#the context is about my college personal statement

[wtylas]

“every word had a purpose”

[incognitopolls]

Abstinence pledges, also known as purity or virginity pledges, became popular in the United States in the 1990s as an evangelical Christian response to the moral panic about teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, and the increasing social acceptance of 2SLGBTQIA+ persons.

These pledges are a statement promising that the person signing will maintain sexual abstinence until they are married. If you can believe it (and I bet you can) most people who signed them did not end up keeping their pledge and engaged in sexual activity before marriage, because teens are teens and will have sex when they want to.

–

We ask your questions so you don’t have to! Submit your questions to have them posted anonymously as polls.

[divine-donna]

body talk

seeing challengers was a mistake guys because all i can think about is challengers and how much i love challengers and how cinema is back after people declared the death of cinema like three years ago and how much i wanna go see challengers again—

anyways uhhhh did challengers make me hop onto the mike faist train? yes. because i love a man that clearly worships his wife and kisses boys.

character: art donaldson

for vibes: "physical" by olivia newton-john

context: stanford university. 2007.

if you had a choice, you wouldn't be working as a receptionist in the gym. instead, you'd work in the infirmary. it was more in line with your desire to pursue sports medicine.

your father himself was an athlete who sustained a career ending injury and went into sports medicine. you wanted to follow in his footsteps.

but for now, you were working as a receptionist at the gym for your federal work study. college wasn't going to pay for itself unfortunately and your parents could only provide so much support.

art donaldson recognized you while you guys were at a party. "you're the person at the desk in the gym!" he sounded so excited. almost like a puppy.

"yeah..." you look down at your red solo cup. "you're like a regular. with tashi duncan."

"you know her?"

"well, i've talked to her a few times. she's great." who wouldn't like her honestly? you weren't the biggest fan of tennis but whenever tashi duncan played, she always managed to make it magical.

"you're also in my bio class, right?"

"you're in my bio class?"

"oh don't tell me you didn't notice."

you shrug. "i didn't. you're not very...noticeable, i guess."

art took personal offense to that statement.

okay not entirely. because to some extent, you were right. he wasn't as noticeable as some of the other people in class, like the lacrosse player on the guys team or the girl from the basketball team, both of whom you seem to be close with.

growing closer to art was just a matter of being in a lot of classes together, something you didn't realize during the first month of college.

to be fair, it was a lot.

but the good thing about having a lot of classes with him was that it meant you always had a go to person for group projects. and god were professors adamant about assigning group work.

at the very least, you had a workout buddy when you guys were free. sometimes, you were even joined by tashi duncan. so it was cool to be able to work out with a famous tennis player.

perhaps the gym is where you started to notice art's...physicality.

he wasn't entirely imposing, aside from being quite tall. but he had a surprising amount of muscle. perhaps the tank tops he wore didn't help much. it left little to the imagination.

because of your familiarity with the body and your desire to go into sports medicine, art called you when he was feeling a bit sore.

he opens the door with a smile, seeing you with your bag and clementines. "what's the fruit for?"

"just in case you get hungry." you step in and remove your shoes. "just lay down."

"bed or floor?"

"whichever you prefer. the bed might be more comfy. we'd have to move stuff around if you were on the floor. oh and take off your shirt."

"what?" he could feel his cheeks beginning to heat up.

"take off your shirt. a massage won't be that effective with your shirt on."

"alright. umm..." art just does what you ask of him, taking his shirt off and setting it aside on his desk chair. he gets on the bed and lays down, front side down.

you pull out a bottle of lotion and crawl onto the bed, straddling him at his waist. you are unaware of how red he is feeling you against him.

you feel around his back for bit, asking him where in particular is tight. once you got a good idea, you squirt some lotion onto your hands, rub it a bit, then begin to massage.

art would be embarrassed from the sounds that came out of him. but he was craving for the relief from his overworked and tired muscles. he could feel just how deep your hands went in, twisting and rubbing. your hands felt so good. they glided smoothly and your touch soothed him greatly.

"damn dude. when was the last time you massaged yourself?"

"don't know." he mutters, burying his lower face into his own pillow. he could feel himself growing warmer all over his body.

your palm pressing into him, dragging itself through his muscles, rubbing baby lotion into his skin so he's soft.

your hand reaches a part of his lower back, your palm rubbing through the muscle. and he moans.

you stop for a moment. "something wrong?"

"no...nothing's wrong..." he mutters.

"you sure?"

"yes. keep going."

he enjoys the way your hands move lower, and lower. he wants them to sneak to the front. massage him a different way.

your hands linger on a particular spot of his back though, feeling the defined muscle. there's something particularly...satisfying, about running your hands over his body. you were tempted to feel more. especially his arms.

art's arms were utterly gorgeous, as if sculpted out of marble by a renaissance artist themselves.

"i think you're all good."

"all done already?" he smelled like baby lotion. whatever that mean.

"unless you want me to massage elsewhere." you get off of him and he turns on his side to look at you.

the tank top you were wearing was a little bit tight.

art gently grabs your wrist. "magical hands you know."

"it's beneficial to learn how to massage. for your own betterment and health. though i will happily help you with the spots you can't reach."

he rubs circles into your wrists. "are they tired?"

"a little. it was because i took an exam yesterday. writing in those blue booklets is absolute torture."

"that's fair." his eyes flicker up to yours. the room was warm, the atmosphere right. "do you...like my body?"

"it's nice. you're very beautiful." you smile.

art pulls you forward, your legs hitting the wooden bedframe of the shitty college provided furniture.

"do you want to feel it?"

you bite your lip. "i think i do."

[learnastrowallura]

💚The 10th house in astrology💚

The source if this information is The Astrology Podcast (Chris Brennan) on Youtube and I will add a personal example plus some of my own thoughts as well

10th house: career, occupation, profession, work, enactment, achievement, reputation, intention, choice, actions, public image, visibility, exposure, rank, position, demand, duty, reward, honor, MC, legacy, bosses, power dynamics, angular

The sign and planet(s) in the 10th house can show us the image that is apparent or visible to others within a professional context, what we do exactly or how we take action toward achieving what we desire, what is the vision that we have and the contribution that we make (within the 6th house it is more... well what you HAVE to do, whereas with the 10th it is more end result based aka what impact will I have in the world), what is my role to play here etc, technical abilities and talents, career potential, our tendencies or even enthusiasm pertaining to taking action (or in the opposite case hesitation toward it) during work, which type of career the individual will take on, what we are known for

Looking at the ruler of the 10th house can, of course, give us more detail on career/reputation matters.

The midheaven in hellenistic astrology may not always fall in the 10th house, so for example if it falls in the 9th house your career may involve spiritual and/or religious matters, teaching people perhaps in college, and if it is in the 11th house then it may involve friendships so maybe there is an overlap with the coworker and friend relationship, or if you pay attention to the talks that you have with your friends there might be a certain theme that comes up that may be a good fit for you in your career, etc (use whole sign house system for this)

Personal example: Leo in 10th house, no planets

Right well this one is a bit tricky to delineate, to be honest

Starting with Leo I definitely make... a statement, I suppose? See the thing is with the 10th house it is something that becomes easier to analyze and figure out in adulthood. I would say I am known for being a certain kind of provocative and bold at my school for sure. Leo is all about shining and self expression and I do not shy away from being authentic and presenting myself as I am, yk? Not many people like it but yea

The reason why I mention college is because I do believe the way I behave there is close to how I would behave in jobs as well since it does count as 10th house work for me but that is my own perspective on it so take it with a grain of salt <3

Right now I am doing an internship which is as close as it gets to a job as of now and I would say I am all fired up to get shit done and I am also quite focused on doing the things that I have to do in a good and proper way (fixed sign quality; stability is prioritized) even though the situation rarely ever demands it; I would say I have good work ethic personally.

My midheaven is in my 10th house so there is not much to talk about there it is the most common case

My Sun which is the ruler of my 10th house is in 1st house placidus and I do resonate with that because my career, my legacy is of priority to me and I take that shit super seriously like it is this huge like goal of mine

Whereas with WS my Sun is in my 2nd house and to me that manifests in being very financially driven so while I do have a good work ethic if I find myself investing my time and energy into something long term that is not going to give me a financial ROI then I will look for something that does idc

My Sun trines my Saturn in the 9th house which does make me feel like that slowly but surely success in career vibes are relevant to me and that hard work and leaning into spiritual studies is going to be quite beneficial

My Sun is also square my Uranus in 4th house and I am not in a stage within my life in which I can quite explain that, however, I do think that shit constantly happening within my private life and home could potentially make me lose my focus and weaken my resolve at times butttt I always bounce back so it's oki

Thank you for reading <3

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[the-ace-with-spades]

Concept: Christopher only realizes how serious of a trauma the tsunami was when he's already almost finishing high school.

I know in the show he's got nightmares about the tsunami but I couldn't help notice how the nightmares are more about Shannon dying in the tsunami than the tsunami itself, which is understandable given that his mom's death was sudden and probably unexplained to him beyond 'there was an accident'. So his brain was probably struggling to process that she's not coming back ever again, like she did when he asked for her to be back on Christmas.

The nightmares aren't about him or even about Buck. Kids' brains can be weird about trauma.

(Skippable context: When I was seven, my dad and I had a car accident. The car behind us skidded on black ice when we were on a river bridge, hit us and we hit another car that swiveled down the hill into the river and then we also hit the balustrade hard enough the front of our car was dangling out. The people in front of us died in the water. We were moved back onto the road by the firefighters after about half an hour, with my dad staring at that river the whole time.

I didn't remember it like that at all, only learned the above from the firefighter who had checked me out on the scene and remembered me years later when my dad set the hedge on fire and the same station answered the call, literally said 'I didn't cut you out of that car so you could set the whole village on fire' to my dad. I only remembered my dad telling me if I wait patiently in the car, he's going to get me McDonald's tomorrow and asking me what I'd written in the letter to Santa (which 6yo me refused to say because it was a list for Santa only) and the firefighter teddy bear Stefan I got from the mentioned firefighter. I literally went on with my life like nothing happened. Like, my dad's leg had stitches but he said it was alright because 'scars are cool', and I literally begged my mum so she'd let me go to school the next day so I wouldn't miss the clay day and then in the evening called out my dad for not taking me for my promised Happy Meal. No nightmares, no fears of bridges, cars or rivers. I didn't even connect that the new car wasn't there because my dad got bored of the last one like he said, but because the old one was totaled.)

So what if Chris only realized how serious the tsunami was years and years later when, idk, they were writing personal statements for college applications and 'the day that changed your life' question comes up and everyone has some either traumatizing or motivational examples but he doesn't know how to answer. And one of his friends says, "Weren't you caught in the tsunami with your dad?" (which, by that point Buck and Eddie are married and he calls Buck pops). And his automatic, absent-minded answer is, "Yeah, but that wasn't a big deal."

And everyone just stares. Because he said surviving a tsunami wasn't a big deal.

Chris knows where they're coming from because if someone told him they survived a tsunami, he wouldn't dismiss them and tell them it's not a big deal.

And obviously, he vaguely remembers asking Buck where all the water went and he remembers that the run Buck did with him in his arms after that was kind of funny and then the water hit.

But he doesn't remember the water hitting him or destroying stuff on its way, just remembers Buck telling him to keep swimming and that he's got him. And the next thing he remembers, they're on the fire truck and Buck is helping people and Chris felt so proud for helping by watching the ropes (which, now he knows was a distraction, duh) and then he remembers Buck just telling him to wait patiently and then playing I Spy and it was kind of fun again and Buck was hugging him and just, it was nice, a bit unusual, but kinda felt like they were just sitting on abuela's back porch, but wet.

Even when he fell into the water again, he wasn't that scared because he heard Buck jumping after him and he was sure he'd get to him in a minute or so. And then the water retrieved and some nice lady helped him and he was still kind of fine because he knew Buck would find him and then they could go to the aquarium like Buck promised early in the day. In fact, the process of looking for Buck was the only time he remembers feeling scared - because he was thinking, what if Buck doesn't find him before Dad comes back after work to pick him up? Dad is going to be mad at Buck if they aren't there.

He just never clocked in how close to dying he was, or how close to dying Buck was.

And that day he comes back from school and asks Eddie if he can tell him what happened during the tsunami because he remembers it differently than he probably should. Eddie gets really quiet and tells him, "I don't know. I never asked Buck for details. All that mattered to me was that the two of you were in one piece."

In the time it takes for Buck to get back home, he rationalizes that maybe it wasn't a big deal to Buck either, he was a firefighter, he probably dealt with enough of that stuff to not really be that affected, and maybe it was just different for both of them.

But then he asks Buck if he can tell him about the tsunami and Buck gets really quiet and pale and finally says, "It was the worst day of my life."

[olderthannetfic]

https://olderthannetfic.tumblr.com/post/751860199130873856/calling-one-guy-in-a-gay-relationship-the#notes

Schan-FG and ONTF are correct. ^w^ This is about twitter wank about MXTX where everyone suddenly is an expert in Chinese and danmei despite not being Chinese, because one of the characters in a M/M couple is referred to as the "Wife" in the book. The one with the red guy and the God. First starting long moralizing threads about not being allowed to use the wrong gendered terms when writing gay relationships. Then the baby gays and their allies going after the gays who ended up responding and telling them they use GNC terms in their relationship as well, and their writing and that it's not a big deal to write that.

The context for the quote part is that I've seen like dozens of people on twitter basically use a variation of the quote "Calling a guy in the relationship wife is homophobic" "Calling a chick in a gay relationship husband is homophobic" as a blanket statement and conclusion, and that regardless of reason and context, even real life and personal choice, a gay man is not allowed to call himself wife, and a gay woman is not allowed to call herself husband. Not even if it's normal in their corner of gay culture. Especially not in fiction because that's all just the icky fetishizing. You are not allowed to make the personal choice between you, yourself, and your partner about what to call you or vice versa.

As a GNC WLW who uses masc terms on the regular this of course hit me deeply. ^o^ 🦀It was a reference to the King crab lazer eye meme.

"Calling yourself a wife as a man in a gay relationship." Guy1: "I consent." Guy2: "I consent." Completely random twitter users: "I DON'T!"

--

Called it! Haha.

Wharrgarbl! I only watch MXTX adaptations! How dare the books not conform to what we use on my college campus?!?! etc.

This flavor of stupid was tedious back in the 00s when it was "My superior Japanese learnings tell me that my FFVII ship is more canon than yours!!!" It's even more tedious in accidental homophobia Chinaboo edition.

[chirpingfromthebox]

Me just thinking out loud and inarticulately trying to wrap my head around my thoughts on the simmering dumpster fire that is my hometown team. Feel free to scroll on by.

I feel like something missing from a lot of the Curl discussion is the context it all happened in. Lots of articles and posts make it seem like the problem fans have is just that Curl got drafted at all. And I think the context around it all matters.

The league shit canned Natalie Darwitz days before the draft, wouldn't say why, acted like they aren't saying anything because they want to respect Darwitz, but meanwhile Darwitz seems like she would LOVE to talk about the situation.

To make matters worse there's all this talk and speculation surrounding the role Klee had in this, and amongst that he goes to the draft table with the emptiest table of any team, drafts Curl in the second round, (you can tell the league already was ready for bad fallout from Curl because they had a prepared statement locked and loaded to go out in the youtube chat seconds after it happened), and then Klee IMMEDIATELY makes things worse by purposefully staging her draft photo to be taken with St. Paul's mayor Melvin Carter (a black man) and the assistant coach (a queer woman).

Then Klee, the team, and the league decide to handle the fallout from everything in the most half-assed tone-deaf manner possible.

Before the Darwitz debacle I had mentally prepared myself for the eventuality that someone would draft Curl. But I had prepared myself for someone doing it in the back half of the draft.

A team would get her, but at least it would suggest Curl's actions had lowered her value considerably in teams' eyes.

Like, none of the craziness happened, and Darwitz had drafted Curl in the 5th or 6th round, made a proper acknowledgement of the situation and their plan for moving forward, and Curl had made an apology video that was written by someone who didn't go to the American Political School of Empty Statements?

I think the community could understand. We wouldn't love it, but we could live with it. It would be like seeing a big spider in the corner of my ceiling: I certainly don't like it, and I'm gonna keep my eye on this, but as long as it doesn't step to me any further we'll be alright.

But that's not what happened. And that's not how it happened.

And I'm still not sure what to do with my Minnesota fandom at this point.

At the moment I'm waiting to see what the final team looks like. If they re-sign their queer players I'm willing to put in the work to fight against Mr. Potato Head's attempts to sabotage my team, and try to at least make the fan community as welcoming and inclusive as possible.

But if Klee and co. don't bring back Minnesota's queer players? Then I'm out. For the good of my own mental health I'll go support a different team until they can get their shit together.

Because I do believe that people can change. Especially people in their 20s who were dumb-ass ignorant assholes in college. And she's not my main problem. My main problem is what does this team and this league want to be? Because someone like Curl coming into a queer positive environment is one thing. But her coming into a place with nothing but conservative ideals and a pinkwashed door? That's something else entirely.

And if the people at the top are going to fire the woman who built the team, put a dude in charge, give a person with a history of supporting bigoted ideas a position of influence, and become the only team in the league without any queer players?

And then have the gall to claim to be an inclusive?

Fuck that.

[also everyone wants to act like Minnesota is some rogue villain in all this and that isn't fair. This isn't like the big league male teams: there are no individual team owners here. The league controls it all and their fingers are in every pie. But that's a whole different conversation.]

[miyamiwu]

omg my youngest sister is arguing with my mother in the group chat about the Carlos Yulo issue. As expected, my mom is on the abusive mother’s side. Fucking boomers

I honestly don’t have the energy to argue with my mom, so I’ll just leave it to my activist sister 🤣

Context for my non-Filo followers: Carlos Yulo is a Filipino gymnast who won two gold medals in the Olympics (men’s floor exercise and men’s vault), but before he won, his mother was rooting for the enemy team (Japan) and hoping for her own son to lose. Now, with Carlos winning two gold medals, her previous hateful statements were dug up and slapped in her face.

In defense, her mother started talking about how Carlos has been an unfilial child and how she thinks his girlfriend, Chloe, is causing him to drift apart from the family. This in turn caused a lot of people to turn against Chloe and throw misogynistic statements at her.

Carlos and Chloe had to post a video to clear up the misunderstanding and show their side of the story.

In the video, they said that they and Chloe’s family made a group chat and pulled Carlos’ mom into it so they can resolve the issue in private. I didn’t read all the screenshots, but one part had Carlos call out his mom for withholding the allowance he got as a national athlete/prize money from previous international competitions (can’t remember if it was just one of these or both) and using it to pay for the family house (which is under his mother’s name) in bulk without asking for his permission beforehand (his mother held his bank account card back then). The mother was unrepentant though, thinking that there’s nothing wrong with what she did and that she doesn’t have to explain herself to her own son.

Carlos also defended his girlfriend, saying how his mom has been very critical of how she dresses and speaks, as a result of how Chloe grew up in Australia, where the culture is very different. (The traditional ideal of a Filipino woman is someone who is “demure and self-effacing” like Maria Clara, but Chloe is the complete opposite of that. She’s an outspoken, strong, independent woman, and the conservatives and misogynists don’t like that.)

There’s a lot of articles explaining the whole thing better online, so just google them for more info

Anyways, this whole issue really blew up in the Philippines, with the conservatives/older generation admonishing Carlos with justifications like “That’s still your mom” and the younger generation rallying with Carlos and praising him for his courage in breaking free from an abusive household. It really brought to light the toxic Filipino family culture, rendering the issue as not only personal to the Yulo family but also a societal one that is prevalent in a lot of Filipino households. The Philippines is so poor that some parents have treated their children as “investments” to bring them out of poverty.

I’ve witnessed this problem in my own family. I remember when my older brother was in college, he had a scholarship that entitled him to P15,000 per semester (adjusting for inflation, this is now about $350). However, my mom held his ATM card and would only send him a little of the allowance. In the end, my own brother would starve and sometimes even steal other people’s food from the dorm 😔 (As someone who now also lives in the college dorm and has had her own food stolen, this is why I can never really hate or be mad at people who steal. I understand the desperation when you’re really hungry).

In the beginning, my brother thought there was nothing wrong with this and it was only right for him to give back to my mother, and it took my aunt (who housed my brother in his first year of college and also gave him some allowance) a lot of talking into him to convince him how this was wrong. As a parent, my mother had every obligation to provide and raise her children and my brother shouldn’t have to feel like he owes her a favor.

In the Philippines, tradition is to support your child throughout college. In some households, the support is until the child turns 18 or 21. But on the first year my brother left for college (he was only 16 then, as he was part of the old curriculum), my mom just threw him to our aunt’s place, which was near the university, and let him depend on our aunt—who had no obligation to even raise him—while also expecting him to hand over his scholarship allowance to her. It was awful.

I have a lot more examples in the family, but this post is getting too long… but yeah, I am both pissed and disappointed with my mother siding with Angelica Yulo, but at the same time, I kind of expected it. She and Angelica are the same kind of person 😩

However, I can only hold myself back from arguing since I’m not in any position to argue with my mom about this. Mom is still supporting me in college even though I am now an adult (got delayed because of mental health issues and stuff). And by support, it’s her giving me a weekly allowance of P500 (~$9)—which is far from enough for me to cover my meals and other necessities, so I often have to borrow money or do some gigs. I’ve been trying to find a part-time job, but there hasn’t been any luck. I also can’t apply for just any job coz I need to look for one that fits with my schedule and has a salary high enough for me to able to send money to my mom while also leaving some for myself (she’s been pressuring me on this, but as I said, I’m really in no position to talk back 😔).

My brother’s been telling me to just focus on my studies and not worry about it, but I know he would also like my help on the bills in the future. He’s currently paying for the family house that is under my mother’s name and which he doesn’t even live in anymore. He really wants to stop so he can focus on his career and build a future with his girlfriend, but it’s just so hard to break free from this kind of culture, especially when society here is so ready to judge you for being unfilial and lacking utang na loob if you do. And well, we also can’t just throw our mother to the wolves (debt collectors)

So yeah, I’ve been having a hard time, and my mom weighing in on the Carlos Yulo issue unprompted made it even worse 😔

And I swear I don’t mean the end the post like this, but since I’m talking about my troubles anyway, I might as well mention how I’m currently running a Ko-fi goal to help cover some expenses. If you have any spare cash, please consider donating to my Ko-fi 🙏

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for sort of wanting to break up with my boyfriend

okay so I [18M] met this guy [18M] back in january through an accepted college students group chat. We got to talking and found out we had a lot of similar interests, plus we live in the same city so we were able to hang out occasionally. We were even each other's prom dates (though both times were "as friends") However, after my prom he drove me home and ended up asking me out, saying he'd had a crush on me for a while and just had to tell me. I told him that I would love to date him, but that I had to tell him something first. I'm a stealth trans man, which means everyone I'd met and hung out with around him had assumed I was cis. So had this guy. I asked if that would be a problem, as he identified as gay and some gay men just aren't into trans men. He responded and said he didn't think it would be. Well, flash forward a month and I was on an out of town trip with him and several of his friends. As the only couple on the trip we were also sharing a room. And for context we'd made out but nothing more. The night before we left, he asked "hey, can we talk about something real quick?" I said sure, and he went "so, you know how I'm gay, right?" to which I thought oh no. I know where this is going. And basically he ended up saying that he didn't think he'd be comfortable doing anything sexual with me because he's "only into cock" but also that he'd be okay 'receiving' sexual acts, just not 'giving.' I was pretty stunned because I hadn't been thinking of that stuff really at all (it was literally the day after our one month anniversary. it was all still pretty new) and I said as much, but that I thought it would definitely be a problem in the future. He then freaked out and said that because he has OCD vague statements like that mess up his brain and basically send it into overdrive, so would I please say that it wouldn't ever be a problem (which I did.) I didn't see him for almost a month after that because he went out of the country, but I was definitely more reserved with the way I talked to him, prompting him to ask many times if he was annoying me and sort of catastrophize about our relationship (sent me a text asking if our LOVE was FADING.) I eventually ended up talking to him about it all over the phone and he immediately apologized saying that he knew as soon as he had said it that it was an asshole thing to say. Then he went into a tangent about how he actually views sex and romance as two different things and thinks sex is super degrading and dehumanizing, and how he thinks our love is this "pure and wholesome" thing (actual words.) He did say that he would be willing to try things with me but I don't want him to force anything on his end regarding sexual stuff, because it is totally okay if he doesn't want to have sex with me, it just means I don't want to stay in a relationship with him. But he keeps going on and on about how much he loves me and how I've changed him into a better person (and also how SCARED he is that I'll break up with him????) and so I feel guilty wanting to break up, especially because I did like him a lot before all this but now it's just so stressful and I don't know what to do. And that's where the "am *I* the asshole" bit comes in because I have been really sort of neglecting him, responding to messages late, not being super enthusiastic about talking to him, just being a bad boyfriend tbh. And of course the cherry on top is that we're going to college together in a month. Okay tumblr please help me what do you think

What are these acronyms?

[madameaug]

Work Wife || JJK x OC

Pairing: Jungkook x Jennette

Context: Jungkook's self-appointed work wife oversteps at the Christmas party.

*woman is not a face claim for Jennette

"Is this Mick Jung's residence?" Jennette was polite when speaking to the woman who answered the door. She could not attend the office ceremony because she was securing child care for Peanut. She would have a sleepover at her Godmother Nala “Lala” house. So Jungkook texted her just to come to the after-party at Mick’s house. She had sat in the car for five minutes, ringing Jungkook’s phone. But knowing him, he was probably in some deep conversation, not paying any attention to his phone.

Yasmin, the woman answering the door was the gyms talent acquisition director. Jennette had seen her before in passing at some of Jungkook and Jaehyun’s fights. However this was the first she ever directly interacted with her.

"Whose asking?" Penny stands up straighter to prevent Jennette from looking inside the house. Unlike Penny, Yasmin knew exactly who Jennette was. The girlfriend of the most famous fighter at the gym. She thought she would have Jungkook to herself since there was no sign of her at the office ceremony.

“Jennette.” She didn’t like that her response came out like a question. If Penny kept staring her down, she would feel compelled to pull out her driver's license.

"Yo!" Coming to Jennette's rescue was Mick. "Don't keep her outside. Come on in."

Reluctantly, Yasmin stepped aside to let Jenentte inside the house. The home decor was seasonal, with a gold and white Christmas theme.

“Mick you must clearly be in the Christmas mood.” Jennette complimented. This was her first time stepping foot in his home in person but she’s seen pictures. It was a bachelor pad, but not as messy. Sexually suggestive artwork with proudly displayed alcohol bottles.

It was what you expect a boy decorating his first college apartment to look like. Mick was past his college days by at least a decade. But shared the same taste as one.

“I have very important company over.” His head turned toward an asian woman looking around the apartment. A red solo cup in her hand, but she had on thigh high heels. Her salt and pepper hair was blowed out straight and framed her thin face nicely. She looked like she meant business. A sharp contrast to Mick’s goofy demeanor.

“I see.”

“She’s so pretty.”

Mick was clearly drunk, but in good spirits. He was chatty, escorting Jenentte into the thick of the party. Friends of Mick were socializing with cups of jello shots in their hands.

"How's my girl doing. She talking yet?" Mick asked about his honorary niece.

"Is she talking? She won't stop talking." Jennette gushed. Peanut was finding her voice. Instead of relying on hand gestures to communicate what she wants, she'll use her voice. Her voice was raspy, but so adorable.

"All day, she just tells Jungkook and me 'no.' "

Jennette soon realized she was talking to herself, as Mick was swayed into another conversation. Slightly awkward Jennette went on the hunt for Jungkook. The person she was accompanying at this event in the first place.

--------

Jennette hadn't realized she stepped into the lioness's den. It didn't take her long to find Jungkook in the house. He was in the kitchen talking to Jaehyun and Yasmin. His back was to her front.

Yasmin put on her friendly act, announcing Jennette's arrival. Jungkook was overly excited and kissed her forehead affectionately.

“So this is the Jennette I’ve heard so much about.” Yasmin started, catching the attention of Jungkook. The statement was odd. He didn’t go rambling about his relationship with Jennette. Unless he was in Mick’s office then he would talk his head off about his family. Never to regular employees at the gym. Especially not to those that work more in the office than the physical gym.

“So what are y’all? Like friends or something.”

“We’re dating.” Jennette answered shirt and sweetly. Unsure of what Yasmin’s motives taking a sudden interest in her relationship with Jungkook. She could assume that it wasn’t good, from the cold welcome she got at the door.

“She’s the mother of my child.” Jungkook corrected.

“Oh so she’s just your baby momma.” She swallowed the jell-o shot. The liquid courage making her bolder with the following statements.

“Are you expecting again?”

“No, the fuck.”

“Oh! Oh my goodness. I’m so sorry.” She turned to make a face, believing the at if she twisted her body, Jennette couldn’t see the fake guilty on her face.

“Let’s talk about something else.” Jaehyun steered the conversation away the emotional landmines, Yasmin was trying to set.

“I didn’t mean to be rudeee. I just thought Jungkook and I were close.”

“When we trained together a couple of times, sitting beside each other in meetings, road trips to meet potential clients together all those years ago. We had a lot of good times together.” Her voice was drawn out trying to create a seductive drawl.

The mind tricks did little to Jennette. Plus, she didn’t know Jungkook when he first moved to America. So whatever and whoever he was doing in his romantic life was none of her business.

“Yasmin that was one time and almost six years ago. When I first moved to Georgia.”

“Did you know that so many people shipped us together? We were like husband and wife. We were like the ideal couple, that never was. I was the one who got away.”

“Work wife?” Jungkook nearly choked on his shot.

Yasmin was trying to frame her words to have a deeper meaning than what truly happened like a lioness showing her claws to warn prey that she was dangerous. If Yasmin was trying to spark a light of jealousy in Jennette, then she was failing. If anything, she was only making Jungkook more annoyed and irritated by her presence.

"Are yall in love or something? Or is this a temporary thing?"

"Yasmin I think you've had too many shots. They literally have a kid together." Jaehyun chimed in. Not sure why Yasmin was choosing this moment in particular to interogate Jungkook.

"I didn’t get this tattoo for nothing.” He stretched his neck, showing his tattoo dedicated to Jennette. It was Jennette's lip print on the right side of his neck, with the letter 'J' in cursive.

He also just got a tattoo dedicated to Peanut as well. Except it was on his chest. Her infant foot prints on his chest, above his heart. There was no doubt in his mind about how committed he was to his family. Jennette and Peanut were his girls for life.

"I think the babysitter is calling." Jennette spoke up to Jungkook. It was the secret code that they would use to excuse themselves out in public. Taking his cue, he exuded himself from the conversation. Saying goodbye to Jaehyun in Korean.

Once back outside in front of Jennette's car, the couple immediately started laughing.

"If looks could kill." Jennette started. "I think Yasmin like you."

"Literally no."

"She was definitely marking her territory. It would explain the warm welcome I got at the door."

"Wait, what did she say to you?"

"It's not necessarily what she said. It was more of how she said it. Her body language spoke volumes.”

"I've literally only seen her four times. And I'm not even exaggerating."

"Sounds like you've made quite the impression, Mr. Jeon."

"Marry me."

"Is that your proposal?"

"Not the official one. But I do want to marry you."

"Looks I need to marry you, before ole girl comes snatches you up."

"Hush." Jungkook looked over his shoulder.

"I wouldn't let that happend. I didn't push out your baby just stay a baby momma."

"My sexy baby momma. Soon to be wife.”

"Damn right."

Jungkook opened Jennette's door. Running to his side and opening up his door.

"What about Mick?" Jennette's seatbelt clicked.

"He's playing host, so he's distracted." Jungkook shrugged waisting no time pulling out of the lot.

In the mist of their comfortable silence, Jungkook brought up the question.

"You didn't technically answer my question."

"Well you didn't techincally ask so I don’t have to answer."

"I just want some reassurance. You still want to be the future Mrs. Jeon."

"Assuming I'm still gonna get a real proposal when I'm not in cheesy Christmas pajamas. Yes, Jungkook I'll marry you."

Jungkook didn't respond but a huge grin appeared on his face. He pumped his fist, hitting his knuckles on the overhead of the car.

“Ow!”

[blythelyunaware]

On the "terrible lyrics" discourse...

It's always interesting to me when, right before an album rollout, we have a subsect of swifties and/or simply bad-faith haters who immediately pan a new album by plucking out lyrics out of context. It seems that the curse of folkevermore will forever loom over any new album rollout because most people aren't...that bright? Folkevermore is brilliant for many reasons, not least of all because it was perfectly timed to fit the tone of the socio-cultural time it was released in. People ate it up because a). those albums were pandemic albums and b). they were written mostly in the "quill pen" style. For some reason, and perhaps this is due to a lack of wider reading, people associate "good lyrics" with flowery prose that is reliant heavily on lots of figurative language and "bad lyrics" as simple statements. And so anything that has been released post-folkevermore has been panned as a "step down" because people think Taylor Swift is only worth listening to when she releases music that people perceive, through stereotypes or general insufferableness, as artsier and therefore of more value.

I don't know if it's just a universally bad education system or maybe we don't read contemporary literature enough, but that's just not true. I love folklore so very much, and its most Keats-style 19th-century poet song, "The Lakes," is perhaps one of its weakest because it's trying too hard and some of it, frankly, makes no sense ("Tell me what are my Wordsworth" ???? Like we know that clunky-ass lyric was only put in there for a dumb ass poet reference). And then we have The Last Great American Dynasty, which contains fairly simple/ slightly kooky statements such as: "And in a feud with her neighbour, she stole his dog and dyed it key lime green." Which is way better at characterising the person in that story!!!

It was the same with the "sexy baby" lyric in Anti-Hero (IMO a very interesting lyric!). It's not about how many metaphors she can pack in or the number of stars or 2 AM dancing-in-the-rain or running-down-a-field-to-her-prince, or other fairytale motifs that makes her songs so good. It's her ability to tie a concept together or create a thread of shared ideas within an album. People are clowning on the whole "Charlie Puth being a bigger artist" because Charlie Puth isn't typically considered "high brow" and has released some pretty cringey stuff. But if you look deeper into the reason for why she included that in her song: it fits into the album conceit. The album visuals are very much dark academia, college prep, intellectuals etc. etc. This lyric is not so much about Charlie Puth as it is about her relationship dynamic with the person she is singing about. It's about how they had shared intellectual values around music. And that is the genius of Taylor Swift. She does not need to point a gigantic neon sign at a lyric saying "LOOK! LOOK! THIS IS A METAPHOR AND I AM VERY CLEVER AND YOU CAN FEEL CLEVER FOR GETTING IT!".

To end it all I would urge swifties to please read more and read widely. (I also realise just how pretentious and obnoxious I sound but hey, if we're gonna play into the aesthetic, why not?)

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Thomas Chatterton Williams

Published: May 19, 2024

We’d gathered that day at the cafeteria’s “Black” table, cracking jokes and philosophizing during the free period that was our perk as upperclassmen. We came in different shades: bone white, tan and brownish, dark as a silhouette. One of my classmates, who fancied himself a lyricist, was insisting that Redman, a witty emcee from nearby Newark, New Jersey, was the greatest rapper ever. This was the late ’90s, and for my money, no one could compete with Jay-Z. I said so, and the debate, good-natured at first, soon escalated in intensity, touching on feelings and resentments that ran far deeper than diverging claims about artistic merit.

“How can you even weigh in?” I still remember the kid fuming. “You ain’t even the pure breed!”

With that, there was nothing left to say. Friends separated us, the bell rang, and I headed home. A short time later, I went off to college, where I would meet a wider assortment of Americans than I had realized existed. But over the years, I have been reminded of that boy’s slicing racism, the lazy habit of mind that required no white people to be present but would nonetheless please the most virulent white supremacist.

Recently, two public controversies spirited me back to the suspicion and confusion of my high-school cafeteria. All spring long, an unusually nasty feud between the rappers Drake and Kendrick Lamar has been captivating audiences, both for the quality of the music it has engendered and for the personal and malicious dimensions of the attacks it has countenanced. Much has been written about the fight, in particular about the two men’s treatment of women, which I won’t rehash here except to point out that it’s a little funny that they both portray themselves as enlightened allies while also acting as if the ultimate disparagement is to call another man feminine. Less has been said about the potency of the racial dimension, which feels like a throwback to a time before Drake’s pop-culture dominance—indeed, to a time before the historic hybridity of the Obama era—and like a distillation of the skin-deep racialism of the current social-justice movement.

Drake, who grew up in Toronto, is the son of a white Jewish mother from Canada and a Black father from Memphis. Since the release of his 2009 mixtape, So Far Gone, he has been not only the most successful visibly mixed-race rapper—and arguably pop star—but also the most visible Black male musician for some time now. Anyone at the top will attract criticism. But not even a white rapper like Eminem has been subject to the kind of racial derogation that has been hurled at Drake.

Back in 2018, the rapper Pusha T released a diss track about him for which the cover art was an old photograph of Drake performing in a cartoonish blackface. The image makes you cringe, but—as Drake explained—that was the point. Drake began his career as an actor, and he wrote that the photograph was part of a “project that was about young black actors struggling to get roles, being stereotyped and typecast … The photos represented how African Americans were once wrongfully portrayed in entertainment.” But presented without context, it appeared to be a self-evident statement of inauthenticity.

Another rapper, Rick Ross, calls Drake “white boy” again and again in his song “Champagne Moments,” released in April. In an op-ed for The Grio, the music journalist Touré explains why the insult is so effective: “We know Drake is biracial. He’s never hidden that, but many of us think of him as Black or at least as a part of the culture … On this record, Ross is out to change that.” Touré calls this “hyperproblematic,” but his tone is approving—he admires the track. “We shouldn’t be excluding biracial people from the Black community, but in a rap beef where all is fair as a way of attacking someone and undermining their credibility and their identity, it’s a powerful message.”

In a series of more high-profile records, Lamar has built on Ross’s theme, both implying and stating directly that racial categories are real, that behaviors and circumstances (like Drake’s suburban upbringing) correlate with race, and that the very mixedness of Drake’s background renders him suspect. It is an anachronistic line of ad hominem attack that is depressing to encounter a quarter of the way into the 21st century.

Lamar’s most recent Drake diss is called “Not Like Us,” and reached No. 1 on Billboard Hot 100. It goes after Drake’s cultural affiliations with the American South. “No, you not a colleague,” Lamar taunts. “You a fucking colonizer!”

It’s hard to hear that and not remember that Drake’s mother is Jewish, and that this is the same invective used to undermine Jews’ sense of belonging in Israel. Such racist habits of thought have become potent rhetorical weapons in the progressive arsenal.

The second (if smaller) controversy followed an essay on language and protest published in The New Yorker earlier this month. The novelist Zadie Smith, who is of European and African descent, argued—carefully—that it is too simplistic to regard the world as sortable into categories of oppressor and oppressed. “Practicing our ethics in the real world involves a constant testing of them,” she writes, “a recognition that our zones of ethical interest have no fixed boundaries and may need to widen and shrink moment by moment as the situation demands.” This was an attempt to take seriously the tangible fate of Hamas’s victims on October 7, the broader implications of anti-Semitism that can at times be found in criticism of Israel’s response, and the ongoing tragic loss of Palestinian life.

Despite praising the protests that have engulfed college campuses and describing a cease-fire in Gaza as “an ethical necessity,” Smith was derided on more than intellectual grounds. One widely shared tweet, accompanied by a photo of Smith, stated the criticism plainly: “I feel like Zadie Smith uses black aesthetics to conceal her deeply pedestrian white middle-class politics. People see the head wrap and the earrings made of kente cloth and confuse that for something more substantive.”

This was not the first time Smith had been regarded as a racial interloper. The author Morgan Jerkins once wrote of the emotional “hurt” she felt reading another thoughtful essay Smith published in Harper’s asking “Who owns black pain?” Smith’s transgression here, according to Jerkins, was “intellectualizing blackness” from a distance instead of feeling it. “Do not be surprised,” Jerkins warned, “if a chunk of that essay is used in discussions as to why biracial people need to take a backseat in the movement.”

The retrograde notion that thought and action necessarily flow from racial identities whose borders are definable and whose authority is heritable is both fictitious and counterproductive. “Something is afoot that is the business of every citizen who thought that the racist concepts of a century ago were gone­—and good riddance!” Barbara and Karen Fields write in their 2012 masterpiece, Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life. “The continued vitality of those concepts stands as a reminder that, however important a historical watershed the election of an African-American president may be, America’s post-racial era has not been born.”

Of course, the first African American president was, like our nation and culture, himself both Black and white. One of the most disappointing—and, I have come to realize—enduring reasons the “post-racial era” continues to elude us is that it is not only the avowed racists who would hold that biographical fact against him.

==

This is why we call it neoracism, not "antiracism."

[teruthecreator]

TW FOR RACISM, CHILD IMPREGNATION, EUGENICS, & TRANSPHOBIA

okay @silvercistern! thats okay! if you dont wanna be here for this conversation then i'll have a conversation without you! for all those readers out there who might've missed it

FOR EVERYONE'S INFORMATION:

Side Quest is definitely one of the weirdest fics I have ever seen get popular, for several content-related reasons.

Firstly, the racism. She writes her Serizawa to be half-black, half-Japanese, which is a perfectly valid hc if not for how she handles this fact. Ignoring the moments of subtle racism she gives Reigen (having him comment on the apparent "sloppiness" of his afro--which she also refuses to call an afro, by the way--and also having him guess his race via his racial characteristics), she blatantly and openly makes Toichiro racist towards Serizawa in a way that I feel we cannot ignore. For example:

I shouldn't have to say that calling a black man a "slave" in any context is fucked up, but I will for the sake of this post! Since she already think I'm insane :-) Also:

Once again, shouldn't have to say this but I will: Saying a black man has a "brutal masculine appeal" is so obviously and blatantly racist while also being entirely unnecessary for his character! We understand, as both readers and watchers of the base material, that Toichiro is a bad guy. We do not need him to then become racist, borderline-pedophilic, and a supporter of eugenics! And if you need quotes for some of these points, I will include one that has both:

Even if he is saying that he won't facilitate the "impregnation of a child", why the fuck is he laughing about it? Just a reminder: Toichiro in canon is only a terrorist and a child abuser. Yes, he is a bad person. However, I think elevating his evil to this level removes any concept of character depth that you could possibly have, and makes the ending of this fic (where he is seemingly normal and fine, with both his wife and child in his relative good graces) all the weirder. But again, I'm insane, right? Oh yeah, one more point about Toichiro that I found from the comments:

Now this tells me several things. Firstly, it's that she lacks the oversight to recognize when there is blatant racism in her works of fiction. Which is questionable, but I'm willing to let that slide because people should always be given the opportunity to grow. HOWEVER, the second part of this tells me that the first part might be a lie!!! Because hey!! If you are headcanoning a person's parent as being a WHITE SOUTH AFRICAN WITH EUGENICIST BELIEFS, you are basically saying your character was raised by an APARTHEID APOLOGIST. So I really don't know how you can avoid the racism embedded in that statement.

Now, let's move away from Toichiro because he's not the only character she completely butchers with weird concepts. Shimazaki is a trans chaser in this fic.

That's right. I'm not kidding. He is a chaser.

Once again reminding you that I'm the insane one.

There is literally no reason I can see as to why she would write this, other than that it is supposed to be a joke. Now, as an afab trans butch, there is only so much I can say to this point, but I will still ask: Who is laughing here? Who is this joke funny to? Is it to the trans women, who have to deal with similar kinds of harassment each time they try to go on a date? Or is it the Shimazaki fans, who I guess aren't weirded out by their fav being a chaser? Or is it just you, silvercistern? Is it just funny to you?

That point brings me to one of my last points with context. She seems to enjoy throwing in random "edgy" topics for either shock value or a laugh, neither of which I think her wording lands on. I did collegiate improv comedy for all four years of college (yes that may seem pathetic to you, but it was fun)--if anyone knows how a joke should sound, I think I'm one of the few. And, frankly, none of these land. For instance, the repeated "joke" of calling Reigen a creep or alluding to him being a pedo:

But, again, me? I'm insane, apparently. If you take issue with any of this, like I did, then to her you are insane.

This is not surprising to me, given that she already had a kind of breakdown to my friend regarding when they asked if silvercistern could tag one of her fics with sa.

Here is the link to their post. I ask that you respect their wishes and do not send harassment to silvercistern (as that is my wish as well) and do not be weird to them in their inbox.

But this is why it does not surprise me that she 1. would private her twitter account when faced with even the slightest backlash, 2. would then talk about the situation to her mutuals to garner sympathy, and 3. not even bother to read a single thing I said, given that she replied to my post in less than a minute after I had posted it.

By the way, one of those mutuals? Yeah, they are literally a toichiro/shou shipper. Here's the proof:

Anyway, this is not an excuse to go harass her. I DO NOT CONDONE HARASSMENT OF ANY KIND. ANY OF MY POSTS ABOUT THIS SITUATION WERE MADE TO DIRECTLY ADDRESS HER AND THE ISSUES I HAVE. IF YOU FEEL THE NEED TO CHIME IN, DO IT ON YOUR OWN TIME WITH YOUR OWN POST. DO NOT HARASS HER.

So yeah. Guess this would be something an insane person does, right? lol

[tbookblurbs]

The Oathbound: Vows and Honor - Mercedes Lackey

2/5 - very adventure-of-the-week (AOTW) style, took a while for me to get hooked, lots of threats of SA or offscreen SA implied and I did not like that

I picked up this book and one other by Mercedes Lackey for a grand total of $6 at a small bookstore in my college town. I'm not going to say that I wouldn't have paid any more than that ... but let's just say this, like many books, is not one that will be remaining in my personal library for very long.

Anyways.

The two main characters in this novel are fairly fleshed out and they feel like real women. They make mistakes and atone for them, they have specific goals and drivers, overall they just feel very grounded. Personally, despite the text's insistence that they were not lesbians, I read them that way anyway. They are in love to me.

It took me a while to get into this book because their meeting and initial team-up happen in another book so I felt like I was really missing context there for a while. Also, I didn't really understand that it was going to be an AOTW style book until I was already a third of the way through. The pace did pick up once we got there though.

As I've said, there were a lot of scenes either referencing past rape, sexual trauma, or other forms of sexual assault to the main characters and many of the female background character. I think this was supposed to add depth, but the last AOTW revolved around some very questionable statements involving rape, gender, and general punishment, so I ended up skipping it altogether.

To conclude, not a book I'd freely recommend. What's sad is the two main characters, Kethry and Tarma, are actually really cool, but the ideologies the author is putting out there, rather uncritically might I add, just turned me off reading any more of the series.

EDIT: Now that I think even more about it, some very heavy TERF ramblings here. Just avoid it if you can.

EDIT 2: Having just finished another book of hers with a timeline, I don't actually think Tarma and Kethry's initial team-up happened in a different book. While I can appreciate breaking the tradition of starting with the teamwork aspect, I don't think Lackey does enough to justify the relationship in this book without this backstory. Too much telling, not enough showing.

[mbti-notes]

Hi, entj here. What other Jungian theories besides the personality theory discussed here do you recommend to study in depth, mainly from the perspective of personality development? I read a book describing Jung's basic theories, one of the theses presented there was the statement that modern humanistic psychology is poor in its view of the human being, for example, it often ignores the past and focuses on the present and future. What are your thoughts on humanistic vs Jungian psychology?

I don't really know how to answer because you haven't explained the purpose of your question with the necessary detail, as per the blog guidelines. Generally speaking, people ask about different perspectives in psychology because they're trying to figure out which therapeutic approach to take. The way you've framed the question seems to indicate that you don't know much about the field of psychology, so you're not approaching the subject matter in the right way.

(1) I'm not sure what you mean by "Jungian theories" in the plural. Jungian theory is an umbrella term that includes a wide variety of ideas related to human psychology because Jung's writings covered quite a lot of ground. One aspect was personality. One aspect was ego operations. One aspect was human development.

Technically speaking, you shouldn't be comparing humanistic and Jungian psychology because they are not in the same category. The former is an overarching perspective or "school of thought" in the field of psychology, whereas the latter is a sub-specialty of another overarching school of thought called psychoanalytic psychology. Therefore, you ought to be comparing humanistic and psychoanalytic schools of thought.

Historically, humanistic psychology arose in part as a response to the shortcomings of psychoanalytic psychology. If you would like to know more about the pros/cons of various schools of thought in psychology, the best way is to consult a brief history of the field which explains the context of how each school came into being.

(2) You (or the book you're reading) seem to be referencing early developments in the field, so be forewarned that the ideas you're looking for could be outdated. The psychoanalytic school isn't really considered a part of mainstream psychology in the US anymore, though there are still some professionals who choose to specialize in it or adapt the ideas to current times. It tends to be more popular in European circles. Current approaches in the US favor more scientific/empirical approaches, e.g., neuropsychology or cognitive-behavioral psychology.

The psychoanalytic school encompasses many well-known early theorists in the field, of which Carl Jung is but one example. Others include: Sigmund Freud, Melanie Klein, Alfred Adler, Anna Freud, Karen Horney, Erich Fromm, Erik Erikson. IMO, all of these individuals (and their academic descendants) contributed some important ideas to psychology that are worth learning about. Most of them touched upon personality and human development in some way. I mainly discuss the ego psychology of Jung and his descendants, as well as how the ideas connect to current developments in psychology. Since "personality development" is too broad and vague a request, all I can say is feel free to explore other psychoanalytic ideas from the above theorists.

(3) Personality is a diverse subfield of psychology. If you'd like to get a good overview of the whole subfield rather than limit yourself to psychoanalytic theory, consult a current first-year college textbook that provides an introduction to all the schools of thought available. Or, if what you're really looking for is to realize your personal potential, you can look into the subfield of positive psychology. (See the recommendations on the resources page.)

A well-written book should provide an objective view/evaluation of whatever school of thought is being discussed. My formal studies in psychology included a strong emphasis on the history and evolution of the field. From this perspective, one should understand that every school was developed with a specific purpose in mind. For example, when you want to understand your past, psychoanalysis is a good choice. If that's not your focus and you want to do something such as learn how to handle depression and be a more functional person, then the cognitive-behavioral approach might be a better choice.

In other words, each school of thought in psychology was developed carefully by intelligent people who wanted to address a particular aspect/angle of human psychology. The tools of any school could be of great value to you as long as you understand what they ought to be used for and use them as intended.

[kalcifers-blog]

MAG 114209: The IRIS of The Eye

A JSE Ego x TMA Crossover fanfic

Content Warning!! Discussions of violence, self inflicted injury and insinuation of suicidal behaviour. Nothing is in graphic detail, but please stay safe while reading!!

[Tape Recorder clicks]

The Archivist: (sighs) Alright, let's try this again shall we-

Chase Brody: oh for fu- is that really necessary? Why do you people all insist on recording people??

The Archivist: oh- sorry this is just- procedure. It's kind of my job to make sure statements are recorded properly- unless you don't- want- to make a statement?

Chase: (interrupted the last sentence) No- no. I'm sorry- I just- I need to do this I think. I'm not exactly sure what this place is but... I think- somethin' tells me that this is the place to get this out there somehow

The Archivist: I see.. well. Whenever you're ready, we can begin

Chase: (deep breath) okay. Yeah I'm ready.

The Archivist: Alright. Statement of Chase Brody regarding the entity referred to as ALTR 114209. Statement taken directly from sub- from Mr. Brody himself. Statement overseen and recorded by Jonathan Sims. The Archivist. Statement begins:

Chase: [statement]

I feel like I can't really talk about this without some context first? I grew up in Ireland- you- you probably already guessed that because of the accent- but yeah. I'm from Ireland. My life there was miserable. I grew up in a small town. One of those classic "everyone knows everyone" schticks. Mostly because my Ma insisted on going to the local church to do all her socialising- I went there too consistently 'til she passed. I was 15 at the time.

Before she did I was convinced I wanted her out of my life, we never got along- I'm not saying that I completely change my mind now it's just- when someone like that leaves your life forever you start thinking about "what could have been" far more often. When she did pass I knew I wanted out- I needed to get away so I saved up my scraps of money to go to college in Britain. Maybe I wanted to get away or run from my feelings- I just. The way everyone would look at me, knowing what I was going through, giving me these- disgusting looks of pity- I needed out. I needed a get away.

So I moved. My Father didn't care too much, the man was out half the time for work and when he wasn't his hand was glued to his ale. I told myself I wouldn't end up like that- miserable sack of shit but- (chuckles sadly) I- I guess things don't always go to plan, huh?

Anyway- My life did start turnin' around when I got to the UK. The college I went too was pretty mediocre but the people I met were some of the most incredible- the person who changed my life forever in ways I couldn't have ever imagined was Jack.

Jack was my first friend- after realising we where both Irish and kinda had a really uncanny similarity to us, everyone always joked that we had to be twins because of how similar we looked. Despite the fact I'm nearly four years older than him- anyway uh- he got me into gaming.

I'd played games before of course but, this was the first time I played proper video games, especially the horror games, my Ma tried convincin me anything to do with horror was born out of evil and well- actually playing them for the first time was really eye opening as to how stupid that idea was.

I know this all sounds like useless information but I promise it's important- what you need to know is that Jack was my best friend. He introduced me to things that would be some of my favourite things ever, he was there when I got with and broke up with my first boyfriend and through everything, all of those disgusting sides of how bad my mental health got, Jack was one of the only ones who stuck by my side. So when he asked me to be his editor when his YouTube career took off I didn't think twice about saying yes.

I don't think I need to tell you about the successful YouTuber Jacksepticeye- and how he's the largest ever YouTuber from Ireland- how he managed to accumulate millions of subscribers before his disappearance on Halloween of 2016.

Of course, now I know that video that was put up on his channel that wasn't uploaded by me or him and definitely wasn't edited by myself wasn't actually a fake.

No one knew what to make of "Say Goodbye" when it first released. For me I was confused- Jack obviously can edit videos on his own, in fact its pretty common for him to do so- but he always lets me know if he does. There's never been an occasion in which he didn't in the entire time I was working for him. So when that video dropped with no warning I immediately felt off about it.

I won't tell you what happened in that video. You don't need to hear the details of Jack seemingly hurting himself to the point that he was placed in a medically induced coma- I was watching the video itself when I got the call- his doctor- German if I had to guess from his accent, calling me to let me know and to ask me some questions, due to the nature of his injury.

I don't care who comes in to tell you. Jack did not try to kill himself. I refuse to believe he ever would. Jack like I mentioned, was more than my boss, he was my closest friend and we told each other everything. There was just. Nothing. Not a single thing to indicate in his life that he would ever want to hurt himself like that.

I ended up staying in contact with the German doctor, his name's Henrik Schneeplestien- really nice actually. And it was talking to him that I got an email from Jack's account. Not his business "Jacksepticeye" account- his personal one, the one I knew he used exclusively for things that where for his personal life.

When I got that email my blood froze over. It was a video. It was that video. But it was longer. There was more to it. Instead of Jack's body lying there- lifeless and bleeding out. It jerked. It jerked upwards- like his muscles and joints where all connected to strings and being hoisted up against his will, like a fucking puppet.

The thing wearing Jacks dying body laughed. It laughed tormenting us- Henrik started believeing me after watching it with me the first time.

I'll spare you the details of how my life derailed after that. The months of waiting for Jack to wake up. Of Henrik losing his mind trying to understand what's going on. The disappearance of both Jack's body and Henrik himself. Me finding the most beautiful woman on the planet and finally feeling like a person again with her. Only for her and our child to be ripped away from me by that fucking thing that insisted on destroying everything in my life that gave living meaning.

Every time something bad happened it was there, still wearing Jack's face. Puppeting him around with this wicked smirk it had some crude inside joke I wasn't apart of.

I lost everything. My friend was gone, my wife and child where dead, the only person who ever cared to hear me out was missing and to top it all off I had some demon wannabe kicking my skull into rock bottom. Just so I knew that my misery wasn't over.

I had enough. I drove myself to a forest, it was our favourite place to go to as a family in the short 3 years we got to be a family. I wasn't planning on leaving that day. I decided then and there that I wasn't having it anymore. I was done. That thing won. I gave in and I just wanted it to be over.

I still can't tell you what happened to me. But I was in the forest one second and the next I was on top of a parking garage miles away. Whatever happened to me, I knew it was the only weird thing that wasn't brought to me because of that fucking monster. I still don't know what- but I just. I just KNOW alright. I just. Know.

Anyway, not long after that I'm detained by IRIS. Your institute already have all the information you need on that fucking place. I was there for questioning about what happened to me that day. And my experiences with the thing thats been destroying my life. There wasn't anything more to say other than what I've already told you.

They where about to put me under "special containment" dragging me against my will further in the building. The whole building felt like it was screaming at me to leave- that something bad was going to happen- I wished I was wrong.

That thing came back. It was still wearing my friends face and it killed any and all workers that came close to it. All it said to me was "hello, Chase" before I blacked out. I don't remember how I somehow managed to wake up in London- or how this nagging voice in my brain told me to come here. I don't know what "ALTR 114209" is, why it decided I was going to be it's plaything or what it even is. I just....

I just need someone to know that this thing is out there and more people will die if IRIS continues the way it has done for years now.

[Statement Ends]

Chase: (deep sigh) Jesus- I- How'd you- how did you get me to do that-

The Archivist: trust me, that's a long story- I just. I'm sorry are you insinuating that IRIS is somehow- responsible? For the actions of this entity?

Chase: yeah I thought I made that pretty fucking obvious man. IRIS has done nothing but hide the truth from me, borderline torture me and do absolute jack shit when something bad happens to anyone- including their own workers mind you.

The Archivist: Okay well... Fair enough. But please be cautious, if IRIS is behind all of this. You don't want to talk about it here, not in a place like this

Chase: oh just because your boss is watching doesn't mean I have to worry about him snitching to the SCP ripoff

The Archivist: wait- what did you jus- how did you- do you. (Whispering) Do you know that Elias Bouchard is listening and can see everyone in the building- there's no way for you to of....

The Archivist: Oh..... I see.. Chase I- I think I know why you might be a target-

Chase: (quietly) wh.. what- what do you mean by that..?

The Archivist: let me get you a drink. This will take a long time to explain.

[Tape Recorder clicks off]

That's all!! Thank you SM if you read through this, I'm very new to writing fanfic so I hope that this is alright!! A lot of people really liked the idea of a crossover between JSE lore and TMA so of course I had to write up how I imagine Chase Brody's Statement.

Again thank you SM for all the support and I hope to get some more drawing/writing done soon!! <333