#the opposite of the problem

[komodocloud]

being a white afab nonbinary can be difficult, occasionally.

not in the way that i am invalidating enbys who are also part of other minorities, but as in i'm now being labelled a "fake" enby because of the pushback against their terrible lack of representation. just because i'm white and afab.

i find it atrocious that such little human, nonwhite, non-androgynous or fem enby rep exist still.

however, whoever has decided that injustice is solved by redirecting the injustice towards the majority is so sorely mistaken.

i should not have to "prove" my gender just because i was born female and white. they are mutually exclusive. poc, amab enbies should be lifted, and that is the whole of it.

i might get hate but i am not looking for sympathy. i just find it ridiculous how people have decided to address this problem.

[andtosaturn]

BARBIE (2023) dir. Greta Gerwig

[thetragicallynerdy]

too many hyperspecific polls time for the least specific poll of them all

[wolvesandvisions]

to anyone who draws and experiences wrist pain like I do i. I figured out the blindspot to solving the pain. maybe this is obvious but whatever. im honestly I'm frustrated at myself for not knowing sooner bcs I was an athlete for so long. but what always confused and frustrated me was that no matter how much i stretched the pain wasnt going away

people always linked n shared resources to stretches and it'd give me temporary relief but not deal with the issue especially not any longer than the time it took me to stretch.

u do have to stretch. but u ALSO HAVE TO WORK OUT YOUR ARMS.

the reason we are hurting so much is because that muscle is doing a lot of repetitive and strenuous motion but the whole length of your arms and wrists aren't strong enough to withstand that much work.

u cant just stretch. buy a set of light-ish weights and just pick a set of wrist and arm workouts u like. do them often. stretch and do those work outs. i really dont even think it matters which you do I do a combination of this and this

just pick ones u like that are good for you, working out can be fun and not miserable i promise. do it. save ur wrists. my life has changed, i still feel pain but ive been able to work and not be ready to cry the next day from daring to try

[nikutsuneart]

Day 2: Ragnarok | Rebirth

An empty start and a false end.

[autball]

Contrary to popular belief, “hating praise” is not just a PDA thing. There are many reasons it could not sit right with someone.

It’s also assumed that people like this just hate all praise, but that’s not true either. What we hate is feeling manipulated, or lied to, or monitored, etc.

I mean, do you realize how much adults are encouraged to use praise to manipulate kids and people in care?? We’re supposed to use it to get more of the behaviors we like, and to promote a “growth mindset,” and to encourage them to stick with activities we think are good for them, and so on and so on.

That’s so much trying to get people to do what we want them to do! Is it really any wonder that praise could end up feeling disingenuous and manipulative after a while? How often are we just genuinely appreciating something they’ve done or who they are as a person, and how are they to know the difference?

If you have someone in your life who reacts badly when you praise them, maybe take a look at your motivations or the way you’re doing it instead of assuming they are the one with the problem. Maybe there’s something like low self esteem or rejection sensitivity skewing their perception, or maybe their perception is just fine and they’re picking up on your ulterior motives (and they don’t appreciate it!).

And please know that you don’t have to withdraw all praise. Everyone wants to feel like they’re good at *something* and that people like what they do. Just wait until it’s wanted, and make sure it’s genuine, with no expectations attached.

[yume127]

I find it interesting how Roxas is often described as the “angry one” or “short-tempered one” when compared to Sora or Ventus, mostly because I always felt Sora and Ven have a shorter fuse than Roxas.

The association between Roxas and anger is understandable, because many of Roxas’ most poignant moments in the series happen when he is very (and understandably) angry, but I also feel like it’s a disservice to his character to only reduce him to his anger, especially when it’s far from who he is in normal circumstances.

For example, during Days, many Organization members treat him poorly and insult him to his face and, for the most part, Roxas doesn’t react at all. In Halloween Town, Lock, Shock, and Barrel throw bombs in his face multiple times before Roxas finally snaps at them. He senses that many people around him are keeping things from him, but it takes him months before he confronts someone about it. That’s far from someone I’d consider short-tempered or easy to anger.

The only situation I can think of when we see him get upset quickly is if anyone does or says something bad to Xion and, even then, the most of his reaction is verbally snapping at Saix to make him stop disrespecting her. In Axel’s case (when Roxas is upset with him for attacking Xion), Roxas doesn’t confront him at all, he just avoids him altogether. Also, I think it’s important to note that every moment in which Roxas is very angry happens when his entire life is falling apart, which is a situation in which, I believe, everyone would be upset.

Roxas seems the kind of person who bottles everything up without much reaction until it becomes too much and he explodes, and that’s when he has a hard time controlling his anger/emotions. Having spent most of his life in the organization probably plays a part in it as, every time he brings up any emotion, his feelings are invalidated and suppressed. That’s not an environment that gave him the tools to process strong emotions in a healthy way.

Let’s compare that to Ventus. Ven is the definition of short-tempered in BBS. He’s ready to throw hands with Vanitas the moment he says something remotely bad about Terra, which was minutes after he met him for the first time. He fought the dwarves without a second thought just because they refused to talk with him. His first reaction when he becomes small and is trapped in a mousetrap is to shout. These are just some examples from the top of my head, but it’s clear Ven has a shorter fuse than Roxas.

Ventus usually expresses how he feels in any given situation and has a short fuse. On the flip side, he doesn’t seem to hold on to these feelings at all. He externalises them the moment he feels them, but then he lets it go and it doesn’t bother him anymore. Out of the three of them, Ventus seems the most open about his emotions and, from what I remember, when he opens up about feeling a certain way with his friends, his feelings are usually not invalidated nor brushed aside. In UX, Ventus seems calmer and doesn’t have much anger in him, but he’s still open to expressing his feelings of low self-worth and sadness with the other union leaders.

Sora, I think he falls in the middle? He seems to have a shorter temper compared to Roxas, which was especially clear in KH2, where he snaps at the Organization multiple times, but he also bottles up his emotions more than Ven, especially around his friends. This happens mostly with his sadness, which he always tries to hide or brush aside, but in KH3 we can also see, for example, how much he’s bothered by everyone constantly bringing up him not passing the Mark of Mastery, even if he tries not to show it.

I think Sora feels like he should always be happy for his friends’ sake, and even during the rare moments when he tries to express his sadness, his feelings are not truly welcomed (“No frowning. No sad faces. This boat runs on happy faces”), so he just tries to brush it off as a joke. He’s loud in expressing any kind of positive emotion, and he openly expresses his anger against his enemies (and to his friends too, sometimes), but he also doesn’t hold on to that anger and is pretty forgiving. However, he usually bottles up his sadness, low self-esteem and other negative feelings, and then explodes when he can’t hold it together any longer (like it happened at the Keyblade Graveyard when he thought all his friends were gone forever).

[fusionspruntcityjournal]

[lgbtlunaverse]

You know sometimes I think about that whole narrative tragedy around Huaisang where to get revenge for his brother on jgy he has to become more and more like jgy and turn into a person that his brother would hate. And yes the scheming and the lying and the making other people do your dirty work so you'll never get caught and have to face consequences for your actions is all very foils. Very tragedy. Love it.

But then I think back to nieyao in the fire palace and how it's not the spy thing Nie Mingjue is mad about, not really. He didn't know about it and changes his mind on trying to kill meng yao when xichen tells him but he's still mad and it's not the spy thing. However many cultivators he killed and tortured under Wen Ruohan's orders because he couldn't lose his cover are a factor but the crux of it? It's those last few. And specifically that Meng Yao had an out. A way for them to survive. And he used it. But only for Nie Mingjue. All the others got killed on the spot but Nie Mingjue got the out, got to live. And maybe (likely) if he'd tried to save the others Nie Mingjue would have needed to die but Nie Mingjue has been ready to die for his sect since he was 14 and if it meant defeating Wen Ruohan he'd be happy to. The fact is that those last deaths weren't to defeat Wen Ruohan but to keep Nie Mingjue alive and that is what he can't forgive. It's that after everything the thing he is so angry at Meng Yao for is choosing to value his life over that of his men.

And then I look back at Nie Huaisang who lied and schemed, yes, but who, most importantly, committed so hard to his headshaker persona that the Nie clan declined by the year, a shadow of its former self after only a decade of leadership.

And I realize that both Meng Yao and Nie Huaisang at one point looked at Nie Mingjue, and then looked at multitudes of Nie sect cultivators, and decided that Nie Mingjue was more important. And that's what he'd hate the most.

[mudstoneabyss]

keep seeing posts about that one playlist posts and I've decided you all make character playlists wrong. they're not about being 100% accurate or sounding cohesive they're about putting any and every song that so much as reminds you of that character and, most importantly, having fun

[robinmage]

one thing i really appreciate about jinshi's character is how he has NEVER once actually had any intention of succeeding the throne. every time the idea is brought up he immediately detests it. so hes giving maomao as much as he possibly can, even though maomao has many qualms about it due to their difference in social status, but jinshi DOESNT CARE because hes NEVER cared about or wanted the status of crown prince! its been nothing but a burden to him! from his perspective the ONLY thing keeping the two of them apart are outside influences. he has no doubt within himself-- hes horribly down bad, in fact. but unfortunately his stupid JOB is getting in the way of him skipping off into the sunset with his favourite little cat

[l-e-i-k-o]

𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕡𝕒𝕟𝕔𝕒𝕜𝕖𝕤.

[trans-androgyne]

Transandrophobia theory is not incompatible with transmisogyny theory. Look into my eyes and understand this, I’m begging you.

Quote from Julia Serano’s 2021 article “What is Transmisogyny”: “For others (e.g., certain nonbinary people, trans male/masculine-spectrum people), misogyny may intersect with transphobia in different ways that aren’t adequately articulated by transmisogyny. This doesn’t necessarily make transmisogyny ‘wrong’; it may simply mean that we need additional language.”

From her 2016 article “Articulating Transmisogyny”: “I have observed people using ‘trans-misogyny’ as shorthand to suggest that ‘trans men are privileged, and trans women oppressed, end of story.’ I reject such oversimplifications.”

We are not on opposite sides. There are large misunderstandings at work here. Transmascs are as capable of (trans)misogyny just as much as anyone else, AND they have experiences with the intersection of transphobia and misogyny. These things can both be true.

[originalartblog]

a pitch: Tsujimura and Higuchi run into each other as civilians and accidentally end up bonding. Now they meet every other week to eat, shop and hang out. They trade work advice about their definitely normal office jobs and troublesome coworkers. They have no idea who the other really works for.

[stuckinapril]

Honestly a big reason for why I don’t get over shit as quickly as I can is because I can’t fucking stop talking about it. And by that I mean I’ll quietly resolve w myself that I’m over something or something, and then in my typical indecisive nature I’ll either ruminate on it hours later or vent about it w a friend. I hadn’t realized how powerful just TALKING about something bothering you was until now. Even if you’re close to getting over something, just verbalizing that it bothers you can bring you 3 steps back. Yeah processing emotions is important, but the moment that’s done I need to actually be firm w myself about moving on. Like it’s done. We’re over it. We’re not gonna waver when someone asks us how we’re dealing w it. We will not complain about it unnecessarily. We simply keep it pushing

[picturejasper20]

Looking back the ending of Gravity Falls while thinking about endings of other series like Amphibia and The Ghost and Molly Mcgee, Weirdmageddon has a message that is underwhelming when it comes to Dipper and Mabel's relationship and Mabel's potrayal in the show.

This isn't about Mabel getting tricked by Bill. She is a 12-13 years old that in that context she was feeling really bad and not thinking well what she was doing. That isn't relevant to the topic at hand and honestly it isn't a problem she did that, it does makes sense in the episode it happened.

What i have an issue is how the narrative makes Dipper feel bad about considering staying studying with Stanford. This is something that Dipper was interested in and he was very fascinated by anything that was paranormal related. Stanford himself told Dipper he had a lot of potential and the kid was digging into it.

Mabel lashing out and not liking the idea of Dipper staying with Stanford is understandable in the episode Dipper and Mabel vs. the Future. She doesn't seem to have much friends back in her home and her parents are implied to not be the best. She gets scared of Dipper leaving, that's a reasonable fear for a kid to have.

However, as i mentioned before, Dipper is made feel bad about considering choosing something he wants to do. It isn't Mabel who has to learn that things change and sometimes this brings things we don't like. She doesn't exactly consider what Dipper wants for himself, she mainly cares about how ¨she is going to be alone¨ and making her brother feel selfish for choosing his own path or do something that could make him happy.

Yes, she learns that things can't stay the same forever and they are growing up, that itself is a pretty good development for her and overall a good message to teach.

Yet her being codependent on Dipper doesn't get brought up nor addressed, in fact the series seems to praise this behavior of hers. In how Dipper has to do what she wants if not he is a bad brother. Mabel's clinginess and controlling behaviour to an extent isn't called out, which that itself is a problem.

Small edit: I want to add an extra point here that Mabel does have a short scene near the end of the episode that she tells Dipper that she won't get in his way if he wants to stay with Stanford and she was ¨acting nuts¨ in the dream bubble. This is good for her but it does still feel in part that her issues weren't fully acknowledged and it doesn't help she didn't say this until after Dipper told her that he was going to stay with her and not be with Stanford, which is rather questionable in my opinion. It would have been more appropiate in the episode to have this brought up and getting adressed better than for her to wait for Dipper to do what she wanted.

In contrast in Amphibia, Marcy Wu has a similar arc about change. The series explores how she can take her escapism too far and how she can be very selfish in plenty of ways, something that is potrayed as an aspect she has to learn from and realize that it isn't healthy.

Her being too codependent on Anne and Sasha and their overall friendship is potrayed as toxic and the series explores this relationship a lot, having the girls grow over time and think about different aspects they have to work on.

In ¨True Colors¨ it is revealed that Marcy Wu learned about the Calamity Box the same day she got told by her parents that they were moving away. Very afraid of having to leave her friends behind and having to be alone in a new city, she found the Calamity Box and told Sasha and Anne about it. Worth of mentioning she didn't know if it would work but it was a desperate act of her just to not having to move away from her friends yet.

When Sasha and Anne find out about this they are, not surprisingly, very pissed and push from Marcy away for a moment, making Marcy realize her mistake and eventually apologizes for what she did.

In ¨All In¨ Marcy finally comes to terms with how she can't force Anne and Sasha to be the way she wants them to be and that her codependency on them isn't a good thing. She realizes that has to move away to her new home at some point, that things change but that doesn't mean the three of them have to stop being friends.

As you can see, there is a clear difference between how Mabel Pines and Marcy Wu’s characters and flaws are potrayed in the narrative. While Gravity Falls makes Mabel’s codependency and controlling behaviour to be something acceptable and that Dipper should conform to, Amphibia does the complete opposite and presents Marcy Wu’s actions as flaws she has and that can hurt other people, including her friends. She is the one that has to make a change and understand she has to work on herself if she wants to have new friends and keep these relationships as times moves on.

Since we are on topic, one thing that really bothered me is how Mabel created a version of Dipper that is ¨cool¨ and says yes and goes along with everything she wants to do. (Weirdmageddon Part 2)

This has… interesting implications of how Mabel believes that relationships should work, or at least with her brother twin Dipper. A lot has to do with how she and Dipper have very different personalities and she maybe wishes that he was more like her, but expecting someone else to say ¨yes¨ to everything you want is a toxic mentality to have. And the episode itself doesn’t address this enough, it doesn’t bring up to Mabel she can’t expect people to work like this and she should try thinking more about what others wants.

Lets talk about The Ghost and Molly Mcgee. In this series Molly Mcgee often has episodes where she has to learn certain lessons. One of them she learns over time is that often she has to give up control and let what others want to do instead.

A good example of this is ¨Ready, Set, Snow!¨ in which she is constanly trying to make Libby and Scratch to go and play outside in the snow with her without considering they would rather stay inside and sit near the fire for the moment. She spends most of the episode trying to find ways to make them go outside until she gets angry and goes out on her own. She has… quite of a mental breakdown in a sequence song. Scratch goes to check on her but he tells to her that she can’t do always what she wants and what it is important is for her to be spending time with her friends. Molly realizes she was wrong, goes back to the house and she apologizes for how she acted.

Molly has quite a lot of episodes like this, and all this becomes important in the series finale ¨The End¨ when she sees that Scratch has to go back to be Todd even if that means forgetting the memories he got as a ghost, her included. She tells Scratch that she is going to miss him a lot but she knows that forcing Scratch to stay wouldn’t be right. She encourages Scratch to go and ¨live his life¨ because she cares about Scratch being happy.

Similar to Marcy Wu, Molly learns that she can’t force people to do what she wants and she has to let them choose for themselves. She knows that encouraging Scratch to do what he always wanted to do as human is the right thing to do, even if it means saying goodbye to him.

I do understand the idea that Gravity Falls was doing at with something among the lines of ¨Dipper and Mabel not repeating the same mistakes that their uncles did¨ but that doesn’t mean Dipper has to give up his dreams at expense of what Mabel wants. As Dipper said in VS The Future episode: he can still visit and they can still talk to each other. They don’t have to fall apart the same way Standford and Stan did. Just like in Amphibia, if Marcy still was able to remain friends with Anne and Sasha over the years, the same can be applied to Dipper and Mabel as siblings.

If not, it could be rewritten in a way that makes Dipper reconsider that he would like to wait a few years before joining Stanford in his adventures. That he is still a kid and wants to spend a while longer figuring himself out and be with Mabel before making a decision. That way it feels more like a decision he wants to do for himself and goes along with his character arc that he doesn’t have to rush to grow up.

As for Mabel, she has a lot of growing up to do. She has to learn overtime that Dipper is his own person and he can take is own path. That if she wants to have friends or have in general healthy relationships with others, she can’t make it always about herself and people have their own needs as well. She would have to work on her codependency and clinginess she has on others, specially her own brother. This would help her with being a more mature capable individual when she grows up.

This post on itself isn’t me hating on Mabel’s character since she has moments she can be good and i feel a lot of her behaviour comes from not being taught properly and being a teenager. The problem is that the series doesn’t address this behaviour enough and, as result, it comes off as the series giving an unintentional underwhelming message of potraying Mabel’s issues as something that should be acceptable and not her having a dynamic with Dipper that comes off as toxic. It is important to understand to learn to support others and not always make things about ourselves. That sometimes relationships change and we can’t force people to be in a specific way.