toshimon-97

[toshimon-97]

A Pride Month Post (just about in time)

I suppose given the time of year I wanted to write a little bit about some of my personal experience and thoughts about my identity (for lack of any better description).

Though I typically don't really do labels for gender or sexuality in terms of my own self description, by definition I suppose you would call me bisexual and non-binary/ a trans woman.

Although this is my internal reality, in the external world I am deeply in the closet due to being from a very small very conservative British town where I don't have the full freedom to express my identity in the way that I would like. And I think living in that socially repressive and conservative environment has given me an interesting perspective on my identity (especially the gender stuff).

Despite me wholly rejecting the idea of me being a man, much of what I do projects masculinity. For example my two main hobbies are lifting weights and training muay thai, two things that are very heavily associated with this hyper-masculine ideal however in participating in these hobbies I never feel as though this makes me any more or less of a man, I actually feel as though my acceptance, and ignoring of, the gendered connotations I am able to find more happiness as if I prevented myself from doing these things (which I of course find incredibly fun) I could only ever live in the context of the very thing that I'm trying to distance myself from (I forget who this quote is from but I think it's very poignant here: "the contrarian can only ever live in the context of that which [they] oppose"). Which I suppose is a very long winded way of saying just because an activity is associated with your agab it doesn't mean it's imperative that you avoid it at all costs, as you could be doing yourself out of something you really enjoy. I also think there's an inner peace to be found if you try not to worry so much about what the correctly gendered behaviour is, and you just do as you please.

Another impact I've noticed is with friendships. Due to the unique situation of me knowing I'm trans but being unable to be open about it or make any change in my gender expression it means I can use telling people my chosen name and pronouns as a means of almost upgrading my relationship with someone. I think it's quite meaningful in a symbolic way to let someone in on who you are by telling them your real name. It's a vulnerable act that is a symbol of honesty and trust, and I couldn't do that if I wasn't closeted. I think that is one of the many silver linings to such a situation.

I should clarify that being closeted doesn't cause me much suffering, I'm very content with my current life and the circumstances I find myself in, I act in a way that I think is authentic to myself, and I am of the opinion that it's not really anyone's business but my own what my identity is anyway so I don't mind that it's not public knowledge.

That all being said I think pride month is a beautiful thing. I love seeing all the people out there unapologetically wearing their true selves on their sleeves and being themselves in a world that would rather they did anything but that. Despite this, I hope for a world where pride month isn't necessary, a world where you aren't an "other" for being part of the LGBT+ community. But to all the closested people out there who may be going through it I hope you are all able to find the inner strength to withstand the internal turmoil and please know that you are just as valid as the rest of the people out there who are out and proud about their identity. Your experiences matter and have genuine value in the community.

[toshimon-97]

Spamton and his fight for freedom

This is somewhat of a follow up to my previous post where I explored Jevil and his philosophy of freedom, and so now I want to talk about the [[number 1 rated salesman 1997]] himself. I think there is a nice contrast to jevil in how he thinks of freedom and how that manifests in his story in chapter 2. The nice thing about spamton is that there is a bit more to sink my teeth into because he plays a slightly larger role than jevil in his respective chapter.

The main contrast I noticed between spamton and jevil is that where jevil sees freedom as something internal (that can be achieved through a shift in your mindset) spamton appears to consider freedom as something of an external force, evidenced by his frequent references to power. This means where jevil can be think of as someone who has achieved freedom, spamton is in a battle to become more free through his pursuit of power.

One thing I've never seen mentioned though is how this links to his characterisation as a salesman. If freedom is what he seeks, and power brings you freedom, then of course spamton would want to become filthy rich by being a salesman as in becoming filthy rich you are, whether you like it or not, exploiting others (or in other words exerting your power over others). When this fails after the disappearance of the voice on the other end of the phone he then seeks a more brute force approach to freedom leading him to his NEO form. When this form is achieved the puppet motif gets really on the nose with spamton literally hanging from strings. The interesting thing is that by cutting these strings spamton falls lifeless and defeated. To me, this seems to imply that freedom for spamton (or perhaps anyone given deltarune's themes) as he is reliant on these strings for his continued ability to act. Perhaps this could mean that without these things that hold us down and technically fetter us (in spamton's case his love of money and pursuit of power) are necessary for pushing forward in life and constructing an identity as without them we are nothing, and are effectively lifeless.

Another interesting thing is his reference to heaven. Spamton talks about getting big and seeing above heaven, almost turning himself into a deity due to his belief in the absolute nature of power. Not existing within paradise, but above it, in a way comparing himself to God. This is similar to Jevil's individualistic freedom I discussed in the previous post. If Spamton does become powerful enough to be considered a God of sorts, only he can be truly free as in order to maintain his freedom he would have to exert his power over others in order to ensure that no one becomes powerful enough to violate his ability to choose (and therefore undermine his freedom).

I've enjoyed writing these two little analyses of freedom in deltarune, freedom is a philosophical topic I am unhealthily interested in and applying it to works of fiction I enjoy and using that as a jumping off point to stimulate discussion about interesting topics is something I find really fun and really useful for getting to grips with different interpretations of a certain concept or idea

[toshimon-97]

Jevil was right about freedom.

Jevil is my favourite deltarune character by FAR. In his insanely brief appearance he provided one of the most entertaining parts of deltarune's story thus far and I fell in love with him throughout my time completing his quest and beating his boss fight.

What with this being deltarune and one of its main narrative themes being freedom (or lack thereof) Jevil wastes no time getting to yapping on about the concept and I just find his outlook to be fascinating (and right)

Granted he MAY be a mad man ranting and raving from the walls of his prison and unable to leave without interference from the fun gang™ but his mind is far more liberated than the rest of the darkners. If you'll indulge my over analysis it reminds me of certain philosophies that I'm aware of (namely some stoic and Buddhist beliefs I'm aware of and the philosophies of Friedrich Nietzsche and Max Stirner). He has totally decoupled himself from the goings on of the external kingdom where everyone is so caught up in the politics and prophecy and drama of everything going on, shifted his perspective with the help of whatever mind breaking eldritch knowledge he received and now in his own world he is completely free. In embracing chaos and rejecting the order and stability provided by falling in line with the ideas of the rest of the kingdom he has found freedom, a unique and individual freedom, which links to him talking about how lonely he is, due to the fact that his freedom is individualistic and no one else has reached the same conclusions as he has

I for one think this is the correct view of freedom, that it is an internal process that you have to undergo by letting go of ideas that were thrust upon you and you were forced to accept without thinking about why those ideas are there. I enjoyed writing this I will probably do one for the other freedom boy (spampton) in the coming days

Ps: I kept the philosophy fairly brief for the sake of time but I'm more than willing to elaborate on anything if anyone would like me to :p

[toshimon-97]

I just finished my first cyberpunk play through

Thoroughly enjoyed my time with this game. I've had it since release where I played it for about three hours and then put it down because until a couple of weeks ago (probably due to a combination of hearing about the game's poor reception on release and my general dislike for rpgs at the time). This time round though the game really sucked me in. I felt really engaged in the setting and the characters, and I was very impressed by what I feel is a realistic depiction of what a hypercapitalistic society would look like if we had that sort of technology (disregarding the satire that the game slips in whenever it can). I really enjoyed V's dynamics with both Jackie and Johnny, two of my favourite characters for very different reasons as you might imagine. I found myself more easily to project myself onto V and enjoy the rp of the rpg despite them not being a total blank slate (also let me just comment on how amazing V's male voice actor is I really love his accent it's so sexy) which kept me engaged in dialogue exchanges because I was able to really think about what I would do in the situations V was in. As a result I was really pleased with the outcomes and endings I got because they were tangibly related to decisions I made. So yeah good game might buy phantom liberty and continue the budding obsession

[toshimon-97]

What a party it's like I'm really at the club hearing the souls of the damned cry out for help. Immersion has peaked with this.

[toshimon-97]

The World Is Mine has such beautiful art. I think it serves as a real testament to the quality of the writing that such a bleak story can leave such a positive impact on the reader. It's not like similarly bleak stories where the bad things that happen in the plot are used to validate a pessimistic outlook. I could probably write for ages about how the art and how it changes throughout the manga is really impactful but I'll hold my tongue otherwise this post will turn into a full on essay

[toshimon-97]

Hi I'm new to this whole Tumblr malarkey I suppose I'll introduce myself

I'm 18 and from the UK. My main interests are things like philosophy, anime/manga, and games. My favourite manga is The World Is Mine and I also enjoy Berserk and JoJos Bizarre Adventure. My favourite anime by far has to be Attack on Titan. In terms of games I'm a big fan of the Yakuza series and I love assassin's creed and Im currently playing through disco elysium and cyberpunk 2077 (both of which I'm having a great time with). Not entirely certain exactly what plans I have for this but I imagine I'll just be writing my thoughts on whatever it is that's got my attention in any given moment. I'm very open to making friends on here so please do interact if you happen upon one of my posts though do bear with my shyness.