#or is that just my disabled worldview

[imwateringmysocks]

not individualist or collectivist but a secret third thing

[atopvisenyashill]

one day i will explain how my complete indifference to both tyrion as a character and his fear/hatred of cersei ties into my hidden tragic backstory but today is not that day.

[strixhaven]

“are you nd or nt” this is stupid as hell and i’m opting out of that framework entirely

[trans-leek-cookie]

so kusakabe and higuruma Megumi and fucking MEI MEI can survive but Mechamaru Nanako Mimiko and Mai had 2 die. Alright.

[imbecominggayer]

Writing Advice: Noticing Bigotry In Your Writing

Tw for mentions of bigotry and discrimination, obvi

Look Up Common Stereotypes For Your Characters

Seriously, this is the best thing you can do in order to incorperate these stereotypes into a full-formed identity. I'm not saying that you can't write a "sassy black girl" or a "happy disabled person".

It's just that if you have any hope of writing these stereotypes into actual 3-dimensional characters, you need to know what you are working with. Look up "Common {Minority} Stereotypes" or "{Minority} Myths"

It's genuinely not that hard to see whether or not your character is a stereotype! Send an ask to @cripplecharacters if you are having trouble with your disablity representation.

Send a submittion to the thousands of Tumblr accounts whose entire schtick is giving you advice!

Let me tell you:

" The Worst Decision You Can Make Is A Subconscious One"

If you go into writing a minority character the way you do with all your characters aka fantasizing and just going straight for it, there is a chance you might undercut your story with bigotry!

Because everyone has bias. That's not a moral failing on your part but it is something you need to consciously fight against in order to write characters who can stand on their own and not be supported by internalized bigotry.

Which leads me to my second and last question.

2. Why Is Your Character Like This?

Investigate why you made the decisions you have made. To help with that, here is a little questionaire!

When I imagine a cruel person what assumptions do I make about their appearance and psyche?

Based on my previous characters, do I have a tendency to lean into a particular archetype when writing my minority characters?

Is there any narrative reason such as plot, themes, and other important devices that would justify my character's personality?

Why did I decide this character would be this particular minority?

How do I view this character in terms of their minority status? Is it condescending? Is it hateful?

What associations do I naturally have between a minority status and social status, personality, and importance?

Would I have treated and viewed this character the same way if their minority status was completely washed away?

Are my minority characters generally relegated to the side lines and only exist to help non-minority characters in their lives?

Is the level of detail, psychological complexity, story, likeability, relatability, and compellingness of minority characters on the same level as non-minority characters?

Do my stories contain symbolism which portrays cruel bigotry-motivated practices as positive or useful?

Do my stories sympathize with bigotry-infused individuals while not extending that sympathy to those who are oppressed by that bigotry?

Have I ever critically looked at my writing and what it says about my worldview on others?

If you are now considering that you have biased belief systems, that's good! Again, it's much better to be aware and fixing your problems instead of not being aware of them.

I hope my little questionaire made you think about your writing in a new way! ;)

Feel free to add your own important "check yourself" questions!

[garak]

i wish you people cared about actual high needs autistic people. so much discourse on disability on social media among autism/adhd “advocates” aims to either push back on the idea that autistic people are all kids/display childlike behavior or frame autism as something non-disruptive that is just a quirky way of living or thinking. these are counterproductive to getting autistic people the help they need because the fact is there are autistic people who display what seems like childlike behavior (poor emotional regulation, poor ability to communicate needs, poor understanding of social norms and cues) and who will act in disruptive and even violent ways. if the idea of autism in the public eye is smart but awkward guy who loves model trains and nintendo, this will push autistic people who act in other ways less immediately socially acceptable to the margins when often it is those individuals who need people fighting for them the most. if your disability activism or god forbid your worldview does not have a space for both me (stereotypically precocious but awkward adult, generally competent and able to live by myself) and my older brother (in sped all through school and now at a job through a disability work program, has trouble with even “simple” daily tasks and will never be able to live on his own) then it is not inclusive of all autistic people and you are not worth my time or respect.

[butchlifeguard]

you, article writer for dazed! are you normal about disabled people?

[void-tiger]

…on one hand, that’s fair.

on the other, kinda feels like a severed limb in the sense I lose my retreat away from potential politics, misogyny, and queerphobia (as well as the solace of people I don’t have to worry about whether they accept me or not, they all just “live” in my phone…hundreds to thousands of miles away…)

[bandtrees]

this has always been one of my favorite lines in this scene it’s so striking to me. i think debating over callum’s level of lucidity and what can or cannot “fix” him is deeply antithecal to what the story is trying to express with him - but the idea that callum is still there and still a person who does have the capacity to love mingus, just not in a way she can ever comprehend or accept, because she can't comprehend or accept anything outside her narrow worldview, is sooooo good.

there is no way of actually knowing if callum is proud of mingus, much less recognizes her at all - but it's added to by the fact there's only so much of that she would accept even if he could. ultimately, she wants validation and power, his prestige, from him, she wants a supportive parental figure she never had - there's only so much of that callum is able to provide even in a world where her stint to fix his memory actually worked. he's like a hundred. he never even MET her. to say nothing of all he's missed in the past fifty-odd years. to say nothing of how his age may have messed with his mind deteriorating even without the pre-existing brain damage.

and mingus' phrasing here implies he doesn't even look at her when she visits - which brings me to the visit that radicalized her: the one after her surgery, where he was watching gingi out the window.

obviously, callum watching gingi is mostly for the thematics of it all, how similar the two of them are in ways mingus refuses to recognize, but theres also the thought of... callum's been sitting alone in that room for over half his life, barely lucid if at all. of course he's going to be drawn to a brightly-colored thing making noises and knocking stuff over outside. if he can't respond to stimuli of the people around him he's at the very least going to latch onto something more visually interesting than Brown Wall and Brown Figure.

but it's not like mingus can think of it like that, because she's internalized so much about her grandfather and built up such a specific, personalized vision of him - she doesn't see him as an elderly man with (a fictional equivalent to) dementia, she sees him as President Callum Crown™, the man she personally has to please and live up to the legacy of and make proud, disregarding the fact that's not something he has the mental capacity to even do - because she's so obsessed with validation and complete control that the only way she can get it is by either subjugating others and forcing it out of them (what she does with her townsfolk), or just completely projecting on someone who, for her purposes, is basically a blank slate.

which is maddening to her in its own way, see how crazy she drives herself trying to restore callum's memory in the first place - but also, would she be happy even if callum could see her for who she is? post-game, when she's working on herself, that's an irrelevant question as she's pushed past that need, but as we know her? absolutely not.

i love the ch3 standoff between norm and mingus as a show of "Okay guys let’s see who can dehumanize this disabled guy harder (via pedestal-putting) and justify themselves for it better" and why i think it is so important that it’s gingi who reads the postcard and ultimately speaks for callum instead of either of them, or even the narrator. they can’t read, and they struggle to, but they manage to get it right even when people are telling them to stop. and the fact they’re able to do it at all, are given the chance to do so, and are ultimately the one to wind down this conflict shows that the world of dialtown, while not perfect, really is how callum would have wanted it.

both gingi and callum are some of the most altruistic and human characters ever, and the crux of their parallels is that they are denied this by close-minded people because they happen to Behave Strangely. it's why seeing mingus act the way she does hits so hard - she loves her paw-paw, yes, but if she were to see him in a vacuum, a one-limbed man who can hardly think, much less speak for himself: or even his younger self, who was struggling to make ends meet with his odd inventions...

...well, the feeling norm's imagining here would probably be mutual. mingus' relationship with bigotry is a very fascinating one, she's very close-minded but views certain oddities (ie her flesh-head) as having earned their place and thus being fine - she's a freak too, by her own admission, but she's doing it for a just and wider purpose, so it's fine. which is, ironically, the ideology callum forced upon himself.

callum was obsessed with helping people, pushing himself to do more and more, because it was the only way he ever found respect. if he didn't help people and have grand visions for the world and make himself "useful" to society at large, then what would he be, if not a freak?

mingus and her paw-paw are very similar people, from their well-intentioned extremism, to their stubbornness and paranoia, to their inability to view themselves as anything more than a vessel for that grand cause they believe in (callum in the dialup, mingus in restoring her paw-paw's memory) - which is funny, because if mingus was able to view callum, and herself, as a flawed human person, she would come to understand how similar they really are.

:(

[leahkentwriter]

Backstories for girls and women in stories that *don't* involve sexual assault.

I beta read a lot, and am involved in writing communities of various kinds, and I briefly taught English way back in the day, and I consume storytelling media in general - and one of my biggest pet peeves is sexual assault backstories. While I think this is improving, it's still annoying to me that a lot of writers (of all genders, but particularly men) fall back on a sexual assault backstory whenever they need to make a girl or woman in a story complicated or haunted or fucked up in some way.

Unless your story is dealing with the topic of sexual assault in some way, please don't use it as a way to give a character depth or angst.

Here are some prompts, just to get you started with some ideas.

Why would a woman be trying to escape her past? Why would she be seeking a fresh start?

She hated her small town; the people there didn't understand her and she never felt like she fit in - she's queer, she has a weird birthmark, she's got unique interests, she has magical powers, etc.

She's a criminal - she robbed banks or stole cars and she wanted a fresh start

She was an addict and hurt people, and she wants a fresh start now that she's sober

Her parent is a criminal or an addict and she's trying to outrun the stigma of being related to them

She didn't get along with a stepparent and skipped town as soon as she turned 18

She had big dreams of being something else, and left to pursue them

Her childhood home was haunted, but no one believed her

She got married young then divorced, and wants to start over somewhere that no one knows her

Heartbreak of any variety - she's leaving a place that reminds her too much of someone she lost or couldn't have

She wants better; maybe more money, or a career, or simply a higher quality of life

Some other violent tragedy occurred - a school shooting, an explosion at the plant, police brutality, her best friend was killed, etc.

Her hometown no longer exists (climate change, the main factory shut down, it was overrun by rabid squirrels, etc.)

What would make a woman distrustful of others?

Heartbreak; being lied to, cheated on, left for her best friend, etc.

A big betrayal - her former best friend told everyone a secret about her, someone weaponized her trauma or her past or a major flaw she's sensitive about, etc.

She witnessed a traumatizing event as a child

Her mother was a grifter and used her as part of her scams

One parent cheated on the other and broke up the family

Her older brother isn't dead after all, he was disowned for being gay and now she's questioning everything her parents ever told her

She has problems with her memory, and is never quite sure what the truth is

She's bad at reading people and has been taken advantage of

She finds out a dark secret about someone she loves and is having trouble processing it

She gradually comes to see that someone she idealized as a child is not at all what they seem

Someone she thought was a good, kind, and genuine person is arrested for a terrible crime

Spiritual abuse - the worldview she was taught was right turns out to be exploitative, represses women, etc., so she leaves

What would cause a woman to have mental health issues?

Any form of abuse - doesn't have to be sexual

Her parents had really high expectations that she couldn't live up to

It simply runs in the family

Survivor's guilt - she survived something that someone else did not

She was bullied and no one protected her

Her parents were very controlling and destroyed her confidence

Her sibling was the golden child and she was the scapegoat

She's had issues since childhood but her parents refused to admit there was anything wrong with her, so she didn't get help

Being a part of any oppressed group of people who experience discrimination - she's a person of color, she's an immigrant, she's got a disability, she's queer, etc.

Any major trauma, either witnessed or being a part of - weather events and natural disasters, infrastructure collapse, crashes and accidents, fires, a shooting or a murder, etc.

You're a writer - get creative. There are lots of ways to traumatize and haunt a girl/woman character without having to resort to a sexual assault backstory. You can even make her the problem! Maybe she's the one who did something bad and is trying to outrun the guilt.

Let's also let go of the idea that it's meeting and falling in love with a man that saves her from her trauma. Let her have a healing arc that doesn't involve a man - a love story can still be there, but it can't be the magic healing balm that fixes her. Make her have to save herself. Give her autonomy to both make her own mistakes, and improve her own situation. Don't let your man go into savior mode - let him get frustrated with her. Let her push him away without him clinging to her in a desperate bid to show her what unconditional love is. Don't let him be a martyr to her trauma.

Women are complicated for many reasons. We have trauma for many reasons. We have mental health issues for many reasons. We may want to escape our past for many reasons. We're angsty and weird for many reasons.

Please pick literally anything other than sexual assault.

[drdemonprince]

what was your journey from libertarian to leftest/anarchist like?

well, as a teen i hated authority and society and wanted complete freedom so i was a libertarian. then i realized i was gay and trans and libertarianism weren't gonna do shit for me. when obama won in 2008 i noticed that i felt relieved, even though i had not voted for him. I went away to academia shortly after that, and became surrounded by liberal people, all of them doing research with a liberal point of view, and what do you know, product of my social environment and queer and desperate for acceptance among the group that said they cared about me, I became a liberal too.

over time academia mistreated me and rejected me for who i really was, and i started to transition and realize that i was disabled. i became more left-leaning frankly because it seemed like that was the only way to be able to survive as what i was, identity wise, and find anyone at all who would correctly gender me or tolerate me. if you want to be able to hang out with other trans people and have them treat you right, there are values you basically have to say that you subscribe to. anyone who didn't subscribe to those political values was mistreated, viewed skeptically, talked to like they were dumb, and ostracized. and some of those values did make sense to me, whereas others didn't.

i saw people pushed to the social margins for being libertarians, for instance, as if that is a political ideology that carries any danger when some random trans woman with a very weak social support system says in a support group that she maybe kinda subscribes to it. i was even terrified of people finding out that i used to believe in anything "wrong" according to the social dogma, for a while. but i tried to make the most sense of the confusing tangle of community held beliefs as i could, so that i wouldnt be completely ostracized from both straight and queer society at once. and so I was vaguely leftist, but with a confused understanding of systemic oppression based on identity (among lots of other things, like abolition and anti-colonialism), and a deep terror of ever saying anything that would ever get me criticized/cancelled/viewed as a bad person.

and then the pandemic happened and i wasn't so beholden to mass community scrutiny anymore. i read a ton i looked at how politics actually plays out, and i got a little bit more capable and secure in myself and came to similarly feel awed by how much people are really capable of when they aren't being controlled or dependent upon approval in order to survive. and anarchy basically asserted that it had always been there in me, i just hadn't known the name for it. and by then i felt safe and strong enough and had enough faith in others to decide it was okay to have opinions that others disagreed with, and that i wouldn't starve out in the cold if i gave voice to them.

like a lot of people, i had misconceptions about what anarchism really was and writers like Graeber, Wengrow, Solnit, etc really disabused me of that notion and made me understand that it wasn't a scary worldview at all, it was the most human and accepting one there really was out there.

My political journey has not been especially principled or philosophical, it has been emotional, intuitive, and rooted in a lot of social influences. i think that's what most political ideologies are about for people, ultimately, belonging and safety.

I was originally a political scientist by training and in that field's body of research we see that most people do not have consistent political belief systems, they agree to a mish-mosh of statements and support various policies that don't all add up in a logically explicable way. they also don't tend to have stable views over time. just as i think morality is a pretty bad explanation of why humans do what they do, and why we help eachother and avoid doing harm, it's very evident that political ideology is a piss poor predictor of political behavior or affiliation. the far clearer explanation far more consistent with the evidence is that people politically align themselves based on their social milleu and their feelings.

this is why i always feel myself holding back from dying for a cause, and blanch when MLMs start talking about needing to do all they can to bring about communism with an almost religious fervor (beyond the fact that such thinking also doesn't line up with a lot of communist thought and theory about how capitalism falls anyway). i dont think that any of these ideologies really carry all that much weight or influence people's actions, affiliations, or political behavior on the level we all pretend that they do. i dont think they're "real". anarchy is more of a philosophy of how to relate to other people in daily life, for me, rather than a religion about how the world needs to be or where we specifically need to be heading. it's more big-I Ideological for plenty of other people, and again, i blanch when they start preaching about it as if their whole life is in service to the idea of it. I think we do anarchism by living as if we're free, every day. and that's what i care about, if i'm being honest. feeling free, safe, and cared for by some other people, without conditions, right now.

[crackinwise]

It's kinda sad seeing posts from people almost apologetically going "I know the movie was [an allegory some on this website have decided is the one] but as someone who's disabled/autistic/gay/gnc/a woman/a minority/not fit in anywhere, this resonated with me and my experience too..."

Just say it louder, babes lmao. It can be multiple things to multiple people. A good story allows that. A fan should never ever be afraid to express their own point of view on subtext or themes, wtf. I read the creator said himself that a 5yo girl loved Nimona bc she's mean. That girl, young as she is, came at this from the view that girls should be allowed to be mean and rude and violent without being chastised to be nice, be quiet, be a good girl. Nimona also represented that for me, even if she's not a human at all in the movie, because she still chose to take a girl form most of the time we know her. Girls & women who are different, who buck their society's gender rules, have historically not fared well, especially in the eyes of a theocracy.

The same with any and all groups mentioned that have been looked at in fear or disgust because of some Pure, decent or divine worldview that deems them a threat.

[birdofmay]

Whenever I see the discourse about disability stalls I'm like "You guys didn't have your physical disability all your life and it shows" because I've been using the disability stall all my life and therefore have seen people entering or coming out of it all my life. It's not a philosophical question for me, it's just a normal fact. I KNOW who uses the disability stall.

I know that it's different when you have a progressive disability or suddenly became physically disabled/impaired as a teen or adult and were told "This is for wheelchair users" all your life and then later learned "Alright, it's also ok for cane users" and then at some point "Well, some people need a hook for their stoma, they're allowed too." You have to constantly adjust your "worldview" about for whom disability stalls are made then.

But whenever I need to pee and someone with no visible disability aids and no carer leaves the bathroom, we just nod in passing and that's it.

And if there's a long queue, those with incontinence who need to change so that they don't stay wet for a long time are let go first. Or those who let us know that it's really very urgent for whatever reason. No questions asked.

When I first realised that this is a real discourse on here I was so confused because I wasn't aware that people who weren't "significantly" disabled all their life have different opinions on that. It's as if you've been crossing the street when the light is green all your life, and suddenly people argue that this light is only for people in green clothes because the "man" is green. And then they say that alright, it's also ok for others as long as you have the shape of the "green man", i.e. don't wear skirts. And later they agree that animals are ok too, as long as they accompany a human.

And you just look at them, absolutely confused, because you learned that it's for those who want to cross the street safely, nothing more nothing less.

Maybe it started because some of us were complaining about people who can use a normal toilet misusing the disability stall. But that doesn't mean "Leave if your disability isn't obvious", it means "Stop occupying the only toilet we can use for your lunch break."

If you can't use a normal toilet, or if the normal toilets are inaccessible/are unsafe, use the disability stall. But please use it only for things it's made for.

That's it. That's really it.

If you're blind and the public toilets are inaccessible, use the disability stall; especially if you can't hear your white cane in crowded public toilets. The sinks usually have sensors, so you don't have to touch too much dirt or accidentally get water all over you. Use the handrails for orientation and balance. You have access to the complete roll of toilet paper, not just one or two strips. You won't accidentally scratch your hand on dispensers.

As long as you only use it for things it's made for, use the disability stall. Just make sure that people who may need it more can go first. How? Just ask.

[bonefall]

it is healing to come onto this blog and see basic respect for diasbility after being in other corners of the fandom and reading the words “snowkit could never be a warrior because he wouldnt know what anything is. he wouldnt even know what a clan is because nobody could explain it to him” said in full seriousness

Im..... That statement is so ableist I cannot even imagine the worldview you'd need to have in order to come up with that.

They really think the only way anyone learns anything is through verbal-speaking-words-noises? No one has ever observed something before? Not even once?

This is beyond touching grass, this person just fell out of the fucking Jurassic Period when all they had was ferns and stegosaurs.

I just...

OH YES. I remember my first day of Society Lessons as a hearing person, where the everything was explained to me. Via Audiobook. FIRST they spoke and said, "you are standing on the ground." It was a life changing revelation, and the world began to spin.

But it did not stop.

THEN they said, "there are fingers on your hands." The sensation of flesh and bone crackling into existence is indescribable, but I did not yet know pain, until they told me, "that hurts." I began screaming immediately.

And yet... it continued.

They explained so much. Chairs. Tables. Walls. The sky. Frogs. Ionizing radiation. Breathing. I was told all of it, in one sitting, and only then did I understand. Only when my ears were bursting with normal hearing knowledges, did they begin... my final test.

A strange wall-chair-finger emerged from the sky-of-the-wall, stood on the ground several times, until it was in front of me. A second one came behind it, this one slimmer. The audiobook gave these things names;

Human. Father. Mother. Door. Walking. It was completely impossible to know what these things were until that very moment.

I watch a human dip a hook into water and produce a fish, and I recall my Society Lessons where they called that "fishing." I am decked in the face by a nefarious hooligan, and I have only the audiobook to thank when I know I have been "punched" by a "bad guy." It was only the magic of verbal-speaking-words-noise that made me understand that there are "other people" and that they "do stuff."

Sometimes, even, in "groups."

Before the Society Lessons Audiobook, I knew nothing. I was pure, innocent, uncorrupted by concepts such as "parents" and "door." I am grateful every day that there is no such concept as "being shown things" or "simple logical reasoning" or "looking."

Blessed be those amongst us who escape the horrors of the Society Lessons Audiobook. I pray that you never learn what anything is. Be free! Free as a bird, which also knows nothing and famously cannot learn. 🤗

DEAF/HOH FOLLOWERS I'm losing my mind do you want me to bump a 'Hearing Disabilities Herb Guide' to the top of my priorities? Something you can use to bludgeon whackadoodles like that. This is ridiculous

Obviously not a MEDICINE guide but like; common causes of hearing disability in clan cats. Accommodations for hearing loss vs congenital deafness. Actual difficulties of not having that sense Clan-by-Clan. Debunking of misconceptions like... not being able to learn APPARENTLY.

[chrysoula]

Albedo spent sixty years rescuing Nahida from her cage, because he was looking for a challenge to test himself against. He didn't spend much time thinking about how, after the rush of satisfaction had faded, he would be in possession of a newborn god of wisdom who was so lost she tried to go back into her cage.

"Why are you here?" she asked, puzzled, as soon as the door to her cage opened. "There's so much-- You did so much, so why are you here?"

He stared at her as all of his sense of accomplishment washed away.

She began to gabble. "I knew something was happening, I could see your echoes, the ripples like a fish underwater, and I didn't know what you could want but I helped you when I could, because I wanted to see them beaten so why are you here?"

Because this is the finish line. But he knew better than to say that. Instead, he ran a rapid post-mortem on his plans over the last sixty years. When had the flaw been introduced, and how could he compensate for it?

"Okay," she said into the silence. "Now what?" Her eyes reminded him of glass marbles.

"I don't know what you want me to do," she said bitterly after a moment. "There's nothing I can do."

It was a worldview alien to Albedo. Ever since his mother abandoned him, he'd practiced turning his knowledge into power over the world around him. Before they called him a mastermind, they called him a meddler, and usually he didn't bother tidying up when he was done. 

"Oh. I see," she said, drawing her own conclusion and dropping her gaze. "You didn't come for me after all. How stupid I am." 

And even then, he struggled. He could see the potential shapes of the consequence he'd created and he didn't like them. He'd done something terrible and he had to repair it, but how--??

Tears began to spill from those green eyes. "I'm sorry, I'm just not good enough yet. I shouldn't... I shouldn't get involved." And, wiping her eyes, she'd turned to step back into the cage.

That, at least, he could respond to. "No, don't do that. It would only make things worse."

"What?" She half-turned, her mouth open in surprise.

"Would you like something to eat or drink?" That was probably a safe thing to ask in the situation. The government imprisoning her had been thoroughly disabled that morning. And newborns were often hungry.

"What?" she repeated, and then ran over to him. "Did you change your mind?"

Pleasantly, he said, "I think you did, but that's not an important detail at the moment. Why don't we sit down and talk about a few things?"

She promptly sat down, looking up at him with clear curiosity. He sat down on the ground too, refining his evaluation of her. "First of all, do you have a name of your own? One that doesn't belong to the Archon?"

"Nahida," she said, possibly for the first time. She looked a little surprised, in any case.

"I'm happy to meet you, Nahida. My name is Albedo." He gave her a friendly smile, and she stared at him like she was decoding his face. "Let's try to figure out what you'd like to do now."

"May I ask a question first?" She spoke with a respectfulness he didn't deserve. Not from her, anyhow. He'd have to earn it first.

"Please do. I'll do my best to answer it." While she formulated her thoughts, he began to synthesize some fish snacks he hoped she'd find palatable.

"Beyond your name, who are you?" It was a question carefully considered, and not the one he expected. But her earnest gaze remained fixed on him.

He considered his own response. It wasn't a question he was in the habit of answering. "Mostly, I plan things for other people. I'm quite clever and I've lived a long time compared to most, so I have certain advantages I enjoy sharing. In quite a few places, I'm considered a criminal, because what I help people do is often illegal. " He offered her the fish snacks. "I also engage in projects of my own, like this one."

She accepted one and nibbled on it. He observed as her eyes widened and she nibbled a bit more before finally making a face and putting it down. "I don't know how to taste it right. I'll work on it later."

"Is that what you want to do?" He saw this as a natural way of leading back to the core topic, but when she flinched, admitted to himself that such directness might have been a little cruel after already thrusting so much change on her unannounced.

"Do you think it tastes good?" she asked him uncertainly.

"Yes, I do."

She thought for a moment. "I'd like to learn to like it too, then. And I want to stay with you, please."

Did gods imprint? He'd never looked into the question. But the truth remained: she might be the god of wisdom, but she was also a powerful and traumatized child. If he walked away now, one way or another, she'd show up in his life again, the worse for it.

Calmly, he said, "Yes, I thought you might say that. Do you also want to rule Sumeru?"

She shrugged, curled up in a ball, rocked back and forth. "Sumeru is a dream to me, a world on the other side of pages and glass." Then she sat up again. "But you are somebody I never imagined existed. That seems more interesting than governing a country that doesn't want me to exist, all by myself."

"I agree," he said. "Still, having Sumeru on a stable footing may be useful in the future, so we should probably sort out the knot I made before we go on our way."

[cripplecharacters]

Salutations! I’m in the process of creating a story wherein both characters are missing an eye. One has a prosthetic, but is presently isolating themself in the woods, and wears an eyepatch to protect the eye while alone; the other’s socket is either empty, or they have a glass eye with no actual details (iris, pupil, etc.). I’ve struggled to find references for the latter, and fear it may come off as unrealistic. I understand prosthetic eyes keep the eyelid from collapsing, but aside from that could a person just not wear one? If these options are unrealistic, please let me know. I can supply you with concept art if need be.

The story itself centers around these characters after one of them finds the other by accident. They’re painted as foils—the one hiding out in the cabin adhering to a self-made sense of logic that centers on cycles and confirmation bias, while the only who takes refuge there after running away is deeply paranoid and prone to hallucinations. The first character is missing their left eye; the other their right. I don’t want to make a symbol of their disabilities, but I feel their designs simultaneously stress their opposing perspectives, as well as the fact they paradoxically still manage to see “eye-to-eye.” Their visual impairment is just one of many ways they’re able to connect across the story, as they also bond over their obscure passions and delusions, and respect each other’s warped worldview to such an extent said worldviews start to blur together. In addition to this, the story places an emphasis upon an entity known as the “ocellus,” which is basically the “false eye” you see on moth wings. In my outline so far, it’s the name of a mysterious band which the pair discover in a record collection, and resolve to solve the mystery of (regarding the members, music, etc.) One of the characters also sleeps with an eye mask with the pattern of moth wings and their respective ocelli overlaying their own eyes; their paranoid counterpart also sees eyes in the trees and wood of the cabin.

Absolutely none of this is set in stone; before it is, I just want to know how much of it is fine, which parts “moralize” or make a symbol of a disability, and what is straight-up ableist. Please let me know if you need more details.

Hi!

The prosthetic eye has two main functions: 1) to keep the eye area stay in shape, 2) to protect the socket. Both of these can be achieved by conformers (it's like a big contact, except it goes into the socket and not on the eye) which I talked about here!

A blank prosthetic eye would probably be fine. The process of getting it custom painted is expensive from what I know, and IRL a lot of people will decide on the generic kind rather than a custom. If in your world the generic happens to be a blank, there's no problems I can think of? Potentially, you could explicitly say that it's not how most prosthetic eyes look like (maybe someone else knows a person with an eye prosthetic and they comment that it's unusual?). You mentioned that the character doesn't have it in all the time, so I don't think the trope of "blind character has blank/white/milky eyes" applies here because it's clear that it's a prosthetic.

A person could decide to go bare, but the sensation of blinking could be uncomfortable, and they would need to clean their socket more to get rid of anything that could get inside. Normal saline could be used for that.

I don't think there's an issue in them missing different eyes at all. If you want to make sure it's not giving "Just Magic Symbolism" energy then you could incorporate some boring everyday things that would make sense. If they go somewhere together, they could decide to walk missing eye-to-missing eye, so that they see what's going on the sides rather than in the middle, things like that. It could make it feel more grounded, so to speak.

I don't see any issues with the moth fake-eyes symbolism either, I think it makes sense for the story you're trying to tell.

If you want to be very safe, I would have a character (can be minor, or background) that's also missing eye(s) that's not connected to any of the potential symbolism and is more of an average Joe of Not Having an Eye.

In case you decide to get into that, it would be nice for them to have different causes of why they don't have eyes. It feels like in fiction it's always physical trauma, but there's a whole more that could cause someone to not have an eye;

anophthalmia,

retinoblastoma,

severe eye infection,

elective enucleation (removal) of an already blind/painful eye,

just to give you a few ideas! Giving them "boring" everyday reasons of eye loss will also make it feel less symbolic and more like a regular disability. Think "dramatic swordfight with Huge Meaning" vs "yeah I had cancer in my eye when I was 2".

I hope that this helps; if you have any further details you'd like to ask about feel free to send another ask!

mod Sasza