#much of it is parental related but most aren’t abusive or anything; many are orphans or being raised by a single parent | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

uncloseted · 3 years

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Recently I've been seeing some tiktoks from people who are apparently "against adoption". I don't really go into their profiles to see what they mean exactly and what they think we should do with children in foster care. They always say that "no one is entitled to another person's baby". At the risk of sounding insensitive, it looks like most of them were adopted and had a bad experience with it and probably resent their birth parents for "abandoning" them. But I don't really know.

I also know that there are some problems with the adoption system in America, but I'm not extremely familiar with it because I don't live there. Please tell me if you need more information and I'll look for it

Honestly, you have no idea how much I've wanted someone to ask my opinion on this 😂 TikTok has been trying to feed me these videos, too, and I have very strong feelings about them. I've been wondering if the fact that TikTok is a Chinese company has something to do with why anti-adoption TikToks keep getting promoted, since China is one of the most common countries that the US adopts from.

I think you're probably right in your assessment that a lot of the very vocal anti-adoption people on social media are people who were adopted themselves and have unresolved trauma around it. Many of them seem like they're not really in a place emotionally where they can imagine experiences of adoption that aren't like their own, or situations in which adoption might be logistically necessary.

That said, there are some serious problems with how we approach adoption in the US, and those problems are important to talk about. So first let's go over some of the issues that the adoption system in the US has, and then we can talk about some potential solutions to those issues and why being totally anti-adoption doesn't really make sense.

What Does Adoption Look Like in the US?

To start, let's go over what adoption actually looks like in the US. The US has an unusually high rate of adoptions- about 3 adoptions per live birth, in contrast to countries like Sweden and Norway (1.1 per 100 live births) and Australia (0.2 per 100 live births). Approximately 15% of those adoptions are international, 40% are from foster care, and 45% are "other" (including voluntary adoptions through domestic adoption agencies and stepparents or other family members adopting a child directly). Roughly 2-3% of all children under the age of 18 are adopted. Infertility is the most common reason that parents seek to adopt a child they're not related to. Kinship adoptions (children being adopted by family members or close family friends) are typically the first option considered by foster care workers when children are removed from their homes.

Types of Adoption

In the US, we have both open and closed adoptions. Open adoptions allow the biological parent to be in touch with the adoptive parents and the child, and provide the adoptive family with identifying information about their biological parent. In some states, adoptive and biological parents can enter into a legally binding contract that enforces visitation rights and what information can be exchanged about the adoption and about the child.

Closed adoptions seal all identifying information in order to protect the identities of the biological and adoptive parents, as well as to protect the child's identity. This is generally done in cases where the child is adopted as a baby, where the adoptive parents don't want their adopted child to be able to find their biological parents or to know anything about them. An estimated 5% of adoptions in the US are closed.

Disruption

In the US, we also have a process known as "disruption", which is ending an adoption. Sometimes, an adoption is disrupted before the adoption is finalized. Other times, disruptions are a court proceeding after the adoption has been made legal- more like a divorce. Disruptions can happen because the adopted child has psychological, developmental, or health issues the adoptive family can't handle or was not aware of prior to the adoption, or because the parents cannot handle being parents themselves. Disruption seems to be especially common in international adoptions, where children have suffered from spending their first few years in an orphanage. One US Department of Health and Human Services review suggested that 10-25% of adoptions are disrupted or dissolved, but it is unclear how frequently this happens because of the social stigma around disruption. Frequently, post-finalized disruptions (also known as "rehoming") are not regulated, so the child's new housing situation is not investigated to see if it is the best place for the child. As a result of this lack of oversight, rehoming is a target for child and sex traffickers.

What are the Problems With Adoption in the US?

Foster Care

Okay, so now let's dig into some of the big problems that the US adoption system has. The first one I want I want to talk about is issues with the foster care system in the US. There are a lot of issues to do with foster care, but for now I want to focus just on children who are adopted out of the foster care system.

Foster care is when a child is placed into a group home or the home of a state-certified caregiver. The state makes all legal decisions for the child, while the foster parent is responsible for their day to day care. Despite the fact that foster parents go through a licensing process that determines their fitness to be a foster parent and requires foster parents to take parenting classes, one third of foster children in the US report being abused by a foster parent or other adult in the foster home.

The goal of foster care is generally reuniting families when possible; 51% of children who exited foster care in 2010 were reunited with parents or caretakers, 8% went to live with a relative, and 21% were adopted by new parents. The majority of children are placed into foster care due to concerns of neglect (81.2% of cases in California), but those issues are not always resolved once the child enters into the foster care system.

Children who have been in the foster care system are disproportionately likely to have a mental illness, and some studies suggest that as many as 47.9% of foster care youth show signs of serious emotional or behavioral problems. In California, as many as 30% of previous foster children are diagnosed with PTSD. Nearly half of all children in foster care have chronic medical problems. Only 56% of children in foster care graduate from high school (compared to 89.80% of the general population), and 3% graduate from college (compared to about 34.98% of the general population). The emotional trauma that can accompany having been in the foster care system may make children more difficult to adopt and make it more difficult for them to adjust to their adoptive family. About 10% of children placed in foster care stayed in foster care for five years or more.

Further, never being adopted from the foster system comes with negative consequences of its own. After aging out of foster care, 27% of males and 10% of females were incarcerated within 12 to 18 months. 50% were unemployed, 37% had not finished high school, 33% received public assistance, and 19% of females had given birth to children. Before leaving care, 47 percent were receiving some kind of counseling or medication for mental health problems; that number dropped to 21% after leaving care.

There is some data to suggest that because of the way financial incentives are set up in the foster care system, there's a financial incentive for the Department of Children and Family Services to remove children from their parents and keep them in the foster care system. There is also some data to suggest that unfit people become foster parents for the financial benefits.

International and Interracial Adoptions

Now, let's talk about international adoptions. I think when a person uses the word "adoption" this is typically what we think of- an American adopting a baby from a developing country to "give it a better life" in the US. The US is responsible for around 50% of all cases of international adoption. This practice is seen by some to be patronizing or neo-colonialist, particularly since there are children who need adoptive families within the US.

Per the Hauge Adoption Convention, inter-country adoptions should be made in the best interests of the child. Despite this, international adoptions are more likely to be products of adoption fraud than domestic adoptions. Because international adoption is a popular option in the US, instead of being about finding homes for orphaned or abandoned children, international adoption sometimes becomes about finding children for first world parents who are looking to make an international adoption. Infants are particularly "in demand" in the international adoption market, which creates a financial incentive to identify more infants for adoption even though most children available for adoption internationally are school-aged. Because of this demand for international children to adopt that outpaces the supply of international children who need an adoptive family, adoption fraud occurs.

Adoption fraud can take many forms. For example, the birth parents may have not consented to the adoption of their child at all, are under the impression that their child will be returned to them after a period of time, or were paid to relinquish custody of their children. The child may have living relatives who are willing to adopt, they may be represented as being more impoverished than they actually are, or they may be represented as having no siblings even though they do.

International adoptions are also frequently interracial adoptions, which can create some unique difficulties. Adoptees who are POC but whose parents are white still face societal discrimination, particularly if their adoptive parents live in a predominantly white community. Their identities are fundamentally different to those of their parents, and so they may struggle with feeling "different" to their family. Children of interracial adoptions are more likely to report feeling like they don't fit in anywhere, although this can be mitigated by how the adoptive family discusses race and ethnicity, how they encourage their child to engage in socialization with other people of their race/ethnicity, and how they construct a "shared family identity" that does not center race or physical appearance.

Familial or Kinship Adoptions

The last thing I want to talk about in this section is familial or "kinship" adoptions versus non-familial adoptions. As I mentioned above, kinship adoptions are typically the first option when a child is removed from their home or loses their parents. Up to 36% of children who are adopted from foster care are adopted by relatives, and around 50% are reunited with a birth parent. I had difficulty finding the number of children who are directly adopted by relatives without being put into foster care first, but know that it's relatively high. Kinship adoptions are thought to minimize trauma since the caregiver is familiar to them, kinship adoptions are more likely to preserve sibling groups, and the caregiver is more likely to live in the same community (meaning that the adopted child can continue attending the same school and won't have to move).

Proponents of kinship adoptions say that children in the care of relatives experience increased stability, fewer placements, are more likely to express positive feelings about their placements, and have fewer adverse behavioral and mental health outcomes. It is important to note that some of these factors are not directly related to familial ties themselves; for example, the reduction in behavioral and mental health problems may be due in part to spending less time within the foster care system when compared to children without family ties. Kinship adoption also increases the likelihood that the children will be reunited with their biological parents in some capacity.

Detractors of kinship adoption argue that we prioritize kinship adoptions because they are less expensive, entail less vetting and follow ups, and reduce risk of liability. They argue that kinship adoptions encourage people who should not be caring for children to do so, and that the financial incentives involved in the arrangement complicate the situation.

Difficulties Being an Adoptee

There are difficulties that can be associated with being an adopted child, particularly for international adoptees or adoptees who were previously in foster care. Adoption research can be somewhat difficult to parse because researchers do not always differentiate between different types of adoptees when recruiting for their studies. Additionally, researchers are more likely be looking at a clinical population to begin with (adoptees already diagnosed with a mental health disorder), so the data they find may not be generalizable to the entire adoptee population.

As we talked about above, international or interracial adoptees can develop feelings of a lack of acceptance or difficulty understanding their identity. Foster children can struggle to cope with the trauma they experienced before being removed from their environments, the ensuing instability that can occur from being moved within the foster care system, and the trauma from the foster care system itself.

The impact of adoption before birth (when a biological parent agrees they will let a person become the adoptive parent once the child is born) on the adoptee seems to be less clear, since the adoptive parent is the only parent the adoptee has ever known. It seems that having a stable, secure, loving, honest, and supportive family is the best predictor of outcomes, whether the child is adopted or not.

Other concerns that I've seen raised on TikTok specifically relate to the role of an adopted child in the adoptive family. They sometimes raise the belief that children are being adopted with the intention of being "parentified" (to provide physical and emotional support for the parents as opposed to the other way around). I couldn't find any evidence that this happens, but I did find a lot of articles about adoptive parents who are looking to help their adopted child stop exhibiting parental behaviors.

I also see concerns that a child is adopted with the purpose of fixing a marriage or to help the parent feel fulfilled in their life. I couldn't find any data on this claim, either. I imagine it does happen. But it also happens in parents who decide to have a biological child, and I would wager a guess that it's less likely to happen in the case of adoptions because there's an extensive vetting process before a person or couple can legally adopt.

Why Adoption is Sometimes Necessary

I do think there are cases in which adoption is necessary. In childhood development research, there's this concept called "adverse childhood experiences". These are various forms of abuse, neglect, and dysfunction that a child may experience. In the original study, the ACEs were as follows:

Did a parent or other adult in the household often or very often... Swear at you, insult you, put you down, or humiliate you? or act in a way that made you afraid that you might be physically hurt?

Did a parent or other adult in the household often or very often... Push, grab, slap, or throw something at you? or Ever hit you so hard that you had marks or were injured?

Did an adult or person at least 5 years older than you ever... Touch or fondle you or have you touch their body in a sexual way? or Attempt or actually have oral, anal, or vaginal intercourse with you?

Did you often or very often feel that ... No one in your family loved you or thought you were important or special? or Your family didn't look out for each other, feel close to each other, or support each other?

Did you often or very often feel that ... You didn't have enough to eat, had to wear dirty clothes, and had no one to protect you? or Your parents were too drunk or high to take care of you or take you to the doctor if you needed it?

Were your parents ever separated or divorced?

Was your parent or caretaker: Often or very often pushed, grabbed, slapped, or had something thrown at her? or Sometimes, often, or very often kicked, bitten, hit with a fist, or hit with something hard? or Ever repeatedly hit over at least a few minutes or threatened with a gun or knife?

Did you live with anyone who was a problem drinker or alcoholic, or who used street drugs?

Was a household member depressed or mentally ill, or did a household member attempt suicide?

Did a household member go to prison?

ACEs are associated with high-risk health behaviors such as smoking, substance abuse, promiscuity, and severe obesity, as well as health conditions such as depression, heart disease, cancer, lung disease, and overall shortened lifespan. Children who had four ACEs had a seven fold (700%) increase in alcoholism, a doubling of risk of being diagnosed with cancer, and a four fold increase in emphysema. An ACE score above 6 was associated with a 30-fold (3000%) increase in attempted suicide. The greater the number of ACEs in a person's childhood, the more likely it is that they will be at risk for negative health and wellness outcomes.

I bring this concept up because adoption is essentially one ACE. It is traumatic to be removed from your primary caregiver, especially if you're old enough to remember it. But being left in a dysfunctional household will typically result in several ACEs over a child's lifetime. When these kind of events occur, it's important to immediately reduce the risk that the child will experience another one, whether that means removing the child from their home or not.

But even if you believe that adopting a child is the equivalent of 10 ACEs, there are some situations in which adoption is unavoidable. If a child loses both their parents, adoption is unavoidable, especially if they have no living relatives. If a child is "safely surrendered" (abandoned at a site such as a hospital or fire station), adoption is unavoidable. If a pregnant person decides they don't want a child, adoption is (and should be) unavoidable. We shouldn't be forcing parents to give up their children, but we also shouldn't be forcing biological parents to raise a child they don't want and aren't ready for. I think people who are fully anti-adoption fail to consider these types situations.

So What Can We do Better?

I am 110% with anti-adoption advocates when they say that there are real problems within our adoption system. But to get rid of adoption entirely is to almost literally throw the baby out with the bathwater. I'm not an expert in this field by any means, but it seems that some things we can do to improve the adoption system might include:

Introducing comprehensive sex education into schools, making access to birth control options inexpensive and easy, increasing access to abortion

Introducing easily accessible options for mental health treatment to anyone who needs it

Offering more support to parents who are struggling to take care of their child, with the goal of reducing the number of children who are removed from their biological parents to begin with

Reducing the prison population by decriminalizing certain victimless crimes

Tightening restrictions around who can be a foster parent or an adoptive parent, regardless of their relationship to the child, and standardizing those requirements across the country

Requiring all adults in a household to be considered "parents" to the adoptive/foster child, meaning that they are also subject to restrictions and foster/adoptive parent training

Putting regulations in place for "rehoming" a child

Encouraging domestic adoptions before international adoptions, if not ending the process of international adoptions entirely

Making rehabilitation of parents and reunification of families the goal except in extenuating circumstances

Ending the practice of completely closed adoptions, and legally protecting post-adoption contracts

Providing better mental health support for adopted children

Providing better resources for parents looking to adopt, including required parenting classes for states that don't already have them and specific training for parents who are adopting from the foster system, adopting interracially, or have other circumstances that may make their situation more emotionally complicated

Realigning financial incentives so that family reunification and adoption are the goals

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aj-illustrated · 4 years

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*pulls up a 97-slide PowerPoint* I’m so glad you asked

Ben is an OC co-owned by me and @finnoky! The short of it is that he’s an orphan who Varian helps save from a life of crime, and who later gets adopted by Quirin!

More about him under the cut:

Age: About 12

Birthday: He has no idea, but thinks it might have been sometime in the autumn.

Likes: Quirin, Varian, farmwork, tending to the sheep, his dog (Achilles), the Challenge of the Brave (spectating and later competing), adventure stories, head pats, strawberries, friendly roughhousing, drawing

Dislikes: Cramped spaces (he’s claustrophobic), people hugging him, carrots, books with complicated words, cold weather, any kind of tight or scratchy clothing

Fun Facts:

Ben meets Varian about nine months after the end of the series.

He’s good friends with Kiera and Catalina! They’re the only kids his age who can beat him in a fair fight.

He eventually grows to be taller than Varian, and absolutely uses that fact to tease him.

He’s an excellent pickpocket, though he hasn’t stolen much of anything since Quirin took him in.

He’s got a knack for drawing— he’s not too good with words, so he finds it easier to express himself with pictures. He’s also a leftie!

He’s been almost adopted several times, but Quirin is the only foster parent who kept him around for longer than a month.

Backstory: Ben is an orphan who’s been given a raw deal in life, and as a result is kinda pissed off at everyone and everything all the time. The orphanage he grew up in was lacking to say the least, and he spent much of his early childhood being routinely abused and neglected, often lashing out in aggression at those he deemed to be a threat (which was most people). He eventually starts getting into trouble with the law and is tossed in prison for multiple counts of petty theft and assault, and it’s around that time that he meets Varian, who is helping to reform Corona’s prison system and is disgusted to see that they’re still punishing children as if they were adults.

He gets Ben out of prison, but the orphanage refuses to let him come back, so Varian convinces Quirin to take him in. Quirin agrees for a few factors: 1. Ben reminds him of Varian when he was going through a rough time, and how Quirin wasn’t able to help him then, 2. He’s not getting any younger and could use some help around the farm (plus Varian has been worried about him getting lonely, now that Varian has basically moved into the castle), and 3. The kid deserves a shot at having a healthy, stable home life.

Ben only agrees to go live with Quirin because trying to survive on the streets is no picnic, and also because he’d really rather not stay in prison for any longer than he has to. He figures that it won’t last, anyway— Quirin will lose patience with him and kick him to the curb, just like every other foster parent/guardian he’s been handed off to. He gets very confused (and a little annoyed) when Quirin turns out to be incredibly patient and willing to give him as many chances as he needs. In response, Ben acts out and does everything he can think of to convince Quirin that he’s rotten to the core, but nothing works.

Ben doesn’t want to get his hopes up or let himself get attached. He manages to annoy everyone else: the other villagers, Varian, even Eugene (who visits sometimes), but never Quirin. The most he ever gets out of him is an irritated sigh.

Throughout all of this, Ben is also finding out that he kinda likes helping out on the farm, and he’s pretty good at it, too. He’s very strong for his age, and a fast learner.... except for one thing: he can’t read. The orphanage had tried to teach him, but it never really clicked and they had long since given up on him, so he just never learned, instead relying on pictures and context clues to figure out the meaning of written words. As he continues to grow more attached to Quirin, he starts wanting to be better, to deserve the love and acceptance Quirin is offering him, so his self-consciousness about reading (among other things he doesn’t like about himself) really starts to bug him.

While he's sociable and generally gets along with other children, he does have the flaw of a short temper. So when he's targeted and called out for his apparent lack of academic intelligence, things get ugly, fast, and he gets in a fight. When Quirin asks later what it was about, Ben is reluctant to tell him, and is even less enthused when Quirin later suggests enrolling him in school.

He eventually admits to Quirin that he’s illiterate, expecting to get belittled or even compared to Varian (who is an actual genius and is kind of intimidating to Ben). But Quirin.... he doesn’t care that Ben can’t read, and even offers to help teach him or find him a tutor if he wants to learn. It’s after letting himself be vulnerable and accepting Quirin’s help that Ben starts to wonder if maybe... maybe he has a shot at being part of a real family.

He starts to let himself feel at home in Old Corona, thinking (or rather hoping) he’s found somewhere he belongs... as much as he hates to admit it, he really likes it here. So he tries to keep on the straight and narrow so he can stay longer, even making an effort to be nicer to Varian (who is more than happy to help him with his reading and is the one to introduce him to the Flynn Rider series). For the first time, Ben’s future is looking bright.

Until he loses his temper again.

On a visit to the capital, he passes by his old orphanage and gets in an argument with one of the kids he used to know (and wasn’t on particularly good terms with). The argument quickly gets personal, and then physical, and Ben takes it way too far— by the time the guards arrive on the scene to break it up, the kid Ben was fighting is a bloody, mangled mess, about a minute away from passing out. The guards don’t care what awful things that kid said to Ben; all they care about is that this boy with a history of violence and petty crime just savagely attacked another child, and Ben is swiftly arrested and taken to the dungeons.

At this point, Ben has cooled down enough to realize just how serious his situation really is. Even if they let him out of prison to go back to Quirin, he’s sure this is the last straw and that Quirin won’t want anything to do with him— he’s violent and dangerous, and no matter what he does he can’t seem to stay out of trouble, even when he really does try his best to be good. He hates himself for blowing his one chance at finding a home and family, and consoles himself by thinking that it was only a matter of time and at least the wait is over (boy’s got some raging self-loathing issues if you haven’t noticed).

Varian gets word that Ben’s been arrested and heads down to the dungeons to hear his side of the story, but Ben is too ashamed to even look him in the eye. Ben was told by the guards that, although he won’t be left to rot in the dungeons or thrown onto a prison barge (as per the new regulations regarding juvenile justice), he’ll be sent away to a correctional facility for delinquents— aka, reform school. Ben has no idea what to expect, but based on what the guards have been saying about it (very loudly, just outside his cell), it sounds no better than regular prison.

Varian is having absolutely none of this and contacts Quirin to tell him what’s going on— Quirin is up at the castle within the hour to try and bail Ben out, or at least renegotiate his sentence. However, since Quirin is not yet technically related to Ben— for the past year or so, he’s legally been closer to a parole officer than anything else— the law states that he can’t actually do much to interfere with Ben’s bail or sentence, especially since the boy is a repeat offender and is now classified as a menace to society.

Instead of giving up on the situation, Quirin decides to become Ben’s legal guardian right then and there, whipping out the adoption papers he’s been keeping in his vest for weeks— he’s been wanting to ask Ben if he’d like to be adopted for a while now, but he could never find the right moment. Now seems to be as good a time as any.

It takes a day or two to sort things out (Nigel and Fred both aren’t too keen on releasing a violent criminal for any reason, even if that criminal is like twelve), but Varian is able to pull some strings with Raps and Eugene to give Quirin full guardianship over Ben. Meanwhile, Ben is expecting he'll be shipped off any day now— when he sees Varian come back down to the prison with a guard, he expects it's to say goodbye... not to remove his shackles and lead him back upstairs to the throne room, where Quirin and Rapunzel are waiting beside a stack of paperwork. They only need one more signature to make the adoption official: Ben’s.

Luckily, Varian and Quirin have been helping him practice writing his name, and once he signs, Quirin tosses Raps the bail money (which she had whittled down to like two coins) and they head back home— Ben’s permanent home.

Ben’s story is a result of many many rambles between me and Feen on Discord, and I don’t think we’re gonna be stopping anytime soon— Ben is such a fun OC to flesh out XD

Feen and I are actually running a Q&A for Ben over on Feen’s Instagram story, y’all should go check it out!

#ben #tangled oc #tangled the series #tts ocs #varian #quirin #long post #AJ draws #AJ talks #finnoky

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raynerfoxstuff · 4 years

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Give Your Witcher Nerf Swords

I don’t normally write things, but this one has been eating at my brain for far too long. In a modern AU, what happens when School of the Wolf Witchers get their hands on Nerf weapons?

Hear me out on this one.

All the Wolf Witchers are likely several decades older than the invention of foam dart blasters. Even Lambert, the youngest of the Wolf brothers, is probably older than toy cap guns, so none of them have childhood memories of anything remotely like Nerf weapons.

Their first encounter with them is in the hands of little boys emulating their parent's prejudice. It’s something easily ignored, and nothing an amber-eyed glare can’t fix, but they all find it a little unsettling to know exactly what parents are teaching children about Witchers.

All Wolves, and many other Witchers, find toy cap guns incredibly annoying. The pronounced pop they make to the sulfuric scent the percussion caps have after they explode to the fact that the toy weapon is aimed at them. It would be innocuous to humans, but to Witchers, its the worst toy to have ever been created.

Only Geralt found something useful about these things when he tracked down a boy lost in the woods. The scent from those popped caps lingered on the boy’s clothes, leaving a clear trail for him to follow, and the boy was very lucky that Geralt found him in time. But this is way too circumstantial for any Witcher to change their mind about those toys.

Then came the advent of suction cup arrows and plastic toy bows. The Witchers don’t like these much either. But when Lambert snatched one of these suction cup arrows from the air and kept it, the Wolves made a game of how many toy projectiles they can collect from kids shooting at them.

They compare their stockpiles every winter.

Surprisingly, Eskel is winning with Vesemir (secretly) in second and Lambert in third. Geralt is last. He likes everyone to think that it’s because he doesn’t care, but everyone knows its because he’s too nice and gives the toy munitions back when a kid’s lips start to wobble.

So, the Wolves noticed when suction cup arrows transition into colorful soft foam darts.

Lambert ends up with the most darts that winter and has to convince the others that they’re real. The others only have a handful, while Lambert has enough to supply several little kids for a whole kid-friendly battle.

(No, he did not walk into a toy store and buy foam darts, and a toy dart gun for a little boy who’s abusive father recently died in a contract related accident leaving him orphaned. No, Lambert didn’t also buy some for himself. He’s not a softy or a cheat - what kind of Witcher do you think he is?)

So, after much argument, mainly just Geralt and Lambert with Eskel being a devil’s advocate, they come to an agreement that this new toy is worth half a point each. This only bumped Lambert up to second, but just barely.

But, this is the game that the Wolves play. They don’t think much of it anymore. It’s just second nature to snatch any wayward toy projectile from the air and pocket it. It’s another type of trophy for them at this point.

Vesemir is secretly winning by now, and Geralt was bumped up to third for reasons Eskel and Lambert aren’t sure of.

Speaking of Lambert, he’s the reason that this little collection game spread to the School of the Cat via Aiden. The Cats are beating any Wolves by miles if they ever sat down to compare notes. Only Aiden and Lambert do that, so no one’s the wiser.

This game continues, and nothing changes until Geralt meets Jaskier.

The bard (or reporter or musician or busker or blogger or whatever job Jaskier would get in modern times) doesn’t notice the dart game at first. Jaskier tends to be the one in the spotlight during the downtime between contracts, but when he does see Geralt grab a Nerf dart out of the air without looking, he’s amazed. But he has to ask why Geralt keeps it? What does a Witcher need a foam dart for?

Getting a story out of the White Wolf is like pulling teeth at the best of times, and Geralt stonewalls him whenever he tries to get an answer concerning Nerf darts. It’s second nature for the Witcher to grab and pocket darts, and why does he need to tell Jaskier anything?

But, the story comes out eventually once both parties are sufficiently drunk off their asses. Jaskier’s lucky he even remembers it in the morning. Regardless, his first question to Geralt after he finished talking was: “But … do you even use them? Like, you’ve got so many, why not do some … something with ‘em? Huh?”

Geralt only hummed in response, and they both passed out not too long after that.

From that conversation, though, an idea was born in Jaskier’s mind. Before they parted that winter, Jaskier gave Geralt three identical Nerf blasters. He’d heard Geralt mention brothers in passing and decided to arm as many Wolves as he knew about.

Jaskier wouldn’t find out what he’d done until late next spring, and it was glorious.

At first, Jaskier’s gift did nothing.

The colorful toy dart guns sat in Geralt’s car, still in their packaging. Geralt wasn’t sure what to do with them. They weren’t practical in any way.

The only reason he accepted the gift was that he felt awkward as Jaskier handed the bag to him, and he couldn’t quite get a word in while Jaskier went on and on about how much fun he’d had with these kinds of toys when he was a kid.

Geralt also didn’t have the heart to tell Jaskier that he didn’t know what to do with them and never played with anything remotely like this. (Not that he really played as a child.)

So, Jaskier’s gift sat there in Geralt's 4Runner, always dubbed Roach, until nosy Lambert spotted the plastic bag through a window when down to the garage to check on the cars and his motorcycle. (Because you’re telling me that Lambert wouldn’t prefer a motorcycle to a more suitable off-road type of vehicles? I don’t think so.)

Out of pure curiosity, Lambert swears, he brings the bag up to the common area.

Geralt protests, but was promptly overruled by his brothers as the contents are revealed. Lambert won’t accept the explanation that it was a gift and gives Geralt shit for owning toys, but the countdown had started until open Nerf warfare began.

Even though Lambert refuses to believe that Jaskier gave Geralt the Nerf guns, both Eskel and Lambert lay claim to one of them, leaving one for Geralt.

To no one’s surprise at all, Lambert would be the one to instigate it. He fell in love with the toy blaster immediately, though he’d never admit it - even under the influence of alcohol.

He was the first one to fire his Nerf weapon, but Geralt didn’t take the bait to annoy Lambert as much as he could, and Eskel only teased them. No one quite had the energy that evening to pick a fight because of training. Besides, none of the Wolf brothers had figured out how to properly aim these toys yet.

But, it was only a matter of time.

Lambert used his Nerf blaster as a tool to annoy his brothers. Throughout the following week, Geralt and Eskel learned to anticipate a surprise dart to the back, face, or head. The youngest Wolf even tried it on Vesemir once, but a cold glare shut that down immediately.

To say that it annoyed the older two brothers would have been the biggest understatement that winter. Retaliation was on its way.

That evening as the older brothers sat in the commons area playing Super Smash Bros on a well-loved and well taken care of Nintendo 64, Geralt wound up catching the surprise dart heard around Kaer Morhen, and Eskel whipped out his own Nerf blaster.

This first Nerf battle in Kaer Morhen went on for hours.

Vesemir could have shut it down, and he almost did when he came in and grabbed a book from the shelves. But, instead of sitting in his Lazy-Boy, the patriarch of the School of the Wolf retired to his room.

None of them saw their mentor’s smile as he left. He wasn’t about to take this fun away from his boys.

As soon as Vesemir was gone, the battle resumed. Much swearing and teasing was heard that night.

Many similar Nerf blaster fights took place that winter with one epic one in which all collected darts were used, and even suction cup arrows were thrown with surprising accuracy. In the end, no one was quite sure whose darts belonged to whom.

But, winter ended, and all the Wolves had to head back out on the Path. At least next winter, they had something more than training to look forward to.

Back on the Path, when Geralt inevitably reencountered Jaskier, the White Wolf had to communicate his brothers’ (and his own, begrudgingly) thanks to Jaskier for the gifts. In due time, the younger man heard about the mixture of chaos, mischief, and joy the Nerf blaster had brought to Kaer Morhen.

This thrill Jaskier to no end, and he eagerly told Geralt about foam Nerf swords ...

Thus ends my ADD thoughts for now. Should I do more?

#thewitcher #witcher #modern au #witcher geralt #witcher lambert #witcher jaskier #witcher eskel #witcher vesemir #witcher aiden #potential crackpost #crackpost #witcher with nerf gun #how do i tumblr #imagine the Witcher using Nerf swords

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justdyingslowly · 5 years

Text

1. Name justdyingslowly obviously come on

2. Nationality Australian

3. Age 22

4. Birthday nnnah dont feel like it

5. Zodiac sign (or your primal zodiac sign) Libra/Scorpio cusp

6. Gender wamon

7. Sexuality very very hetero

8. Your looks (add a picture or describe yourself) androgenous

9. What do you/did you study? Psychology (focus on sexology) and art.

10. What’s your current job like?/What job would you like to have? I am disabled you think I can work ha sexologist would be awesome. When I was a kid I wanted to be a fireman but Australias always burning

11. Your birth order head first

12. How many siblings do you have? 1

13. Do you have good relations with your family? yeah dads finally out of his abusive relationship, nearing age 70 and his emotions and his sexuality are finally opening up for the first time and that makes me SO happy.

14. How many friends do you have? what kind of fucked up question is this.

15. Your relationship status relationshipped. Fiance? got the marriage papers in a drawer somewhere with the car rego but can’t be fucked filling them?

16. What do you look for in a SO? empathetic, mature, calm. Always open to discussion. Prefers to be blunt rather than secretive. Emotional age over 14 (incredibly fucking rare apparently). Puts an importance on context and understanding other views above all else.

17. Do you have a crush? Hellll yeah Crush on my partner and got a crush on a mutual friend of ours who don’t even know hes cute af hehe one day partners gonna accidentally spill the beans and embarrass me coz hes shit with secrets RIP me.

18. When did you have your first kiss? You think I can remember this bullshit? Its not that big a deal

19. Do you prefer serious and meaningful relationships or casual dating/one night stands? One night stand sex almost exclusively sucks. Just. SUCKS. Because neither of you know what the other likes and it ends up being an awkward mix of trying to please yourself while trying to also be considerate.

20. What are your deal breakers? Plugging your ears to anything that feels gross, uncomfortable or disagrees with you. How can you grow as a person without introspection? How can you mold what you think and believe without taking in other arguments and comparing them to your beliefs to see how they stack up? Its pathetic.

21. How was your day? cute mutual friend had a fall this morning and were both worried about him. His back is bad and he’s getting a little older, he can’t be getting dizzy and having falls like that. other than that im anxious about seeing my gastro. He’s lovely but... specialists are specialists. Good at knowing what they know but not always great at listening.

22. Favourite food & drink you think im allowed to eat or drink? water and... foods a touchy subject.

23. What position do you sleep in? Usually on my side with a body pillow to grip so I don’t end up choking my partner in his sleep.

24. What was your last dream about? uuhhh...going to italy and being unable to get into this tiny basket boat properly.

25. Your fears does PTSD to medical shit count haha

26. Your dreams ... going to italy and being unable to get into a tiny basket boat thingy?

27. Your goals - get some sort of diagnosis eventually. Its been 3 years of trying and im tired. - get back to studying art part time for my bachelors. - pass JLPT N3. - go back to university for psychology. - do the dishes when I get home.

28. Any pets? two budgies. we also take care of any orphaned or injured birds.

29. What are your hobbies? feeling nauseous drawing writing a little bit im making a little gameboy game in C atm too

30. Any cool places in your area? i live next to a national park with waterfalls and koalas and emus and stuff

31. What was your last awkward situation? mutual friend made a comment on his chest i playfully smacked it (related to the comment) it was surprisingly hard “O-oh wow, thats... I didnt expect that” my partner laughed at me. it was awful.

32. What is your last regret? getting embarrassed at friends pecs stop making me think about it 33. Language/s you can speak english. N4 Japanese.

34. Do you believe in astrological stuff? (Zodiac, tarot, etc.) of course not what the fuck

35. Have any quirks? Quirkless. I do wiggle when im happy though apparently.

36. Your pet peeves open doors.

37. Ideal vacation spend a months chilling in an old japanese house in autumn hokkaido oooooof that sounds nice

38. Any scars? internal? yes

39. What does your last text message say? peepee poopoo ustinky

40. Last 5 things from your search history how do i find this

41. What’s your [device] background? Sam Porter Bridges walkin around Sam Porter Bridges cuddling BB-28 Louise while he sleeps my chicken

42. What do you daydream about? all might

43. Describe your dream home an old japanese house in autumn hokkaido oooooof that sounds nice

44. What’s your religion/Your thought about religion its a comforting thought having a parent-figure who cares about you and looks after all the big things you can’t manage yourself, but institutionalizing it runs a severe risk of becoming harmful cults. And it often does.

45. Your personality type me

46. The most dangerous thing you’ve done i saw the lost bunny that was on all the posters in the neighbourhood looked thin and patchy so i grabbed him to take him home. im allergic. sent me to hospital and I almost died.

47. Are you happy with your current life? feeling sick sucks and partners having a depressive episode but things are pretty good

48. Some things you’ve tried in your life living

49. What does your wardrobe consist of? blacks, reds, whites and pinks

50. Favourite colour to wear? at the moment pink. Red is always comforting though.

51. How would you describe your style? mix between lazy alternative punk, teenager with band shirts and harajuku peach kawaii uwu

52. Are you happy with your current looks? kinda wish i was a bit shorter but what can you do

53. If you could change/add something to your appearance - impossible or not - what would it be? bit shorter

54. Any tattoos or piercings? lol no PTSD

55. Do you get complimented often? by who? partner constantly, family haha are you kidding im australian so a friend’s version of showing affection is calling you a cunt and slapping your ass in public

56. Favourite aesthetic? all might

57. A popular trend that you dislike blocking because you disagree or find them distasteful. Ignoring all context to opposing thoughts and arguments. taking a personal feeling of disgust to mean something is evil. Blocking your ears to anything that isn’t a circlejerk of what you already think - and trying to isolate anyone who even just listens to something other then the noise of your sloppy dicks to have a thought of their own.

58. Songs you’re currently obsessed with? The Machine by Low Roar

59. Song you normally wouldn’t admit you like. why wouldnt i admit i like a song

60. Favourite genre? probably enka haha

61. Favourite artist/band/genre? probably enka haha oh and tatsuro yamashita

62. Hated popular songs/artists? why the hell would I hate something like a song? I hate aspects of the music industry as a whole I guess?

63. Put your music on shuffle and list first 5 which playlist they aren’t all together in one place

64. Can you sing or play any instruments? piano, saxophone... uh... partners good at making music and playing shakuhachi

65. Do you like karaoke? no.

66. Own any albums? yes? many?

67. Do you listen to radio? What stations? no. but triple J, ABC Jazz and Classical. sometimes they even play final fantasy and JRPG music on classical which is pretty neat. -

68. Favourite movie/series? can i make this about games because then the answer is Metal Gear Solid

69. Favourite genre of movies/books/etc ...shounen?

70. Your fictional crush/es if they’re over 40yrs old, male and happy and bubbily or grumpy and sad then there’s a big ol fat chance I wanna bone. Solid Snake from MGS4, All Might and pretty much anyone drawn by Tarou Madoromi.

71. Which fictional character is you? uh

72. Are you a shipper? List your otps, if so what does this even mean what language is this

73. Favourite greek god? idk hades seems chill

74. A legend from where you live that you like the story of Tjilbruke is funny and good. all Kaurna stories are good.

75. Do you like art? What’s your favourite work or artist? im in a big egon schiele mood atm.

76. Can you share your other social media? no i am incapable

77. Favourite youtubers? many

78. Favourite platform? not too high up. actually i like being a little lower than ground level in corners.

79. How much time do you spend on the internet? too much

80. What video games have you played? Which one’s your favourite? look i just want to say that MGS4 is the best one in the series and Death Stranding is phenomenally engaging.

81. Your favourite books (manga also counts) these are all so goddamn definitive how can I pick? Oh wait the answer is One Piece

82. Do you play board/card games? I play DnD atm and know 15 yr old rules to Yugioh

83. Have you ever been to a night marathon in cinema? that shit dosn’t happen here

84. Favourite holiday golden week coz its a week also easter because thats when all the glucose based sweets come back

85. Are you into dramas? what kind

86. Would you use death note, if you had one? no. thats called being a murderer.

87. What changes would you make in the world, no matter how impossible, if you had the power to? chill people out a bit. when people feel unsafe they get really depenfive and territorial and block their ears to everything, making in-and-out groups for themsevles that end up putting them in more harm.

88. Could you survive a zombie apocalypse? im disabled with a disabled partner. we arent funny sure we can survive normal everyday life when society is angled so sharply against us.

89. If you had to be turned into a paranormal being, what would it be? id like to be a mimi spirit

90. What would you want to happen to you after your death? spooky time

91. If you had to change your name, what would be your pick? toshinori yagi

92. Who would you switch your life with for a week? anyone healthy

93. Pick an emoji to be your tattoo that cursed one with the intense eyes and the hand

94. Write 3 things about yourself - only one of them must be true im me im not me im pee

95. Cold or hot? cold.

96. Be a hero or be a villain? both are distasteful ideas in reality

97. Sing everything you want to say or rhyme? i can’t do either partner speak sin bad puns and its hell, these both sound about equal

98. Shapeshifting or controlling time? shapeshifting. controlling time is eithe rmanipulative or lonely. shapeshifing is every other superpower at once.

99. Be immortal or be immune to everything aside from natural death? both are deeply upsetting ideas

100. ….. or …..? jiji or ossan? generally Jiji, but ossans can be lovely too.

#personal #stupid

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mysmedrabbles · 5 years

Text

RFA Reacting to MC Growing Up an Orphan

requested: by anonymous

a/n: oof this actually turned out really cute so here ya go lads! enjoy!! if you’d like to buy me a coffee click here

warnings: light alcohol mention, but filled with fluff and comfort and kindness (saeyoungs delves more into abuse and emotions)

-somft mod alex

Jumin

-its a semi drunken night when you tell him, you’d finally gotten Jumin to loosen up after a long workday, and were now on the couch together, Jumin’s head on your chest as you ran your fingers through his hair lazily, letting the alcohol dull your mind as you listen to him rambling about his childhood

-it must have been an offhand comment you made that sparked his attention, making him rise from the comforts of your lap as he stares at you incredulously. you sheepishly tell him your story, and although he’s sensitive with you as to not upset you, he’s horrified to learn that you were constantly neglected in your childhood, growing up without a place you could actually consider a home

-he listens to you, quietly concerned as the alcohol hits him hard, and the next thing he knows he’s passed out on your shoulder.

-when he wakes up he has only a faint recollection of you telling him of your past, but he doesn't bring it up; partially because of a raging headache and partially because he didn't want to upset you, you looking so at peace reading something on your phone, a loving smile forming on your lips as you sense him watching you

-he’s not one to go in full steam ahead (well- he is, but he reAlly wants to be subtle with this) but he tries his best to make living together feel as homey as possible

-he talks to Yoosung, the Professional at all things Family, and realizes that he should tone down the money spending to ensure your comfort and instead use that time to do things together, bond over small dumb things.

-knows that as much as he would want to go back in time and fix your childhood, give you the love you deserved, find you a home, the past cannot be changed. so instead he opts on building the sense of family between the two of you

-he takes you to ikea (Saeyoungs idea), and the two of you find new furniture, something that fits your tastes as well, to redecorate the penthouse.

-imagine jumin trying to assemble ikea furniture

-he gets frustrated with having to do things like a commoner, but bless him he’s trying his best to do it for you, and the way your face lights up whenever the two of you do something “domestic” or “familial” makes it all worth it. it’s a learning curve for him too, and despite his protests he cant help but admit that he was missing a lot from his childhood too but it brings him peace knowing he’ll soon be building a family with you ;^)

-he’s not willing to get rid of the giant aquarium pillars, however he lets you get them some cool aquarium furnishings and plants

-goes grocery shopping with you more often, and overall spends more time with you, even telling chef to take the weekends off from now on, opting to cook together instead, and even though most of the time things end up burnt or tasting weird, all that matters is that the two of you have fun

-everyone thinks he’s lost his mind, including for the RFA, who's in the corner crying because “What happened to our cold emotionless Jumin Why Is He SO Domestic”

-teaches you to waltz

-the day you make an offhand comment about how you consider him your family, he stops and starts tearing up, pulling you into a tight hug as you confusedly kiss his cheek, only slightly worried about him

Jaehee

-it was one of the first things the two of you really talked about, a kind of bond forming over past trauma and losing a part of your childhood.

-she’s a very action forward woman, knows that she can’t change the past, but she sure as hell can help you heal from it.

-she takes you to show you all her favourite sweets from her childhood, and takes you to spots she loved sitting in as a kid, trying to share these experiences with you

-she challenges you to a race to see who can climb to the top of a tree the fastest, and it’s one of the few times you see her truly free, giggling as she watches you struggle up the branches, meeting you with a kiss when you finally reach the top, and with her it feels like nothing else in the world matters, that in that moment the only ones that exist are her and the sunset, making her smile shine, casting an ethereal glow on her face as she caresses your cheek lovingly.

-tries to take more breaks to spend more time with you, building more memories in places that most people deem “kiddie places”

-yes im saying she takes you to SkyZone and/or a ball-pit

-she gets lost in the ball-pit, slowly sinking lower and lower as you have to dramatically rescue her

-diner dates, sharing a milkshake and relaxing together after a long day of work, and although none of it can bring back the past, her devotion to giving you fu childhood related memories lessens the pain, and the memories that you build with her of course will always last forever

Yoosung

-he’s always so excited about meeting your family, about joining two families and building a new one- with this boy its always about family, so how the hell do you bring up that you dont actually have one?

-when you do finally tell him, he stops in his tracks, trying to process how that could be

-he’s a good listener, bless him, and he listens to your story, how you were mostly in and out of orphanages and foster families and grew up a child of the System.

-at first he doesn’t know what to do with the information, and feels the deep pangs in his chest when he realizes that you missed out on so many things growing up, things that he took for granted

-you already view him as family, (frankly its hard not too, his general attitude towards you, the constant loving gazes, the way the two of you were always there for each other, mixed with the annoying comments of the RFA on how the two of you are “so married” making it hard not to), but he still sets out to make you feel like his family is yours

-this means he introduces you to his family.

-he knows how nervous you are the day before, and calls ahead without you knowing and tells his family to take it easy and not overwhelm you

-however they still do- overwhelm you with love i mean

-his grandma is immediately sizing you up and telling you to eat more, asking what size sweaters you wear and his dad is making silly jokes at your expense, yoosung holding your hand as him and his dad go back and forth one teasing, one protecting you. his mum is smiling, holding a wooden spoon as she steps out of the kitchen, calling yoosung to help her with the cooking

-his sisters dote on you, introducing you to their husbands as their children run around in the background screaming in happiness, yelling at you to join them in playing tag, and their gleeful laughs draw you in. stopped by yoosung as you run into him, almost making him drop the mashed potatoes, and the look on your face is priceless, making the whole day worth it

-you get along with his oldest sister spectacularly, and you have your time to joke about yoosung as you ask his grandma for embarrassing stories of yoosung. (you enjoy watching his get increasingly flustered as he tries to hide in the crook of your neck)

-you and his parents have a long chat, ending in them hugging you and telling you just how much they appreciate you and the way you’ve made his son grow. the two of you seem so happy together, perfect even.

-it’s almost one in the morning when the two of you start heading home. as the two of you walk to your car, he colds you close to his side, placing small kisses on your cheek as he watches you smile softly.

- “mc i know, i know that you,, may not have had a family growing up but know that,, know that you always have a family in us, you’re a part of my family now, and you’ll always have us. we’re not going anywhere.”

Seven

separate post [here]

Zen

-he’s a good listener, and listening to you talk about growing up poor and alone breaks his heart

-he can empathize, he had to grow up too fast, but he can’t even begin to imagine what you had to go through

-he’s there for you, always trying to make you feel better, and even though you never had a true family, he always lets you know that you’ll always have a family in him, even though you aren't legally married yet, nothing can stop him from calling you his family

-he’s not one to go all big and grand, he knows that logically you can never get that time back, but that doesnt mean you dont deserve that same childish delight that most people get

-he’s one to treat you closer than ever, like true family, constantly reminding you that he loves you and protecting you from everything he possibly can, doing everything in his power to make sure that you’re protected from pain

-carnival date!!!!

-he takes you out to the carnival, playing all the booth games with you, making it a competition who can win more (the winner being no one)

-you get your face painted, a cliche green butterfly under your left eye, zen getting a matching red butterfly under his left

he ends up just buying you a large teddy bear, unable to have actually won you one (he’s extremely ashamed of himself but its the thought that counts)

-the two of you go on a carnival food spree, buying a little bit of everything as you walk hand in hand to the ferris wheel, (eating with a view amirite)

-please know that he’ll always do anything in his power to keep you safe and make sure you know you’re loved. you’re his family and, along with the RFA he’s yours.

142 notes · View notes

mimzy-writing-online · 4 years

Note

In my Creative Writing class, I wrote a scene where the protagonist is being dropped off at an orphanage. The orphanage I set up was ugly and dark, and the head mistress was a mean, horrible lady. One of my peers that reviewed it warned that this is a cliche. Is that true? I don't mind changing it, but the thing is my orphan boy will be adopted by a wonderful man and finally have a home he truly belongs to. How can I create a need to belong without being trite or cliche? Am I better off

anon continued: making the orphanage a good place? I want to build up to the fact this boy will finally find a loving family and home.

My answer: You should change your setting, but it’s very possible for you to maintain that it’s an unpleasant experience that sets a strong contrast for the eventual loving family.

I recommend switching the setting to a group home. Group homes function similarly to the way orphanages did in the past.

Group homes are facilities attached to child protective services that are designed to house a large number of children in the foster care system at one time.

To do that, there will be a staff of child caregivers to manage the children. The caregivers work in shifts, so there will be a day shift, evening shift, and night shift. Meaning they work 8-9 hours a shift (the extra hour might be related to catching up the next shift on any new developments, such as a new child arrival).

There might also be a care worker or two specific to managing that group home who works with each child’s case worker. They would have day shifts, a normal 9-5 type consistency.

There will also be a manager for the group home who accounts for funding, financial decisions, staffing and schedules.

These facilities work with CPS and by extension the government. They get government funding and must meet state government established standards for quality of care, child-safety, and facility management/wellbeing.

Group homes usually stick to a specific demographic of children. Example: boys or girls group homes, only accepting children within specific age ranges (0-4, 5-8, 9-12, 13-18) or group homes that are specific to children with special needs. And they have a set capacity, a number of beds they can fill at max. Set capacity varies on state laws. According to the Children’s Bureau (a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, average capacity is 4-12 children (source)

They are by far more humane than the media-presented image of an orphanage.

But that said, they can still be unpleasant.

For one, a group home isn’t a replacement for the love and care you get from an emotionally healthy family. The child is competing with several other children for attention and resources. Your character may develop an attachment to one or two of the caregivers, but the caregiver is not there all the time and their attention is stretched between multiple children.

There’s always a sense of temporariness. Children get placed with new families and new children take up the beds the same day. That’s not an exaggeration. The foster care system is overwhelmed by cases of children being removed from the home, so there is a high demand for foster families and group homes with open beds. As soon as there’s an opening, case workers are jumping to get one of their kids placed there.

It should be noted that CPS works hard to make sure that removing the child from the home is the last resort. To do this, they try to offer services to children in need, like helping parents apply for welfare if the issue is the child isn’t getting fed. Loving family, but parents who are struggling financially. Or helping connect families with finding therapy for special needs children.

The other children aren’t in a happy situation either. They’ve come from abusive or neglectful homes or have lost their loving parents. They’re living with unknown traumas and high emotions that are difficult to process. It can lead to acting out: temper tantrums, anger, trying to hurt themselves, all of which are stressful for the caregivers trying to calm the child and the children watching from the side lines. It can lead to bullying, hoarding of food or toys.

And in the defense of children who act out this way, because villainizing the bully is a cliche as well, those children aren’t acting out of some evil desire to hurt. They’re just in pain and they don’t know how to express their emotions fully, which leads them to the form of expression they’re most familiar with: what their parents did, or what they did in the past that has worked before.

Those children are the protagonists of their own story in a sense, they don’t fully understand that everyone around them has emotions they’re dealing with inside, or how their actions make others feel. The younger they are, the harder it is to understand the feelings of others and the consequences of their actions.

Which is why bullies apologize years later, when they’re old enough to understand that what they did and said hurt someone else, another person with their own complex emotions and experiences, realizing that they became someone else’s nightmares when they were too young to understand.

So, so far (recapping for my ADHD self, because tangents are a thing I struggle with)

Group homes can be painful experiences because: 1. Not enough love 2. Lack of stability 3. Other children acting out and being visibly distressed is a distressing thing to watch.

4. Group homes (and the foster care system in general) get a very limited amount of funding. I can’t speak for other countries and their social welfare programs, but America has a habit of cutting social welfare funding in favor of just about anything else.

So sometimes group homes have a few hidden, run down parts. Things that have fallen through the cracks because funding can’t take care of everything and they have to meet the bare minimum first.

Children are fed and clothed and the facility is clean, has running water, electricity and is heated. That’s the bare minimum. Smaller things slip through the cracks- like furniture is old and creaks and on the verge of breaking, there are rips in couch cushions, little holes dug in the wall or tiny graffiti hidden in corners and behind furniture where bored children tried to find something interesting to do. The bathroom pipe leaks so the floor is always wet. One of the bedrooms doesn’t get warm air, so there are extra blankets for that room.

They don’t make the place awful, it’s not the worst thing about living there, and for children who had hoarder or neglectful parents it’s a good deal better, but those are details that are pretty common.

5. Caregiver fatigue. Caregivers are wonderful people who put a lot of time and energy into caring for children, but it can wear down on their mental and emotional health. And they try their best to hide it, but children are sensitive to those things somehow, even if they don’t understand what it is they’re sensing.

It’s to be expected that you find a tired social worker who is late and harried from managing god-knows how many cases. Or caregivers who have a little less patience, but certainly aren’t cruel. There are so many sad cases they deal with every day and there’s never an end in sight, so they run the risk of caregiver fatigue or burn out.

They’re human, and they’re trying their best, but sometimes their job demands more than they have in that moment.

Also, it should be addressed that social workers are not paid enough, not anywhere near as much as they should be.

So it’s easy for a group home to be an unpleasant but not necessarily evil experience.

#writing community #writing advice #writeblr #writing #fanfiction #Anonymous

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xurkitry · 5 years

Text

A Circus Lost in Time; A Hat in Time Circus AU

Circus AU! Circus AU!

currently this AU is getting a lot of attention from me because I wanna actually start making a story and doing more character designs!

here are the basics!

if you’ve ever seen or read ‘Coraline’ then this is actually pretty similar!

Hat Kid and her parents move into a new house, HK finds a weird door, and being the curious child she is, she goes through it! On the other side is a circus version of her world! Unlike in Coraline where those within the other world are there to pretty much trap kiddos The Circus is there to help kiddos.

Everyone in the circus were once kids who decided to stay with exceptions for Cooking Cat, The Nyakuza Cats, Lazy Paw Gang, and others similar! Basically enemies that are animals that aren’t exactly overly important to the story of A Hat in Time!

Hat Kid easily befriends a lot of those who are in The Circus and they start asking if she’ll stay, however, she isn’t exactly very sure. The offer is very tempting but she loves her family a lot and doesn’t want to leave them. Although some of the inhabitants of The Circus are a little worried since HK can come across as obsessive and defensive when it comes to her family in the real world, so they try to do some investigating!

Those in The Circus can leave and go to the real world but it takes a lot of energy and they can’t interact with anything. Only those who have been to The Circus before can see those who come from it!

The Circus is like another planet but it just exists kinda like in a little pocket dimension of sorts? the entire planet is just one giant circus, but different kinds! you got spooky scary ones, normal ones, very classy looking ones, futuristic looking ones, and so many more.

the characters that were never kids, exception for CC, are pretty much the circus animals while other characters can be considered as the audience! CC is the one who allows the existence of The Circus to continue. she created The Circus in an attempt to help children who were in bad places and with bad families. CC is a very motherly person and just wants to help children.

warning for dark themes beyond here.

----------------------

The version of Snatcher in this AU is named Goofball and when he was alive he was named Alex and had a very entitled sister named Vanessa.

Alex was often blamed for things that Vanessa did, such as spilling juice or milk everywhere, stealing food, or making messes and he was often punished harshly for it. at school Alex didn’t have any friends since his sister had spread rumors about him throughout the school and made everyone hate him. He was often bullied because of this.

When Alex found The Circus it was one of the few times he felt true happiness and joy and could be himself, everyone accepted him and was kind to him. Alex had quickly decided to stay and eventually became Goofball.

Alex’s parents had quickly realized that it was Vanessa who was causing all the messes and troubles in their house and Vanessa was punished for them. his parents were distraught by his disappearance and looked desperately for years. now, Vanessa is a matured adult and understands what she had done was wrong. Now she also looks for her missing brother, even after all these years. she still has hope that he is alive and just wants to see him at least one more time.

Mu, a girl who had a mustache, had been homeless for a very long time and had grown very depressed. no one wanted her because she was a freak. it was not normal for a girl to have a mustache. eventually Mu had given up on life and swam far into the ocean that surrounded the island she lived on and attempted to drown herself. however she was lured to a cave and ended up in the circus, which is where she stayed and still is. No one from the real world misses her.

Conductor and Grooves were very close friends, however, their families hated each other greatly and wanted to stay away from each other. upon hearing this both Conductor and Grooves were distraught as they would have so much fun together and didn’t want that to end. Conductor ended up finding The Circus first and later brought Grooves with him. in order to continue being friends with each other they decided to stay in The Circus and are still great friends to this day. Both families are distraught in the real world and blame each other saying that the other family kidnapped their child.

Empress’ family were involved with a gang and there was a very nasty gang war going on, threats were being thrown and none of them were empty. eventually threats were being thrown about Empress being murdered or worse, this made Empress scared. she was just a mere child, only 5 years old. she had done nothing wrong here, her only connections with the gang were family related, she had done nothing for them and yet she was being pulled into it and treated as if she actually did stuff for them.

the rival gang broke into Empress’ home and killed her parents and siblings while she tried to hide, however her hiding spot led to The Circus. the first to greet her was Cooking Cat, also called CC. she comforted Empress and became a mother figure to her. Empress now is a bit rough around the edges but she isn’t bad. she’ll protect anyone who is being bullied and will comfort those who need it.

Moonjumper was once a young prince and was meant to be the heir to the throne, however his parents, the king and queen, didn’t believe he’d make for a good king. they’d tell him that he’d never be fit to rule and that he would destroy the kingdom if he became king. Moonjumper had many good intentions for the kingdom and many plans, even at his young age. He had wanted to rule the kingdom and make things right, listen to those who would soon be under his rule. however, the more and more his parents insulted and degraded him the more and more he no longer wanted to be a king, the more he didn’t want to rule.

so he didn’t, he ran away and eventually ended up in The Circus where he immediately decided to stay. he claimed a small part of the world and became the king there, ruling with a golden heart instead of an iron fist.

the kingdom in the real world fell a part shortly after the prince had left as the citizens believed that the king and queen had killed to poor boy for an excuse to have another child. the citizens began to riot and eventually overthrew the king and queen. however, with no one else to rule the kingdom fell a part and now only the ruins remain.

the Mafia Goons were all a bunch of unruly kids who got upset with their parents and ended up in The Circus, while Mafia Boss was an orphan who came to The Circus for a family. it hurts him to know most of the Mafia Goons ran away from their families over small arguments and issues and he considers it his job to make sure they know what they have done was a mistake.

The Owls and Penguins were all children who abandoned and Grooves and Conductor often take them in and help them realize that they’re safe now and that they’ll protect them and keep them safe.

The minions were all children who were abused by their families. Moonjumper and Goofball often play with and take care of them, often Moonjumper will ‘adopt’ some and Goofball will ‘adopt’ others. It isn’t uncommon to hear the minions calling Moonjumper or Goofball ‘Dad’ or ‘Uncle’

Moonjumper and Goofball grew rather close after they met each other, sharing many interests and coming from families who were rather cruel to them. they consider each other family and will protect each other and the minions at all cost.

undecided characters at the moment

Tim

Tim’s Friend

Shapeshifter

Bow Kid

Timmy

The Captain

some random art for the AU as well as designs

a blessing from @zodiacfoxtrot

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purbol-xiv · 5 years

Text

LFRP - Mana Yuzuka - Balmung

❁ The Basics ❁

Age~ 33 Birthday~ 12th Sun of the First Umbral Moon Race~ Raen Au Ra Sexuality~ Pansexual Marital Status~ Single Alignment~ Neutral Evil

❁ What I’m Looking For ❁

Friends! Enemies! Partners in crime! Plots plots plots! As a note, I’m open to developing romantic relationships with other peoples characters, but its not a priority for me, and its certainly not a priority for Mana. If any romance happens, I’d like it to be worked up towards DEFINITELY plotted out.

More under the cut if you’re interested~

❁Physical Appearance❁

Hair~ Short, uneven dull green locks. One look by anyone and it can be assumed she cuts it herself Eyes~ Deep indigo irises with purple limbal rings Height~ 4′9″ Build~ Slightly toned Distinguishing features~ There are less scales around Mana’s neck, which was something she was born with. She also many scars running along her back that she doesn’t like to talk about. Common Accessories~ There is almost always a small pouch on her person containing tarot cards, though she has no formal astrologian training. It’s unknown how she got a hold on these. Some form of jewelry - and most of the time many kinds - can be seen on her as well.

❁Personal❁

Birthplace~ Unknown, thought to be somewhere near or in Doma Religion~ Mana doesn’t have a religion of her own Residence~ She has a house in Shirogane where she lives, as well as an apartment in the Goblet where she conducts alchemical experiments. (Both yet to be acquired in-game, so sorry) Likes~ The ocean and night sky, money, fancy clothes, drinking, reading Dislikes~ Overly sweet things, weakness, losing control of a situation Hobbies~ Studying, bad fortunetelling, people watching, traveling Brief history and information~ Mana was orphaned very young and taken in by a pair of Doman nobles. She endured years of abuse up until the Garlean occupation of Doma, where she was taken in as conscript. The garleans didn’t treat her much better then her adoptive family. Mana was only able to break free of her conscription when the calamity hit, and so she is terribly traumatized and is dealing with it in not the greatest ways. She appears calm most of the time, and can even be quite approachable at most, but she also can be a cold, heartless sort of person if gotten at the wrong angle.

❁Professional❁

Profession~ Alchemist Languages~ Common Eorzean, Hingan Skills~ ~Alchemy~ This is pretty straightforward. She finds alchemical research interesting and has made it into more than just a hobby in recent years. ~Red magic~ Mana preforms red magic in a very base sense. Though she is not properly trained, she uses her basic knowledge of conjury and thaumaturgy to incorporate magic in her fighting. ~Sword wielding~ Since Mana was conscripted for a good chunk of her life, she picked up wielding weapons quite early on. She particularly prefers swords, specifically rapiers as she thinks they add a nice flair to her appearance in battle. ~Cooking~ Though she would prefer not to do it when given any opportunity, she’s actually quite a talented cook.

❁Relationships❁

Significant other~ None Children~ None Parents~ Dead Siblings~ Only child Other relatives~ Unknown Pets~ A morbol seedling she has lovingly named Popoto.

❁RP Hooks❁

Apothecary~ If someone is in need of a potion or two, Mana is up to the task. Whether it be a healing potion, poison, or anything else, she won’t ask any questions. Ex-conscript~ Mana served Garlemald unwillingly as a conscript for nearly half of her life, but despite this her views on garleans aren’t entirely all bad. If your character was a conscript, or is perhaps of garlean decent, they might have something to talk about... and perhaps even bond over, if the mood strikes right. Extended family~ Mana was actually born in Sui no Sato, where her parents decided to bring her to the surface world at a very young age. This being said, though she knows her parents are dead, she is unaware of any other living family beyond that. Any older raen from there could have known her parents or could have been related to them. Open mind~ I’m open to any other sort of hooks and would love to hear what you have in mind! These are just some suggestions off the top of my head.

❁OOC Info❁

Hi! I’m Amelia, a 22 year old nonbinary individual who uses they/them pronouns. First of all if you aren’t going to respect this, I’d rather not interact. Thank you, and I hope you have a lovely time finding other people to RP with. Second! I’m incredibly shy and anxious about RP, but I do love it a lot. I have a hard time keeping up with text in populated areas, so if I miss any of your messages please just give me a poke. I promise I’m not ignoring you! If you have any thoughts or suggestions for how our characters might interact, I’d love to hear it~ I’m on CST and usually work in the evenings randomly throughout the week. I can be on late at night (around 9-11pm) and in the mornings from 10am-12pm when I work, otherwise on days I have off I’m almost always available. If you’d like to inquire about RP, I can be reached right here on tumblr or in-game. My discord can be asked for in PMs.

#ffxiv #ffxiv rp #ffxiv balmung #crystal data center #lfrp #au ra #raen #mana yuzuka

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isdamned · 5 years

Text

floyd's trauma/ptsd

(heavy tw for (child) abuse of all kinds, suicide, self harm, and discussions of mental illness)

floyd suffers not only from ptsd but from complex ptsd or c-ptsd - a subtype of ptsd which shows up in cases of elongated trauma over a period of years - often , and in this case , in childhood . he was diagnosed with ptsd ( but not c-ptsd) by the therapist on call at belle reve , though he refused to do anything about it .

i. safety seeking mechanisms

people who grow up in unstable environments and go through the stress of unexpected and violent situations often become attached to things they believe they can protect them , in addition to having paranoid behaviors . smoking makes floyd feel safe because he is in control of what he's doing and his body . guns make him feel safer because they mean that he has a means to defend himself and fight back against people who would hurt him and the people he cares about .

ii. violent flashbacks

emotional flashbacks are a type of flashback common in c-ptsd - where the person suffering from it , typically without realizing it , will , when triggered , regress to the emotional state they were in at the time the trauma happened to them . floyd becomes violent when people trigger him by bringing up his own fatherhood in relation to his son , edward , because he was violent when edward was kidnapped .

iii. emotional repression & dissociation

floyd copes with his emotions - many of which are negative - by repressing them , pushing them down as deep inside of himself as he can , and doing his best to numb them with things like alcohol . floyd often doesn't feel quite really in his body , and is detached from it , which makes it easier to let himself get hurt and to hurt himself .

iv. fight/freeze coping dichotomy people with c-ptsd often have one or two main methods they use to cope with their trauma . floyd , when triggered , defaults to fight and freeze . he becomes aggressive , fighting back , becoming irritable and angry and taking it out on people around him . the fight reflex sometimes shows itself in homicidal impulses and violent intrusive thoughts . he also freezes , coping by dissociation and repression , often using alcohol to numb himself . the emotional repression and dissociation symptoms become more intense when he's triggered.

v. suicidal impulses and actions

floyd is suicidal - primarily passively ; he does aggressive and reckless things that he expects to get himself killed . he says that he doesn’t care if he dies or not , and has had a reckless disregard for his own life for years - since he was a teenager .

floyd experience multiple types of trauma which caused this reaction in him , all of which affect him to this day .

i. childhood physical and emotional abuse floyd's father beat him and his brother as 'punishment' ; often , eddie took the beatings in floyd's place .

i. normalization of violence

the severe violence that floyd grew up with as a child - once or twice culminating in broken bones - and , later , the death of eddie i , brought death and violence into his life at a young age . he sees it as a ‘normal’ , almost , experience , one that’s to be expected from the world and his life . it numbed him , gave him the knowledge of the world as a violent place and his own place in it as a violent person .

ii. startle reflex

floyd’s startle reflexes - and one of his triggers - is getting startled from behind or having his wrists grabbed . he gets violent , and has trouble being close physically to people that aren’t people he trusts the most .

iii. emotional incompetence

floyd never got good role models when it came to interaction . his relationships are often dysfunctional because he just doesn’t figure how to treat people , and though he learns more as he goes on , his young self is particularly dysfunctional and his romantic relationships are often tense .

ii. childhood sexual abuse floyd was sexually abused by his mother at various points in adolescence ; and witnessed his mother sexually abusing his brother / was aware of it happening . by the time he was thirteen , he'd blocked it out , and still does not remember (a condition called dissociative amnesia) - though he sometimes gets mini-memories that come up and he pushes all the way back down . the trauma still remains , though slightly blunted . floyd's main triggers are mentions of sexual abuse , being emotionally manipulated , and very ornate rugs in a parisian style .

i. hypersexuality/hyposexuality floyd oscillates between being hypersexual (very sexual) and being hyposexual (sex-repulsed) . he dislikes the emotional commitment that comes with relationships , but often solicits escorts when he wants to have sex . he's primarily hyposexual , and often becomes hypersexual when he's in a situation where he's triggered .

ii. distrust of women floyd distrusts women , and often believes that they are out to get something from him , or manipulating him behind the scenes . he associates women getting emotional with being emotionally manipulated ; this is where some of his misogyny stems from .

iii. obsession with abuser(s) floyd is fixated on his parents and what they did to him . he blames both of them , to some degree , for eddie's death - but mostly his mother . he sometimes insists he was "born an orphan" or "had no parents" - and took a very specific , thought out revenge on his mother for all she had done to him .

iii. eddie's death floyd shot his brother on accident when his brother attempted to kill his father at his mother's behest ; he meant to shoot the gun out of his brother's hand , but missed , and hit him in the head instead . this could easily be called the most formative moment of floyd's life . he remembers the moment when he pulled the trigger and seeing the gun go through eddie's head , but he did not remember what lead up to the incident for about five years ( until he was nineteen or twenty ) .

i. traumatic fixation floyd was adept with guns before the incident , but afterwards became even more obsessed with them . he trained as much as he could , until it took up almost all of his waking moments , determined to never miss again .

ii. nightmares floyd has nightmares about his parents , about eddie , about the day that eddie died , and also occasionally about batman . he usually wakes up and drinks to forget them .

iii. recreation and habitual retraumatization the route of an assassin seemed natural for floyd . every time he pulls the trigger , it's like he's reliving that first moment - hoping it might turn out different . it doesn't , of course , because he never misses . he gets himself back around into these self triggering situations over and over , and almost dissociates every time he shoots - despite feeling a thrill for danger and excitement .

iv. eddie ii's death

eddie the ii , son of floyd’s divorced wife , is kidnapped by people who want to get to him . floyd goes on a rampage to get him back instead of cooperating , leaving bodies in his wake . he gets there too late , and eddie ii is molested and murdered by a pedophile .

i. retraumatization

the situation activated floyd’s own trauma and reminded him of his traumatic childhood ; this was part of the reason he reacted so violently and refused to cooperate . it made the trauma from the event that much more intense , and made him very afraid for the people close to him .

ii. emotional distance

eddie’s death was the nail in the coffin when it came to floyd’s relationships with other people . even the people he did care about , even a little, weren’t safe from him and his work . afterwards , floyd was more unstable , cared less about himself , and began to take on more and more suicidal missions .

#ᵇᵘˡˡᵉᵗ ⁱⁿ ᵗʰᵉ ᵇʳᵃⁱⁿ ( headcanon )#cw csa #cw child abuse #cw abuse #cw suicide #cw mental illness #cw incest #/ oh god my boy has been through so mUCH

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yueqqi-main · 6 years

Note

MY FRIEND! Tell me about your OCs! ;D I know you're a creative person, an artist and I think a writer as well. I feel like you've got some really well developed OCs, and I'm so curious to meet them and get to know the kinds of worlds are alive in your mind!

:,) I have waaaay too many. For the Persona series alone, I have 20+ and that’s for a Persona 6 concept fic I have going on at Ao3. But I’ll share some of my favorites and separate them by fandom/original novel.

Bnha

Li Fong: smol angry, kinda moody boi (not that small actually, he’s like my height) who is an international student at U.A. from Hong Kong. He can generate portals with his mind (2 at a time, Portal-inspired unlike Kurogiri). He was traumatized (long story short, abusive family, he walked in on his mother’s dead body while his asshole father was throwing a rage fit, and “killed” his father in self-defense by reflecting his father’s knife attack with portals, but not really because his father is immortal technically), so he experiences a block with his quirk until he gets help. Depending on how the roleplay on Discord goes, he can become a villain or hero.

Otsuka Kyouma: tol beautiful boi with an ENFJ smile who graduated top of his class (#3) at U.A. before Mirio and crew. He’s really kind and compassionate, but won’t take people’s shit, also usually bright and smiley until he’s not. He’s a pro-hero who goes by Seraphim, which came from his quirk Hypnotic Illusion: he can induce a hypnotic field on people within his field of vision and make them see whatever he wants them to see, like a dream master of sorts. His favorite thing is to disguise himself as a biblical angel and terrorize the enemies out of spite or for information gathering.

He worked for Endeavor’s agency for the first few years of his hero career, and decided to transfer to the police force in Hosu City (where he meets and partners with ISTP’s jerk OC, Hirai Kaito, and becomes enamored with the detective) when his career didn’t go anywhere. Also, fun fact: Kyouma got his 6 eyes from his mother, who is a brightly colored hero who can do anything a mantis shrimp can, in water and on land.

David Li: aaaaa I hope no one who’s reading Our Hero Academia is reading this. David is an absolute villain who desires control and reaches from his goals to destroy criminal activity...with more criminal activity. He’s two-faced: to the public he projects a kind politician sort of air who backs the heroes and defends justice, but behind closed doors he is leading a network of organizations (triads, yakuza, villain groups, and of course, his branch of the government) with a terrifying power. He’s known as the Shinigami, a merciless contractor, but to those who are closest to him, he still retains compassion (even though it’s twisted sometimes) and tries to treat innocents right.

Before he became a politician, he was an immortal hero named Agent Sun who often worked in USA and China as an assassin-type, superhuman type figure. While he does have above-average strength, speed, and agility, most of that came from training rather than a quirk. Instead, his actual quirk is the ability to take and give time from anyone’s lifespan who he comes into direct contact with. He has at least 500 years added to his clock, so he’s been around since the 1st and 2nd generation of quirk-users, plus he was sort of rival-buddies with All For One.

[For the record, David is NOT Li Fong’s father. Still related though, just by an extra generation]

Persona

Shirogeki Haku: Oof, Haku is a bit of a mess. He’s a bisexual trans guy with a somewhat strained relationship with his traditional parents, living in Tokyo with his attorney cousin to study Computer Science with a focus in AI at Tokyo University. Furthermore, he has a constant self-depreciating attitude because of factors like his identity and his thalassemia, which has worsened since childhood so it gets in the way of a lot of things he used to love doing (soccer). He also lacks self-preservation because he thinks he’ll die early anyways, so he lowkey jumps at the chance to use the cognitive ‘verse to a) run away from his illness since he finds the effects of his anemia aren’t as strong there and b) to put his life on the line as the new group’s Wildcard, which is seriously concerning to criminal profiler!Akira after the Shadow Operatives, Investigation Team, and the Phantom Thieves team up with the new persona users.

His arcana is the Fool, but he also represents the Tower. His persona is Karna, a hero-turned-villain from the Mahabharata.

[I have so many plans for this character, it’s gonna be a wild ride in Icarus]

[And I’m leaving it at that for Persona; if I start talking about Zuni, Sora, or Help Wizard, I’m not going to stop so a separate ask, post, or DM about this particular fandom would be more wise lmao]

Water Runs Clear (original novel series)

Lan Honglian: LHL is the crown prince of Mei, until his father’s, Lan Jinyun’s, most trusted advisor, Chen Zhongming, betrays Mei, kills the royal family, and takes the throne for himself. CZM’s oldest son, Chen Yongyi, betrays his father by saving LHL and taking LHL to a far away village to be taken care of by a cultivator elder.

Anyhow, terrible childhood aside, LHL learns to be a cultivator under like five different masters through his pre-teen and late teen years, growing excessively bitter and obsessed with vengeance after seeing the mistreatment of the impoverished. In his early 20s, he joins the Kongxuan sect and starts leading different rebellion missions under the fake, super generic name, Jiang Mingxin (it’s so generic that if you knock down a store sign in the city, you’ll hit five of them), and in a mask+weimao that covers his features, since his green eyes and dark skin draw too much attention and CZM knows LHL is out there somewhere.

Chen Yongxue: CYX was LHL’s childhood best friend and sworn brother until CZM’s betrayal and the palace siege. While CYX is resentful of his father for the betrayal, the execution of Chen Yongyi for saving LHL, and his mother falling deathly ill after CZM’s first wife kills herself, CYX feels more helpless and just does what he could to limit the extents of the new policies under his father’s rule. CYX, in his early 20s, is an investigator for the royal guard whose purpose is to track down and capture rebels from the Kongxuan sect.

LHL and CYX’s friendship was crumbled after the betrayal and LHL eventually learning about CYX’s role as a head investigator, so LHL harbors a lot of bitterness toward his once-best-friend. CYX feels guilt and doesn’t blame LHL, even to the point of telling LHL that it’s his every right to kill him for the murder of his parents.

[LHL and CYX eventually make up once LHL realizes that CYX still cherished their sworn brotherhood.]

[Also they’re gay for each other.]

Yang Xinxuan: A Taoist priest from the Tiebing sect, the protag of another novel that happens almost concurrently with LHL’s story. YXY is a terrifyingly powerful cultivator, who is no-nonsense, serious, and, most of all, oblivious to romance. He once fought Death (literally, he fought the Heibai Wucheng) and got away, albeit injured. Later, another Death (Yanluo) becomes enamored with him, though every flirtation goes over his head.

YXY got his stubbornness and resolve from growing up orphaned and trained under top cultivators at his sect.

Zhang Xiaohen: A stony-faced, strict cultivator who was in Tiebing before she joined Kongxuan and later took LHL in. She rarely is angered, but the last few times she did get angered did not end well: after discovering her siblings were still alive, she impulsively went to confront the nobles that had taken them as servants and got thrown out of Tiebing for it.

Liu Shuangyu: Another cultivator in Kongxuan who is known for her musical cultivation technique. Working as a mercenary of sorts, she brings chaos pretty much everywhere until she decides to settle in Zhang Xiaohen’s village, but still acting as a bad influence for LHL.

[They are also in love and basically LHL’s moms.]

#answer #oc #bnha oc #persona series #persona oc #persona 5

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mllemaenad · 6 years

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'Imagine your children growing up in such a world. If a mage asked it of you, you would have to give him your daughter, not knowing what his plans for her might be. You could not resist him, and neither could she.' - Sorry, this line particularly came to my attention because take away magic and this? Is exactly what happens in the Tabris origin. And to that one Orlesian merchant in Denerim in DA:O. And probably to any number of peasant/elven girls at the hands of nobles every day across Thedas.

No need to be sorry. :)

You’re right. Absolutely.

The thing is – take this in context. This is an answer written by a grand cleric to a nobleman who seems (we don’t have his side of the conversation, obviously, so we can only infer from the substance of the reply) to have been challenging the Chantry’s treatment of mages. If you look at it like that, then what the grand cleric is describing is what happens to almost every mage child in southern Thedas.

Armed men come to your door and take your child away. You have no right to say no. And you have no idea what they’re going to do with them. They may take your child to a Circle across the sea. They may murder them. They may make them Tranquil. They may rape them, beat them, torture them. Maybe you’ll be lucky: maybe your kid is Vivienne or one of the Warden mages. Maybe they’ll do okay.

But you don’t know. And you can’t tell the Templars to go away; that they can’t have your child. They live in a world where this happens to parents every day.

It’s almost too much to imagine. The Circle, the Templars, they’ve shaped my life. I was no more than twelve when they came for me. My mother wept when they fixed the chains to my wrists, but my father was glad to see me gone. He had been afraid, ever since the fire in the barn. Not just afraid of what I could do, but afraid of me, afraid my magic was punishment for whatever petty sins he imagined the Maker sat in judgement upon.

– Anders (short story)

Anders’s mum couldn’t say no. Maybe she wanted to. At bare minimum, it sounds as though she didn’t want to lose her son forever. But that’s what happened. Little Ella is desperate to get back to her parents, because the Templars didn’t even tell them where they were taking her – and when we encounter her, a Templar is threatening her with Tranquillity and strongly implied sexual assault.

Wynne gave birth to a healthy baby boy, whom she was allowed one day with before he was taken into Chantry custody. The child, who was names Rhys, was taken to Lydes and from there transferred to the White Spire in Orlais when it was discovered that he, too, was a mage.

– World of Thedas I

They kidnapped a newborn baby and took him to a different damn country. It took decades, and fighting an archdemon, for Wynne to even get the chance to find him again.

Dulci de Launcet was lucky: she’s a noble, so she at least had letters and some general idea of where her kid was, but she hadn’t laid eyes on her son since he was six.

Yeah. Good fucking job, Chantry. You really solved the problem of powerful people coming to your door to abduct your children.

But while, yes, given the context of the letter I think the irony is best understood in relation to mages, I definitely think it can be expanded upon:

The demon had impersonated the human man who had bought her from the slavers that took her in after her father died. She’d had no idea back then who those kind men really were, only that they offered her food and a warm bed to sleep in. Then an even kinder man came to take her from them, and she found herself in his luxurious home and thought herself the luckiest girl in the entire alienage.

How very naive she had been. Count Dorian, as she learned her new master’s name to be, had been in search of an elven whore he could keep as a pet, something he could put in a pretty dress and bring with him on one of his many trips to the capital, like baggage.

– Dragon Age: The Calling

Ah, look. The exact scenario Grand Cleric Francesca was fear-mongering about. A little girl abducted, enslaved and sold to a nobleman who abused and tortured her. Yes, a mage-child as it happens, but that wasn’t apparent at the time. Fiona was vulnerable because she was an elf – an orphaned elf considered expendable by society.

“What they wish is irrelevant.” Celene turned and stalked away from the window. “I am already fighting a war on two fronts. I cannot be seen to fight a war on three.”

“Then don’t.” Briala rose, putting herself in Celene’s path. “Give them justice.”

“A lord for the death of an elf? I … damn this thing.”

With a quick jerk, Celene tore her mask from her face. Her face was flushed beneath, her eyes red from another night of little sleep. “Shall I declare the elves equal citizens before the Maker and the throne as well, while I’m at it?”

“Why not?” Briala took her own mask off, stealing a quick moment to steady herself. “Unless you don’t believe that, and I’m just a jumped-up kitchen slut you haven’t tired of yet.

– Dragon Age: The Masked Empire

Or here: a revolt that ends in genocide, and that begins because it is unthinkable that they arrest a nobleman for murdering an elf. The victim’s name was Lemet. He was killed shielding an eight-year-old boy who threw a rock at a carriage. And the boy said he did it because his mother had been murdered by Orlesian nobility:

“They killed my mother,” the boy said, pulling against Lemet’s grip.

“Be quiet.” Lemet looked back at the coach and heard its joints creak as the guards jumped down to the street. The driver would want to have that oiled, some part of Lemet’s mind noted.

“They can’t come down this street after what they did to her,” the boy insisted. “They can’t!”

– Dragon Age: The Masked Empire

Or this, where soldiers rob, rape and murder their own citizens in the midst of a civil war:

“Two days ago, Lady Seryl’s men rode in and cur down every man and woman working the fields. Killed our guards, killed everyone in the village square. When they finished killing the other soldiers, they fired arrows out onto the water, killed most of our boys in the boats. They took all the food they could find. They spent the night.” A collective flinch splashed across the crowd. “Said we had been assisting enemies of the throne, that this was a lesson to anyone who’d help Gaspard’s men.” At the last, his voice broke. “My lord, I don’t even know who Gaspard is.”

– Dragon Age: The Masked Empire

Or the serial killer who is repeatedly allowed to walk free because he’s a magistrate’s son, and he targets elven children. Or the elven boys who fled to the Qun because a guard raped their sister – no one would arrest him, so they took matters into their own hands.

And yes, of course, you see the exact same thing in Ferelden in the alienage.

I’m sure everyone feels so much safer now they’ve locked up all the mages.

Orlais’s crimes don’t excuse Tevinter’s. That’s where they went wrong with Dorian’s … painful dialogue on slavery. You can’t point to the horrors of Orlesian society and therefore suggest that the Tevinter slave trade is not that awful. It doesn’t work like that. What you can do, though, is say that Tevinter’s crimes don’t excuse Orlais’s – particularly when they tend to do exactly the same shit:

Slavery still thrives in Thedas, even if the trade has been outlawed. Who hasn’t heard the tales of poverty-stricken elves lured into ships by the prospect of well-paying jobs in Antiva, only to find themselves clapped in leg-irons once at sea? And humans fall prey to this, too.

If they’re lucky, they end up in Orlais, which has only “servants.” Most nobles treat them decently because they are afraid of admitting the truth. Orlesians go to great lengths to maintain the fiction that slavery is illegal.

Of course, the greatest consumer of slave labor is the Tevinter Imperium, which would surely crumble if not for the endless supply of slaves from all over the continent. There, they are meat, chattel. They are beaten, used as fodder in the endless war against the Qunari, and even serve as components in dark magic rituals.

—From Black City, Black Divine: A Study of the Tevinter Imperium, by Sister Petrine, Chantry scholar

– Slavery in the Tevinter Imperium

Fiona is not an anomaly: Orlais kidnaps and sells people into slavery, too.

And this makes sense. Fantasy always draws on the real world, even if they mix and match the cultures and historical periods a bit. So, just like in the real world, you generally have to take anything the wealthy and powerful say with a grain of salt.

The Chantry has a very specific, empire building, agenda. It makes much of problems that aren’t really problems (demons and abominations are not widespread threats, and both are poorly understood); it pins the blame for actual crises on oppressed groups (the Blight is in no way the fault of this random peasant mage from Antiva); it uses racism and religious intolerance to create in- and out-groups (elves [and dwarves, but we haven’t conquered them yet] are degenerate heathens who are preventing the Maker from returning).

As much as I love Dragon Age, what Bioware does sometimes that is … uncomfortable … to use a mild word, is that it lets the powerful rule the narrative. Inquisition is worst at this, because it presents strong voices for people like Cassandra and Cullen, who stick fairly close to the party line. And then it takes characters like Varric and Sera, and distances them from their own cultures … which is fine for individuals but awkward when we’re not letting Briala or Fiona say much either – and where the fuck is Sigrun? No one’s spoken for Orzammar’s casteless since Awakening. But it’s there, to some extent, in all the games.

So the point, always, is that mages and Circles are misdirection. Mages are scapegoats in the Chantry faith who are held responsible for all the bad things, and represent a pretend evil nobility that the Orlesian Chantry is keeping under control.

But the actual problems of this fantasy world are more or less the same as the problems of the real world: powerful nations dominate the continent and force others to bow to their whims and adopt their culture, because empires are just shit; the rich and powerful hoard all the rights to themselves, and can do damn near anything to the poor – particularly where the poor are part of a marginalised group.

What Orlais doesn’t want people to realise is that they are Tevinter. It was never the mages that were the problem, it was the absolute power the Tevinter magisters held over their slaves – a power now held mostly by the Orlesian nobility, who use it in pretty much the same way. Not exclusively, no: of course the nobility of other nations can be, and bloody are, evil fucks. But even there, the Chantry view helps to obscure the truth: you should be scared of empires and those who rule them. Much more scared than you are of a possessed mage.

#dragon age #Anonymous #cw: violence #cw: abuse #cw: rape #chantry critical

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themarauderstheoutsidersandpeggy · 6 years

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What is the outsiders? So that I'm knowledgable

HOOOOOO LETS GO!!! So the outsiders is a novel written by S.E. Hinton in 1967 about a neighborhood that has been taken over by gangs. You have the socs who are the ‘spoiled rich kids’and the greasers, the more hoodlum type. The novel focuses on a gang of seven greasers, more specifically three of them, as things finally get pushed too far with the social statuses. I want you to read the book, so I’m not going to spoil anything, but I will introduce you to the greasers and show you what they looked like in the movie. :)

So the book opens with a famous line that was supposed to be written by the main character, Ponyboy Curtis.

Fourteen at the time, Ponyboy Michael Curtis was described as having “light-brown, almost-red hair and greenish-gray eyes,” and wears his hair “longer than a lot of boys wear theirs, squared off in the back and long at the front and sides.”

He is portrayed as the sensitive one in the book, a writer and a lover of watching sunsets. At one point in the book, he recites the poem, “Nothing Gold Can Stay” by Robert Frost. The line, “Stay Gold Ponyboy” comes from this.

He also, throughout the course of the book, is seen to fight quite often with his oldest brother, Darry.

Next we have his slightly older brother, Sodapop Curtis.

Sodapop Patrick Curtis is sixteen years of age while the events of the book are taking place, and he is the middle Curtis child. He is described by his brother Ponyboy as being happy-go-lucky, but we also know that as much as Ponyboy loved Sodapop, (he was described as his favorite person!), he really didn’t know all that much about his struggles.

We find out later in the book that his girlfriend, Sandy, is pregnant with another man’s child, and leaves the town to raise the baby, even though Sodapop was willing to raise the child as his own with her through marriage.

Sodapop works at a gas-station, the DX, and we find out that he has dropped out of school to help his older brother pay the bills since the car-wreck that killed their parents.

Now for the oldest Curtis brother, Darrel.

Darrel Shaynne Curtis of 20 is the oldest brother and therefore legal guardian of the Curtis brothers. His hair is said to be like his father’s- dark brown that sticks out in the front of his head with a cowlick in the back. His eyes "are like two pieces of pale blue-green ice.” He is said to look exactly like his father, but with different eyes. Also, he looks older than his actual age, which is twenty. Ponyboy says he would be better looking if his eyes weren’t so cold.

That was stolen from the outsiders wiki page, but only because I couldn’t find his physical description from the book. He is the brother that Ponyboy is seen to fight with a lot, but not sibling fights, more in a way you would fight with a parent, grades and curfew and such. Seeing as after they are orphaned, Darrel becomes their legal guardian, this style of fight makes sense.

Now we’re going to move on to the other members of their gang of friends, ones that aren’t related.

Dallas Tucker Winston is the tough one.

As much as we want him to become sensitive in the end, he really doesn’t change as a person. He breaks, and there were severe consequences from this breaking. He isn’t ever really able to experience love from anyone, the kid with a tragic backstory, horrendously abusive parents, and little to no will to live. He is seen as a player, but it’s important to remember that he wasn’t just a horny teen. He was pissed when his girlfriend used to cheat on him, so that makes me think that he really wouldn’t be the cheating type. He was vital to the story though, the book would have only been about thirty pages had he not been there to help. Although he was raised on the harsh streets of New York, he seems to offer helpful advice, albeit somewhat extreme.

In the book, Dallas Winston is said to have an elfish face with high cheekbones, a pointed chin, small, sharp animal teeth, and ears like a lynx. Dally didn’t like haircuts nor hair oil, so his almost white-blonde hair fell over his forehead in wisps. He had blazing blue eyes which Ponyboy describes as “cold with all the hatred in the world.”

Steven Lucas Randle is Sodapop’s best friend and co-worker at the gas station.

(This is my favorite picture of him, only Steve could look that hot while having chocolate cake smeared across his face whoop)

Steve is seen as hating Ponyboy, and most people hate him for this. It is my personal opinion that Steve sees how Ponyboy takes Soda for granted, sees how Soda’s problems are ignored while Pony’s are discussed, and resents the child itself rather than the issue.

It is also important to remember that Steve is only a part time worker, and still regularly attends school. Steve has an abusive father and has a girlfriend, Evie, who we do not get to see.

Keith Mathews, or, “Two-Bit” is seen as the comic relief.

I believe he is more than that. He is shown to truly be concerned when Ponyboy is dangerously on edge, and is known to hide his depression with jokes. He has a younger sister, but we do not get to see her either.

He is an alcoholic, chocolate cake lover, kleptomaniac and from what we know, A VERY MESSY BOI. He is eighteen and in junior year, and just likes to go to school for the hell of it.

He loves Mickey Mouse with all of his soul man it’s intense. His shirts in the movie are often Mickey shirts and he is seen to go to the movies and make a game of flipping girl’s skirts up, not to mention he is great at impressions, making Ponyboy and Johnny believe for a second that he was an angry soc coming to hurt them.

He is said to have a thing for blondes, although the girl that he hit on, in the movie at least, was a brunette. He was around six feet tall, stocky in build, and was very proud of his long, rust-colored sideburns. He has grey eyes and was always wearing a wide grin.

Now for the “kicked puppy” of the group, Johnny Cade.

I’m going to start off by saying that he has ridiculously abusive parents. His house is shown at one point and you can hear screaming from inside. He goes up to the front door to turn in for the night and is shoved back out, his mother behind him with a broom, screaming about how he shouldn’t be there.

He is also amazingly caring, the only one Ponyboy can really talk to, and I believe he is the only person that Dallas Winston loved, that’s why he broke.

"Johnny was smaller than the rest, with a slight build. He had big black eyes in a dark tanned face; his hair was jet-black and heavily greased and combed to the side, but it was so long that it feel in shaggy bangs across his forehead. He always had a nervous, suspicious look in his eye. Johnny reminded Ponyboy of a little puppy that had been kicked too many times. Because of his parents, and the socs abuse, and all of the trouble that comes from being a greaser, he is extremely jumpy and when Two-Bit scares them at the movies, mentioned above, he physically jumps and Keith has to calm him down a bit.

All in all, the outsiders is fabulous and go read it thank you for coming to my ted talk

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kkglinka · 7 years

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I see many writers characterizing Blake Belladonna as fundamentally timid, receding, someone “who has always run” etc, and I think that's wrong, for a number of reasons. I strongly suspect that pre-Adam Blake was anything but those things — that they aren't character traits at all, but outward coping mechanisms. Before I explain, I want to establish that we're on the same page:

Abuse is a pattern of manipulative or controlling behavior. The majority of abuse is emotional and psychological, followed by sexual, then physical violence, with financial aspects mixed throughout. The vast majority of abuse is non-violent and hinges on things like gas-lighting, causing financial dependence, isolating their victim from potential support networks, entrapment and coercion. The only uniting factors among abusers are relatively high intelligence and narcissism. They typically appear like nice, likable, often charming and admirable folks to anyone who is not their victim — enabling their abuse through social disbelief. Above all else, they want their victim's attention and energy, no matter what form it takes. Even constant, focused hostility is a desirable response because the abuser feeds off the emotional attention.

The majority of their victims are not weak-willed or stupid. That is a social myth, one often fostered by abusers themselves, because it leave their real targets unguarded. Beginners will start this way, but for most experienced abusers, a weak person is boring. They don't provide much fight, much effort, much resulting attention. Instead, they often target “strong” people that they can manipulate, whittle down, force into emotional attendance, take all that energy for themselves, then bask in the achievement of gaining and maintaining control over such a challenge.

Adam Taurus fits the Sensitive/Passionate Man model of abuser. He's suave, handsome, a charismatic leader, persuasive enough to both gain numerous followers and manipulate them into achieving his goals. Oh, but he's so sensitive, able to cry in very artful restraint in front of certain followers, gaining sympathy, evoking empathy because surely he must be in pain; he must be the true victim. And suddenly everyone is coddling, reassuring — even the victim themselves — showering the abuser with attention and support.

Blake's aggressive avoidance (preemptively fleeing) of emotional confrontations in which she believes she will be blamed by someone she cares about, even for actions over which she had little or no agency, is consistent with severe emotional abuse and gas-lighting. In this scenario, the abuser holds their victim responsible for any displeasure they experience. Even in cases where their victim is clearly not at fault, they are guilty of insufficient compassion and sympathy, especially if the victim themselves is in any way demanding emotional comfort. For instance, an abuser might attack their victim until they cry, then condemn them for “trying to get attention.”

Contrast this avoidance with what we know of her formative years:

Given that no one suggested Chief Ghira Belladonna be removed or replaced in office during the attempted coup, I believe that his office is hereditary, which is in line with other aspects of the Remnant universe. I'm guessing that he stepped down from the previous White Fang political party, and became Chief, when an older relative died. I'm inclined to believe any formal royalty the faunus might have had were executed by the victorious human forces prior to the establishment of Menagerie, but that's the cynical historian in me. Regardless, the Belladonna's clearly have a high social status, which also explains a puzzle: Blake's obvious lady-like behavior, which didn't fit with the peasant orphan narrative.

If she comes from a political line of succession — if her family is the equivalent of old money — then she would have been groomed for her role as a political leader her entire childhood. Even if she's not a formal heir, her family name carries enormous prestige, a valuable asset. She would have been well-educated, any leadership abilities she naturally possessed would have been bolstered. Her political and social engagement with a wider community would have been encouraged, and she would have studied strategy, public speaking, crowd control, along with the more subtle “good manners” that are used to guide small groups.

Yet we also know she participated in front line, violent protests. In many noble families, civil or military service is a tacit expectation. It might be considered a civic duty to experience the full range of human/faunus conflicts, to witness front and center what problems exists and the effects they have on their people Given their own pasts, it makes sense that Blake's parents would train their only child — and possible heir — to be equally engaged.

We know she was passionate enough about her beliefs to fight tooth and nail over it with what seems to be a very loving, supportive, and respectful family. A runner doesn't draw that sort of line in the sand to the point of rejecting their own family. What she did, as a naive but highly principled teen, wasn't run away; it was run toward and to hell with anyone who wasn't brave enough to stand with her on the front lines. Altogether, this suggests a pattern of confrontational behavior — an angry idealist.

She would have been the perfect target for a charismatic man with political ambitions — and I'm sure her parents knew it. If she was trained to have all the skills I described, she would have been a very useful lieutenant. Given her age when she joined RWBY, she was at best sixteen when this, at least somewhat, older man charmed her away — young enough to groom. Fortunately, she had a strong enough formative period that she was able to overcome the gas-lighting and escape on her own. This is a very difficult achievement for any abuse victim, but next to impossible for someone already inclined toward passivity and avoidance.

Next we have Blake's initial conflict with Weiss during Season 1. Background narrative tells us that the two were engaged in repeated verbal debates before Blake finally loses her temper, accidentally revealing her race to someone she knows is a key (future) political rival. Only after she reaches that level of confrontation does Blake's abuse-related coping mechanism come into play, triggering immediate and irrational avoidance. That level of pnaic is an excessive and abnormal learned behavior — not a mere personality trait.

Back up, rewind, abusers isolate their victims. They lie and manipulate friends and family into abandoning the victim. They disrupt outings, invent excuses to cancel events, fabricate evidence and lie about their victim to that individual's friends and family. They make the victim look bad, irrational, hysterical, unreliable, cowardly...You name it, until the friends leave in frustration. A particularly vicious abuser might even arrange harmful events that the victim learns about but is unable to stop. I can easily imagine Adam sending Blake's budding friends on suicide missions or otherwise putting them at risk, to sever their emotional support. Consequently, Blake expects to be rejected by potential friends; expected to be rejected by her own family.

In real life, an abusive ex will often violently target a new lover or partner, sometimes attempt murder, because it's only when their victim's emotional attention shifts away that the abuser feels threatened. So running in response to her former abuser enacting demonstrable harm to a new loved one was completely rational.

Adam is strong, intelligent and calculating. You'll notice that he didn't “lose his temper” (abusers always remain in emotional control of themselves), but made a strategic choice to demonstrate his continued power and control. Given that he successfully disabled RWBY's strongest member, given that abusers will use almost any tactic to separate their victim from supportive networks, leaving was the most logical choice. Abusers don't stop until they're appeased or their entire system of control is destroyed.

Blake's actions really did protect the rest of her team by "giving Adam what he wanted", but you'll notice that she headed straight toward another support network. Good on her; that was a sound, strategic choice and in contrast to another maladaptive coping strategy: the urge toward self-isolation.

Another thing in abuse survivors is overcompensation. Yes, she felt irrationally guilty over Adam's malevolent actions and Yang Xiao Long's conscious choice — neither of which are within Blake's agency — but her entire relationship with Adam probably centered on his feelings, needs and desires. Survivors need time to attend themselves, and Blake never really did that. She went straight from putting all her energy into Adam and the White Fang into serving RWBY. She was bound to be overwhelmed by a need for self-care sooner or later...but abuse victims learn early on that no one will do emotional labor on their behalf. So again, we've got a learned coping mechanism rather than inherent trait, and one that was repeatedly challenged by Sun Wukong and both her parents.

What we really have is two people, Blake and Yang, who have spent most of their lives doing emotional labor for other people — for different reasons — and won't ask for any in return. One has been taught harsh lessons about how risky it is to expect any. The other convinced herself she was too strong to need any. But in this latest seasons we see both of them begin trying. In Blake's case, she needed to regain confidence in her own judgment enough that she was able to command her community (which achieved what she wanted). Her confrontation with Adam demonstrated how much having support makes a difference.

In Yang's case, she better start bloody well asking for what she wants instead of cavalierly dismissing her own emotional needs. Yeah, that's on her; it's not Blake's job to play guessing and appeasement games. That's unhealthy. You don't hold a partner responsible for your own feelings, especially if you've made no direct, honest attempt to communicate them — which is called emotional avoidance. So I was relieved to see her break down in front of Weiss, confessing that need, but even moreso when she finally allowed herself to get past that machismo and cry. Baby steps, y'know?

In conclusion, Blake is a passionate, confrontational firebrand who acquired maladaptive coping strategies consistent with gas-lighting and emotional abuse, and those should not be conflated with core personality traits. Also, she doesn't have psychic powers and I look forward to seeing Yang use her words instead of brooding.

#fandom #rwby #blake belladonna #tw: abuse #bumbleby #rwby meta

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roxannepolice · 6 years

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Dark side of the simulacra

Simulacra and precession of simulacra are one of the concepts explaining postmodernity, one created by Jean Baudrillard. I’m about to elaborate on what he understands by these terms, but for the less engaged among you, here’s the shortest definition ever:

Death Star is a simulacrum and StarKiller Base is a preceeding simulacrum. Or so they are in the eyes of general audience.

Ok, now for more elaboration. Simulacrum is basically a symbol which lost the connection with its meaning, destroying the meaning itself in the process. It’s in contrast to representation (which equates a meaning with a symbol), as simulation negates the symbol as value. Simulation encapsulates the meaning and the symbol and devours them both, transforming them into the simulacrum. A good comparison provided by Baudrillard is that of what simulation is commonly understood as and what are the result of its abuse. When you simulate a sickness (which is more than just pretending to be sick, to simulate you’ll force yourself to vomit, artificially heighten you temperature, etc.) you make people question if there even is anything like a sickness – because if all the signs can be faked, then how can it be diagnosed?

Baudrillard opens his dissertation by recalling a story about a country of cartographers – their great ambition was to create a map of their country which would be as accurate as possible. And so they would make it more and more accurate until finally they created a 1 to 1 map, basically a huge coloured blanket which covered their entire country. And if that sounds like apparent creative process behind The Force Awakens – then yeah, it should. I’ll say more, it’s the next generation of that cartographer country taking a satellite photo of that 1 to 1 map and covering that map with their satellite map.

Because Baudrillard presents four stages of relationship between a meaning a simulacrum:

a meaning, an idea (say, and idea of destruction, aggression)

an idea receives a tangible body (nuclear weapons. I mean the real ones.)

tangible reality receives abstract symbols, which don’t lose touch with the meaning – that’s the level of representation (Death Star. it’s overblown, it’s fictional but it represents a fear of a weapon capable of destroying entire planet, a fear very real during the cold war)

abstract symbols give birth to new abstract symbols, which may make an impression of being more real than the actual idea (StarKiller. Death Star only BIGGERRRRRRR, so more EVIL than the Death Star) – and this is also the point at which that symbol of a symbol may destroy its own meaning, become the exact opposite of itself (obviously both Death Star and SKB are negative symbols of aggression and how many people here on the hellsite met with very real aggression over a very not real StarKiller?)

Now, to the average viewer, that’s how TFA came to be. Take A New Hope and repeat it. Maybe make everything more – make Rey more abandoned than Luke, BB-8 cuter than R2-D2, StarKiller bigger than Death Star, Hux more skinny than Tarkin, First Order more nazi than Empire, Resistance more heroic than Rebels and Kylo Ren more evil than Darth Vader, underlined by giving him an even more evil looking lightsaber. Oh, and give Luke a more Jesus like hair than Obi-Wan had.

To fake. To dream. Perchance to watch The Last Jedi and throw a tantrum because what the hell is this?

Yes, TLJ destroyed every illusion that the sequels will be simply an originals’ simulacrum. Resident Vader didn’t get redeemed when he killed the resident Palpatine, Luke didn’t happily jump back into action like Obi-Wan, a heroic Rouge One like disobedience got people pointlessly killed, apparent neutral good Lando was a actually a selfish junk and celibate-to-be orphan looking for her parents actually knew all along her parents were dead garbage and, wait, wants a D? An evil D at that? PREPOSTEROUS, that’s against everything Star Wars is.

Well, thank the force we got such reactions. Because it shows the symbol needs to be reattached to its meaning before it gets devoured by simulation, which is exactly what I believe the sequels are here to do. Now, as I confess I didn’t recognize in 2015 but the fine people on this site have shown me, there were obvious clues this was not going to go the way we think already in TFA, but, well, they require a moment’s thought. On the most obvious symbolic level – the StarKiller didn’t simply get blown up like Death Star only once the shell fell off, a sun was reborn. Anyway, enjoy.

Devil wears Boss or how to make nazis even more nazi

Trigger warning: I go unpleasant places in this paragraph relating to WW II and nazism, up to the point of actually quoting nazi agenda, but if you want to reattach a meaning with a simulacrum sometimes you have to go to unpleasant places. That being said, if it is upsetting to you, please stop here.

Arite, how many people here have been called literal nazi supporters for rooting for Kylo Ben’s redemption?

How many for rejoicing over Darth Anakin’s redemption?

Yeah. First Order is even more nazi than the Empire. Their weapon is more destructive, Hux is more Hitler, cinematography is more Riefenstahl, oh, and look, the protagonists are a woman and a POC, in case there was any question of power imbalance represented. Well, clearly, First Order are literal neo nazis, right?

Hold your horses. LITERAL definition of neonazism from online Collins dictionary: a modern extreme right-wing political movement and ideology based on a resurgence of support for Nazi ideological principles. Ok... So, Nazism? Nazi Party, byname of National Socialist German Workers’ Party, German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP), political party of the mass movement known as National Socialism. Under the leadership of Adolf Hitler, the party came to power in Germany in 1933 and governed by totalitarian methods until 1945. I can’t see anything literal here to be applied to the GFFA, especially if Star Wars happen a long time ago. Mean question, but how many woken tumblrers knew there’s “socialist” in NSDAP?

I could rest my case here. But of course, what we do mean by “literal” Nazism is racism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, cult of a leader, cult of power, belief in god given superiority... And to be fair, oversticking to historical circumstances may be just as harmful as overabstracting the subject, as I’m about to point out. But there’s still nothing “literal” in a sequel to kids’ movie.

That’s simulation at its finest. Symbols, appearances of imperialist ideologies have become completely detached from how they actually functioned historically – and themselves became a reason to send racist anons over a space opera. Now, I have a misfortune of living in a country where far right is doing well right now and if you think those guys are listening to Wagner, you’re badly mistaken. Of course, they won’t call themselves neonazis, because Nazism is a thing exclusive to Germans and European Union is heir apparent to Third Reich. And abortion is a nazi practice. And Hitler was a vegetarian, so vegetarians are evil. That’s what they actually say you know. But hatred towards people of other ethnicities and religions? Yes, very much there. Including suggestions of “final solutions”, albeit mostly in online discussions. Oh, and guess what, they can watch Star Wars and understand that they are supposed to be FO. Conclusion? Hollywood-jewish agenda. Believe me, showing the FO members die in agony won’t make actual neonazis rethink their ways. They’re romantic heroes on a quest against a globalist empire, strike them down and they’ll become more powerful.

The First Order aren’t literal neonazis. They are neo-frequent-villains-in-video-games-nazis. I would actually argue that the parallel to Nazism in Star Wars only became clear when we saw how Palpatine came to power – in thunderous applause of democratic rules, just like Hitler and it should above all warn us of the pitfalls awaiting a system as good as democracy. Making Rae Sloane, a co-creator of the first order a bisexual WOC was a conscious step at detaching FO from what the nazi party historically was. The original imperials are closer to a more abstract totalitarian system and imperial ideology, thus being more of a critique of generally understood western world in the 70s, finding its peak in Vietnam War. Interestingly, one of the movies which inspired Lucas while making ANH was Pontecorvo’s The Battle of Algiers, where “the Empire” would be... France. Somehow I don’t see Renperor being compared to de Gaulle.

Ah, but that’s not so simple. If we want to dig deeper, beyond the level of tangible history and into the world of ideas, then FO is indeed symbolic of Nazism understood as aggression, thoughtless hatred, war, will to destroy all opposition, army as a totalitarian subsystem, suspension of human rights, antiparliamentarism. That’s nothing good and historical circumstances have nothing to do with it. And Disney-LF brings this point home. Depiction of violence in the sequels is much more realistic than in the originals.

Mind probe, in the originals shown as an evil looking syringe and Vader with Leia behind closed doors (no screams, next time we see her she’s fine), in the sequels is shown as a psychological violation of the worst kind

Death Star shot Alderaan we knew nothing about into smithereens and it was soooo coool and all we saw was Leia’s horror and Obi-Wan’s impression in the force – StarKiller was a slow scene with evil red rays and horror of people on Couruscant, planet we knew well, as they were about to be burned to death

Vader was force choking anonymous imperials to death like nothing short of a comic relief, Kylo choking Hux not to death is unpleasant to watch even if you remember it was Armitage who rooted for using the SKB

Originals’ stormtroopers were faceless cannon fodder, sequels’ have Finn’s face and history of brainwashing.

So, in this sense, FO are indeed metaphorical (because still not literal) neonazis in a very realistic war circumastances of blood, suffering and subjugation. And I have no doubt that as a collective there’s nothing good in store for them in this trilogy.

But.

Allow me to quote the “best” expert on Nazism there’s ever been (yes, I’m using Hitler’s quote in tumblr post, I can’t believe it, Star Wars what are you making me do, don’t worry, I’m reaching the end of the political dissertation):

It is part of a great leader’s genius to make even widely separated adversaries appear as if they belonged to but one category, because among weakly and undecided characters the recognition of various enemies all too easily marks the beginning of doubt of one’s own rightness.

Talk about expertise in mass psychology. Take a breath, we’re about to return to the GFFA, but so many people use the nazi argument I feel they need contact with LITERAL nazis.

Consciousness of this technique of manipulating the masses is basically why I believe we’re about to get extremist Resistance and differentiated FO. Because right now we have no doubt of the former’s rightness and no recognition of variety in the latter (except for maybe stormtroopers). Additionally, we have coded them as good and bad guys before TFA’s opening crawl even appeared, courtesy of precession of simulacra, promos and how the good guys and the bad guys looked like in the originals. Sustaining this belief is a LITERAL totalitarian technique. And I believe Disney-LF is already making ground for a massive change, both with big game changers like Galen Erso and Finn, but also on a more everyday level in Solo, with actually surprisingly human imperial official coming up with Han’s surname.

FO are the bad guys because they use offensive violence and have no respect for human rights, not use offensive violence because they are the bad guys. And violence used by the Resistance doesn’t become good because good guys use it – they are the good guys because, so far, they’ve only used it defensively and avoided collateral damage. And when the agenda stops being rebuild the republic and becomes burn the first order down – we have reasons to believe it can change. Dehumanisation of the enemy is the first step to lose your own humanity. No extremists attack not believing it was the only way to achieve a noble higher goal.

To cut the long story short, villainy needs to be reattached to offensive violence and not Hugo Boss uniforms. And at this point, I’m afraid it can only be done by making it equally terrifying when dressed in cool leather jackets.

#star wars #first order #simulacra #armitage hux #kylo ren #tw: nazism #tw: world war ii #tw: abortion #tw: adolf hitler #feel like that should be mentioned

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fantasysuiteleague · 8 years

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Week 6: The Chokey

At the beginning of this week’s episode, Taylor rises from the depths of the bayou to remind us one more time that she has a Masters and Corinne is not here for the right reasons. While I applaud her resolve to get the last word and very much enjoyed the anxiety she gave Corinne while talking with Nick, this ultimately felt like a lazy waste of everyone’s time. Of course Nick knows that Corinne is lying but he doesn’t care because he makes the majority of his decisions based on his dick, and the rest based on whatever the producers want. So sure, he’ll begrudgingly go outside and get scolded by Taylor for falling for Corinne’s shtick because he has to at least pretend like he cares about and respects these women. But ultimately, he doesn’t. And so instead of spending an extra 3 hours getting some quality time with the remaining women, he cancels the cocktail party under the guise that he promised himself if he knew where his heart was, he wouldn’t waste anyone’s time. But then he wastes everyone’s time with a rose ceremony...

I’m really sad to see Alexis leave as I imagine everyone else in the house is as well seeing as she’s probably one of the only girls I’d even want to have a prolonged conversation with. If you told me that the aspiring dolphin trainer from Jersey would end up being my season favorite, I’d have told you to get that fake news out of my face. And yes, she’s not the right match for Nick but that’s not really the point of this show and like, who is Whitney?

An Orphan Emerges

The first stop on the International Bachelor Tour is the island of St. Thomas, where The OA gets her first 1-on-1 date immediately on arrival. They take a water plane to a private beach where Kristina begins to unravel her long awaited back story that explains her thick Russian accent. She’s only able to reveal she was adopted and has 8-9 brothers and sisters before Nick gets tired of the serious conversation and asks her to go swimming. Later that night, after a prep session with the producers, Nick starts to ask more targeted questions about her hometown in Russia and her parents.

In response, Kristina tells a horrifying and heartbreaking story of child abuse and abandonment of a 5 year old girl by a woman who surely had mental health issues. After a few years in a Russian orphanage (woof), she found a US family to adopt her and she was able to exchange a life of prostitution and a bleak gray country of despair for a colorful life in America where she can go on national TV and compete for the “love” of a man who wouldn’t know struggle if it smacked him in the face. Being unable to relate and without a producer near him to hold up a cue card so he can give an appropriate response, Nick says “wow that’s..wow.” To be fair, it’s a lot to take in for someone with such a small brain. He tries though, which leads to some classic Viall tears and Kristina getting the rose and officially becomes the Jubilee of this season: beautiful orphan who has been through way too much shit to put herself on this show alongside fame whores looking for their 15 minutes of fame. Get out of there, girl! You’re better than this and you deserve more than Weepy Nick and his dysfunctional dick.

Do you like to be choked?

I can’t tell if this date was set up to fail or if the producers were just too lazy to come up with a better idea for a group date, although I’m guessing this all went according to plan. We’ve reached the point in the season where everyone is emotionally exhausted after needlessly obsessing over an instagram model and competing for time and attention only to get seconds of feigned reassurance to “just be patient.” Foolishly, the girls think they’ll have more time with Nick on the group date since there are fewer people to compete with, but instead they’re made to compete against each other all day. After the producers get everyone liquored up, they cruelly engage them in the absolute worst activity you could give tired drunk girls: beach volleyball. Having been on a spring break or two and found myself playing drunk beach volleyball I can confirm that this shit “fun” for about 30 seconds. The girls are #sports about the whole thing for awhile, but tired drunk girls can only take so much before they crack and say:

While Rachel is the first to really put her foot down and say “fuck this, I’m out,” everyone quickly follows suit and retreats to their respective corners to cry (or nap) until it’s time for round 2. Nick pulls Rachel aside first because he knows she’s smarter than most and could tell she was done with this shit, which gives him anxiety because up until this point he was under the impression that everyone would want to be with him and this would all definitely work out. But ... Rachel doesn’t want to be with him? I mean, come on. He’s Nick Viall. Either way, she certainly is done with this show and all the game, and he gets it, to an extent, as he tells her that she should still stick around because even though she hates this (him), he “thinks something great can happen.” AKA, she can be the first Blachelorette and he can get credit for making it happen.

Everyone else spends their time talking to Nick about how hard this is getting while Jasmine continues to unravel. She talks non-stop in a downward wine-fueled spiral about how Nick doesn’t see her; she’s never had a 1-on-1; she’s been to St. Thomas before so she doesn’t even need to be here; and wants to physically assault Nick. When Nick finally calls her off the bench, she absolutely blows it. Not that I had any faith in her playing it cool after the 5th time she mentioned getting violent with Nick, but like, wow. After repeating to Nick a condensed version of her earlier downward spiral, Jazzy hammers the final nail in her coffin when she repeats to Nick that she’s so frustrated she wants to choke him. And then she tries to choke him. Repeatedly.

To say that his conversation with Jasmine didn’t go well is an understatement, but she should have known that when you criticize the Bachelor for not paying enough attention to you, your time is probably up. Nick tries to gracefully wiggle away from Jasmine and apologize for dumping her, but she’s not buying his apology and doesn’t want his sympathy because she (like the rest of us) can see right through him. Then again, there’s not much to see other than a pair of pastel short shorts and raging insecurity, but here we are.

Beauty Doesn’t Always Win

In a move that puzzles everyone in the house and at home, Whitney and Danielle L. (or should I say D-Lo) are tapped for the second 2-on-1 date of the season. D-Lo is confused because Nick was really into her in the first few weeks of the show and she seemed like a front runner until this assignment. Whitney, on the other hand, is that beautiful shadow they cast every season to float around in the background and offer nothing worth airing until someone realizes she’s still around and it’s time for her to go. Nick has absolutely nothing of substance to say to her, but just tells her she’s beautiful and has a nice aura around her.

Nick stumbles through his breakup with Whitney after she questions his choice to keep D-Lo around because she doesn’t seem to think that D-Lo is right for Nick. Neither do Vanessa and Danielle M., who are sitting at home saying the same thing, leading me to wonder what has been going on behind the scenes that they aren’t showing us? Has she been a bitch? Can they tell she’s fake? Or is it just because she’s very stupid? Ultimately, I’m guessing it’s a combination between being dumb, fake, and unable to have a substantive conversation about anything. Take, for example, the beginning of her conversation word for word with Nick later that night:

Nick: I’m excited about tonight. It was a great first date

D-Lo: Yeah t was a great first date I had an incredible time

Nick: I don't think it's a moment I’ll ever forget, I just don’t know how many people in a lifetime will ever experience something quite like that

D-Lo: I know like looking back, dancing has kinda become our thing. It’s fun.

Nick: I certainly like that. It’s fun to goof around that way.

So. Much. LOL. D-Lo continues this awkward conversation by saying all the things she thinks she’s supposed to say at this point in the competition (like “it’s hard to be away from you” and “I like social things” and “I really have feelings for you” and I could totally see us together at the end of this,”) because she doesn’t have a brain and doesn’t seem to notice that Nick is sitting there looking painfully uncomfortable:

Finally, D-Lo tells Nick she’s falling in love with him and is so glad they’re on the same page, to which Nick responds that they are not, in fact, on the same page even though he really wanted it to work out with her because she’s so hot, but sadly he just cannot take one more minute of listening to her talk. And finally the reality of this whole week sets in for Nick: he can’t force himself to “fall in love” with a hot girl without a brain just going through the motions, and he might not be able to force these girls who are clearly better than him (Rachel, Kristina, Vanessa) to actually fall in love with him either. Realizing that he might be trying to hard, he retreats to the girls locker room to cry...

He proceeds to tell them how breaking up with one of the hottest girls made him realize this might not work out for him and at any moment he might just get up and leave ... and then he does. No one should feel bad for Nick at this point because he’s a pathetic baby bitch boy who, after parading himself around on this show 3 separate times, needs to take off that Livestrong band, stop trying to make people feel sorry for him, and get a real goddamn job.

Did you notice . . .

Jaimi’s dress at the rose ceremony was all sorts of wack

Nick’s sweater on his date with Corinne was also wack

It was refreshing to not have a Corinne-centered episode for once, although it looks like she’s going to make it all about Corinne again next episode.

Corinne’s face when Lorna, aka Black Raquel, shows up to essentially wait on Corinne. It was all very staged and edited and such an eye roll, but the look of horniness on her face at the beginning was great.·

The editing of the group date was incredibly sloppy and lazy. We didn’t see how things devolved after the volleyball game and if Nick talked to anyone or if he just retreated to his suite like the bitch he is. We also didn’t see Raven get the group date rose or see Nick tell them that he just dumped Jasmine. I can’t tell if it’s because Nick and the girls aren’t giving the producers enough material to work with, or all just refused to play along after that. Either way, bored.

Nick held that rose for a long time before not giving it to D-Lo·

“Maybe I just wasn’t perfect.” - D-Lol

Minority Report: And then, there was one.

#chris harrison #The Bachelor #bachelorabc #the final rose #fantasysuiteleague #nick viall #im bored

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