#w an agnostic no less

[lottalove01]

rant <3

[astrxealis]

i will return on tumblr soon bcs i'm graduating hs soon and acads r done so i have a Lot of time on my hands for now Anyway can i just say am very proud of myself. got into the Top 1 school in my country, top campus, and a vv competitive stem course. yay 😁💝💘❤️‍🔥✨

[teabutmakeitazure]

Burgeon Part 3 - continued

As Chrollo takes off his shoes by the door, he can hear you cursing over something. At first, he's puzzled over your colourful string of words, but when he rounds the corner and peeks into the kitchen, he discovers the situation that you are in at the moment.

"Do you need help with that, dear?"

You startle, turning your body completely to face him as you gape. "W-when did you get back?"

"Just now," he shrugs. "Why are you in the kitchen? I recall asking you to stay away until your hand is healed."

The jar in your hand is promptly placed on the counter next to you. Sighing, you click your tongue, displeasure written over your face. "I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself."

"And yet you horribly cut your hand, then proceeded to cry in pain afterwards."

"It's a natural human response."

"Natural human response is to solve the problem on hand, quite literally in your case, not sob over it."

Your eyes narrow at him, and Chrollo smiles at the cuteness.

"Oh forgive me, great mister Lucilfer, one of the most feared men in the criminal world, that I still have human emotions left in me."

"There's no need." Chrollo takes a few steps closer, stopping just a few feet away. "They make you more adorable, so why would I want them gone?"

"Has anyone ever told you that you shouldn't have been blessed with vocal cords?"

"Perhaps you can take up that issue with fate."

Groaning, you reach for the jar again. Chrollo simply watches, growing more amused as you tuck it between your injured hand's elbow and your hip. You try to twist the lid with the other hand, but it doesn't budge.

Out of very pure intentions to help you, Chrollo reaches for the jar himself, but you stop him short of the action with a glare. The two of you maintain eye contact while his hand remains suspended mid air, fingers reaching for the troublesome item. Soon, the lid opens with a pop, and you stick your tongue out at him in mocking.

"I don't need your help."

Chrollo hums, smile widening when he recalls last night. "Really? You were hugging me in your sleep last night."

Placing the jar and lid on the counter, you give no reaction. "Perhaps I mistook you for the sweet embrace of death."

"Ah, you should know I'm much, much worse than that, darling."

A few emotions cycle through your countenance. Confusion, thought, and realisation. Chrollo watches every furrow of your brows, the widening of your eyes, and the slightest parting of your lips with intrigue, carving the sight into his mind. It's when you look at him again that he feels rewarded.

"Oh leave me alone, you gothic fanatic."

"Are you sure I'm not an agnostic?"

"I couldn't care less."

You walk away, leaving the jar open on the counter, while trying your best not to comment on how he eyes you. Ah. You're too cute sometimes.

[andreablog2]

I’ve been having some reverse spiritual epiphanies lately. I’m basically coming to terms w the fact that a variety of things in the todays unofficial agnostic spiritual cannon aren’t real/never will be. I’m really content w the unfairness w aspects of my own life, the fact that I can’t make people less cruel on my own, can’t manipulate situations to my benefit through manifesting, I’ll never live another life, I can’t wish for anything…things like that.

[queenie-blackthorn]

a sign of sa3at alWiama / the end of times is supposedly ‘a man looking at another’s grave and wishing he was the latter’ (as if being suicidal hadn’t existed forever) and also the guilt about that because suicide is a sin (that has not helped anyone struggling with being suicidal and only makes things worse, especially adding onto that how many families deny suicides and say their kids just died naturally. (i’ve experienced this first hand. my friend in ninth grade. his mom lied to my face when i asked what had happened) Which is why the suicide rate in muslim countries is so low, it’s not because of good mental health at all, also the people themselves will often go out of their way to make the suicide look like an accident.

thoughts?

hmm

this is a really interesting take. ive never heard of anyone claiming this, but i cant deny that it is highly possible. perhaps the suicide rates are low because theyre unreported, yes (and may i say this is gonna sound shallow but im sorry about your friends death)

before elaborating id like to mention that i am in no way a scholar of islam, and my knowledge of religion stems purely from my islamic education in school, my very religious parents, and the occasional tutor, and my knowledge in psychology is only from half a year im the gcse course, an innumerable amount of informational videos on youtube, and my personal mental health issues

now, im gonna assume you live in a muslim country as i do and are, obviously, therefore surrounded by muslims. youd know that a surprising amount of people call themselves muslims but are in fact (by definition) apostates

okay, so in my experience: people who are very practicing in religion, be it islam or christianity or whatever, tend to be happier w their lives. the more religious they are, the more they believe that its a part of gods plan and if you just bear it youll be rewarded. this obviously doesnt mean that they dont suffer w mental health issues, but they do tend to have happier outlooks on life and have more satisfaction w their lives, and this is backed up by numerous studies

and i think it takes common sense to know that the happier you are w your life, the less willing you are to end it

this however does only apply to people who are actually religious, not people who dont practice as much. i think youre right when you say that the fact that suicide being a sin may add on to the guilt, but also adding on to that would be if an individual is not practicing in religion—they may feel an onset of guilt and thoughts like "im going to hell because im not religious" which may just feed into the suicidal thoughts until the guilt snowballs and potentially leads to suicide

what im trying to say in a nutshell is that youre probably right—suicide rates in muslim countries may only be lower due to the straight up denial of suicides, but also since muslim countries will, guaranteed, have religious people, the number of people unsatisfied w their lives may genuinely be at a much smaller scale compared to countries w a larger number of atheists/agnostics

im not entirely sure how to tie in that a sign of the end of times is when a man looks at the grave and wishes he was the latter, although i will say this. i dont think its the presence of suicial people that makes it a sign, but when it becomes widespread, thats when it becomes a sign of يوم القيامة / the day of judgement approaching.

for example, literacy. literacy has obviously been present. but when its widespread, then its considered a sign of the end of times. so i think its not suicidal thoughts alone that are a sign of the day of judgement, but when they become as widespread as they are now, thats when it means the day of judgement approaches

[bakurapika]

Fellow ex-christian kid who's words were HEAVILY censored (I wasn't allowed to say something "sucks", "crap", or even call things stupid). By far one of the most validating things I ever learned is that "taking the christian god's name in vain" refers to stuff like claiming your own opinion or belief is actually biblical or claiming committing things like genocide in the name of the christian god. Basically doing evil and claiming it's divinely condoned. It does not, in any way, refer to teenagers saying coh my god". I felt very vindicated when I learned that after countless lectures.

yeah, at some point you realize that "taking _ in vain" isn't a phrase you hear anywhere else.

of course in the original, it doesn't refer to christianity but to judaism - but even that has some interesting roots behind it. (after spending most of my adulthood as an agnostic atheist, I converted to judaism ... and am still an agnostic atheist but with an asterisk and "it's complicated" lol) i like to read torah in as many ways as possible - commentaries, figuring out how people historically read it, and what the little we know from archaeology can tell us about how it was originally interpreted.

it is my VERY humble onion as a layperson (as always, i am not a rabbi, i don't speak for any other jewish people, etc etc) that most of the torah was written in the context of "other gods exist but aren't as cool as our god." idk, regional patron gods made a lot more sense once I started viewing them as analogous to mascots of their local sports team. like we don't believe those literally exist but we will still go fuckin crazy for em. i've never watched an entire football game but i do get a swell of pride and recognition whenever i see a packers logo

man im rambling. i think my point is that it's one thing for a modern religion to project its own meaning on the past (like how xtianity's trinity explains away the "we will make..." in genesis, which is indeed the plural - without the trinity, you wind up with a big theological question mark if you're married to the monotheism-has-always-been-true thing) is understandable and valid as far as that goes, but trying to figure out what the "original meaning" of the text is, that's a historical question more than a theological one imo. and it can be interesting and cool to try to figure it out, even if we'll never know the actual One True Answer. w/judaism i feel like there is so much more textual tradition of criticism that i can say more confidently that our modern interpretation is just as valid as ancient interpretation... i would feel less confident saying that about xtianity

[thatcryinggayboy]

Alone in religion.

I think it’s kind of funny, how my faith progressively gets further and further from mainstream, and yet the only thing I want is a community. When I was a child, I was an atheist. Well, when I suppose when I was around 5 I thought that being Christian was just part of life because I was a gullible child, it wasn’t until my parents were like “no you silly child, that’s not the only religion” and when I realized it wasn’t just a fact of life, I quickly dropped it.

When I was older, maybe around 10, I learned what an atheist actually was as I began to use the internet more commonly. “YES, that’s it, I’m an atheist” but like, not a fully spiritless atheist. I still believed in ghosts, I have since I used to see them around my house. That was a belief I’ve never been without.

So in 2015 I was an angsty teenager, I used to make stupid jokes and one that I had for some reason was “I blame witchcraft”. It was my first pride and I was road tripping to the big city with a couple of friends from a local LGBTQ+ group.

When we arrived at our destination, my friend E informed me that our other friend W was a Wiccan. “What the hell is that?”, I was briefly explained it was a religion based on witchcraft. “THERE ARE WITCHES?!”. I apologized to W and when I got back home, I did some research.

Now for some context, my parents always said the male equivalent of witches were warlocks. I always thought that was dumb, I always in turn said “why aren’t they both witches” because functionally, they aren’t the same. So when I found out that male witches were just… witches, I found something that connected to me. I COULD BE A WITCH.

And yes, I knew it wasn’t like the movies, I’m not that silly.

Cool, now I’m a Wiccan…. Who is god? So I did a couple of very brief google searches. “The Horned God and The Moon Goddess”. And who are they?, well, according to the first website I checked, specifically Pan and Hekate. No explanation to the archetypes and roles they were meant to play, just Hekate and Pan. Well, okay, two Greek gods, I’m down with that.

I suppose I was never truly an atheist but I didn’t want to identify as agnostic, that term never felt like me.

So now I’m a 13 year old, still figuring out who he is and now he has a religion. I’m autistic and this just became MY WORLD. Immediately I was searching and searching; eventually I found out how the horned god and moon goddess worked but now that I have these two, I’m set…..

Well not exactly. I became obsessed with the images of fertility goddesses, something about it all was so fascinating to me. And then I looked into more gods, more goddesses, different pantheons… and I did something I’m not proud of.

I was unaware of the topic of cultural appropriation when it came to religious systems. It had never come across my feed and I was never told that it was a thing. I probably should’ve known but I didn’t.

I found a new goddess I felt really connected to.

Kali.

I made her offerings, burnt incense, listened to music about Kali, and yet outside of her own religion. She felt so motherly to me, but it was not my place and to say it simply, I learned from my mistake. I discovered how insensitive it was and I sang her goodbye, but she was never meant to be my goddess to begin with.

——————

So eventually I became less and less in love with Wicca. The practice wasn’t meant for me, I still practiced witchcraft but the community was not mine.

“Well, I already have a couple of Greek gods under my belt, what is that whole thing like” so now I’m looking into Hellenic Polytheism…. Sort of. I didn’t know that there was a full religious movement, so I kind of just, felt it out. AND THEN I FOUND IT, after a little while of winging it.

And you know what, this was my place, I never felt at home more with anything else. But over time, when you study and study and pray and think and read and just sit there, your world view will change drastically. As I learned, my beliefs were a little bit more complex over time. Basic Hellenic Polytheism might not be JUST IT.

I was looking into Orphism, the Eleusinian Mysteries, I was looking in as many cults as I could to see which one perfectly matched with how I believe. I would practice for a while, see how it felt, and move on if it didn’t feel right. And I would follow multiple gods at a time, I’ve always been a a devotee of Zeus since I became Hellenic. He was the one thing I felt was right.

But I became overwhelmed, and I burnt out.

I wasn’t making offerings, saying prayers, building Kharis, I wasn’t even thinking about the gods. I still called myself a Hellenic Polytheist, but was I?

————

Okay so side note, I love learning about religions, in an effort and interest in broadening my understanding and educating myself. And I found another love, that I didn’t think I would ever be a part of so I appreciated it from a distance. I really love Judaism. Everything about it, the laws, the cultures, the language, the fact that no Jewish person is the same and that’s embraced. But I was unaware that converts where a thing. For a while.

Eventually I found out that conversation to Judaism existed, but I still stood back.

In 2022 I went to work for a summer camp further up the coast from my hometown. I was so excited. I worked in the kitchen and while I didn’t interact with the counselors much, I wanted to befriend them. They were so full of life, they had that city energy that I so badly craved. And there were two in particular that I was able to become semi-closer with. Not by much because I don’t actively seek out friendship, I just hope it happens. But I still considered them the closest friends there. I’ll call them P and B.

One day in the kitchen, we were preparing lunch and P & B came in, they looked directly at me and asked me if I was “part of the tribe”, maybe they weren’t meaning to look at me because they were friendly with other kitchen staff but it felt like they were. I said “…huh?” And they asked “are you Jewish”. I told them no but I did like the religion. That was that and they moved on. But something in me didn’t.

It was almost as if my soul was looked into, I could feel that question in my very fibers.

Fuuuuuuck.

I just don’t know who I am do I? Will I ever? I feel like Trisha Paytas, I can’t just be playing dress up with religions, especially not closed ones. I didn’t want to take advantage of other people beliefs for my own benefit. That’s not chill.

——————

So back to where I was before. My religious beliefs were sort of fading. I wasn’t fully connected anymore, even if I still loved Zeus. Eventually, I stumbled my way onto Jewish TikTok.

So many creators who I enjoy, Jewitches, Danielle Silverstone, and Zara Zahavah (side note but it was like a dream come true when she answered my comment about whether or not furbys would be classified as kosher).

One night, while watching a Jewitches livestream, the switched kind of flipped, and I wanted to pursue this.

But wait? I live in a small town, there’s no synagogue for miles. The closest one is 4 hours away. There’s a community here, but I have really bad imposter syndrome and I don’t want to push my welcome. So I didn’t reach out.

I did however, start taking intro to Judaism classes online, and it was going well for a while, until I had a very uncomfortable conversation with one of the teachers. And I stopped going.

Eventually I reached out to that group in my town, but I left due to their overt Zionism, it didn’t come out fully until around the 3rd session. After that, I decided to go back to my place with the Greek gods.

It was shaky getting back into it, and as I went back into my research, I came across the cult of Hypsistos.

Hypsistarians believed in Zeus Hypsistos (most high), a monotheistic group that didn’t worship with statues but rather with the light of a flame. “But I still believe in Apollo, Aphrodité, Hermes, etc.”, as it turns out, so did they, not as gods per say but rather as angelic messenger manifestations out of Hypsistos. This fits perfectly with what I believe…. But there’s not much to work with.

There is a scarcity of sources about the group, and as far as I’ve been able to tell, I am the only one. All I’ve ever wanted is a community, people to worship with, talk about our experiences and share something so meaningful to me. And even if there were another one of me out there, I have to make educated guesses about Hypsistarians based on their ancient influences, so most things are up for interpretation.

————————

I suppose the real point of this post is to express something I can’t express to many, even if I’m speaking to the void.

Thank you.

[shadowfromthestarlight]

Addressing the Dumbest Pro-Abortion Arguments

Not an exhaustive list.

1. If men could get pregnant, there would be abortion clinics on every corner. Then men would be women. There wouldn’t be a need for two distinct sexes in nature. It’s a moot point. It’s meaningless nonsense. And even if there was no male/female binary and we were all the same, it would still be morally abhorrent to deliberately destroy our own species.

2. Abortion = women’s rights/women’s equality. a. Without the right to life, all other rights are meaningless. The most basic right is the right to not be murdered. b. It’s not equality. It’s a special right to kill that can only be exercised by a pregnant woman and her abortionist. 

3. A fetus is not human. Then what is it? Canine? Feline? Equine? Lol. 

4. The world is overpopulated. There should be less people. That is not a road we want to go down. We should not kill humans in the name of saving humanity. Who decides who is “too many?” Who decides who should die to save the world? Besides, as global wealth and childhood survival rates increase, population growth is supposed to level out. 

5. An abortion basically happens every time you have your period.  No, it doesn’t, because gametes are not distinct human organisms. 

6. If abortion is murder, then blowjobs are cannibalism. See above.

7. An abortion is like removing a cancer. No, it isn’t, because it’s removing a distinct member of the human species, which exists because of a process that is supposed to occur if the mother’s body is working the way it’s supposed to. 

8. A fetus is a parasite. No, it isn’t, because it’s a member of the same species as the mother, and if allowed to develop, will grow to the point where it can exist independently of her.

9. Pro-lifers are just Republicans who want to keep people in poverty. There are a lot less convoluted ways to keep people in poverty if that’s really the goal. Most pro-life/anti-abortion arguments are based on a belief that an unborn human being has rights, and no pro-life arguments have to do with keeping people in poverty. There are many Democrats and people of various political and religious persuasions who consider themselves pro-life. Anyone who makes this argument is truly talking out of their ass. But keep alienating people who might have become sympathetic to your side, lefties. It’s fun to watch. 

10. Abortion is simply none of the government’s business.  Homicide is the government’s business and the number one thing government is instituted for. Unless one is an anarchist, believing that the government should completely ignore certain types of homicide is logically inconsistent and quite frankly inconsistent with most political philosophies. 

11. Abortion is just a religious issue.  It’s an issue of whether and when certain classes of human beings can be killed. It is not exclusively a religious issue. There are many atheists and agnostics who oppose abortion or believe it should be restricted. 

12. The fetus/embryo is just a clump of cells/blob of tissue and not really a life yet. Putting aside the fact that size shouldn’t determine a human being’s value, and that everyone is ultimately giant clumps of cells, If that’s the reason you’re in favor of abortion, you should be in favor of strict cutoff points where the fetus is developed enough to look recognizably human, is making movements, can feel pain, etc. Why do so many pro-choice people vehemently oppose restrictions on abortion after certain cutoff points like 15 or 20 weeks, when there’s no longer any plausible deniability that abortion ends a human life? P.S. try telling grieving parents who just went through a miscarriage that their baby wasn’t real or doesn’t matter because it was just a clump of cells; I’m sure that’ll go over well.

13. A fetus is just a part of a woman’s body and a person should be allowed to remove part of their own body. No, it is a distinct human organism with its own body. Also, removal of body parts is a serious procedure that is much more regulated than pro-choicers want abortion to be, just sayin’.

14. Abortion restrictions violate religious liberty. Even if some people’s religious beliefs do not prohibit abortion, it does not follow that abortion is a core part of their religious practice. Many people who claim this also might find that if they dug deeper into what their religion teaches, that it isn’t in favor of abortion except in grave circumstances such as preserving the life of the mother. Also, not all but many pro-choicers support forcing doctors to perform abortions, forcing religious hospitals to have abortion available, and forcing people to fund abortion, which is an actual violation of religious liberty. 

15. Abortion is better for children because otherwise they would be abused or in foster care.  Not really true, again this is just people talking out of their asses. A lot of kids who go into foster care were born in places where abortion was easily accessible and where there were safe haven laws so their mothers could have easily given them up. For whatever reason, their mothers chose to keep them. In many cases, foster kids have a parent or parents who are trying to get them back, and  reunification is always the family court’s priority. Consider how insulting it is to say that those kids would be better off dead. Also, something that pro-choicers misunderstand or perhaps maliciously lie about is that giving a child up for adoption is not the same as putting a child in foster care. There are many agencies out there ready to place babies in permanent homes from day one.

***

This is just meant to address some of the very common NPC-level posts that go around whenever abortion is in the news. More nuanced and interesting arguments to be addressed in a later post. If you want to send one to me, go ahead; I guarantee I’ve seen it already and have an answer or that one of the pages I follow has a post on it. 

[wiccxn-child]

Divine Intervention

Hi all, I usually wouldn't post here as I'm not as involved in paganism as I used to be (I would say I still am pagan, however), much less online. I've always been a little more agnostic than actually believing the deities I work with are tangible beings, as I have a lot of trauma with fundamentalist Christianity and have a little distaste for literal faith, personally. Obviously, if you feel differently, that's perfectly valid. It's just how my spiritual journey has progressed over the years.

However, I just went through an experience that I genuinely feel was some sort of divine intervention.

I run a game development organization at my university, and over the last semester or so, a freshman I met became one of my best friends through this group (this will be important later). We'll call them Merry. Every Friday, after out meetings, a majority of the group goes out to dinner at a restaurant here in town. Because of Easter, we weren't going to have a meeting or our dinner this week. However, I truly think something intervened in my fate and put me exactly where I needed to be.

On Thursday, I was at my department's building, waiting to briefly meet with my advisor after he finished teaching a class. I almost didn't stay, because I had work soon after, but something just made me decide to stay anyway to meet with him. While I was waiting, Merry passed by me, and mentioned they had forgotten to take their medication and was heading back to their dorm to do so. Understandably, I was like "aw, that sucks" and then said "it's for epilepsy!" and I was obviously like "oh yes, go get that!"

I was supposed to go home for Easter weekend this Friday, to spend some time with my family. Since my university is 4 - 5 hours away from my hometown, I haven't been able to visit very often due to work and being extremely busy with my masters program. However, Thursday night, my parents called me to inform me that they had contracted COVID, and didn't think it was a good idea for me to come the next day. I was disappointed, but understood.

Because I was in town, although we couldn't have our weekly meeting, I decided to have dinner with the organization members who were still in town for the break. The other members (including Merry) decided to hang out later that night, and although they invited me, I wasn't sure I would go as well since I had a exam to take and was worried about being exhausted. However, I eventually decided to go last minute after I had completed the exam when my friend asked me I was going.

I showed up at 10:15p, and we hung out a little bit and eventually started watching a movie around 10:30p. Merry and my other friend were smoking, but I was sober since I have a drug screening for my medication coming up. I considered drinking that night, but once again, I decided last minute that I didn't really feel like it.

Merry had a seizure at exactly 11:00p. They stood up, collapsed, and started seizing. I was the only one who even knew they took seizure medication, and as my other friend panicked, I realized what was happening. Thankfully, I called 911 and I instructed my other friend to put Merry on their side. EMS came and we got them to a hospital and nothing severe happened other than a massive headache and some carpet burn from their fall, and obviously the hospital bills, but no money is worth someone's life.

I found out later from Merry's mom that they had only had one other seizure before - their doctor wasn't even sure if they had a seizure disorder or if it was a one-time occurrence, since they hadn't had any since. It wasn't something anyone was expecting, not even a little bit.

I realized today, that if all these things hadn't aligned weeks in advance, things may have gone terribly different. Not only could my other friend had been dealing with this situation on their own without any idea what was happening, but we probably would've never met for dinner if I hadn't been in town and thus my friends wouldn't be hanging out last night in the first place. Merry could've been in their dorm, where they no longer have a roommate. They could've had a seizure alone, and no one would've known. There's a very real possibility that they could've have died last night.

I am so grateful that things happened the way they did. And so many little situations occurred at just the right spots to ensure I never went home and was there in that moment.

I really feel like something knew I needed to be there for my friend. I'm really thankful, whoever you are.

[kattahj]

A personal musing on La Pluie, soulmates, and predestination

My reaction to La Pluie really made me examine how I feel about soulmates.

Now, this is more of me untangling my own feelings than it is any type of analysis of the show, so be aware of that before you hit read more (if you do).

I've always had a distaste of soulmates, but this show had me thinking more about why, and how, I get that reaction.

I did like the show, for the most part. While I put it on the backburner sometimes, I had no problem watching the whole thing (and I'm not someone who has to finish watching everything I start). In a way, how the show examined and subverted the tropes worked for me, at least up to a point, because every time I hear the word "soulmate" it's like Psycho shower scene music in my head, and that's not so dissimilar to what Saengtai feels.

But whether or not the soulmate thing is "real" in the La Pluie universe, and whether that makes it easier or harder for couples to find happiness, this is still a BL, and so the main characters HAVE to end up together! Which, poor Patts! It's not his fault I hear shower scene music every time I see his face, just because he unfortunately happens to believe in soulmates.

Would I have preferred Lomfon as a partner for Tai? No, not really. I don't think there was ever much basis for it. Tai didn't seem particularly interested, and Lomfon only interested in the way you're interested in that hot person you've talked to a couple of times.

I think I would have liked everyone to just go, "Okay, this has been interesting, but let's go our separate ways and forget this rain-fueled soulmate situation ever happened." And that wasn't ever going to be the end of a BL.

So, why the shower scene music?

What I realized was, it's the exact same feeling I get from "chosen one", or "prophecy" or "destiny". I hate them all. I hate the notion that there's some cosmic force that steers our lives in a specific direction that we cannot deviate from in a meaningful way, and we don't even get to know who that force is or what their reasoning is. I mean, if it were Cupid shooting his arrows at people, and I had a quibble with his decision, I could at least go, "Cupid clearly has shit aim" and be done with it. :-) It's hard to do that in the face of ineffability.

Most of my favourite characters have been people who do something completely different from what was expected of them. They were supposed to be meaningless, and became meaningful. They were supposed to be villains, and became heroes. My unchosen ones.

I guess it also ties into religion, and ideas of predestination. Now, I'm agnostic these days, but even the brand of Christianity I was raised in didn't believe in predestination, for which I'm grateful. There might be better and worse choices, but never just one correct path. Life as "choose your own adventure", rather than a straightforward story. (Or, to use the discussion of Cain and Abel from East of Eden, "thou mayest" rather than "thou shalt" or "do thou".)

And of course La Pluie is Thai, with entirely different religious customs and expectations, and I can't really speak of that. Nor can I make any deep analysis of how it uses soulmate tropes compared to how it's usually done, since I stay the fuck away from every love story that so much as breathes of soulmate, if I can help it, and only watched this one specifically because of the subversions.

The only other BL show I've watched that went there was Never Let Me Go, in its Our Skyy 2 epilogue. I wasn't happy about that, and wished they hadn't, but it was a bit easier to handle, in part because it came so late (after I was already invested in the ship), and in part because it seemed  more based on personality, and less on the random whims of the universe. We were told that Palm and Nueng, since they are who they are, will always be attracted to each other, but since they are who they are they will never be happy long-term until they learn to communicate better. Which, that's okay, I guess.

I still much prefer characters who get together just because they want to. And my absolute favourite kind are the ones whose time together is so valuable that they could break up tomorrow and it'd still be worth it.

Thinking of Moonlight Chicken as an example. If Jim and Wen break up, Jim has still learned to process his feelings after Beam's death, and not close himself off so much. Wen has still learned to live on his own and not stay in a bad situation because he can't stand being alone. If Li Ming and Heart break up, both of them have still won their freedom and started exploring the world, away from, yet reconciled with, their families.

A path doesn't have to end up a specific place to be worth taking.

And of course, it's rather ironic, feeling like this, that I sit here watching dozens of QLs, with their guaranteed HEAs (whether I want them or not).  The cosmic powers dictating the outcome do exist, and they're called the audience.

But I guess that's where decades of Bury Your Gays has taken me. If the alternative is death, I can take a little predestination. Just coat it in the chocolate of supposed free choice. :-)

[dubiouslyanonymousdespairblog]

Aug 2 -2022

I need some way of maintaining some sense of accountability or obligation to myself and the people around me. I don’t know what it would be, exactly, but it’s quite easy to slip into the sort of dross of like, passive consumption, disengagement, disappearing, and I think to like, the credit of deontology there is something  really immediate, local, and grounding about imagining myself in a sort of meaninfull network of commitments. Like, you know, if I try to zoom out, find some sort of ultimate good that I can serve or not serve, or ultimate goods, I notice that I’m really imagining things in a rather pale sort of way. Abstract,, not concrete, or not full.

But this girl that I love, when she speaks to me of our relationship, what she wants from it, what she wants for me and from me, it’s all local. It’s all “I don’t want to make a rule about this” or “I would like to be responsible for this” or “I want you to be able to this” you know, it’s all very... about us. She doesn’t talk about boundaries, really, in the way that most people do these days. Like, it’s not abstract like “a relationship should be this” or “you shouldn’t have to this” or “I think it’s healthy to do this.” I guess ostensibly the idea around boundaries is that they’re supposed to be personal, but they’re also supposed to be sort of... general, too, right? Like, they’re about you, and they’re agnostic about the other person, as though you need to have this impartial rule in order to be able to say no to something. But all relationships are unique and particular, I think. It’s weird I don’t see a lot of people say that sort of thing now. I’m guessing it’s bc it was a way to, sometimes, explain away abuse. But like, people being disingenuous about a thing doesn’t make that thing any more or less true, right? I could lie about all sorts of things that should be socially held if I wanted to. If I had the power that line of reasoning would assign me, I could kill forgiveness, charity, the right to a shelter if I wanted to. So, I am not interested in this concern as it relates to whether or not “all relationships are different.” They just are.

I mean, my darker suspicion is that this has fallen out of favor because you are much more likely to be reading, and perhaps even giving and receiving, advice given from one stranger to another, and that kind of context cannot stomach the possibility of particularity, and it makes us all dysfunctional and insane and moralistic in a very clumsy way.

Anyway, when this girl that I love tells me that she wants to make a something a particular part of our relationship it makes me feel special. When she tells me that she wants to make a new rule for her in the relationship to help make space for me it makes me feel safe. Sometimes they’re very strange, sometimes they’d be hard to explain to people outside the relationship w/o it being seen as cringey or possibly even dysfunctional, but like... we get to choose, right? Like, together we get to create this relationship. And that means we have a certain amount of responsibility for this creation, like more than people usually talk about. Like, writing new rules to our relationship that are decidedly local means that we have a bit of a responsibility for the rules working or not working; we don’t get to devolve that responsibility back to what is “healthy” and claim we like, didn’t know. We have to like, directly say “I personally don’t want our relationship to be like this,” and that’s like... a lot harder bc you don’t get to pretend impartiality. You have to not want something, and you have to even assert that like, not wanting something is sufficient.

So I want to live the rest of my life like that. I’m tired of thinking in abstractions, tired of trying to figure out what’s acceptable or what could be expected of me or what’s maximally good. I want to make promises to myself and fail those promises, and recognize them as failures without the tribunal in my head deliberating over them, without them rendering a verdict, and a judgment. Like, I just want to fail. I don’t want it to be anything more than that. And I want to let go of the idea of succeeding for others, let go of praise and acknowledgement. Hope is as hollow as fear.

[justaholeinmysoul]

I wish all artists that wanna be controversial or aesthetic using catholicism would start hopping on something dressed in burkas in a mosque but they don't have the guts for that uh

[magdaclaire]

i really don’t know anything about christianity like 

girl what even is a saint? 

completely unsure what the difference between a priest and a pastor is 

which one is a father and who is a brother? 

why are there so many different denominations? i know about martin luther and protestants and ~all that jazz~ but boy howdy there’s so many 

i’m being completely genuine in expressing my confusion, completely devoid of sarcasm, i have no idea what’s goin’ on  

[the-mostdiabolik-of-lovers]

Heya Ava, may I request a match up?

My Nicknames varies from, Ave, Avie, or Angel. I'm 5'2 with an average body but get comments on how I have a big Booty, and breast even though they are the high numbers of C-cup size. Long layered Dyed Hair from blueish to purple with Brown eyes and a beauty mark under my right eye. All my clothes are black, my style is either goth, anime weeb, or dress up casual with horror on it. COFFEE IS LIFE, literally addicted. As for religion, Agnostic. Zodiac would be Cancer.

Personality qualities: very laid-back, materialistic, hate showing weakness, very blunt, More on the pacifist side but will use violence if necessary. Open-minded, don't tend to show it but very supportive. Can be manipulative w/ pure intentions to help the other. Seems rude but kind. Likes to provoke or tease, stubborn. Good listener. Faithful & loyal depending on the other's actions. Can be very protective.

Bad traits: Indifference, Loner, pessimistic, can't express my emotions. Hate asking for help, trouble, sadistic tendency. misunderstood and have the same qualities under antisocial personality disorder.

YOU’RE MATCHED WITH LAITO SAKAMAKI!

“O~oh, look at you standing your ground. Are you going to swipe at me, and hit me if I rile you up too much? ‘No’? Fufu, guess we’ll see about that. I lo~ve when you get carried away!”

Appearance:

　　❈  Those comments about your body would be limitless when it comes to Laito. Whether to tease you, rile you up or try to get you into the mood, he always puts a new spin onto each comment he makes.

　　❈  You’ll often catch him twirling and playing with your hair, whenever he pleases. He’s always the first to offer to help maintain it, too. From dying it to trimming it, he’s always a little too happy to help... I would be a little suspicious if I were you--

　　❈  Laito will often compare his beauty mark to yours, and leave teasing kisses to yours in hopes you’ll return the favour~

　　❈  When it comes to your style, Laito is a little indifferent. He’s seen a lot of styles on many people, but he still likes to tease here and there. He might rip extra holes into your stockings for that “added goth effect~!” when, really, he just wants to see more of your thigh. Or he’ll suggest spilling a bit of your own blood to stain your clothes and give them unique horror twist.

Personality:

　　❈  Your more blunt personality and “no weakness” mindset is something Laito has heaps of fun working with! He’ll push and prod and poke at you until you snap at him and lose your cool (forcing your to be a little less laidback than perhaps you usually would).

 　　❈  It’s an absolute thrill for him when you resort to violence! He’ll be, in typical Laito fashion, asking for you hit him or tease him more if you are getting fed up with him~ He really has no limits. He also has fun in bringing out your more sadistic side, just for his own amusement more often than not. Ju~st don’t get carried away with it.

　　❈  Your more open-minded personality and supportive nature at heart is something that intrigues him more than anything. You’ll seemingly still be there for him even after his awful attitude, and are always there to provide a new opinion on things. You seriously keep his attention!

　　❈  What he does adore is how contradicting you can be; Your manipulative side is something he immediately picks up on... but since you tend to do it for the other persons benefit, in your words, it’s far more amusing that he seems to admit. He finds it rather wholesome, even if twisted in logic~ 

　　❈  Be as stubborn as you like with him, he enjoys one hell of a challenge! That being said, since you are more of a lone wolf, he doesn’t seem to have much trouble keeping you in your own little world with just him and you. A little much, but hey, it’s Laito!

　　❈  Your faithfulness and loyalty may dwindle with Laito... but he expects that. He seems to push your limits more often than not, but still finds some way to secure your faith in him. He counts on you not being a fan of asking for help to keep you by his side more often the not, though.

Your Interests:

　　❈  Laito is HUGE on nicknames, so you’ll be getting a lot of those. Not just the nicknames you mentioned, but his own unique ones too~

　　❈  Coffee dates are big between you two. It’s usually a public outing though, so do be mindful about getting too close to him--

Other Possible Matches: Azusa Mukami, Subaru Sakamaki.

[metisket]

@helesia has asked for classic lit book recs, and I realized I haven’t babbled about books for a while, so here they are.

I feel like a lot of the problem with books you read in school is that they throw you right into the deep end, and that’s only sometimes a good idea. Like they have you read The Sound and the Fury, and that’s five full courses of Faulkner right there. Nobody’s ready for that. Start with the soup. Read As I Lay Dying. If you like it, there’s more. If you don’t, you haven’t invested a significant portion of your soul, you know?

So. The recs are: The Razor’s Edge, by Somerset Maugham, Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, The Master and Margarita, by Mikhail Bulgakov, Catch-22, by Joseph Heller, and Dance Dance Dance, by Haruki Murakami. Details below.

The Razor’s Edge, by W. Somerset Maugham

I love Somerset Maugham and everything he chose to be anyway, and I particularly love The Razor’s Edge, which is the story of an agnostic-bordering-on-atheist (Maugham) observing, with fascination, the life of someone genuinely, deeply spiritual. Maugham is like, “Well, you clearly know SOMETHING I don’t know, but I’m not sure what.” The book is weird, sarcastic, observant, funny, and pleasantly open-minded. All of Somerset Maugham’s work is semi-autobiographical, and while that usually irritates me, it doesn’t at all in his case. This is because he’s a real-life John Watson--he is absolutely the narrator in his own life story.

Somerset Maugham was English, born in the late 1800s, promptly orphaned, and then raised by his rabidly religious aunt and uncle who would probably have beaten him to death if they’d known he was bisexual. And then he became a spy and lived through both WWI and WWII. He wasn’t a happy person, but he was a fascinating writer (and a very good spy).

Quotes from the book: "American women expect to find in their husbands a perfection that English women only hope to find in their butlers." "I am sure you wish me to do nothing disloyal to my employer, Mr. Maugham, besides which the old cow would fire me if she found out I'd disobeyed her."

If you decide you want the full meal Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage will keep you occupied for ages.

(Also, related vibe: Graham Greene, who also lived through two world wars up close, but instead of becoming a detached, amused observer, he became a bitter, hostile observer. I like it. I particularly recommend The Ministry of Fear--terrifying with moments of hilarious--and Our Man in Havana--hilarious with moments of terrifying. The Quiet American is good, too, but it is, ah...DISTRESSING. On multiple levels. But at least you can have in your heart the knowledge that eventually Vietnam kicked everyone’s ass.)

Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston

This is the story of Janie Crawford, whose life absolutely sucks at the beginning of this book. It’s not like it’s easy to be a black woman at any time, but it was particularly not easy in Florida in the early 1900s. But Janie responds to adversity by fighting through it despite staggering opposition, and eventually becoming faster, better, and stronger, until she is a cast iron badass by the end of the book. She’s done it all! She’s seen it all! She is out of fucks to give and will be doing whatever the hell she wants for the rest of her life! She’s a very cool and inspiring character.

Also, this is one of those books that kept getting banned, as I recall. Because of course it did. It was published in 1937, and that is BOLD, Zora Neale Hurston. Apparently Zora Neale Hurston was fresh out of fucks to give, too. I love her. She was a total badass in her personal life, too, as you might expect.

(Related vibe: The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, which is also about a black woman taking all the shit that life throws at her head-on and pushing past it to become awesome and happy anyway. Though the main character is a less combative person than Janie, which is why the book is..less...my favorite. I IDENTIFY WITH ANGRY CHARACTERS, I’M SORRY.)

The Master and Margarita, by Mikhail Bulgakov

Previous rec here. I stand by it, though. The Devil Went Down to Moscow: the novel. XD

(I have never read a book with a similar vibe to this book. I wish I had, but I’m not sure such a book exists. But for a story by another Russian author who was just doing whatever and finding himself hilarious, there is My Wife, by Anton Chekhov. He thought he was so funny. Bear that in mind: he thought he was a COMEDIAN.)

Catch-22, by Joseph Heller

This is about war as both nightmare fuel and ridiculous parody, brought to you by a B-25 bombardier named Yossarian, the biggest troll ever unleashed in a combat zone. It’s a rollercoaster--starts out absolutely hilarious, becomes increasingly absurdist, has a nightmarishly horrifying interlude, and then reverts to cheerful absurdity. The characters are fantastic, the turn of phrase is a delight, and it’s probably more accurate on war than I strictly-speaking wanted.

Fun fact: In his later book No Laughing Matter, Joseph Heller admitted that he quickly became impatient with questions about Catch-22, and therefore spent 30 years lying in response to every single question he was asked about it. This means that any literary criticism that chose to trust the author is just...HILARIOUSLY WRONG. (Honestly, we should go for automatic Death of the Author when the author is a KNOWN DICK who wrote a character like YOSSARIAN. Just saying.) (No Laughing Matter was co-written by Speed Vogel, and is a true story about the time Joseph Heller got Guillain–Barré syndrome, and took the opportunity of being flat on his back and paralyzed in a hospital to SEDUCE HIS NIGHT NURSE, or at least, that was my take-away from that book.)

(Related vibe: Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut. Mainly it’s about WWII, the bombing of Dresden, and all the ways in which humans are horrible and wonderful and crazy. It's...bizarrely uplifting, given that it centers around a massacre. Also, Vonnegut insisted all his life that it wasn’t sci-fi, and while I see what he was getting at, it is nonetheless a book containing time travel and alien abduction. VONNEGUT. XD.)

Dance Dance Dance, by Haruki Murakami

It’s hard to know which Murakami book to rec, because they’re all so weird, and the trick is matching your personal weirdness with the correct Murakami book. Dance Dance Dance is still my favorite, but I also read it at exactly the right time in my life. But I’d say the general 2021 mindset is a very good fit for this book.

It’s about loss, and chasing after things you may never find, and just randomly encountering a lot of weird people who are living their own weird lives that intersect with yours, briefly and strangely, before they disappear, too. And that makes it sound VERY SAD, but it’s actually peaceful, mostly. Like the end of the grieving process. And, as I say, weird. Just. So very weird.

Also wow, Japanese police. Wowwww.

Quotes:

“Although I didn't think so at the time, things were a lot simpler in 1969. All you had to do to express yourself was throw rocks at riot police.”

“I stepped into a coffee shop and drew a diagram in my notebook of these personal relations of mine. It looked like a chart of the European powers before the start of World War I.”

“We’re all image. Signs tacked up in empty air. That’s why we respect each other’s illusions.”

Other favorite Murakami books: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Kafka on the Shore, A Wild Sheep Chase (which Dance Dance Dance is a sequel to, but I honestly don’t think order especially matters, here), and Underground (which is a nonfictional account of the sarin gas attack in Tokyo in 1995--very amazing.)

(Again, I know of no one with a similar vibe to Murakami. So I give you a book by an entirely different Japanese author I like: Out, by Natsuo Kirino. It’s a serious and often disturbing book, but the setup is just...IT’S FUNNY, OKAY? I enjoyed the contrast. Because the plot is like: so your friend accidentally snapped and murdered a man. Awkward! How do we deal with this? ...Is a corpse burnable or non-burnable trash? It’s burnable, right? Right, everyone?! Still, overall, it’s an angry book, and I like it a lot. Natsuo Kirino has written many, many books, but this is still my favorite of the ones I’ve read.)

...OKAY, I’M STOPPING. For now. I can stop anytime. I feel like I have too much World War II and too few women on this list, but I’ll just take that weird guilt with me and go.