#purity culture tw

[resignedseraph]

Despite the whole cult thing I think my mom actually did a pretty great job of teaching me some things as a kid, before I was in the cult

Like, she taught me what HIV and AIDs and other immune diseases were when I asked (a friend had one of them, I think) and just explained how they can make someone's life different, not making any sort of claims about what kind of person someone with any of those is

She also taught me that nudity isn't a bad thing all the time, when me and my brother watched My Neighbor Totoro as kids and asked about the scene where the main family took a bath together. She just said that some people in other countries feel differently about when it's okay to be naked, which is fine

In addition to that, she also didn't dissuade me from learning how pregnancy worked, even though she phrased how it gets started as "combining genetic material," which I think is a very funny way to phrase it to a five year old. We went to an interactive science museum a lot growing up, and they had an exhibit explaining what pregnancy is, and I remember feeling perfectly comfortable knowing that growing up

Things changed as I got older and the sway of church and the later cult got to her, like arguments about why I couldn't run around shirtless in the backyard at seven. But in general, she did a really good job at the start and I'm really glad she did, and even more glad that she's kept growing and changing and learning new stuff, because that's who she really is at the end of the day

[wolfsbanemanor]

What Were They Taught About Woohoo?

When the time came for their parents to give them the woohoo talk, of course they were taught about the basic biological stuff. They were taught (by their parents) the importance of consent. Lilith got some additional lessons about how it was important for her to dress "modestly," that "boys only want one thing," and that it was important for her to protect it for the sake of her Future Husband, with her very life if necessary. That she needed to cover up so that she wouldn't cause them to "stumble." And "them" included not only boys from school and youth group, but her own father and her own twin brother. That her body belonged to her Future Husband, the Watcher, their church community, her family, and literally everyone except her. Caleb was made to read a book along the lines of Every Man's Struggle, that posited that temptation was everywhere, and that women (even his own twin sister and his own mother) were or could be temptresses "out to get him." That he was to "bounce his eyes," and never to be alone with anyone who had a vagina, even his own sister.) They heard sermons and had lessons in youth group about how the Watcher does not approve of woohoo outside the confines of a legally-defined, heterosexual, monogamous marriage. That if they even so much as thought about it before then, they'd be damaged goods, used up, as disgusting and worthless as chewed gum. (Especially the girls.) That premarital woohoo was effectively cheating on a Watcher-ordained spouse before they even met that person. And worse, the Watcher would punish them for all eternity. (A missing pool ladder would be the least of their worries!) That woohoo was like fire: within the confines of a good-quality fireplace (i.e. traditional marriage), it was a blessing, but outside the fireplace (or within a cheap fireplace), it could destroy both lives and furniture. That if they waited, they'd be guaranteed a happy, lasting marriage, a perfect spouse, a wonderful honeymoon, etc. etc., but if they didn't, they were guaranteed only misery and heartbreak. That once they were married, not only was woohoo something okay to do, it was something they were supposed to do, whether they wanted to or not, both to keep their spouses satisfied and make nooboos. (Lilith especially heard lessons about how "men have needs," and if a wife wouldn't fulfill those "needs," he'd get those "needs" fulfilled elsewhere, by someone younger, prettier, and freakier.) They were even given silver "promise rings," and signed a piece of paper vowing to the Watcher to save their first woohoo for marriage. Lilith's ring may or may not have ended up in the bayou and found inside the belly of a fish someone mounted and sold. Caleb's may or may not have been "lost" somewhere in Granite Falls, after he saw something he wasn't supposed to. (Namely, his pastor stepping out of a woohoo bush with a woman who wasn't his wife, and who'd only just aged up out of youth group a few days prior.)

[eelfuneral]

Fandom, particularly fanfiction, has unironically helped me deal with my religious purity culture trauma (thanks Roman Catholic Church) and the scrupulosity OCD that made it worse. I have a long way to go in terms of healing, but I no longer worry that I’m committing some kind of horrific sin simply because I find someone sexy.

[fire-to-fire]

Christian Summer Camp Horror Stories

I went to a few Christian summer camps as a child, here’s some stories off the top of my head.

Camp 1:

The speakers were dressed up to be what I can only assume was what they thought people from rural tribes in South America looked like. They had red and yellow and black face pain all over their faces, skirts made of leaves, and leaves sticking out from their heads (I have photos still to this day and it’s horrifying).

They also talked about native people in general in really appalling ways (basically calling them primitive for not having Jesus).

We were forced to watch a cartoon about missionaries who were brutally murdered by a tribe in South America. It was bloody and honestly made me feel sick as a kid.

Bible smugglers is a stupid game and I stand by that. Anyways, we LARP’d persecution every night after dark.

This isn’t really bad but it was weird. Girls with long hair were required to tie their hair up at the pool (cuz of the filter) but boys with long hair did not?

Camp 2:

We had to fill out paperwork detailing how sure we were we were going to heaven after we died. I was 11 maybe? I wrote down 9/10 because I was a believer but also nothing is 100%. It turned out to be the wrong answer and my counselor literally cornered me and grilled me about it. I ended up lying and saying it was a typo. They then proceeded to watch me erase my previous answer and change it in front of them.

I have a debilitating fear of heights. My parents were sure to specify I got an exemption for the high ropes course. Nobody there cared and I was told that I was a bad Christian for not trusting God to keep me safe. After being shamed in front of everyone, I agreed to climb to the top of the tree but not any further. Once I got to the top I went to go down and the worker at the top tried to bodily drag me up. When they finally let me down my counselor said “huh, you really are scared.”

I got sick and they still made me participate in camp activities even when I protested. I got told off for having an attitude.

Girls who were further on in puberty were forced to wear T-shirts and shorts while swimming. Even if they showed up in a one piece swimsuit (as per dress code).

[teaboot]

When I was a kid, I regularly lost reading privileges for "having an attitude" and "acting out".

It wasn't as simple as being told not to read during other activities- one of the first times it happened, I remember being six years old, watching my stepfather pull fistfuls of books off my bookshelf and throw them to the floor in a heaping mess while I cried and asked him to stop.

It was weird. Every other adult I knew described me as exceptionally well-behaved, but at home, it was the opposite, and it was blamed on "learning bad habits from that shit you're reading".

Because I couldn't read at home, I spent all my free time at school in the library, reading with my friends.

When I grew up and moved away, I realized that my family life was toxic and abusive, and the "attitudes" I was being punished for were standing up for myself, standing up for my younger siblings, and resisting actual, real-life psychological abuse. Because I'd learned from what I'd read that my family wasn't normal, not like my parents said it was, and in my stories, the heroes were the people who spoke out when it was hard to.

It is insane to me that there are students right now who can't access books. It is insane that books are being outlawed. It is perverse that we are stealing away an entire generation's ability to contextualize their lives, to learn about the world around them, to develop critical thinking skills and express themselves and feel connected to the world or escape from it, whatever and whenever and however they need.

That is not how you raise a compassionate, thoughtful, powerful society.

That's how you process cattle.

It's fucking disgusting.

[sparkling-pink-lemonade]

Saw a post of an anti saying that they are leaving AO3, as they are too uncomfortable to post their fics there now. The reason? They found out one of their long time readers was a proshipper, despite their fics having proship dni. And how "that includes silent readers too, I don't want you all looking at my content."

My brother in christ, you are posting on the fiction freedom site. The proshipping site. Dnis aren't god damn restraining orders. They are one tool in helping you display your boundaries. It's still on you to enforce your boundaries. You post something publicly, you forfeit your ability to regulate who can view your work. If you're obsessive enough, you can regulate who actually interacts with your work by stalking each person in the kudos list, comments, or bookmarks and then blocking snyone you don't like, but you do not get a say on who may silently read your posts. Not unless you private your work and only show it to specific people.

And if you don’t want proshippers to interact, get off the profic site.

[redditreceipts]

anime, to a large part, has become a disgrace

[wildfeather5002]

I hate it when xtians reduce my religious trauma to "a religious person said something mean to you once so now you're mad at religion".

Like, shut the fuck up. My trauma isn't just someone being a little rude to me once, it was systematic, deliberate manipulation with the threat of possible eternity of suffering in Hell if I didn't obey religious rules and "keep Christ in my heart". It was "Nonbelievers burn in a lake of eternal fire. Tell your friends to convert to our faith or they'll be damned for eternity".

I have suffered from anxiety, ocd and other mental health issues for several fucking years because of this shit. I've suppressed my sexuality and felt terrible guilt just for the 'sin' of having sexual thoughts. I've feared for my loved one's souls, genuinely believing they would go to Hell for simply not being xtians and that I'd never see them again in the afterlife.

These beliefs are sick and twisted. What I went through was sick and twisted.

I seriously don't know what to say to you if you still think telling anyone, let alone a child, that they're going to be damned for eternity if they disobey 'God's word' is totally fine and not abusive.

Know your fucking place and stop speaking over trauma survivors who have been hurt by your shitty religion.

[lostmf]

By @desnos

[woaheyeradioboy]

I genuinely don't fucking care what you like in fiction. I don't care how disgusting, heinous, or "illegal" (not actually) it is, as long as you aren't agreeing with it or acting out things you read in a non-roleplay/fiction setting.

TW: Rape, Child Abuse, Pedophilia, Age gaps, Abuse, Bestiality, Grooming, Incest, and similar content

You can read about someone being raped. You can read about a child being raped. You can read about incest. You can read about pedophilic incest. You can read about someone fucking a dog. You can read about someone being raped by an animal. You can read about someone grooming someone else. You can read about horrible power imbalances. You can read about Victim x Abuser. You can read about gang rape. You can read all of that and more, whether the content is "romanticizing" or "sexualizing" it or putting it in a "positive light", because I do believe if you're reading these things you are capable enough to not have your morals and "respect" of laws immediately broken because you didn't get told 100 different times during the story how bad the content was.

You can read WHATEVER THE FUCK YOU WANT, however you want, forever and ever. Don't act out the fiction in real life unless roleplaying with another consent adult (or teenager within your age range if you're not 18+) and it DOESN'T MATTER.

Fiction can affect reality, but usually only if you're allowing it to. Children oftentimes shouldn't be online but even if they are, it is never an authors fault or the people who enjoy the fiction the author writes that the child ends up exposed to bad things. If someone who is mentally unwell and cannot separate fiction and reality due to this is online and is affected by these things, it is not the authors fault or the fault of the people who enjoy the authors fiction.

If something that someone else wrote affects someone else in a bad way, it is not the authors fault.

Censorship of fiction is bad no matter what, and if you want to censor any form of fiction you are automatically already getting closer to people like transphobes and racists and ableists, because being pro-censorship ALWAYS leads down the same exact rabbit hole of puritan beliefs and controlling others.

[mywitchcultblr]

Can people stop being a piece of shit for once? You can dislike the game, but doing this to an innocent person is just disgusting

You don't want to see it? Block the tag and don't buy the game. People are only willing to hurt weaker and smaller creator, but they're never doing this to bigger and more established creators

[vagrantcallisto]

"This fanfic is disgusting!"

Bitch, nobody Clockwork Orange'd you into reading it.

[tommyssupercoolblog]

Vent about Antis

obvs this convo would never happen they would be blocked already but. aguhgh.

[ineffectualdemon]

Someone just equated fucking your friends to incest to me

Friends aren't biologically related to you!

It is literally not incest!

[roadside-oddity]

There is a Rampant and Vicious Cycle in the Online Left That Needs to Be Addressed

Every leftist needs to understand that not every proclaimed leftist is a safe person or one that is acting in good faith. Many people in this sphere --even if they are minorities themselves-- are Abusers. Let me be clear: they are Abusers REGARDLESS of --NOT because of-- them being a minority. Despite this, many of them have weaponized their standing as a minority in order to get away with their behavior and achieve what they see as some form of power and control over others. Let me be clear. I am referring to those that:

Manipulate and lie about pressing situations (especially when it's to harm another person or demographic)

Excessively use idpol to either elevate themselves to holier than thou levels ("listen to ___ people but only when it's something I agree with, which just so happens to devolve from constructive change to making others grovel and plead forgiveness endlessly before me") or belittle others (ie their skin color, gender, queerness, disability, neurodivergence, religion, age, etc.) in order to discount their point or not treat them as equal human beings; yes, even if their skin tone is white or if they are men, abuse does not have to be backed up by systemic issues in order to be abusive or at the very least harmful (sidenote: this does not apply to people talking about their experiences as a minority that is otherwise not experienced or understood by others, the issue I'm pointing out is when it's twisted to cover everything not directly tied to their identity and proclaim themselves as the only ones allowed to be the voice of reason, therefore shutting up everyone else and to avoid any constructive criticism or discussion)

Act on rage and at times even trauma to bring forth harmful ideals (ex: truly hating every person of a demographic, wishing for a genocide, making actual death or rape threats towards someone or a group, conversion, etc)(sidenote: I'm not discounting those that have trauma and even have harmful thoughts, just please seek help and understand that it is not healthy nor sustainable to paint or alter reality to be in line with what trauma makes you believe)

Actively try to get others they don't agree with to either permanently leave the internet or commit suicide and even celebrate when either happens

Excessively test others on their "purity" on unachievable standards to the detriment of everyone and Leftism as a whole (purity culture is fueled by christian culture in order to disguise doomerism, accepting defeat when change is not possible, of which is the very thing that will kill leftism)

Infight over weird made up issues (remember how divide and conquer is a war strategy? To split hairs and discount others for non-issues is to do the work of conservatives and nazis for them)

Shut down people or discussions over minor slights such as using an incorrect word/phrasing or any numerous perceived mistakes (example I've seen here: berating a person with schizophrenia (or a trans person or any other minority) for using a derogatory term for themselves when they're talking about how everyone else is speaking over them and not listening), ignoring the hypocrisy or not taking into account any number of mundane causes such as non-native english speakers, generational gaps, being in the process of learning (either recovering from harmful beliefs or simple ignorance), using those terms to prove a point (such as that example I mentioned above), neurodivergence, etc.

Not letting others talk about their experiences of oppression when those experiences don't match theirs, instead opting to call those people bigoted for contrived reasons

A rejection of nuance, intersectionalism, and even reality to better suit their goals (ex: claiming that every trans man benefits from the patriarchy and can never experience misogyny)

Misuse of therapy speak and terminology in order to water down those terms and render them near meaningless so they can weaponize them under the pretense of their original use (ex: gaslighting), or to cut off any need to connect or sympathize with other human beings and instead speak to them like a PR message (refer to this video by Zena and Poppy for reference)

They never speak on true leftist/progressive ideals or positive change, they only engage in destructive discourse or any behavior listed above

Making baseless dangerous accusations towards someone they don't like. Before you go harr harr you're doing that, I'm not calling out any specific person and am merely listing dangerous behaviors I've seen people here act out. What I am referring to are when someone casually calls someone specific a predator (or whatever else) with absolutely zero proof and expecting everyone to believe them no questions asked. This has been shown to ruin people's lives

Any other similar behaviors not included in this list (as well as classic logical fallacies), but what I've mentioned above should paint you a good picture

Every example I've pointed out were REAL EVENTS I've seen from people that proclaim themselves as leftists or even just progressive, and sometimes are even minorities themselves (some even infight against their own communities using the behaviors listed above, often out of internalized bigotry)(an example of a real event that happened here recently were when several people were making rape threats towards a trans man by the username of @a-faggot-with-opinions). To be blunt, I'm pointing out exclusionism in practically every form, asexual discourse, transandrophobia, TERFs/radfems, TEHMs, tankies, "cornbreadtube", nationalists and ethnonationalists, and all else I don't have the terminology for For many of the people that fall under that bullet list I would hesitate to even refer to them as leftist or progressive, as they never seem to actually show they act on it or even believe in it, only making an appearance in those communities for their own destructive personal gain; hell, often times they have ideals that directly go against what those communities stand for! Examples include TERFs with white supremacist beliefs, transandrophobes that are misogynistic, ethnonationalists that are antisemitic, puritans that are ableist, the list goes on forever. Once you know what to look for, you can see the hidden or overt bigotry behind their false "progressive" statements

No one is infallible No one is better than everyone else You are not immune to propaganda No one is immune from behaving abusively

These people are dangerous, whether they actually qualify as abusers --as I've been referring to them as such for brevity and impact-- or are people that are engaging in hurtful or fully abusive behavior (use this paragraph as a disclaimer, I of course can't know if someone is an abuser in real life unless there is documented evidence of such). Regardless, they are hurting the left and are letting the right win

If you see any of these behaviors either 1) take caution if you're unsure, 2) block them, or 3) if you have the fortitude, call them out. Either way, use your best judgement and think for yourself (or discuss with good faith leftists if you're uncertain). And remember, often times (albeit not always) they are actually fully aware of their disgusting behavior and are choosing to act maliciously, not ignorantly.

Stay safe, log off, do what you can to support your local community and leftism as a whole, don't let these people distract from the real issues at hand. Have empathy, if you don't have empathy then act in compassion, if you don't or refuse to do either please do not engage in politics. Misanthropy has no place in matters concerning humanity.

And remember: we have to stand together in unity so we can create a better future for all

[locustgirl]

Twitter thread by @SamAburime (@rainystudios)