole thing, he didn’t want people to think he was dying.

He sat at the table, a piece of paper in front of him and a pencil. He grabbed the pencil and started to write.

‘ Dear Quill,

I love you, ’

Before he could continue writing he had to cough up some more petals, he swallowed when he saw how many more petals were mixed into the blood. Was that normal?

He shook the thought off and started to write again

‘ I love you, please don’t blame yourself for the illness. It’s not your fault, it’s mine. Please don’t hate me, and don’t let anyone tell you it’s your fault for me being sick. ’

More petals, that was barely a minute between coughs. That wasn’t normal, and he knew that. He also noticed how much harder it was to breathe, was the letter speeding the growth up? God, he hoped not. He just had to finish the letter, then he’d be okay with dying.

‘ I love you, please don’t blame yourself for the illness. It’s not your fault, it’s mine. Please don’t hate me, and don’t let anyone tell you it’s your fault for me being sick. I love you unconditionally, hence the flower currently suffocating me. ’

More petals. More blood.

‘ Just know that I love you. ’

He coughed up more petals, an entire flower coming with it He was dying. He was dying right now. He’d surely die if he kept writing this letter. And in all honesty, he couldn’t bring himself to care.

‘ I love you. I love you. I l ’

He pushed the paper away from him, grabbing the trash can and heaving more and more petals, blood, and small sunflowers into it. He felt the vines start to make their way out of his mouth and around his neck. He started to panic and grabbed and pulled at the vines, but he couldn’t pull them loose.

He started to feel hot, he couldn’t breathe. Plant vines were wrapping themselves around his neck and squeezing, so that made sense. He didn’t want to die, he felt tears start fall down his face, but he couldn’t tell if they were water or blood.

He fell forward onto the table, reaching for his phone, it would be helpful if he could manage to talk. He brushed the screen with his fingertips, the cold glass the last thing he felt. He tried to scream as he felt the vines start to invade his body. He was suffocating. He tugged weakly at the vines at his neck. He choked out a final word, that no one except the walls and the table and flower would be able to hear.

“Quill..."

 —

 He and the rest of their friends all screamed when they saw the body lying limply at the table. He rushed forward to the older man, his heart-stopping when he saw the pale skin, still open eye and sunflower hanging out of the man’s mouth.

He was too late. The other man was gone. He was frozen in place, helpless to do anything else but stare at the corpse. He wanted to run, he wanted to run as far away as his legs could take him. But his legs were seemingly glued to the tile floor. Everything else was a blur, all he could do was stare at the corpse.

The body was covered with vines and flowers and blood. The flowers were sprouting out from his skin and underneath his clothes. The vines were wrapped tightly around his neck, blood spilling over them in some places. The sunflower in his mouth was covered in blood and there seemed to be a bit of his lungs. The thought made his stomach churn. The blood in his veins had been replaced with vines.

On his arms, the vines had forced themselves from out of his muscles and skin, blood pouring down his arms. His face was tinted a faint purple, the green vines more prominent under his eyes and on his cheeks. One of his eyes had been replaced with one of the bright yellow flowers. The blood dried to his face, but still pouring off his nose and dripping onto the wood of the table.

It could’ve been beautiful. It could’ve been if it hadn’t been so bloody. If it hadn’t been so disgustingly grotesque. If it hadn’t been a million more things. It would’ve been beautiful if it hadn’t been him.

He noticed the letter, that it had his name on it. He pulled it out from underneath the vine wrapped arm. He started to read it but couldn’t get past the first five words without wanting to vomit, the taste of acid stinging his tongue.

He was in shock, staring at the body of the man in front of him. It wasn’t just any man though, was it. It was him. It was Alden, it was his Alden. The man he met in the third grade, the man he had slowly fallen in love with in Junior year of high school.

His throat felt like sandpaper and he coughed into his hand, his blood running cold when he saw the flower petals. They were Anemone petals. ‘ Anemone: Forsaken, forgotten love, affection. ’

[hufflly-puffs]

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Chapter 2: A Peck of Owls

Shouldn’t it be a parliament of owls? (And yes, the English language is weird)

Also, the very first thing we learn about Mundugus Fletcher is that he is unreliable. Which in some ways could be a tragic foretelling of his role in Harry’s departure from Privet Drive in book 7, where Mundugus was in part responsible for Moody’s death. Obviously the more people Dumbledore can gather around to fight on his side the better but I still wonder how Mundugus earned so much trust if you can’t rely on him.

We learn that both Mundugus and Mrs Figg were responsible that day to keep an eye on Harry whenever he leaves the house, and later he is repeatedly told not to leave the house, so I think the protection Privet Drive provides him is really just limited to the house itself. Outside he can still become a target. (That might also be why Uncle Vernon couldn’t strangle Harry, because the house protects Harry in maybe more than just one way.)

So, Mr Tibbles is one of Mrs Figg’s cat, that, as she said, she put on the case, and who informed her that Mundugus had left. But unless Mr Tibbles is an Animagus (which I doubt) how could he? It seems in general that magical pets are much more intelligent than common pets. We saw that with Crookshanks, and basically with every owl, because owls are really stupid in reality (and gave the animal trainers of the movie adaptions a hard time). So is it possible that in a world where humans can be born either with or without magic animals can as well? Not in the way like magical beasts, but common animals like cats. Or maybe not magical but with a broader sense of understanding? In what way does Mr Tibbles communicates with Mr. Figg?

I like that despite being a Squib Mrs Figg is still part of the magical community. She uses a lot of phrases that sound typical for a witch/wizard, so she probably grew up in a wizard household. She does what she can to help, to contribute something in fighting this war. And it is possible that a lot of Squibs become outsiders, isolate themselves, might even leave the Wizarding World behind. But with Mr Filch and Mrs Figg we have two examples of Squibs who found their place in the Magical world thanks to Dumbledore.

“Talk about the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery … this was exactly what Dumbledore was afraid of […]“ �� So Dumbledore already suspected the Ministry might use this regulation against Harry, creating a situation where we had to use magic, knowing of course that he already had used magic before in his holidays. What was the goal here? Do discredit Harry publically? To get him expelled from Hogwarts? To get him away from Dumbledore’s influence?

“Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia exchanged looks of utter horror. If their least favourite thing in the world was magic – closely followed by neighbours who cheated more than they did on the hosepipe ban – people who heard voices were definitely in the bottom ten. They obviously thought Dudley was losing his mind.” – It is so telling that people like the Dursleys would fear that one of them might suffer from a mental illness. Because they seem like the kind of people who are unable to understand this kind of illness, who merely think in categories of “crazy” and “sane” and everyone who isn’t like them is other. Then again, despite the repeated trauma Harry has to endure we never see him getting any kind of psychological  help and therapy, so mental illnesses might be stigmatized in the Wizarding World as well.

“But Dudley seemed incapable of saying. He shuddered again and shook his large blond head, and despite the sense of numb dread that had settled on Harry since the arrival of the first owl, he felt a certain curiosity. Dementors caused a person to relive the worst moments of their life. What would spoiled, pampered, bullying Dudley have been forced to hear?” – Harry, in many ways, isn’t very likeable in book 5. He is angry, he acts selfish, he only sees his own suffering. Which is actually in great contrast to book 6, and that is why the two of them complement each other. And Harry’s selfish behaviour isn’t just towards his friends, it is towards people like Dudley as well. Yes, Dudley is a bully, and our sympathy for him is limited. But Harry’s curiosity isn’t born out of empathy or care, but because he looks down on Dudley. What in the world could Dudley see and hear, when his life had been seemingly without so much less pain than Harry’s? Harry never asks, he never tries to reach out, even after he realizes that someone like Dudley has deep settled fears.

“‘I heard – that awful boy – telling her about them – years ago,’ she said jerkily. ‘If you mean my mum and dad, why don’t you use their names?’” – That awful boy that told Lily about Azkaban and Dementors was of course not James, but Snape. It’s a shame really that Harry and Petunia never really talk, how her pain of losing her sister to this other world (in more than one way) closed her off so completely that she could never talk about it, not even with Harry who had a right to know.

“‘Back?’ whispered Aunt Petunia. She was looking at Harry as she had never looked at him before. And all of a sudden, for the very first time in his life, Harry fully appreciated that Aunt Petunia was his mother’s sister. He could not have said why this hit him so very powerfully at this moment. All he knew was that he was not the only person in the room who had an inkling of what Lord Voldemort being back might mean. Aunt Petunia had never in her life looked at him like that before. Her large, pale eyes (so unlike her sister’s) were not narrowed in dislike or anger, they were wide and fearful. The furious pretence that Aunt Petunia had maintained all Harry’s life – that there was no magic and no world other than the world she inhabited with Uncle Vernon – seemed to have fallen away.” – I love that scene. For the longest time the Dursleys were an abstract concept for Harry, in no way related to his parents, despite knowing that Petunia and Lily were sisters. But Petunia never mentions her sister, never even showed Harry a picture of her, nothing. As if she had never existed. It is understandable that Harry never saw her as his mother’s sister. But suddenly he does. Suddenly he understands that he is not the only one who lost someone that night, that Petunia’s fear, her ignorance, her hatred are a result of the terror of that night. And now she has learned that the man responsible for the murder of her sister is back.

“This Lord Voldything’s back, you say.” – You know in book 7 when they can no longer use Voldemort’s name? This is the nickname they should have used.

And here we have Uncle Vernon, who just learned the same thing as his wife, but his reaction is to throw Harry out of the house. He only sees the danger it would cause for his family and doesn’t even think for a minute about his nephew. Harry needs more protection than ever, but his uncle refuses to give him some. It shows you exactly the kind of man Vernon Dursley is.

And then there is of course the Howler Petunia gets, as we later learn from Dumbledore, referring to his last letter (the one he wrote when he left Harry at the Dursleys). We learn later the reason why Harry has to return to his family every year: as long as he can call this place his home it will protect him. And I don’t think Petunia ever told Vernon about it. She finds excuses now why Harry has to stay and she found probably excuses back then to explain to her husband why they had to keep her nephew. Because Vernon made it clear that he doesn’t care about Harry’s safety. However complicated her relationship with her sister was a part of Petunia always loved her sister, mourned her, and couldn’t bear the thought to let the child die that her sister gave her life for. However horrible she treated Harry, she gave him a home, she gave him the bare minimum to survive, and with that she kept Lily’s sacrifice alive.

[gehayi]

The Austrian doctor after whom Asperger syndrome is named was an active participant in the Nazi regime, assisting in the Third Reich’s so called euthanasia programme and supporting the concept of racial hygiene by deeming certain children unworthy to live, according to a study by a medical historian.

Herwig Czech, from Vienna’s Medical University, has made the claim in an academic paper published in the open access journal Molecular Autism, following eight years of research into the paediatrician Hans Asperger.

Asperger is hailed as a pioneer in the field of child psychiatry and paediatrics, particularly for his groundbreaking contribution to the understanding of Asperger syndrome and the autism spectrum.

But by unearthing previously untouched documents from state archives, including Asperger’s personnel files and patient case records, Czech has revealed a scientist who allied himself so closely with the Nazi ideology that he frequently referred children to the Am Spiegelgrund clinic, which was set up as a collecting point for children who failed to conform to the regime’s criteria of “worthy to live”.

Nearly 800 children died at the clinic between 1940 and 1945, many of whom were murdered under the notorious child “euthanasia” scheme.

In a joint statement, the editors of Molecular Autism – Simon Baron-Cohen, Ami Klin, Steve Silberman and Joseph Buxbaum – said they welcomed the fact that Czech’s “meticulous research” had finally thrown light on decades of scepticism about Asperger’s claims that he had taken a caring approach to his patients.

“The degree of Asperger’s involvement in the targeting of Vienna’s most vulnerable children has remained an open and vexing question in autism research for a long time,” they wrote in a joint statement.

At the time the term Asperger syndrome was first coined in London in 1981, by Dr Lorna Wing, they added, “She and we as scientists and clinicians, as well as the broader autism community, were unaware of Hans Asperger’s close alliance with, and support of, the Nazi programme of compulsory sterilisation and euthanasia.”

Among Czech’s findings is a photo of the distraught face of Herta Schreiber, who suffered from encephalitis and died of pneumonia three months after her admittance to Spiegelgrund, on Asperger’s orders, a day after her third birthday.

Asperger ordered her transfer because “she must be an unbearable burden to her mother” and she was deemed incurable. A specimen of Herta’s brain, found in a preparation jar in the basement of the clinic in the late 1990s, was buried in 2002, Czech said.

Two year-old Herta Schreiber was one of the children Hans Asperger sent to the Spiegelgrund clinic, the collecting point for children not considered under Nazi criteria “hereditarily worthy” or “racially pure”, where almost 800 children died between 1940 and 1945, many murdered by poisoning and other means.

Asperger examined Herta on 27 June 1941. She was the youngest of nine children, and since falling ill with encephalitis a few months earlier had displayed signs of mental disturbance and impaired physical development.

Asperger wrote of Herta: “Severe personality disorder (post-encephalitic?): most severe motoric retardation; erethic idiocy; seizures. At home the child must be an unbearable burden to the mother, who has to care for five healthy children. Permanent placement at Spiegelgrund seems absolutely necessary.”

Herta was admitted to Spiegelgrund on 1 July 1941. The following month the head of Spiegelgrund, Erwin Jekelius, recommended she be considered for euthanasia. She died of pneumonia the day after her third birthday on 2 September 1941. Pneumonia was routinely induced in Spiegelgrund patients through the administration of barbiturates over a prolonged period.

A note in her file indicates her mother knew and accepted that her child would be killed. Her husband, at war, should not be informed, she told the doctors, as he would be too upset.

There was no evidence that Asperger deliberately targeted for euthanasia the patients with distinct psychological characteristics he had called “autistic psychopaths”, under the diagnosis for which he became famous, said Czech. But his diagnoses proved burdensome for many of his patients, even years after the collapse of the Nazi regime. Asperger continued working as a doctor for more than three decades.

Neither, said Czech, was there evidence of the benevolent attitude towards his patients that Asperger and others later boasted of. Czech also found a distinct lack of evidence of Asperger’s self-coined “pedagogic optimism”, according to which some could be treated or cured.

Asperger did take considerable pride in his “Heilpädagogik” – therapeutic pedagogy – which promoted the popular idea among his colleagues and Nazi leaders at a time of labour shortages that in certain cases people with autism made excellent soldiers and reliable workers. But Asperger also wrote about the need to “carry out restrictive measures” against patients deemed to be incurable and with hereditary conditions “out of a sense of great responsibility” towards the German race.

“In short, he was responsible for depriving of their liberty many children whom he deemed incapable of existing outside institutions,” Czech said.

Asperger rose to the highest position in the expanding field of therapeutic pedagogy, adapting it to suit Nazi ideology, and was promoted over the heads of Jewish colleagues who were forced out of the profession.

In his 43-page paper, Czech is deeply critical of authors in the English-speaking world, who he accused, over decades, of perpetuating a “predominantly apologetic narrative” of Asperger, “based on the limited range of sources available to them”. He also criticised Uta Frith, considered one of the UK’s leading autism experts, saying she had barely mentioned Nazism in her 1991 book Asperger and His Syndrome, which he believed had been instrumental in establishing the common view that Asperger had “defended his patients against the Nazi regime at great personal risk”, when the opposite had been the case, Czech said. Frith declined to comment for this article.

Czech also lists examples of how Asperger often deemed sexually abused children to be responsible for the abuse and cites how antisemitic stereotypes crept into Asperger’s diagnostic reports.

“Asperger refused to acknowledge the reality of anti-Jewish persecution by the Nazi regime; this indifference is visible both during and after the war,” said Czech.

The historian admitted that his findings might well be painful for autistic people and their families to digest, but said he was obliged to reveal them.

“It would have been wrong for me to have withheld this information, however difficult it might be to hear,” he said. “At the same time, there is no evidence to show his contributions to autism research were tainted by his problematic role during National Socialism. So purging the term Asperger from the medical lexicon would not be helpful. Rather, this should be an opportunity to look at the past and learn lessons from it.”

Carol Povey, director at the National Autistic Society in the UK’s Centre for Autism, said: “We expect these findings to spark a big conversation among autistic people and their family members, particularly those who identify with the term ‘Asperger’. Obviously no one with a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome should feel in any way tainted by this very troubling history.”

[siavahdainthemoon]

why I hate the concept of karma and/or the Law of Attraction

Because both of them only really ‘work’ when your starting point is white and cis and straight and healthy and middle-class-on-up. And both of them encourage people who are white and cis and straight and healthy and reasonably wealthy to look down on and blame other people for being in pain, and/or justify not helping those who are suffering.

‘You’re calling all this pain to yourself by the way you think!’ ‘You can make everything better just by thinking positive!’ ‘If bad things happen to you, it’s because of something you did or thought.’ Or, if we’re talking the original concept of karma, as opposed to how it’s been appropriated and mangled by white western New Age-ism, ‘You’re suffering because of something you did in your previous life!’

It’s such utter victim-blaming bullshit.

I mean, look. Karma is/was originally a concept from Hinduism, wherein - sorry-not-sorry, Hindu people, read your own history - it was used to justify the abuse and suffering of the lower castes, particularly the ‘untouchables’ who were - whoops, I’m sorry, I thought this bs was over with but apparently it’s still a thing in some places, allow me to correct myself - who are so super unclean that they are forbidden from allowing their shadows to fall upon anyone of a higher caste (and can be beaten, or even killed in older times, if they let that happen). Because according to the rule of karma, if you are suffering in this life, it’s because you were bad in a previous life. In much the same way that the concept of the Divine Plan and Divine Right of rulers/nobility in Medieval Christian Europe was used to enforce and justify a strict, abusive class system, Hindu karma said/says that the suffering of the lower social groups is not just justified, but a fundamental aspect of reality itself. It also works/worked in much the same way that the idea of Heaven and Hell did and do in Christianity; if you suffer with patient forbearance now, you will be rewarded for it later, whereas if you set yourself against the ‘natural order’, you will be punished for eternity/in your next life (if not in this one. Hindu karma also allows for your actions to be rewarded/punished in this lifetime, but the point I’m making here is that it explains away why some people are born into horrible situations, and why no one should help them if they are). 

(Which is obviously not to say that many Hindu people tried to do right by those beneath them, in the same way that ‘true’ Christians try to be compassionate and kind instead of overbearing evangelical fuckheads. But the fundamental concept is fucked up.) 

Now, I haven’t seen a whole lot of New Agers who talk about karma in relation to reincarnation; white New Agers mostly talk about karma in the same way they talk about the Wiccan threefold rule (whatever you do comes back to thee/three times three times three) or the Law of Attraction; i.e., if you do good things good things will happen to you, if you do bad things bad things will happen to you.

The Law of Attraction is actually a little less about what you do and more about how you think and behave. Simply put: if you cultivate a positive outlook, you will attract positivity to yourself, and if you think negatively, you will attract negativity to yourself.

Anyone else see the problem with that?

Now, I’m a witch. I accept without qualification that human thoughts and desires, focused in the correct way, can alter reality. That’s my definition of magic. But it takes a very particular focus to work magic. That’s why every culture has developed rituals and ceremonies to get their people into the right headspace for it - dancing, chanting, meditation, music, etc. It’s not something m/any of us can do without training and/or practice, deliberate intention, and faith - in yourself, in your spell/prayer/ritual, in your god or God, one or all of the above. 

Simply thinking bad or sad thoughts, simply being sad or angry or frustrated, does not call bad shit down upon you. I’ll grant that a lot of us with things like depression end up with messed up lives - but that’s because it’s a mental illness that a) makes it hard to function and b) doesn’t always get a whole lot of compassion and assistance from others. 

If you turn around and tell me that’s how the universe works - that bad things happen only to people who call bad things to them - that good things happen only to good people - not only have you regressed to a three year old’s understanding of reality, but I could literally kill myself by climbing to the top of your ego and jumping to your IQ. 

You smug, arrogant, oblivious, privileged piece of shit.

Karma doesn’t work as a theological concept even when you apply reincarnation to it, because punishment-based education doesn’t work if you don’t remember/know what you’re being punished for. It’s the reason you can’t punish a dog for misbehaving while you were out of the house, because they are incapable of connecting the punishment to the thing they did hours ago. If you can’t punish them right then, they don’t learn the lesson. You can explain to a human being what they’re being punished for, and they’ll understand what action or behavior resulted in the punishment. (What they do with it...well, I don’t think punishment-based education works at all, but that’s an argument for another post). But there is no fucking lesson to learn if one has no memory of what earned the punishment. 

Karma without reincarnation falls apart even faster. What does a child do to deserve abusive parents? What does an eleven year old boy do to deserve a disorder that means he’ll die if he sleeps? What do teenagers do to deserve conversion therapy? What do trans people do to deserve being born into the wrong body? What do perfectly ordinary people do to deserve being raped? Or developing cancer? Or chronic pain disorder? How does an unarmed black boy ‘earn’ a cop’s bullet, exactly? What did the approximately 280,000 people who died in the 2004 tsunami do to deserve that? What has any teen girl in the world done to deserve female circumcision? What did the African peoples do to deserve slavery? What did the Jews and Romanis and queers and everyone else do to deserve the fucking Holocaust? 

And the Law of Attraction? Are you really going to sit there and tell me that people born into poverty, born into abuse, born into bodies that are falling apart or wracked with pain, should smile and be cheerful like fucking flower fairies because otherwise they’re making it worse? Or again - tell me how my negative thinking, at twelve years old, made my mother beat me black and blue. Tell me how positive thinking is supposed to cure clinical depression, or banish away an abusive spouse, or put money in a bank account so far in the red it’s bleeding over your hands. Tell me how positive thinking puts food on the table, or fixes gender dysphoria, or cures a disease doctors will barely name. 

It’s so fucking easy and convenient to believe in karma and the Law of Attraction when you’re white and straight and healthy and have no real problems. It’s such an ego-stroker, isn’t it, if you can tell yourself that you deserve how easy your life is, if you can flick your eyes away from the homeless girl and her dog and tell yourself that it’s nothing to do with you, she earned it, or she could fix her life if she wanted to, if she just thought right. It means you don’t have to feel guilty about the less fortunate, it means you don’t have to make yourself uncomfortable by reaching out or giving to charity or protesting a law that won’t affect you. It means you get to feel like you earned all the things life pours into your lap, as if you worked for them, as if you won them. 

It means you can cheerfully, patronizingly burble your New Agey delusions at anyone who’s in real pain instead of offering real help, and you know what, I don’t give a flying fuck if you do it with good intentions. Intentions don’t mean anything in the real world; if you do harm it doesn’t matter that you didn’t mean to. The harm still objectively exists. If you say ‘oh, you just have to think more positive!’ when someone is in tears, when they’re bleeding, when their life is falling apart - then not only is your grammar atrocious, but you are utter scum, and I hate you, I hate that you exist, I hate everything that you stand for. How fucking dare you say, or imply, that all suffering is deserved, that all suffering is something we call down upon ourselves? Given the terrible, heart-breaking surfeit of pain in the world, the vast majority of which falls down on those who could not possibly deserve it?

Because that is what you’re saying. It is what you’re implying.

So either admit that you are privileged enough, and enough of an unintentional asshole, to ‘accidentally’ believe everyone but you and people like you deserve to suffer - or wake the fuck up and trade in your philosophy. Because the one you have right now sucks.

[fear-god-shun-evil]

Confessing With the Mouth And Believing With the Heart Is Not Enough For Us to Truly Be Saved

Liangliang

Question: The Bible says, “That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart man believes to righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made to salvation” (Romans 10: 9-10). So, we believe that we’ve been saved through our faith in the Lord Jesus and that salvation is once and for all. When the Lord comes, we will enter the kingdom of heaven. Is our understanding right?

Answer: The majority of the believers nowadays interpret the above scriptures in this way: We will be saved once we believe. As long as we hold on to the name of the Lord Jesus at all times, and endure to the end no matter what sufferings we encounter, then we’ll be saved. When the Lord comes, He will take us into the kingdom of heaven. Is this thinking tenable or in accordance with the truth? Let’s fellowship about this problem.

“That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart man believes to righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made to salvation” (Romans 10: 9-10). We all know these verses were said by the apostle Paul, but they are totally against the Lord’s word. The Lord Jesus never said one can enter the kingdom of heaven after being saved by faith. Instead, He said, “but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). Only the Lord Jesus guards the gate of the kingdom, and only His word is the truth and the standard for man’s entry into the kingdom of heaven, while man’s word is not. We say that we are “saved by faith.” But this “salvation” only means our sins are forgiven, and we won’t be condemned or put to death by the law. It doesn’t mean that we can practice God’s words, that we have broken away from sin and achieved changes in disposition and purification, much less that we can enter the kingdom of heaven. We have been forgiven of our sins by believing in the Lord Jesus, but the nature of resisting and betraying God still remains within us. When we encounter something unpleasant, such as natural or man-made disasters, illness, persecution and tribulation, we still can blame and misunderstand God. Some people have already believed in the Lord, yet they pursue worldly trends, greedily enjoy sinful happiness, and still often sin and resist God. How could such people possibly enter the kingdom of heaven? The Lord is holy and righteous, so He makes no exceptions. The Lord Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the Son stays ever” (John 8:34-35). Obviously, if we cannot break away from sin, we will not be able to enter the kingdom of heaven. So, the assertion of “One can enter the kingdom of heaven after being saved by faith” goes against the Lord Jesus’ word. Otherwise, He would not have said such words, “Not every one that said to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21).

Where then did the concept of “being saved” come from? Is the real meaning of it the same as what we imagine? Thinking back, when God created Adam and Eve, there was no death at all, and so, for them, there was no such statement as “being saved.” After they sinned, death started to come upon man. It was then that the concept of “being saved” came into existence. When the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, God asked Moses to deliver them from the slavery of Pharaoh and lead them to the good land of Canaan. At that time, the Israelites were saved by breaking away from the slavery of the Egyptian Pharaoh. When God decreed the laws and commandments to guide man’s life on earth, as long as man could keep them and offer sacrifices to God after sinning, then they would be saved. Therefore, “being saved” in the Age of Law meant that man gained God’s blessing and protection through abiding by the laws of Jehovah. This salvation enabled people to know what was sin, but their sinful behavior was not resolved then. Therefore, at the end of the Age of Law, man couldn’t keep the laws, and offered lame or blind cattle and sheep on the altar as sacrifices. According to the law, they would have been condemned and put to death. However, as God couldn’t bear to allow them all to die under the law, He was incarnated for the first time against such background, and was nailed to the cross for man as man’s sin offering. As a result, man only needed to pray and repent and confess to the Lord Jesus to be forgiven of their sins, and would no longer be condemned and executed by the law. This is what it meant to be saved in the Age of Grace.

God’s work is done according to the age and the stage. It does not remain unchanging, and thereby man is required to keep up with it. If they fail to follow God’s footsteps, they cannot be saved, and will only be eliminated by His work.

When the Lord Jesus began to do His work, the Pharisees didn’t know this principle of God’s work, but lived within an imagined conception of truth, and held to the words in the Scriptures, “that whoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered” (Joel 2:32). In their belief, all that was needed to be saved was to keep the law. So, they didn’t seek or investigate the new work carried out by the Lord Jesus, but instead rejected and resisted it. Ultimately, they were punished and cursed by God. Surely they were not saved despite their confidence in that. Isn’t the outcome of the Pharisees worthy of our contemplation? In regard to the scriptures “That if you shall confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you shall be saved. For with the heart man believes to righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made to salvation” (Romans 10:9-10), the salvation here actually refers to having man’s sins forgiven in the Age of Grace, with the result that man is qualified to come before God and pray, commune with God, and enjoy the abundant grace and truth of God. But the root of man’s sin hasn’t been resolved and they can still sin endlessly, so it cannot be said that man has truly been saved.

Now, brothers and sisters in all denominations and sects live in sin involuntarily, and no one is exempt. Satanic dispositions, like arrogance, greed, maliciousness, selfishness, and craftiness, can all be seen within us, and we have already got used to them. People who have believed in the Lord for years have known a fact: Though our sins are forgiven by the Lord, we can still commit them in spite of ourselves. We still tell lies to seek fortune, fame, and position. We are arrogant and do not accept the truth. When calamities befall us, we complain and betray God. Although we frequently speak of honoring God as great, we still adore and follow man in our hearts. Sometimes, for the sake of position, we try to exalt ourselves and stand in the place of God to let others look up to us. Worse yet, we separate into factions, form cliques, and establish our own independent kingdoms. It can be seen that, with satanic nature, we cannot enter the kingdom of heaven even if our sins are forgiven. These manifestations are sufficient to prove that we are still of Satan, are not truly saved, and are enemies of God, for which we will surely be condemned and punished by God.

God’s disposition is righteous and holy, so He requires man to break away from sin, and get cleansed and changed. It is mentioned many times in the Bible, “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). “And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God” (Revelation 14:5). “Be you therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). These verses tell us clearly that people who can enter into the kingdom of heaven are sinless, pure and unblemished. Just think: Can God bring men as filthy and corrupt as us into His kingdom? Are such people worthy to get into it? About these issues, God’s word shows us a definite answer. God says, “You have missed a step in your belief in God: You have merely been redeemed, but have not been changed. For you to be after God’s heart, God must personally do the work of changing and cleansing you; if you are only redeemed, you will be incapable of attaining sanctity. In this way you will be unqualified to share in the good blessings of God, for you have missed out a step in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting. And so you, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are incapable of directly inheriting God’s inheritance.” “At the time Jesus’ work was the redemption of all mankind. The sins of all who believed in Him were forgiven; as long as you believed in Him, He would redeem you; if you believed in Him, you were no longer a sinner, you were relieved of your sins. This is what it meant to be saved, and to be justified by faith. Yet in those who believed, there remained that which was rebellious and opposed God, and which still had to be slowly removed. Salvation did not mean man had been completely gained by Jesus, but that man was no longer of sin, that he had been forgiven his sins: Provided you believed, you would never more be of sin.” God’s words are very clear. The root of sins is still within us although our sins have been forgiven. Though none of us is willing to sin against the Lord subjectively, we commit sins despite ourselves. It’s like cutting the leeks; they get cut over and over again, but they come back every time. Hence, we still need God to get rid of the corrupt disposition of resistance and disobedience to Him within us.

We can’t save ourselves, so we need to accept God’s salvation. It says in the Bible, “For by grace are you saved through faith …” (Ephesians 2:8). From this verse, we can see that “being saved” is, on the one hand, because of God’s salvation coming to man, and on the other hand, because of their faith. That is, when God’s work of salvation comes to us, we must believe and follow in order to be saved. God’s word says, “Man’s flesh is of Satan, it is full of disobedient dispositions, it is deplorably filthy, it is something unclean. People covet the enjoyment of the flesh too much, there are too many manifestations of the flesh, and so God despises the flesh to a point. When people leave behind the filthy, corrupt things of Satan, they gain God’s salvation. But if they remain incapable of divesting themselves of filth and corruption, then they will still be under the domain of Satan. People’s conniving, deceitfulness, and crookedness are things of Satan; by saving you, God separates you from these things and God’s work cannot be wrong, and is all in order to save people from darkness. When you have believed to a certain point and can divest yourself of the corruption of the flesh, and are no longer enshackled by this corruption, will you not have been saved? When you live under Satan’s domain you are incapable of manifesting God, you are something filthy, and shall not receive God’s inheritance. Once you have been cleansed and made perfect, you will be holy, and you will be normal, and you will be blessed by God and delightful to God.” God’s words show us the path to the kingdom of heaven. Only by accepting this stage of God’s work of judgment and chastisement in the last days, can we be cleansed and saved and enter the kingdom of heaven. If we are satisfied with being saved through faith, then we are simply sitting passively to await destruction. Because this stage of God’s work in the last days is to bring the age to an end, and to separate all according to their kind and reward the good and punish the evil; it is the last work to save mankind, and will bring everything to a close as well. Those who are incompatible with God and refuse to accept His work in the last days, as well as the wicked in resistance to God will end in destruction, which is unalterable by any person. God’s words say, “After God’s work ends, among all His creatures, there will be those who will be destroyed and those who will survive. This is an inevitable trend of His management work. No one can deny this. Evildoers cannot survive; those who obey and follow Him to the end are certainly to survive. As this work is that of humanity’s management, there will be those who remain and those who are eliminated. These are different outcomes of different types of people, and these are the most suitable arrangements for His creatures.” God’s words tell us clearly that there will be creatures who will be destroyed and creatures who will survive when His work is finished. Nowadays, God has reclaimed the work of the Spirit throughout the universe and worked on this group of people who have accepted His work of the last days. Only when we follow the footsteps of God, accept His judgment and chastisement, and have our corruption purified, only when we become the ones who truly love and obey God and no longer disobey or resist Him, will we be truly saved.

Source: By Grow in Christ

[collymore]

The House Niggers last hurrah! (Article)

By Stanley Collymore

 For centuries your sort has been a bane proverbially and literally in the lives of all decent, hard-working, thoroughly exploited but all the same exceedingly in spite of the inhumane travesties habitually and mercilessly inflicted on them, whether individually or collectively and always without question extraordinarily principled and deeply religious, whether their religious faith was Islam, Christianity or Judaism, Black persons. And you customarily did your unscrupulous deeds on behalf of your perceived racially and socially-superior betters, regardless of whether they were white Caucasians or others, during the time of Slavery, its offspring Colonialism, Segregation, Jim Crowism, Apartheid, Racial Exclusivism by white Caucasians and in marked contrast by them the total and contemptuous exclusion in every conceivable situation of all Black people.

 And throughout your avid, treacherous and ever willing assistance to any and everyone who, for whatever spurious or perverse reasons they have or had previously entertained, or even when they can vouchsafe none that are either coherent or more reasonably insane and rather paradoxically do pertain even to your treacherous selves, when callously and discourteously used against you for their own barbaric ends, you’re none the less still unquestionably and sycophantically eager to do their odious biddings.

 All because you’re simply nothing more than a bunch of contemptible, black lowlife scum revelling in your all-out toadying service and the disingenuously subscribed to and eagerly employed by your abusive exploiters but evidently to anyone with even a half-functioning and receptive brain between their ears the effortlessly come, readily withdrawn patronage that’s habitually shown to House Niggers of every kind when ill-treating and manipulative white Caucasians and others them who certainly relish abusing you and accordingly derive great satisfaction from their irrefutable hold over you in instances like these, unmistakably need you to do their dirty work for them!

 Something that you Useful Black Idiots, and without question, always readily, permissively, sycophantically, unreservedly and most receptively respond to every time. Notwithstanding the obvious and brutal fact that your services and more particularly yourselves are, to put it charitably, extremely expendable. Since unchangeably either at the frivolous whim or sick fancy of those who in every perceived sense are still pulling your psychological and deeply embedded slavery chains, a situation that you voluntarily permit them to indulge in, clearly think little or nothing at all about you as a person except, of course, on how best to happily exploit or denigrate you.

 For most of their actions in relation to you their perceived and actual House Nigger basically stem from vague but all the same pernicious whims coupled with the unredeeming and brutal fact on their part that when you’re either no longer advantageous to them and your usefulness in their cause has come to an end they see no problem in readily and happily dispensing with all resistibility for as well as heartlessly and unconcernedly getting rid of you.

 A ferally-induced situation in common with a very likeminded and promptly implemented situation which from a specifically analytical as well as a conscionably humane observation emphatically bears more in its existence than just your own personal as well as an obviously shared and pathetic existence among you detestable House Niggers.

 Something that your inured racist abusers and exploiters are indubitably, absolutely correctly, predictably and even understandably in these somewhat bizarre circumstances most tirelessly and together with your unquestioning assistance instinctively gotten quite used to, as they’ve always been. Diligently and egotistically completely aware of this ongoing and one-sidedly, racially exploitative affair, and they’re not alone in this believe me!

 For you are the unashamedly, demonstrably idiotic, most ingratiating in the process to those whom you willingly serve, vile and treacherous House Nigger scum that every conscionable and principled Black person is cognizant of, contemptuously detest and quite understandably intensely abhor. In other words: contagious vermin!

 I’m a steadfast believer in as well as a staunch supporter of the principle, practicality and the practice of meritocracy and furthermore passionately believe, and unswervingly do, that the only limitations on one’s personal capabilities and realistic ambitions must be their own well-informed and well-intentioned considerations in relation as to how best, or not at all, they ultimately use their God-given and perceived expectations. In other words, all such definitive solutions or resolutions must be theirs and theirs alone.

 Conversely, I don’t for a solitary second believe in, never have done or will I ever do so, the notion of so-called “privileged elites” of any kind or how they ostensibly emerged, let alone who they are, what they do for a living or, more likely, spend their time idly scrounging off of or else exploitatively using others for their own selfish and acquisitive ends, where on earth they emanate from, and even less so what economic status or social background such persons arrogantly consider that anyone of sustenance, and most notably themselves, should and must automatically belong, if only they insist to categorically and justifiably distance themselves, understandably they will say, from the general throng of less worthy human beings.

 The hereditary principle of automatic superiority is equally something that I implacably abhor having discerned it to be a rather ludicrous, in the extreme, concept to honestly envisage as an acceptable and defensible approach to living; and accordingly, as I see it, is on parity with the worst aspects of the abysmally failed and fantasy perception of eugenics. And, therefore, is in effect nothing more or less than a perverse excuse for the worst excesses of unashamed incest and other equally disgusting forms of sexual manipulation, pathetically but also reprehensibly masquerading to anyone with eyes to see and who’re are prepared to consciously do so, as the epitome of what cultured life and de facto the pinnacle of earthly civilization is all about and unquestionably must be.

 For the House Nigger, however, it’s demonstrably obvious that logic, common sense nor any other form of rational evaluation doesn’t ever, even for a single second, enter their somewhat pathetic and sickening equation let alone what either he or she is despicably doing, for they’re so completely and likewise unresistingly brainwashed by those who’re cruelly manipulating and self-servingly exploiting them, that what these House Niggers are accordingly willingly but transparently, catastrophically and idiotically doing against other Blacks doesn’t register with any of them and, consequently on their part, is seemingly incapable of doing so.

 Since all that these inured and ludicrous House Nigger scum are concerned about is to either voluntarily or instructively do all that they possibly can to promote, secure and advance the welfare, personal satisfaction as well as the combined wide-ranging interests and ambitions of every white Caucasian man and woman they gleefully and unswervingly serve, as well as those peoples’ similarly horrible offspring, and to do so in every conceivable and beneficial manner that they possibly can. Undertaking assignments, like the Useful idiots that they are who don’t mind in the least embarking on any of them, even if in accepting such tasks it’ll necessarily involve them having to sacrifice their own lives, so long as they can fawningly achieve these much cherished goals or ambitions on the behalf of their toadying-perceived racial and socially superior master or mistress, who invariably happen to be a white man or woman and not uncommonly and rather ironically these white Caucasians spoilt and just as racially ingrained children.

 Offspring who following their conception and birth these Black House Niggers have looked after hand and foot but yet treat not as charges in their care but most ridiculously as though they were hereditary earthly Gods and Goddesses to who, as with their parents, these House Niggers must equally, despite their youth and inexperience of life, nevertheless without any exception intuitively bestow on them the corresponding obedience, subservience and rites of passage to their notion of white superiority and its attendant entitlement to white Caucasian exclusivism that all racist nerds of their racial breed consider to be rightfully their own.

 But we’re now in the 21st Century and this was all a long time ago, surely. Don’t you believe it for “House Niggerism” in still very much alive, in total rude health and very much kicking its subservient heels in offensive jubilation as it carries on its long-established service to other races but most particularly so it’s beloved white Caucasian man and woman. But observably unlike the past when House Niggers were principally ensconced in the home of his master or mistress – hence the terminology House Nigger – they’re now, like the verminous scum that they are, located everywhere; never allowed to be in charge of anything substantial but with the skilful cosmetic PR work applied to them by those who manipulatively control them can be disingenuously passed off as the meaningful change from the dark and bad old days.

 So we now find them in the case of Britain in the House of Commons but because of the way politics is run in Britain disproportionately in the Labour Party. All of them Tory-minded of course and who would like nothing better than to be in parliament as Tory MPs but there’s not much chance of that happening and certainly not on any significant scale, you can rely on that, and principally because the redneck Tory constituency parties and voters aren’t going to keenly have these House Niggers representing their perceived blood-blooded constituencies in parliament. So these House Niggers join the Labour Party but treacherously from within its ranks support the Tory Party and every conceivable right-wing Conservative agenda that you can think of. And with their similarly abhorrent and highly treacherous white “Labtories” in the Labour Party malevolently carry on doing their contemptible work against ordinary men and women across the United Kingdom.

 But Britain’s House Niggers aren’t alone in this damnable perfidy, and unquestionably even in greater numbers proliferate within Rogue State USA where these loathsome bastards and bitches can be effortlessly found, and most infamously now as the customary chattel they’ve always been throughout Rogue State USA’s vile, barbaric and ongoing genocidal and racist history in that entity’s supposedly, but laughably termed, prized forum of “democracy”. It’s called the US Congress!

pharCR �7